SOME BOOKS OF THE WEEK - .
[Under this heading we notice such Books of the week as have not been reserved for review in other forms.]
Delphi. By G. K. Allen Bell. (Blackwell, Oxford. is. net.)— Prize poems are commonly spoken of with something like a sneer; and it is true that they do not always herald the advent of a great poet. But then the world does not produce a couple of first, or even second, class poets every year ; and when we scan the lists (we speak of the Oxford and Cambridge verse prizes only) we find a fair proportion of names that have afterwards become famous. We do not prophesy about Mr. Bell. His poem has technical defects, and as a whole it has the fault of wanting the constructive element. It is an eloquent lamentation over the " creed outworn" of paganism ; could he not have told us of a present which has in some way come out of the dead past ? But it has great merits, and not a little promise. Here is a fine passage, communia, it may be said, yet proprie dicta :— "The lord of light and lyre long since is dead. Thou, last of all his line, where art thou fled Of all his priests and prophets ? art thou far In some dim region where no mortals are ? Or a sown star within the fields divine And pastures blue of heaven dost thou shine ? But haply, toille.ss now, thy footsteps range The Blessed Isles where comes not any change But Summer dreams unbroken: and there blow Lilies more light and white than froth of snow Or foam of surging seas when tempests swell. The level lawns are lapped in asphodel, There drives no blinding sleet, nor slanted hail Strikes ; but the winds are dead and laid the gale. There holy poets sweep the sounding lyre, Songs on their lips and in their eyes a are."
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