BOOKSTIMES

THE POET AND THE HOUSE-BUILDER.

IT has been written often in books that the poet is essentially different from other men; that he lives in a world apart and must be judged by a different standard. And yet if you sift him down to his prime motive he is trying to do what all progressive men have been trying to do since the beginning of earthly things. What is called civilization is simply the result of making things more comfortable and more beautiful than they were in a state of nature. A rich man says to himself: "I will build a fine house "--and straightway ugly bricks and mortar, and stone and wood begin to take shape under a directing mind. They fall into a certain harmony which this mind conceives; they are fitted and polished and decorated, until at last the builder and architect say: "Here is a home for a prince."

The weaver who makes a beautiful fabric, the shoemaker who makes a graceful shoe, and the engineer who spans a river are all working out the same problem of making the world a little more comfortable and beautiful than it is in a state of nature. This is idealism pure and simple, and the men of art who are always preaching "realism" actually mean the faithful reproduction of the present stage of the development of idealism. The most drunken sot is the result of a certain ideal of pleasure, as the most effective picture is an ideal of beauty.

Now the poet is only trying to do for the mind what the artisan does for the body; he is the maker of beautiful images which are to "furnish" the mind of the reader with pleasant surroundings, as we put white and gold furniture and curious bric-a-brac into an empty room.

The simple reason that he is not a "practical" man is that there is not a sufficient demand for beautiful mental furniture to make it a "practical" business. If, by turning out "new styles" of verse, spring and fall, at the old stand, the poet could achieve a fortune, it is very likely that he would become the most "practical" of men.

TAKE Lord Tennyson's drama, "The Foresters" (Macmillan), as an example of this theory of poetry. He is one of the greatest poets because he has succeeded in filling the human mind with the greatest number of beautiful images. Long ago there was a real Robin Hood in Sherwood forest-a rough, aggressive man, with a touch of idealism in him. Ever since that day tradition and song and story have been gradually eliminating what was base and exalting what was beautiful and romantic, until finally Lord Tennyson comes with his poetic mind and rebuilds the structure. He has no ear for words that are not melodious, no eye for scenes that are not picturesque, no heart for men and women who are not good. The result is one of those perfect pieces of mental furniture which we have agreed to call a poem.

Yet when he was making it he was following exactly those impulses which move skilful artisans everywhere.

FROM the four hundred poems which Charles Henry Lüders had

written when he died at the age of thirty three, his friend Frank Dempster Sherman has chosen about seventy as fittest to represent him at his best. These are published in a beautiful volume entitled "The Dead Nymph, and Other Poems" (Scribner's).

There is not a bit of careless verse-making among them. He had a wonderful gift of melody, "a love of lovely words," and an eye for beautiful things. The poems are seldom impassioned, yet never dull. There is always a glow of fancy, a love of nature, and a touch of sentiment. He had something of Keats's way of looking at nature, with a good deal of Aldrich's precision of method in expressing it.

Droch.

NEW BOOKS.

New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

THE GOVERNOR AND OTHER STORIES. By George A. Hibbard.

A Double Wedding. By Mrs. C. A. Warfield. Philadelphia: T. B. Peterson and Brothers.

The German Emperor and His Eastern Neighbors. By Poultney Bigelow. New York: Charles L. Webster and Company.

The Three Fates. By F. Marion Crawford. New York: Macmillan and Company.

The Story of Philip Methuen. By Mrs. T. H. Needell. New York: D. Appleton and Company.

The Odes and Epodes of Horace. Translated into English verse by John B. Hague, Ph. D. New York and London: G. P. Putnam's Sons.

Across the Plains, with Other Memories and Essays. By Robert Louis Stevenson. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

The Duchess of Angonleme and the Two Restorations. By Imbert de Saint-Amand. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

Hertha. By Ernst Eckstein. Translated by Mrs. Edward Hamilton Bell. New York: George Gottsberger Peck.

J

ONATHAN was beloved of Dorothy and Dorothy was the girl who occupied the whole of Jonathan's heart. But marriage was not for them, as they were both too poor. No one else in the little village having been sanctified by wealth they failed to realize the vulgarity and sinfulness of poverty. Jonathan, however, knew there were innumerable dollars in the outside world and he decided to try and gather a few. So when he was twenty-one he said good-by to his family and friends, and there was a sad parting with the tearful Dorothy. He tried hard to persuade her that it was all for the best. "I don't believe in waiting for fortune to begin the flirtation," he said, "she doesn't seem to be headin' for this village, and if the old girl's got anything for me I'll jest hunt her up and give her a show."

THE

assured.

THE FAIR.

HE Actors' Fund Fair opens to-day at the Madison Square Garden, and its financial success is already Therefore millionaires need not fear to attend, as the lovely saleswomen have agreed among themselves that no millionaire shall be permitted to expend more than threequarters of his entire fortune in button-hole bouquets.

It has also been agreed that no one shall be ejected from the garden for kicking because his change is not returned. A special padded room has been set aside for such unreasonable people.

No impecunious dude need expect to avoid the inevitable by providing himself with a boutonniere in advance. A special policeman will be stationed at the door to remove the flowers from any such.

No dude or Johnny will be permitted to linger for more than three consecutive hours in front of any one booth.

There will be no extra charge for smiles. They will be included in the price of the article or articles sold.

The management will provide car-fare home for persons who expend their last cent.

Dorothy never realized until after his departure what a vast gap he filled in nature. She now saw how foolish and incomplete creation was without him.

As for Jonathan he tramped patiently along for about a week until he came to the suburbs of a tremendous city. As he passed along he was surprised to see twelve aristocratic young gentlemen sitting upon a curbstone. Some were weeping, some were cursing, and some were despairing silently. All being fashionably dressed and seemingly prosperous, his curiosity was aroused and he said to them: "What's the row?"

THE MELANCHOLY SWELLS.

"Mind your own business, Country," answered one of the youths, and they all frowned upon him as if annoyed by his presumption. Jonathan said nothing, and continued his journey into the city. As it was now about noontime, he sat upon a bench in the park to eat his dinner. He had just begun the frugal meal when he was joined by twelve hornets who also sat on the seat beside him. They seemed a friendly band and soon opened a conversation. Jonathan found them intelligent and well-bred

hornets. He gave them some of the maple sugar he was eating and they relished it and partook very freely.

"I never tasted such maple sugar," said Ohlstingum, the leader, "and we are much indebted to you. If we can serve you in any way let us know."

Just then another group of young men, fashionably dressed but broken-hearted, came walking by. Then Jonathan said to the hor

nets:

sand things no words could utter-his soul was flooded with their beauty. He felt within him the kindling of consuming fires whose torture was a burning joy. Almost involuntarily he threw himself upon his knees and had begun an excited declaration of his love, when the haughty banker interrupted him.

"Say no more, young man. He who weds my daughter must first bring a fortune from the Garden of Zpek."

Then he led her away. But she turned and gave Jonathan a glance that sent hot thrills a-coursing diagonally up his spine. The father and daughter disappeared around a turn in the walk leaving him upon his knees in the gravel, the hot thrill dying gently away among the roots of his hair.

He was recalled to himself and his undignified position by a suppressed chuckle from the hornets.

"You must pardon our levity," said Ohlstingum, "but not being human it is difficult for us to thoroughly appreciate your position and feelings. That the old gentleman should

insist upon the fortune is only natural as his finances are a little dizzy just at present."

"Very likely," replied Jonathan, "but I shall believe no ill of the daughter. Good-bye."

"Where away?" cried all the hornets.

"To the enchanted Garden of Zpek," said Jonathan, and he started off. But the hornets flew after him and kept him company, exhorting him to throw aside his folly. They assured him that where one succeeded hundreds failed; that if the fever of Zpek once seized upon him he would never recover; that the soil of the garden was rich with the blood of its victims. But Jonathan's brain was dancing with a woman's beauty and he had no use for reason or for hornets.

"Can you tell me why the young men in this town are so sorrowful?"

"Why, haven't you heard of Parra Liza?" exclaimed all the hornets in surprise. Then Ohlstingum told him of the beautiful damsel whose spell no mortal could resist. To see her was to love her, and the coolest heads were intoxicated by a single glance from her eyes or the first words from her tongue.

"But no man can marry her," said Offle Hottend, one of the younger hornets, unless he brings her a fortune from the enchanted Garden of Zpek. And here she comes now, with her father, the haughty banker! Don't look that way or you may fall beneath the spell!" But Jonathan had already looked. His senses reeled and wavered in a drunken ecstacy as he gazed upon her face. He arose and stood before her. When her eyes met hisand her eyes were limpid lakes of passion that meant a thou

"Then let us go with you," said Offle Hottend. "I was a broker once and we can give you points. And when hornets give points it means business," and he chuckled at his little joke.

Dorothy about this time was very blue. She was begining to realize the possibility of Jonathan's loving some woman more beautiful than herself, and she shed silent tears upon the flowers as she watered them. Also one or two fell from her lashes into the piecrust she was kneading in the kitchen.

Jonathan, on the following morning, travelled two miles southward through the great city to the enchanted regions of Zpek. But on arriving he felt very much like turning back,

for the garden was filled with bulls and bears and shouting men, all crazy with excitement. All about him the ground was thickly strewn with bones of innumerable victims, but he boldly started in. Bleating lambs frisked gaily by him, hurrying to their doom, and, later on, their plaintive bahbahs pierced his soul as they yielded up their fleeces. Wild, shabby looking men, who had lost all they once possessed, were hurrying aimlessly about, having nothing to plant, but fascinated by the excitement of the garden. The trusty hornets guided him to a spot where the soil seemed promising, and there he planted the only gold piece he possessed. Within a minute it began to sprout. He watched it in a fever of anxiety. Up it grew and soon began to throw out little white, rectangular leaves. These leaves were covered with cabalistic inscriptions which enabled the owner to transform them into gold at his pleasure. Noisy bulls and bears tried hard to interfere, and more than once he thought the enterprise was ruined, but the hornets always diverted them by skillful applications of their cruel weapons. Swiftly grew the plant, and many were the leaves. At the proper moment, when they were fully developed and would lose their value if left longer on the branches, Jonathan plucked them all, and hastened from the garden. Some bears came very near upsetting him, but the faithful hornets again saved the treasure by their hot attentions. The shorn lambs and half-demented men who hovered around the outskirts of the garden looked enviously upon him as he hurried away, his hands and pockets filled with the gold-bearing leaves. Jonathan was now enormously rich.

Although he marched swiftly along, accompanied by Ohlstingum and the other hornets, the news of his great luck travelled faster still. When he reached the upper part of the city he saw the wealthy banker, his dazzling daughter by his side, standing on the marble steps of his mansion. The

scornful expression had left his mouth and in its place was a welcoming smile.

"Enterprising young man," he said, reaching forth his hands, "you shall now marry my daughter."

"On the contrary," replied Jonathan, "I shall now marry a girl whose love for me bears no relation to treasures from Enchanted Gardens." As he spoke he kept his eyes away from Para Liza for fear of again yielding to the spell. The banker clenched his fist, and a fierce anger shot from his eyes.