18 



'coal, but owing to one of those perversities with which we geol- 

 ogists have nothing to do, Ireland was robbed of these vast coal 

 fields which are now represented by a few insignificant tatters. 

 I would like to add one other idea of the geography of this 

 country in the carboniferous age. During the whole of the car- 

 boniferous age there were volcanoes active in one or another 

 part of our island. For instance in this area — the centre of 

 Scotland — there were volcanoes comparable to Etna or Vesuvius 

 throwing then- lava into the air and filling with the most singular 

 beauty the forests upon which they fell. I must ask you really 

 to consider whether it is not worth while, living as you do in an 

 area so full of interest as this, to look into the how and why of 

 these things and see whether you cannot add to the interest 

 which you possess in life by trying to make out how these things 

 of which I have been speaking came to be what they are. I can 

 speak for myself that I have derived all the pleasure which some 

 people get from hunting, fishing, killing time, or even in follow- 

 ing many of the other amusements of life — I say I have obtained 

 a far greater amount of satisfaction, in my private opinion, by 

 going into these matters than by following those other and 

 perhaps more expensive pursuits. 

 [An interesting discussion followed.] 



MAY PROBYN'S POEMS. 



By J. WILLIAMSON. January 18th, 1887. 



In 1881 May Probyn published a small volume of seventy- 

 eight pages ; and if brevity be the soul of poetry as well as of 

 wit, the book is a poetical treasury in which all lovers of good 

 verse will take an ever increasing delight. Written at a time 

 when the taste for exotic forms of verse had developed into a 

 mania, it would be too much to expect Miss Probyn to be proof 

 against the fascination of the revived rhymths first made popular 

 by Austin Dobson and Andrew Lang. Fourteen Ballades, 

 Virelais, Kondels, Rondeaus, Triolets, and Villanelles help to 

 enlarge the small collection without adding anything to its real 

 value, and may be passed without farther comment. Of the 

 remainder, no poem could be left out without loss. Dramatic 

 power, brevity, quaintness, and a curious indefinable charm of 

 treatment belong to them all ; while, m one rare quality — sug- 

 gestiveness — Miss Probyn approaches some of our greatest writers. 

 As an instance, look at the little gem called a "Jacobite Snatch : " 



" He left the wheat in the ear, 



And the bearded barley. 

 Left the heifer and steer — 



My love's away with Charlie." 



