62 BY-WAYS AND BIRD- NO TES. 



that lamp-oil is the better medium, but just 

 now I am writing from the saddle of a tricycle 

 with the spell of all out-doors upon me. 



How precious is the pleasure now-a-days of 

 coming upon a really good stanza of verse, one 

 that breaks pen, so to speak, like a fragrant 

 bud, and distils into one's mind the quintes- 

 sence of genuine originality ! I do not speak 

 of such originality as Poe's or Baudelaire's or 

 Rossetti's, but such as Swinburne has shown 

 in a choice few of his simpler lyrics, where he 

 has forgotten himself; for Swinburne is a 

 master when French and Greek influences do 

 not master him. His music is haunting, and 

 there are, scattered through his poems, pic- 

 tures sketched from nature with a hand as free 

 and firm as Shakespeare's : 



" Where tides of grass break into foam of flowers, 

 Or where the wind's feet shine along the sea." 



It is not hard to find good out-door poetry if 

 we go back to the beginning of English verse. 

 Chaucer, with the language fresh in his hands, 

 so to speak, coined his phrases with a pen 

 dipped in dew. See how he begins his pro- 

 logue : 



" When that Aprille with his schowres swoote 



The drought of Marche hath perced to the roote, 

 And bathed every veyne in swich licour, 

 Of which vertue engendred is the flour." 



From Chaucer's day down to this no poet, 

 save Chaucer himself, has written four lines so 

 full of the subtle flavor of Spring as these. I 

 must add another stanza : 



" And the river that I sat upon, 

 It made such a noise as it ron, 



