64 B Y- WA YS AND BIRD-NO TES. 



as Coleridge expresses it, was Chaucer s verse 

 in a large degree. His was a. paradis parfume, 

 of a kind quite different from the hot-house 

 paradise of our modern poetry, whose odors are 

 of Vhuile de coco, du muse et du goudron so liked 

 by Baudelaire and his admirers. 



Emerson s poems are good to have in one s 

 tricycle-pouch. I wish I could say as much for 

 those of Matthew Arnold. Nothing can be 

 finer than the tonic raw sweetness of some of 

 Emerson s verses when read in the solitude of 

 the woods ; and no doubt this unstrained 

 American honey is too rich (as is the pulp of 

 our papaws) for the over-delicate English pal 

 ate. I am afraid that Mr. Arnold would find 

 fault even with the flavor of sassafras tea or 

 rhubarb pies ! It is one of Emerson s quali 

 ties, sharply observable, that, whatever maybe 

 his technical short-coming, his thoughts are so 

 phrased in his poems as to give them a smack 

 of the clean, the home-brewed, the genuine. 

 A cup of sweet-apple cider, with its honest bou 

 quet and non-intoxicating effect, is not a whit 

 more grateful than some of his wood-notes. 

 He had the nerve to preserve the aroma of a 

 thought, even at the expense of a false rhyme 

 or a halting verse. He left some seeds and 

 floating bits of apple-rind in his cider. As we 

 slowly imbibe his precious meanings we are 

 ready to quote him : 



&quot; I, drinking this, 

 Shall hear far Chaos talk with me;&quot; 



and we fall into a state of mind that melts 



&quot; Solid nature to a dream.&quot; 

 Let some flying tourist stop for a moment 



