128 Autumn 



ing and differentiating him from the rest. Essentially 

 and with but slight variation of gift he is one with 

 others who make a hubbub on the otherwise quiet 

 earth, with the heaven-born artist who on his first 

 slate drew a caricature of his nurse, the poet who 

 rhymed 'jam' and 'ham' before he quite knew the 

 use of either, the urchin novelist who romanced to his 

 uncle while still in short clothes all those, in a word, 

 whose missions date from the cradle, and who thus 

 are looped together by this fiery kindredship. 

 Whether he works with paint or plot, rhyme or soap, 

 words or votes, the man of mark, the celebrity of the 

 day, will be shunned and feared by him who loves to 

 lie i' the sun beyond hearing of the troubled noise. 



The matchless charm of the might-have-been is 

 dearer to me than any joy in mere accomplishment. 

 Of the fortune which is made, the book which, is 

 written, there is an end as far as personal interest 

 goes. In hard and definite outline, finite and there- 

 fore disappointing, its exact contours have emerged 

 from the hazy fairy land of futurity shorn of all 

 romantic hopes and boundless possibilities. But what 

 is still undone supplies inexhaustible food to the 

 imagination. Therefore do I love the unpractical 

 theorist who is ever conjuring up visions that shine 

 and are beautiful as long as they are untested and un- 

 approached, but fade and die if you attempt to reduce 

 them to practice, and dislike the narrow practical man 

 whose horizon is confined to the practical and possible 



