LITERATURE AND ART 307 



physical, lier poetic capabilities, and tliere is tlie fnrtlior notable fact 

 that, though this paper is limited strictly to the literature of New 

 South Wales, it may yet include most of the Australian poetry at all 

 worthy of the name, of the period. If the mantle of Kendall, or even 

 of Harpur, can hardly be said to have yet fallen on any quite worthy 

 shoulders — and it certainly cannot — it is at least not due to any lack of 

 plucky local aspirants. The names of Holdsworth and Heney, of 

 Farrell and Daley, and later of Paterson and Lawson, may well be 

 added to the list at any rate of our minor poets — and minor poets, it 

 may be noted, appear to be about as much as the gods just now are 

 vouchsahng in this way to mankind anywhere. 



But if the four chief names mentioned must still be said to stand 

 first on our literary roll, that does not mean, of course, that in regard 

 to literature generally the country itself has been standing still. On 

 the contrary, there has been, specially of late years, a mai-ked, even 

 rapid, advance along the whole line — a further honor, perhaps, to 

 those lost leaders who so gallantly in darker days (if they were darker) 

 showed the way. It would be absurd, indeed, to count as literature 

 all the late local production in this sort. Only a very liberal con- 

 struction of the term, we are afraid, could be made to cover much of 

 it. But the effort has been there, if not altogether the accomplish- 

 ment, and so far, if only like the poet's 



Plants bred in darkness, striving upwards to the light, 



shows the right tendency. Here may be mentioned, perhaps. Sir 

 Henry Parkes's " Fifty Years in the Making of Austrahan History," 

 certainly the veteran's best literary performance, his famous ''poems" 

 not excepted, whatever may be thought of it as authentic history. The 

 mother colony, however, has always been strong in history. The 

 works of her historians — Collins, Lang, Flanagan, Bennett, &c. — form 

 no inconsiderable part, either as to quantity or quality, of her literature, 

 and the great work — the " History of New South AVales from the 

 Eecords " — some years since undertaken by the Govermnent, promises 

 very worthily to crown the series. Two volumes by Mr. G. B. Barton 

 and the late Mr. Britten respectively — it is only fair to the first-named 

 writer to say, of very unequal merit— have already been published ; 

 but the work is now in abeyance, pending the completion of the com- 

 pilation of the records, themselves in course of publication from time 

 to time under the editorship of Mr. F. M. Bladen. Then, there has 

 certainly been some little literary revival in the newspaper press. We 

 do not know, indeed, that the leading columns are more literary than 

 they were — rather, perhaps, the other way — but the short story, the 

 essay, the sketch, seem to find more room there, and more attention 

 appears to be given to reviews or notices of the best new books and 

 current literature. At the same time, it nnist be said that the advance 

 has been much more conspicuous in one direction than in another — m 

 the consumption of literature than in its production. This, of course, 

 is not surprising, the one being so much easier a process than the 

 other, and may be set down perhaps as one of the excellent results of 

 our State education system, which at least teaches everyone to read. 

 It is to the State, too, that the people are mainly indebted for the 

 means of indulo-ing: this new taste or facultv. AN'hen .Mr. Barton wrote, 



