' AMARYLLIS AT THE FAIR ' 267 



revolt. There is here no waste of energy on the plots that 

 led Jefferies astray in ' World's End ' and ' Greene Feme 

 Farm,' and compelled him into courses where his genius 

 availed not. The book has a form dictated solely by his 

 own mind and soul, and by the life he elected to project. 

 Here is nothing irrelevant or out of its place. Jefferies 

 has free play for all his nature, has no need to do what he 

 has no mind to, or to shirk. Though at the end he seems, 

 alas ! to promise another book, nothing is left unfinished, 

 though, indeed, he neglects to say that all hved happily for 

 ever after. You may like it or not, but to find fault with 

 the form is to assume that you know more about the life 

 at Coombe Oaks and about Jefferies than he himself knew, 

 and to confess that you want a detective story, a treasure- 

 hunt, a proof that the righteous man never begs for his 

 bread, or what not. Some have taken the trouble to say it is 

 not a novel. It is called ' Amaryllis at the Fair : a Novel,' 

 and has on the title-page the words of Alcaeus : ' Our day 

 is but a finger ; bring large cups.' It is, at any rate, 

 a fiction, a statement of hfe through conversation, action 

 and reflection, and it is an artistic whole. Accept ' Panta- 

 gruel ' and ' Tristram Shandy,' and you must accept 

 ' Amaryllis,' however poor it may be. Reject it for its 

 ending — then rewrite it as was done with ' Paradise 

 Lost.' 



And first for the characters. They are always seen at 

 once with the eye and the mind. Amarylhs, lovely, young, 

 and strong, stands out, ' the front line of her shape begin- 

 ning to bud like spring ' against the red brick wall as she 

 runs. She is running against the March east wind to tell 

 her father of the opened daffodil. At last Iden rises 

 from his potato-planting : 



' " Trumpery rubbish — mean to dig 'em all up — would 

 if I had time," muttered the father. " Have 'em carted 

 out and drowed away — do for ashes to drow on the fields. 

 Never no good on to nobody, thaay thengs. You can't 

 eat 'em, can you, like you can potatoes ?" 



' " But it's lovely. Here it is," and Amaryllis stepped 



