THE RETROSPECT OF THE YEAR. 23 



Monday Evening, Feb. 8, 1897. — Prof. Alio Bates, 

 of the Institute of Technology, Boston, lectured in Plum- 

 mer Hall on " The Language of Literature." He began 

 his lecture by referring to the fact that all language is a 

 system of conventions. If we do not understand the 

 convention we are not able to communicate with the in- 

 dividual using it. This principle holds good in music as 

 well, as is shown in the ditJerence between European and 

 Chinese music for example. The latter, a jumble of un- 

 melodious sounds to our ears, to the Chinese conveys 

 sentiment and deep meaning. The poet also has a lan- 

 guage of his own, one far removed from the ordinary 

 speech of every-day life, one b}^ which he can express 

 the emotions and phases of feeling, which we try in vain 

 to put into words. The poet's genius consists in this, 

 that he turns his hearers, ordinary men though they are, 

 into poets for the time being ; makes them see with his 

 eyes and, by some luminous phrase, lifts them to some- 

 thing of his own level of inspiration. Similes form a 

 great part of our language, often distorted, perhaps 

 robbed of their original meaning, yet full of suggestion 

 to the student. Such a word is " backer," originally used 

 to denote the one who stood back to liack with you in 

 the tight, warding ofi' all blows from that side. The lan- 

 guao-e of literature is full of allusions which must l)e un- 

 derstood to get from it the meaning which should be 

 there. These allusions may be classical, historical, myth- 

 ological, allusions to folk-lore or to literature itself. 

 Examples of all these readily present themselves. Our 

 ancestors read and re-read their treasured volumes of the 

 classics, and our speech is full of references to persons 

 and situations found therein. History has given us much 

 that we use without thought, but cannot fully understand 

 without having in mind the especial event or person 



