40 
NATURE IN THE NATURE POETS. 
in the sea ; a world that knew not man, yet which seems 
now to live before us as though it were the possession of 
to-day. 
The treaty of peace, then, having been signed, or, if you 
prefer the image, the bonds of v/edlock having been entered 
into, one of the parties in either of these engagements will 
rest a while, to let the other speak. And in this both will 
rejoice. If Poetry shall feel as though she were in some way 
taking up a challenge -glove thrown down, this will be more 
in the form than in the essence and spirit of her story. She 
moves through a land she loves, wherein are others who also 
love. The cherubim know m-ost, and perhaps the seraphim 
love most, and there is room for both in the intellectual 
heavens. 
It is very pleasant to think that two apparently opposing 
personalities are moving together through that fairy land, 
an invisible link binding them together. They are moving 
hand in hand, like partners in some stately measure, each 
with its own characteristic step, and yet in rhythmical 
accord. Perchance one day the poet shall strike even yet 
wider reconcilements, and find that what once seemed hard 
and metallic and unlovely is really clothed in glory and 
delight ; and the man of positive knowledge shall learn that 
the laws he is tracing out are after all most true poetic 
harmonies, and that the skies above his daily path are 
multitudinous with song. 
What is it then that the poets have to say about nature ? 
Now, in answering this question, we have inevitable need 
to limit ourselves. We cannot call into council the whole 
starry field of nature-poetry from Bion and Moschus to 
Wordsworth, or from the idylls of Theocritus to the idylls 
of Tennyson. Let us think mainly of English poetry as it 
has come to us, fresh and strong, as a reaction from the 
