ly. They ought simply to let them alone and
live nice hard-headed lives.

It is the same way with soft-headed people who cannot enjoy the real
world. Not having much taste for it, and not getting on too well in it,
they are apt to call it pretty bad names and to wish it were different.
I think them too hasty. Before they abuse or advise it they should first
understand it. If they can't, they should let it alone more, and live in
their dreams.

Or in those of such dreamers as Maeterlinck, Dunsany, or Poe.

The Maeterlinck books constitute quite a beautiful country. They have
long been a favorite home for our soft-headed friends. And those of us
who are of a compound between hard and soft enjoy visiting the
Maeterlinck coast as we might a resort. It is pleasantly unreal; it is
varied. Gentle breezes of sweetness; blue seas, massive rocks; and
storms too. Here and there a crag, or dark castle of terrible grandeur.
Is it not picturesque? Don't poke at the castles with your umbrella; you
might go through the tin; but take it all in the right spirit as you
would Coney Island.

Human nature being what it is, there is certainly a need for this place.

There is one little difficulty about the situation however. Monsieur
Maeterlinck, the proprietor, although he makes his home in this region,
likes sometimes to visit the real world, if but for a change. Well, this
would be nothing to object to, though for him injudicious, but he is
such a stranger there that he does not at all know his place. He takes
himself seriously at his home; it is natural, I'm sure; but it leads him
to speak in the real world with a voice of authority. He is not in the
least offensive about it, no one could be more gentle, but he doesn't at
all realize that his rank here permits no such tone. On the Maeterlinck
coast, in the realms of romance, he is king. In the real world his
judgments are not above those of a child.

It would give me more pleasure (or at any rate it ought to, I know) to
dwell on his many abilities than on this one fault. But this excellent
man has the misfortune to resemble wood-alcohol. Wood-alcohol is a
respectable liquid; it is useful in varnish; when poured in a lamp it
heats tea; yes, it has its good side. Yet how little we dwell on its
uses, how much on its defect; its one small defect that it's fatal when
taken internally.

Maeterlinck has for years made a business of beautiful thoughts. With
some of them he built romantic