literature--
The English Press, and a good many contemporaries--
Tennyson palls, Browning is found--
Only a brownie--
The mountains divide, the Press is unanimous--
Aylwin is born--
On a perilous path, on the cliff of immortality--
I met Theodormon--
He seemed sad: I said, 'Why are you sad--
Are you writing the long-promised life--
Of Dante Gabriel Rossetti?'--
He sighed and said, 'No, not that--
Not that, my child--
I consigned the task to William Michael--
Pre-Raphaelite memoirs are cheap to-day--
You can have them for a sextet or an octave.'--
I brightened and said, 'Then you are writing a sonnet?'
He shook his head and said it was symbolical--
For six and eightpence!--
A golden rule: Never lend only George Borrow--

A new century had begun, and I asked Theodormon what he was doing on that
path and where Mr. Swinburne was. Beneath us yawned the gulf of
oblivion.

'Be careful, young man, not to tumble over; are you a poet or a
biographer?'

I explained that I was merely a tourist. He gave a sigh of relief: 'I
have an appointment here with my only disciple, Mr. Howlglass; if you are
not careful he may write an appreciation of you.'

'My dear Theodormon, if you will show me how to reach Mr. Swinburne I
will help you.'

'I swear by the most sacred of all oaths, by Aylwin, you shall see
Swinburne.'

Just then we saw a young man coming along the path with a Kodak and a
pink evening paper. He seemed pleased to see me, and said, 'May I
appreciate you?'

I gave the young man a push and he fell right over the cliff. Theodormon
threw down after him a heavy-looking book which, alighting on his skull,
smashed it. 'My preserver,' he cried, 'you shall see what you like, you
shall do what you like, except write my biography. Swinburne is close at
hand, though he occasionally wanders. His permanent address is the
Peaks, Parnassus. Perhaps you would like to pay some other calls as
well.'

I assented.

We came to a printing-house and found William Morris reverting to type
and transmitting art to the middle classes.

'The great Tragedy of Topsy's life,' said Theodormon, 'is that he
converted the middle classes to art and socialism, but he never touched
the unbending Tories of the proletariat or the smart set. You would have
thought, on homoeopathic principles, that cretonne would appeal to
cretins.'

'Vale, vale,' cried Charles Ricketts from the in