e was a home by the sea, with its purity and freedom, and
its infinite expanse, telling me of God. For, from the time when as a
child the roar of the surges set my pulse beating, and the scents of the
weed and the brine would make me turn pale with pleasure, I used to pray
that some day, when my life's work would be nearly done, and I had put
in my years of honest labor in the dusty streets, I might spend my
declining years in the peace of a seaside village, and go down to my
grave, washed free from the contaminations of life in the daily watching
and loving of those

"Moving waters at their priestlike task
Of cold ablution round earth's human shores."

My wish was realized, and I was jubilant.

Returning home by train, when my emotion had calmed down, my mind could
not help recurring to the expression used by the Bishop; and it
suggested the following reflections: How has it come to pass in Ireland
that "poet" and "saint" are terms which denote some weakness or
irregularity in their possessors? At one time in our history we know
that the bard was second only to the King in power and influence; and
are we not vaguely proud of that title the world gives us,--Island of
Saints? Yet, nowadays, through some fatal degeneracy, a poet is looked
upon as an idealist, an unpractical builder of airy castles, to whom no
one would go for advice in an important matter, or intrust with the
investment of a five-pound note. And to speak of a man or woman as a
"saint" is to hint at some secret imbecility, which it would be
charitable to pass over in silence. I was quite well aware, therefore,
on that day, when I had the secret pleasure and the sublime misfortune
of seeing my name in print over some wretched verses, that I was ruining
my prospects in life. The fact of being a litterateur, although in the
most modest and hidden manner, stamped me as a volatile, flighty
creature, who was no more to be depended upon than a feather in the
wind; or, as the Italians say, _qu' al piume al vento_. It is a curious
prejudice, and a purely insular one. And sometimes I think, or rather I
used to think, that there was something infinitely grotesque in these
narrow ideas, that shut us out from sympathy with the quick moving,
subtle world as completely as if we were fakirs by the banks of the
sacred Ganges. For what does modern literature deal with? Exactly those
questions of philosophy, ethics, and morality which form the staple
material of t