ussion of Responsibility, Democracy, Education, etc., has
inevitably detached the lurking spirit of pessimism. It has
to be:--Into the depths and darkness we descend, and the
work reaches the tragic climax in the third out-of-door
scene--Winter.

Now that the forces have been gathered and marshalled the
true, sane movement of the work is entered upon and pushed
at high tension, and with swift, copious modulations to its
foreordained climax and optimistic peroration in the fourth
and last out-of-door scene as portrayed in the Spring Song.
The _locale_ of this closing number is the beautiful spot in
the woods, on the shore of Biloxi Bay:--where I am writing
this.

I would suggest in passing that a considerable part of the
K.C. is in rhythmic prose--some of it declamatory. I have
endeavoured throughout this work to represent, or reproduce
to the mind and heart of the reader the spoken word and
intonation--not written language. It really should be read
aloud, especially the descriptive and exalted passages.

There was a movement once on the part of Mr. Sullivan's admirers to
issue _Kindergarten Chats_ in book form, but he was asked to tone it
down and expurgate it, a thing which he very naturally refused to do.
Mr. Sullivan has always been completely alive to our cowardice when
it comes to hearing the truth about ourselves, and alive to the danger
which this cowardice entails, for to his imaginary pupil he says,

If you wish to read the current architecture of your country,
you must go at it courageously, and not pick out merely the
little bits that please you. I am going to soak you with it
until you are absolutely nauseated, and your faculties turn
in rebellion. I may be a hard taskmaster, but I strive to be
a good one. When I am through with you, you will know
architecture from the ground up. You will know its virtuous
reality and you will know the fake and the fraud and the
humbug. I will spare nothing--for your sake. I will stir up
the cesspool to its utmost depths of stench, and also the
pious, hypocritical virtues of our so-called architecture--the
nice, good, mealy-mouthed, suave, dexterous, diplomatic
architecture, I will show you also the kind of architecture
our "cultured" people believe in. And why do they believe in
it? Because they do not believe in themselves.

_Kindergar