onkling takes a vacation, she does not
"nod," as erstwhile Homer; she merely reverts to type and is a child
again.

I think too highly of these poems to speak of the volume as though it
were the finished achievement of a grown-up person. Some of the poems
can be taken in that way, but by no means all. The child who writes them
frequently transcends herself, but her thoughts for the most part are
those proper to every imaginative child. Fairies play a large role in
her fancies, and so does the sandman. There are kings, and princesses,
and golden wings, and there are reminiscences of story-books, and hints
of pictures that have pleased her. After all, that is the way we all
make our poems, but the grown-up poet tries to get away from his author,
he tries to see more than the painter has seen. The little girl is quite
untroubled by any questions of technique. She takes what to her is the
obvious always, and in these copied pieces it is, naturally, less her
own peculiar obvious than in the nature poems.

Hilda Conkling is evidently possessed of a rare and accurate power of
observation. And when we add this to her gift of imagination, we see
that it is the perfectly natural play of these two faculties which makes
what to her is an obvious expression. She does not search for it, it is
her natural mode of thought. But, luckily for her, she has been guided
by a wisdom which has not attempted to show her a better way. Her
observation has been carefully, but unobtrusively, cultivated; her
imagination has been stimulated by the reading of excellent books; but
both these lines of instruction have been kept apparently apart from
her own work. She has been let alone there; she has been taught by an
analogy which she has never suspected. By this means, her poetical
gift has functioned happily, without ever for a moment experiencing the
tension of doubt.

A few passages will serve to show how well Hilda knows how to use her
eyes:

"The water came in with a wavy look
Like a spider's web."

A bluebird has a back "like a feathered sky." Apostrophizing a
snow-capped mountain she writes:

"You shine like a lily
But with a different whiteness."

She asks a humming-bird:

"Why do you stand on the air
And no sun shining?"

She hears a chickadee:

"Far off I hear him talking
The way smooth bright pebbles
Drop into water."

Now let us follow her a step farther, to where the