yground for the aimless and the
frivolous.

Last of all, the undersigned wishes to thank the membership for its kind
reception of the Department's reports. It is ever the Chairman's design
to render impartial judgment, and if harshness or captiousness may at
any time have been noticed in the reports, it has in each case been
unintentional. An ideal of sound conservatism has been followed, but in
no instance has the critic sought to enforce upon others that peculiarly
archaic style of which he is personally fond, and which he is accustomed
to employ in his own compositions. The Department of Public Criticism
aspires to be of substantial assistance to the members of the United,
and hopes next year to co-operate with Mr. Lockhart in presenting
reviews of truly constructive quality.

Solicitous for the approval, and confident of the indulgence of the
association, the Department herewith has the honor to conclude its first
annual report; in the hope that such a summary of events and estimate of
conditions may be of use to the incoming administration.

H. P. LOVECRAFT,
Chairman.

THE UNITED AMATEUR SEPTEMBER 1916

DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC CRITICISM

=The Amateur Special= for July is a voluminous magazine of credentials
and other work of new members, edited by Mrs. E. L. Whitehead, retiring
Eastern Manuscript Manager, with the assistance of the Recruiting
Committee. Of all papers lately issued in the United, this is without
doubt among the most valuable and most significant; since it is the
pioneer of the new regime, whereby the talent of all our membership is
to be brought out by better publishing facilities. Mrs. Whitehead, with
notable generosity, has reserved for herself but one page, on which we
find a clever and correct bit of verse, and a number of graceful
acknowledgments and useful suggestions. The contents in general are well
calculated to display the thorough literary excellence and supremacy of
the United in its present condition; for in this collection of stories,
poems, and articles, taken practically at random from the manuscript
bureaus, there is scarce a line unworthy of commendation.

"Tatting", by Julian J. Crump, is a fluent and graceful colloquial
sketch. "Mother and Child", by J. E. Hoag, is a sombre and thoughtful
poem having a certain atmosphere of mysticism. The metre, which is