sary implication in others also.

He was, thus, in all things a humanist. He faced the universe, but he
did not deny his own soul. There could be for him no antagonism between
science and literature, or science and humanity. They were all pluses;
it was men who quarrelled among themselves. If men would only develop a
little more loving-kindness, things would be better. The first duty of
the artist was to be a decent man.

'Solidarity among young writers is impossible and unnecessary.... We
cannot feel and think in the same way, our aims are different, or we
have no aims whatever, we know each other little or not at all, and
so there is nothing on to which this solidarity could be securely
hooked.... And is there any need for it? No, in order to help a
colleague, to respect his personality and work, to refrain from
gossiping about him, envying him, telling him lies and being
hypocritical, one does not need so much to be a young writer as
simply a man.... Let us be ordinary people, let us treat everybody
alike, and then we shall not need any artificially worked-up
solidarity.'

It seems a simple discipline, this moral and intellectual honesty of
Tchehov's, yet in these days of conceit and coterie his letters strike
us as more than strange. One predominant impression remains: it is that
of Tchehov's candour of soul. Somehow he has achieved with open eyes the
mystery of pureness of heart; and in that, though we dare not analyse it
further, lies the secret of his greatness as a writer and of his present
importance to ourselves.

[MARCH, 1920.

_American Poetry_

We are not yet immune from the weakness of looking into the back pages
to see what the other men have said; and on this occasion we received a
salutary shock from the critic of the _Detroit News_, who informs us
that Mr Aiken, 'despite the fact that he is one of the youngest and the
newest, having made his debut less than four years ago, ... demonstrates
... that he is eminently capable of taking a solo part with Edgar Lee
Masters, Amy Lowell, James Oppenheim, Vachel Lindsay, and Edwin
Arlington Robinson.' The shock is two-fold. In a single sentence we are
in danger of being convicted of ignorance, and, where we can claim a
little knowledge, we plead guilty; we know nothing of either Mr
Oppenheim or Mr Robinson. This very ignorance makes us cautious where we
have a little knowledge We know something of Mr Lin