and not only passionately, in which it is not only the
cry of the heart and of the senses which takes the form of drama.

In Maeterlinck's earlier plays, in "Les Aveugles," "Interieur," and even
"Pelleas et Melisande," he is dramatic after a new, experimental fashion
of his own; "Monna Vanna" is dramatic in the obvious sense of the word.
The action moves, and moves always in an interesting, even in a telling,
way. But at the same time I cannot but feel that something has been
lost. The speeches, which were once so short as to be enigmatical, are
now too long, too explanatory; they are sometimes rhetorical, and have
more logic than life. The playwright has gained experience, the thinker
has gained wisdom, but the curious artist has lost some of his magic. No
doubt the wizard had drawn his circle too small, but now he has stepped
outside his circle into a world which no longer obeys his formulas. In
casting away his formulas, has he the big human mastery which alone
could replace them? "Monna Vanna" is a remarkable and beautiful play,
but it is not a masterpiece. "La Mort de Tintagiles" was a masterpiece
of a tiny, too deliberate kind; but it did something which no one had
ever done before. We must still, though we have seen "Monna Vanna,"
wait, feeling that Maeterlinck has not given us all that he is capable
of giving us.

THE QUESTION OF CENSORSHIP.

The letter of protest which appeared in the _Times_ of June 30, 1903,
signed by Mr. Swinburne, Mr. Meredith, and Mr. Hardy, the three highest
names in contemporary English literature, will, I hope, have done
something to save the literary reputation of England from such a fate as
one eminent dramatic critic sees in store for it. "Once more," says the
_Athenaeum_, "the caprice of our censure brings contempt upon us, and
makes, or should make, us the laughing-stock of Europe." The _Morning
Post_ is more lenient, and is "sincerely sorry for the unfortunate
censor," because "he has immortalised himself by prohibiting the most
beautiful play of his time, and must live to be the laughing-stock of
all sensible people."

Now the question is: which is really made ridiculous by this ridiculous
episode of the prohibition of Maeterlinck's "Monna Vanna," England or
Mr. Redford? Mr. Redford is a gentleman of whom I only know that he is
not himself a man of letters, and that he has not given any public
indication of an intelligent interest in literature as literature. If,
as