one comes out again into the hot sunshine that warms
one's blood, and sees the eager hurrying faces of men and women
in the street, dramatic faces over which the disturbing experiences
of life have passed and left their symbols, one's heart thrills up
into one's throat. No, no, no, a thousand times no! how can one
deliberately renounce this coloured, unquiet, fiery human life of
the earth?" And, all the time, her subtle criticism is alert, and
this woman of the East marvels at the women of the West, "the
beautiful worldly women of the West," whom she sees walking in the
Cascine, "taking the air so consciously attractive in their brilliant
toilettes, in the brilliant coquetry of their manner!" She finds
them "a little incomprehensible," "profound artists in all the subtle
intricacies of fascination," and asks if these "incalculable
frivolities and vanities and coquetries and caprices" are, to us,
an essential part of their charm? And she watches them with
amusement as they flutter about her, petting her as if she were a
nice child, a child or a toy, not dreaming that she is saying to
herself sorrowfully: "How utterly empty their lives must be of
all spiritual beauty IF they are nothing more than they appear to be."

She sat in our midst, and judged us, and few knew what was
passing behind that face "like an awakening soul," to use one of
her own epithets. Her eyes were like deep pools, and you seemed
to fall through them into depths below depths.

ARTHUR SYMONS.

FOLK SONGS

PALANQUIN BEARERS

Lightly, O lightly we bear her along,
She sways like a flower in the wind of our song;
She skims like a bird on the foam of a stream,
She floats like a laugh from the lips of a dream.
Gaily, O gaily we glide and we sing,
We bear her along like a pearl on a string.

Softly, O softly we bear her along,
She hangs like a star in the dew of our song;
She springs like a beam on the brow of the tide,
She falls like a tear from the eyes of a bride.
Lightly, O lightly we glide and we sing,
We bear her along like a pearl on a string.

WANDERING SINGERS

(Written to one of their Tunes)

Where the voice of the wind calls our wandering feet,
Through echoing forest and echoing street,
With lutes in our hands ever-singing we roam,
All men are our kindred, the world is our home.

Our lays are of cities whose lustre is shed,
The laughter and beauty of women long dead;
The