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UNHAPPY CLEMENT SCOTT.
A Sarcastic EngUabnisn'a Comment on
the Critic’s Poems.
Bexhtll-on-Sea is t ae haven for me
Whene’er my nerves are depressed,
For there's a retreat where you golf and you
eat,
And yon sleep and yon dream and yon rest!
These exquisite words were writ
ten by one of the most prolific and,
it may be, most popular of our mod
ern poets, Mr Clement Soott. We
quote them, not merely because
.their cadence has haunted us and it
is a pleasure to write them out, but
also because they seem to epitomize
the bitter tragedy of their writer's
life.
Every great poet has had some one
impulse, to which may be traced all
that is finest in his work. It is a
function of criticism to determine
in each case what that impulse was.
Some poets have been impelled by a
love either of liberty, or of truth, or
of pleasure, or of their native land;
others, again—and it may bo that
their work is the most enduring—by
a love of nature. Wordsworth loved
nature in all her manifestations. To
him sky, air, watetr, landscape, were
’all impressive and suggestive. Shel
ley was more particularly “the poet
of the clouds.’’ Swinburne is the
poet of the sea. And Mr. Clement
Scott is the poet of the seaside.
Circumstances, the curse of poets,
compel this man to live in London,
driving him in and out of glaring
theaters, up and down Fleet street.
It is fearful to think of his soul be
ing slowly crushed by so uncon
genial a life. Many, many are the
poems he has written about this or
that seaside resort. Some of them,
indeed, have evidently been written
during a happy holiday and are in
stinct with the joyous spirit of Sat
urday to Monday. But most, alas,
have been wrung from him in smoky’
exile and are suffused with mel
ancholy, subdued, nostalgic! As in
the lines written recently and quot
ed above, ho writes most often, net
with Horace’s mild desire for the
Sabine farm, but rather with Byron’s
terrible longing for Ravenna.
Now, we do earnestly appeal to the
dramatic profession, ever generous
in helping the oppressed, and not
only to that profession, but also to
all whose hearts have been, like
ours, gladdened by the poetry of
this man, to raise some great fund
which will enable him to flee away,
with his broken heart and his split
infinitives, to the shores of Bexhill
on-Sea, there to work out his genius.
It may be that his love for this place
is not destined to bo lifelong. Wo
suspect that Cromer was the great
passion of Lis life. It is not given to
any man to love twice with a devo
tion so ecstatic as that which Scott
gave to Cremer. Per maps ho knows
that that love is always really up
permost in his breast and whispers
sometimes to himself in paraphrase
of another poet:
I have forgot much, Cromer! Gone with the
wind
And thrown confetti with the riotous throng.
Dancing to put thy red, lost poppies out of
mind;
But I was desolate and sick of an old passion.
Yea! Though I wrote Bexhill up, all along
I havo been laithti'l to thee, Cromer, in my
fashion.
But let us not pry into these heart
secrets. Let us rather respect the
spoken wish of the poet. Soott has
cried aloud for Bexhill-on-Sea. To
Bexhill-on-Sea let him go. Poetry
and drama will uplift their voices
in a sweet unison of praise when
they hear that be is at length living
there.—Saturcl ay’ Re vie w.
Minor Music Halls In ?Jadrid«
As for the flamenco coffee houses,
they are a kind of minor music hall,
whore, on a raised platform, while
customers were consuming light re
freshments, the gypsy’ band perform
ed and gypsy girls sang and danced
in that oriental manner which re
mindsone irresistibly of the nautch.
Between the dances the girls strolled
in and out among the audience, sell
ing paper covered novels, presuma
bly for their own benefit. One I
bought was called “La Casamen
tera"—“The Matchmaker.” These
are places where jealousies are
quickly kindled and as quickly set
tled by the method of arbitration of
which ore reads so frequently’ in
Spanish newspapers. The survival
of the fittest, in the shape of the first
man who gets in with his knife, is
as much a scientific certainty as that
of the spriest with his shooting iron
in a western mining camp. I bought
one of these same knives in Madrid.
It was a murderous triangular blade,
with engraved on it the three words,
mujer, vino, toros —women, Mine
and bulls—the trinity most worship
ed in modern Spain.—Gentleman's
Magazine.
Too literal.
“They is such a thing as bein in
the habit of takin things too literal, ”
said the old settler, who had been in
the country for four years, “and
Wall Eyed Bowker is 'bout as good a
example of it as I know of. "
“What's he been doin now ?’ ’ asked
the postmaster.
“Yisterdaj the preacher said it
should be the juty of us all toe put
sunshine in the hearts of our feller
men, and what does Bowker do bi’.t
followup the idee by lettin daylight
into a Chinaman. “—Cincinnati En
quirer.
Sensation in Rome!
Immense Stock of Goods at Cost!
Eighty Thousand Dollars Worth of High Grade Dry
Gocds, M ■ . nery, Notions,Clothing, Hats, Shoes, etc, etc,
in Roma at Cost! We throw our Great Stock of Goods
-1. this market, and, to prepare for a change in the busi
ness, We Are Going to Sell It. You can buy anything
this House from top to bottom, from front to rear—
any article, every piece, parcel, item or measure At
Wnat It Cost Us!*
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When are you coming to Rome? Do not put it off too long if you want to buy anything. The Goods
offered you at Prime Cost, are first-class in every particular, new and up-to-date merchandise and that
you can buy them as offered is
AN OPPORTUNITY OF A LIFETIME.
Come to see us. We’ll do just what we advertise. You can get anything in this immense stock at
Y hat It Cost Us. Come at once and save big money on your purchases.
Bass Bros., & Company.
A strange animal is at large in
the vicinity of Eoctdale. It is
i said to resemble ; man in disguise
! and when standii g up is about the
height of a man, but when running
’ gees ou its four legs. Its color is
black and its app aranc » ind’icat 3
great muscular power, both in jaws
and imbs. The bony ridges in
the skull above tie eyes are ex
tremely prominent and the teeth
are very large.
POOR DICESTiON leads to
nervousness, chronic dyspepsia and
great miserv. The best remedy is
HOOD’S SARSAPARILLAe
Child Fatally Burned.
Rome, Ga., Dec., 2.—The four
ye:<r-;>ld child of Charles Wood
and his young wife caught fire
while playing around the hearth
at their 1 onie, some distance be
yond East Rome. The mother had
gone out to the woodpile and heard
the litt.e one scream. Rushing
■ back into the house she found that
the clothing of the child had caught
fire, and before she could extinguish
the flames it was fata'ly burned.
The mother’s hands were badly
urned in trviug to save her only
1 child.
They Were Advertised.
There was a man once on a ti ne
who thought him wondrous wise.
He swore by all the fabled g<ds,
he’d never advertise. But his
goods were advertised ere long, and
thereby hangs a tale; the ad was
set in nonpareil and headed
“Sheriff’s Sale.”
Just across the Georgia line
from Cleburne county, last week,
john McDaniel was caught in the
machinery at the Tallapoosa Gold
Mining Works and killed.
| The Align-ta S■•ulL ei.et
. bound pas:-:--iiger train No. 24, was
derailed at Greenw<.<-J, eight miles
I from Aug; ta, Saturday morning.
. : The t; imud c' l.qimt'.-ly over
i i and li.e oiigiimer am! fin-man only
L escape d < ; by jumping. The
[ acciaen occurred v. here a spur
track joins tl.e main iue, and it is
suppes’ ■; t.’.ar the switch at that
point w; sP M. -open. Tiie track
was b uclmm d for several hours,
but no <u i( . was seriously hurt by
‘ the accident.
Rjpans Tabules cure torpid liver.
Ripans Tabules: for sour stomach.
HIS BOOKS SERVE.
Jio One Will Forget Stevenson, Even U
He Has No Other Memorial.
Andrew Lang has bis doubts about
the advisability of erecting in Edin
burgh a statue of Robert Louis Ste
venson and has expressed his views
on the matter in a letter to the Lon
don papers. He said:
“The question of a memorial to
Mr. Robert Louis Stevenson raised
by Lord Rosebery is of deep interest
to friends of the author of ‘Kidnap
ed’ and to admirers of his work. It
is natural to make conjectures as to
what Mr. Stevenson would himself
have desired. That be would have
liked some permanent sign of appre
ciation from his countrymen is mor
ally certain.
“Nobody could bo so pure from
the modern literary sin of seeking
advertisement; no man was more in
capable of trying to procure recogni
tion or ’of lamenting its absence.
But fame and praise gave him un
disguised and honorable satisfac
tion. He took a kind of boyish pleas
ure in his‘Edinburgh Edition,’as
he stated in private letters, just be
cause it mixed his name with that
of his own romantic town. That the
unconsidered, little, wandering
schoolboy and the truant student
should be honored in Edinburgh was
to him a sincere surprise and delight.
His admiration cf the city’s natural
beauty and historical charm W£3
even stronger than his horror of its
easterly winds and writers’ offices.
“So far, probably, alt wh -t.-t-tt"'
Mr. Stevenson are agreed. He would
have rejoiced in a public token of
Scottish recognition. Rut what form
should such a recognition take?
What would Mr.- S-evenson have
preferred? Modern Britain is not
fortunate in its statues. The effigies
cf Professor Wilson and Sir James
Simpson in Princess street might
determine an Edinburgh genius to
prefer the fallentis ssmita vitro.
“Mr. Stevenson’s taste in matters
of art and his sense of humor would
have recoiled from a clumsy image
cf his own unstatuesque figure,
shrouded in a plaid and exposed on
a pedestal to the winds of Edinburgh
and the compassion cr curiosity of
tourists. The odds against a good
modern statue are incalculable,
though if such a work of art could
be procured it would doublings bo
the most adequate token cf national
admiration.
“As for a useful memorial, such as
a word in a hospital, that would cer
tainly be more serviceable to man
kind than commemorative of Mr.
Stevenson. Yet we could not wish
to :■ o a monument cf l rl >■; T--
t! ic d M d<. n: i. i ’ • « w/ios>■ t ffigiosT”
or memorials poprrkytH the C.dtcu
hill, among the Pin. fairs find Du
galifl Stewarts. . Lockhart was not
anxious to see a statue of Scott in
this honorable but melancholy com
pany.
“It may be suggested that the
quadrangle of the Town’s college,
where Mr. Stevenson attended lec
tures so slackly and reluctantly and
whither his memory so often and
wistfully returned, might be an ap
propriate place for his memorial. His
heart was always with the. young,
and his works are dearest to the
young in ago or in heart. This he
himself knew well, and for this rea
son the university seems a fitting
place for his monument.
“There may be good reasons for
some other choice or objections to
this idea. Mr. Stevenson while alive,
■was no great prophet in his own
country, cf which, after Burns,
Scott and Carlyle, he was the chief
literary glory. His country and bis
native town may now redress their
comparative neglect of one whose
heart was always full of Scotland.”
Jacky and Bls “Antic.” f',
Jacky is almost always on good
terms with his mother, but ho has a
tiresome aunt, whom ho has good
, reason for disliking. He was once
unavoidably left in her charge while
his mother was away from home,
I and her visit was net altogether a
success. She had been “obliged” to
punish him severely for some fault,
and alter the operation was over he
was seen to get a pencil, and, retir
! ing into a corner of the nursery, la
boriously write something upon a
small piece of paper. The same spy
who observed him do this watched
him afterward from the window
while he dug a hole with his little
spade and buried the bit of paper in
a corner of the garden. When Jacky
< was safely out of the way, the spy
I exhumed his manuscript. It ran as
follows: “Dear Devil-—Please come
and take Antie. ” —Cornhill Maga-
I zine.
i
A Curious Watch.
In the year 1764 a handsome and
curious present was made to George
111 by Arnold, a celebrated London
■ watchmaker. It was a repeating
j timepiece, set in a ring, and was
: about the size of an old fashioned
silver 3 cent piece. Though it weigh
ed less than five pennyweights, it
was composed of l? 0 different pieces
and was provided with the first ruby
cylinder ever made. For this little
■ mechanical marvel Arnold received
I from the king a present of 500 guin
eas.—St. Louis Republic.