called Bougainvillia, and above
all the volcanic mountains, green fringed with huge trees, with tree
ferns and palms, the whole tied together into an impenetrable jungle by
the long armed lianas. The Sierra Nevada, sweeping in majestic waves of
stone, alive with color and steeped in sunshine. Switzerland, Norway,
Alaska, Tyrol, Japan, Venice, the Windward Islands and the Gray Azores,
Chapultepec with its dream of white-cloaked volcanoes, Enoshima and
Gotemba with their peerless Fujiyama, Nikko with its temples, Loch
Lomond, Lake Tahoe, Windermere, Tintagel by the Cornish Sea, the
Yellowstone and the Canyon of the Colorado, the Crater Lake of Oregon,
Sorrento with its Vesuvius, Honolulu with its Pali, the Yosemite, Banff
with its Selkirks, Prince Frederick's Sound with its green fjords, the
Chamounix with its Mont Blanc, Bern with its Oberland, Zermatt with its
Matterhorn, Simla with "the, great silent wonder of the snows."

"Even now as I write," says Whymper the master mountain climber, "they
rise before me an endless series of pictures magnificent in effect, in
form and color. I see great peaks with clouded tops, seeming to mount
upward for ever and ever. I hear the music of distant herds, the
peasant's yodel and the solemn church bells. And after these have passed
away, another train of thought succeeds, of those who have been brave
and true, of kind hearts and bold deeds, of courtesies received from
strangers' hands, trifles in themselves but expressive of that good-will
which is the essence of charity."

That poetry was a means of grace was known to the first man who wrote a
verse or who sang a ballad. It was discovered back in the darkness
before men invented words or devised letters. The only poetry you will
ever know is that you learned by heart when you were young. Happy is he
who has learned much, and much of that which is good. Bad poetry is not
poetry at all except to the man who makes it. For its creator, even the
feeblest verse speaks something of inspiration and of aspiration. It is
said that Frederick the Great went into battle with a vial of poison in
one pocket and a quire of bad verse in the other. Whatever we think of
the one, we feel more kindly toward him for the other.

Charles Eliot Norton advises every man to read a bit of poetry every day
for spiritual refreshment. It would be well for each of us if we should
follow this advice. It is not too late yet and if some few would heed
his words and