ora's Feast. It is an
imaginative Masque of Flowers, and as lovely in colour as it is exquisite
in design. It shows us the whole pomp and pageant of the year, the
Snowdrops like white-crested knights, the little naked Crocus kneeling to
catch the sunlight in his golden chalice, the Daffodils blowing their
trumpets like young hunters, the Anemones with their wind-blown raiment,
the green-kirtled Marsh-marigolds, and the 'Lady-smocks all
silver-white,' tripping over the meadows like Arcadian milk-maids.
Buttercups are here, and the white-plumed Thorn in spiky armour, and the
Crown-imperial borne in stately procession, and red-bannered Tulips, and
Hyacinths with their spring bells, and Chaucer's Daisy--

small and sweet,
Si douce est la Marguerite.

Gorgeous Peonies, and Columbines 'that drew the car of Venus,' and the
Rose with her lover, and the stately white-vestured Lilies, and wide
staring Ox-eyes, and scarlet Poppies pass before us. There are Primroses
and Corncockles, Chrysanthemums in robes of rich brocade, Sunflowers and
tall Hollyhocks, and pale Christmas Roses. The designs for the
Daffodils, the wild Roses, the Convolvulus, and the Hollyhock are
admirable, and would be beautiful in embroidery or in any precious
material. Indeed, any one who wishes to find beautiful designs cannot do
better than get the book. It is, in its way, a little masterpiece, and
its grace and fancy, and beauty of line and colour, cannot be
over-estimated. The Greeks gave human form to wood and stream, and saw
Nature best in Naiad or in Dryad. Mr. Crane, with something of Gothic
fantasy, has caught the Greek feeling, the love of personification, the
passion for representing things under the conditions of the human form.
The flowers are to him so many knights and ladies, page-boys or shepherd-
boys, divine nymphs or simple girls, and in their fair bodies or fanciful
raiment one can see the flower's very form and absolute essence, so that
one loves their artistic truth no less than their artistic beauty. This
book contains some of the best work Mr. Crane has ever done. His art is
never so successful as when it is entirely remote from life. The
slightest touch of actuality seems to kill it. It lives, or should live,
in a world of its own fashioning. It is decorative in its complete
subordination of fact to beauty of effect, in the grandeur of its curves
and lines, in its entirely imaginative treatment. Almost every pag