od art, the need for complete
subjection of personal enthusiasm to the force of ideas. His art is
akin to the art of silver-point, which, as is known, is an art of
directness of touch, and final in the instant of execution, leaving no
room whatever for accident or untoward excitement of nerve.

We shall wait long for the silver suggestiveness such as Barrymore
gives us when Peter gets his first glimpse of Mary, Duchess of Towers.
Who else could convey his realization of her beauty, and the quality
of reminiscence that lingers about her, of the rapt amaze as he stands
by the mantel-piece looking through the door into the space where he
sees her in the midst of dancers under a crystal chandelier somewhere
not very distant? Or the moment when he finds her bouquet neglected on
the table in the drawing-room, with her lace shawl not far from his
hands? Or when he finds himself alone, pressing his lips into the
depth of the flowers as the curtain gives the finale to the scene with
the whispered "l'amour"! These are moments of a real lyrist, and
would match any line of Banville, of Ronsard, or of Austin Dobson for
delicacy of touch and feeling, for freshness, and for the precise
spiritual gesture, the "intonation" of action requisite to relieve the
moments from what might otherwise revert to commonplace
sentimentality.

Whatever the prejudice may be against all these emotions glace with
sugary frosting, we feel that his art has brought them into being with
an unmistakable gift of refinement coupled with superb style. How an
artist like Beardsley would have revelled in these moments is easy to
conjecture. For here is the quintessence of intellectualized
aquarelle, and these touches would surely have brought into being
another "Pierrot of the Minute"--a new line drawing out of a period he
knew and loved well. These touches would have been graced by the hand
of that artist, or by another of equal delicacy of appreciation,
Charles Conder--unforgettable spaces replete with the essence of
fancy, of dream, of those farther recesses of the imagination.

Although technically and historically Barrymore has the advantage of
excellent traditions, he nevertheless rests entirely upon his own
achievements, separate and individual in his understanding of what
constitutes plastic power in art. He has a peculiar and most sensitive
temper, which can arrange points of relation in juxtaposition with a
keen sense of form as well as of substance.