to the opposite of himself. There is a beautiful
example of this in _Mortal Coils_. Among the stage-directions to his play,
'Permutations Among the Nightingales,' occur the following sentences:
'Sydney Dolphin has a romantic appearance. His two volumes of verse have
been recognised by intelligent critics as remarkable. How far they are
poetry nobody, least of all Dolphin himself, is certain. They may be
merely the ingenious products of a very cultured and elaborate brain.'

"The point is not that these words might be applied to the author himself,
but rather that he knows they might, even hopes they will, and has sought
to lull his too-ready self-criticism by, so to speak, getting there first
and putting down on paper what he imagines others may think or write of
him.

"Huxley is a poet and writer of prose. His varied personalities show
themselves in both. The artificer in words is almost omnipresent, and God
forbid that he ever vanish utterly. The disciple of Laforgue has produced
lovely and skilful things, and one is grateful for the study of the French
symbolists that instigated the translation of 'L'Apres-midi d'un Faune.'
In 'The Walk' the recapture of Laforgue's blend of the exotic and the
everyday is astonishingly complete.

"The cynic is as accomplished as the Pierrot and 'Social Amenities,' parts
of 'Soles Occidere et Redire Possunt,' and, in _Limbo_, 'Richard Greenow'
(first 100 pages) and 'Happy Families' are syncopated actuality, and the
mind jigs an appreciative shoulder, as the body jerks irresistibly to
'Indianola.'

"There remains Huxley the sensualist, a very ardent lover of beauty, but
one that shrinks from the sordid preamble of modern gallantry, one that is
apprehensive of the inevitable disillusionment. As others have done, as
others will do, he finds in imagination the adventure that progress has
decreed unseemly.

"The reader who is shocked by 'slabby-bellies,' 'mucus,' 'Priapulids'; the
reader who is awed by the paraded learning of 'Splendour by Numbers,' by
the deliberate intricacy of 'Beauty,' or the delicate fatigue of 'The
Death of Lully' in _Limbo_--these are no audience for an artist. It
tickles the author's fancy, stretches his wits, flatters his deviltry to
provoke and witness such consternation and such respect. But the process
is waste of time, and a writer of Huxley's quality, whatever his youth,
has never time to waste."

=ii=

Readers who have chuckled over _Guinea Girl_ or h