ough divining her thoughts, Walcott went on
quickly, with much more sincerity of tone:

"I do try now and then to put an idea that strikes me from German or
Italian into English; but think of my painful groping with a dictionary,
before the cramped and crippled idea can reach my mind! I am the
translator most in need of condolence, Miss Campion!"

"Yet, even without going to other languages," said Lettice, "there is an
unlimited field in our own, both for ideas and for expression--as well
as a practically unlimited audience."

"The artists and musicians say that their domains are absolutely
unlimited--that the poet sings to those who happen to speak his
language, whilst they discourse to the whole world and to all time. I
suppose, in a sense, they are right."

He spoke listlessly, as if he did not care whether they were right or
wrong.

But Lettice's eyes began to glow.

"Surely in a narrow sense! They would hardly say that Handel or
Beethoven speaks to a wider audience than Homer or Shakspeare, and
certainly no musician or painter or sculptor can hope to delight mankind
for as many centuries as a poet. And, then, to think what an idea can
accomplish--what Greek ideas have done in England, for instance, or
Roman ideas in France, or French ideas in nearly every country of
Europe! Could a tune make a revolution, or a picture destroy a
religion?"

"Perhaps, yes," said Walcott, wishing to draw her out, "if the tunes or
the pictures could be repeated often enough, and brought before the eyes
and ears of the multitude."

"I do not think so. And, at any rate, that could not be done by way of
systematic and comprehensive teaching, so that your comparison only
suggests another superiority in literary expression. A poet can teach a
whole art, or establish a definite creed; he can move the heart and
mould the mind at the same time; but one can hardly imagine such an
effect from the work of those who speak to us only through the eye or
ear."

By this time Alan Walcott was fairly interested. What Lettice said might
be commonplace enough, but it did not strike him so. It was her manner
that pleased him, her quiet fervor and gentle insistance, which showed
that she was accustomed to think for herself, and suggested that she
would have the honesty to say what she thought. And, of course, he
applied to himself all that she said about poets in general, and was
delighted by her warm championship of his special vocation. As the