figure of this sort with which the fancies
of our poets have played. From the glory and power of his dramas their
imaginations inevitably turn to

The gloriole of his flame-coloured hair,
The lean, athletic body, deftly planned
To carry that swift soul of fire and air;
The long, thin flanks, the broad breast, and the grand
Heroic shoulders!
[Footnote: Alfred Noyes, _At the Sign of the Golden Shoe_.]

It is no wonder that in the last century there has grown up so firm a
belief in the poet's beauty, one reflects, remembering the seraphic face
of Shelley, the Greek sensuousness of Keats' profile, the romantic fire
of Byron's expression. [Footnote: Browning in his youth must have
encouraged the tradition. See Macready's Diary, in which he describes
Browning as looking "more like a youthful poet than any man I ever
saw."] Yet it is a belief that must have been sorely tried since the
invention of the camera has brought the verse-writer's countenance, in
all its literalness, before the general public. Was it only an accident
that the popularity of current poetry died just as cameras came into
existence? How many a potential admirer has been lost by a glance at the
frontispiece in a book of verse! In recent years, faith in soul-made
beauty seems again to have shown itself justified. Likenesses of Rupert
Brooke, with his "angel air," [Footnote: See W. W. Gibson, _Rupert
Brooke_.] of Alan Seeger, and of Joyce Kilmer in his undergraduate
days, are perhaps as beautiful as any the romantic period could afford.
Still the young enthusiast of the present day should be warned not to be
led astray by wolves in sheep's clothing, for the spurious claimant of
the laurel is learning to employ all the devices of the art photographer
to obscure and transform his unaesthetic visage.

We have implied that insistence upon the artist's beauty arose with the
romantic movement, but a statement to that effect would have to be made
with reservations. The eighteenth century was by no means without such a
conception, as the satires of that period testify, being full of
allusions to poetasters' physical defects, with the obvious implication
that they are indicative of spiritual deformity, and of literary
sterility. Then, from within the romantic movement itself, a critic
might exhume verse indicating that faith in the beautiful singer was by
no means universal;--that, on the other hand, the interestingly ugly
bard enjoyed considerable vogue