BOOKS AND AUTHORS.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 425, 6 February 1909, Page 9

BOOKS AND AUTHORS.

1 ! . VERSES NEW AND OLD. Among a myriad of now Christmas poems lately published, the following has, been comniondcd for its "sheer, almost brutal, origin, fthty." THE CHIUSTJIAS FEAST. "Tis Christ His feast," said Short to Long, "Let's pass the- night in drink and sour. "The liquor must i\ot be too mild , For toasting of that Holy Child." Said Long, "Them Jews was blind," said "But not so 'blind' as wo will'be." They drank Him once and twice and thrice; The main brace they began to splice. A ohild's voice wailed without the "door: "0, let me enter, I luiploro! Tis freezing cold and dark and dire. 0, let me warm me at jour fire!" "No place for children hero," said Long, And bid him "cut his luoky" btrong. "We're keeping of Christ' Jesus' feast. Clear out," said Shoit, "you little boast!" They sang to "David's royal Son." And not till all Iho dunk was dene Abstained; then staggered to the door, And sobered at the sight they saw. - Stark on the snow Christ baby lay. Twas Him those sots had cursed away. Now tell me. what availed them, then, lo keep Christ out and Christmas in' * > —Bornard Capes in "Amaranthus." THE EVIL' THINGS. .' Not 'worst to face the great calamities— On quaking crags the loosened tempest's beat On one lost, shelterless, not worst to meet In shock of wai, the reeling chivalries, Flung back iniruining ranks of tragedies, Speeding from each to each tho'blfick defeat; flor yet to watch the dreadful moments licet, Dooming the riven wrest. Not worst>are these. I Life shouls in these; but whore, with jaded glance, One sees the bleak day gloom deross the marsh, I Searching the long monotony, athirst For some far-flickered hope ot circumstance; Be what it may—jojful, or dull and harshBo it be Only change. That is the worst. -F. O'Neill Gallagher, in the ''Dailj News " BALLADE OF THE DREAMLAND EO£E. fVhere tho wpves of burning cloud are rolled On the farther shore of the sunset sea, m? lind of ' w °nder that none behold, There bloome a rose on the Dreamland Tree It grows in the Uarden ot Mystery Where the Ttiver of Slumber softly iiows, And whenever a dream has come to be, I 4 4. petal falls from the Dreamland Rose. I In the heart of the tree, on a branch "of gold, A silvery bird sings endlessly A mystio song that is agas bid—, A mournful song , in a nnnoi koy, Jiulrof the glamour of faery,, And whenever a dreamer's ears unclose To the sound of that distant melody, , A petal falls from the Dreamland Rose. Dreams and visions in hosts untold Throng around on the moonlit leaDreams of ago that are calm and cold, Dreams of yonth that are fair and freeDark with a lone heart's agony, Bright with a hope that no one knows— v And whenever a dream and a dream agree, A petal falls from the Dreamland Rose. l'envoi. Pnncess-you gaze m a reverie Where the diowsy fiiehght redly glows, bfowly you raise your eyes to me . . A petal falls from the Dreamland Rose. —Brian Hooker, in "Harper's Magazine."