Laureates of Labor.

Maoriland Worker, Volume 2, Issue 27, 8 September 1911, Page 4

Laureates of Labor.

No. I—SViarie E. J. Pitt.

By ROBERT HOGG.

What though we stand in sundered lands, And sing in several voices? The Brotherhood has many bands, But with one heart rejoices. — J. Logic Robertson.

The other day the editor of "The Worker" placed in my hand a duodecimo volume of poems, entitled "Horses of the Hills," by Marie E. J. Pitt. Mrs. Pitt's name was not new to mc. I know her as the ( asso-ciate-editor of the Melbourne "Socialist" and as the writer of numerous pieces of fugitive verse, several of w'hioh had found their way into my scrapbook as being worthy of more, than the ephemeral life bestowed upon them by the weekly newspaper or monthly magazine. The. editor handed mc various criticisms, also, more or less laudatory of Mrs. Pitt's work, which, unfortunately, I read before taking no the book for review. I writ© "unfoi-t.iuia.tely" advisedly. I hold it one of the worst preparations for such work to first get to know what other critics think of poem, essay, or story one is called to animadvert upon. Because, if one would speak with a. not© of his own, and not merely echo the praise or blame of others, one may nave to search deeper, and sift moro careftally than, time or inclination - permits in order to discover some gem or flaw (according to bias) which those others have missed. The more conscientiously the latter have done their work the harder the. task of the later critic, and setting difficulties in the path of a reviewer is not the surest way of winning his encomiums. Again: The stronger the personal note in the others, the more this or that critic dogmatises or theorises, the more one taking the opposite view is likely to lose sight of his subject in an effort to combat the particular fallacies (as he thinks) promulgated under the guise of a critique.

Thus I found my birse rising at certain claims and statements made by Bernard O'Dowd in his appreciative notice of Mrs. Pitt which appeared in the. Melbourne "Socialist" some- time ago. Of these I he-re mention but one. In referring to the faults in rhythm, painfully apparent in a few of Mrs. Pitt's verses, ho declares that such faults are common in the case of "writers of English who ure of Irish origin." And this from one who himself is of Irish (Celtic) extraction ! "" I wonder if O'Dowd believes this, or was he merely letting his sensitive Irish heart make an excuse for a fault his sensitive poetic ear could not fail to deprecate?

In my opinion, this handicap (writi?#g in a foreign tongue) pointed out by O'Dowd is the strength of tho Celtic bard —Irish or Scots. Nay, the poets of Celtic descent writing in English not only excel in the perfection of English rhythm, but have discovered to English readers a cadence and a phrasing peculiarly their own. If this be not so, whence the supremacy of the Irish and Scots poets in the realm of English lyrical verse? Even the apostate O'Dowd will not- deny their kingship in that domain. An he would, let him have proof. Take Palgrave's "Golden Treasury of English Verse" (the original collection) con'iaining the cream of English lyrical poetry. Is tho Celtic singer conspicuous by his absence? Nay, verily! I have not a copy of Palgrave's classic besklo mc, but, if 1113' memory does not trick mc, exactly onehalf of the poots included in that unrivalled compilation are Celts ! Think, Ireland and Scotland combined, having little more than one-fourth of the population of England, and using a fremmit tongue, produce an equal ninnber of front-rank lyrists and a majority of front-rank lyrics! And what of our Australasian singers? Plow many of them, past or present, have not had, or have not, Celtic blood in. their veins ? I fcrlie you could count them on th® fingers of one hand, avic. Bernard, my bouchailin ban, read our Celtic bards a little more and the classical a little less. Believe mc, it will do you a lot of good—in more ways than you wot of. But Mrs. Pitt (nee McKeown). Born on a little out-back farm in North Gippsland. From her earliest j-ears helping in the farm work as the average farm child must help in these new Lands—toiling in the fields, milking cows, feeding the eornstripper, bagging potatoes, driving horses, and the hundred and one other "odd" jobs of the farm. She did them all, and yet in her eleventh year, although her attendance at school had been exceedingly irregular, she secured her certificate with credit. She wanted to become a teacher, but her help was needed on the farm. Reason? Economic. She was "as good to dad as a man," ay, and cheaper. The last was the deciding factor. So she continued

to work on the farm, "like a. man," until, in her eighteenth year, her health broke down. In her twentieth year she left the farm for good and took up work in a photographic studio* afterwards "drifting into literature." Subsequently she married, and now, her husband stricken with miner's phthisis, she toils ungrudgingly for those she loves.

But Ma.rie Pitt's book. When Beaumarchais, in his famous

comedy, "Le Barbiere de Saville," put into th© mouth of "Figaro" the words "Cc gui ne vaut pas-la peine d'etre dit, on le clmnte," he surely of "Cassius Oasius" and his "pieces." Whether or not this be the case (and perhaps "Cassius" is entitled to the benefit of the doubt), I am certain he was not thinking of Marie Pitt, whose neat little volume of poems has given mc much joy. The volume is made up of a selection of Mrs. Pitt's verses which from time to time have appeared in the varioiis Labor and Socialist papers of Australia, and with the beauty of more- than one of which, as already indicated, I was much taken on my first perusal of them In one or other of these publications. Mrs. Pitt isjio long-winded or loud-voiced singer, and in. her songs- it may be a voice of less volume than sweetness that makes the music, but the music is genuine, and enjoyable always. Among the poems most to my liking I would instance ''The, Reiver," with its touch of the weird, "City Hunger," a heartcry for human society and for the fallen by the way. "A Gallop of Fire" (you feel the brazen breath upon your cheek) is finely conceived and grandly wrought out. Of her few, too few, exercises in the sonnet, "Evil" a.nd "The Enslavement," though, not correct as to form (the same charge can be laid against many of the Masters) entitle her to a place among the best sonnet writers in the English language, especially "The Enslavement/ not only for its virile phrasing, but for the daring conception of its sestett.

Rail not at Mammon, helots of to-day. Nor cures Bellona, goddess of the sword, Not" Tyranny, of To-il meet overlord: This is your covenant —"You must obey.'" Under its ban your helot-mothers lay; Your sires, slave-born to slave-born mothers, poured The gluttons' wine, or cringed for bed . and board; Why murmur then? And whence your blank dismay? Not with red rite of sword on Strife's wan hill, 'Mid clash of arms and pomp of war's estate, Was Freedom slain, and her strong sons laid low.' But in some wild red dawning long ago, Wli>en Man, the savage, took his savage nuate, And beat, and bent, and broke her to his will. Mrs. Pitt has essayed, also, that most difficult form of poetic expression, blank verse —more difficult since it attained such perfection at the hands of Tennyson and the other Victorian singers. The following lines are not an unworthy echo of those Master Songsmiths. Hear her: See here the legal bill of his decease — And "Death from natural causes" writ thereon By our respected city coroner.

And lo! for those that read, ■'tis countersigned All in the grim sign manual of the three Dark sisters, borrow, Hanger, and Despair. Sic transit! In the game upon the board ,r Fis dross kings count —a man is but a pawn! "The Keening" is grand in its note of revolt, and one foe Is that behind it lies the bitterness of personal, as well as class., experience. List: Yβ were the lords of Labor, They were the slaves of Need. Homes had they for the keeping — Children to clothe and feed. Ye paid them currency wages — Shall it stand to your souls for shrift That ye bought them in open market At "seveii-and-six a shift?" And ye who con the nation, ■ Statesmen who rule the State! Foolish are ye in your weakness, Wise are we in our hate! Traitors and false that pander To the spilLers of human life, Slaying with swords of silence Who dared not &lay with the knife! I confess, then, to being pleased with much of Mrs. Pitt's work, more especially with the- least ambitious a.nd, perhaps (logically) most successful efforts of her muse. If you would understand what I meaai, take these verses from "Hamilton": O the moon, the lonely moon, leaning low on Hamilton, Through the years that sunder us the dead come back, come back j Scent of Avhite eucrephia stars blown, on winds of Memory, Glint and gleam of fa.gus gold adown the torrent's track. Half my heart is buried there, buried high on Hamilton, Lonely is the sepulchre with never stone for sign, Where the nodding myrtle plumes stand like sable s-entin-els, And the ruddy rimony wreathes the hooded pine. How the rhythm lays hold of you, haunts you! The name of your town, like tlie name of my town, may not be Hamilton, but if we have "wandered yont," then, as we read these- verses, somehow, neither you nor I can tell by what how, your town comes back to you, as my town comes back to mc, with its visions of youthtime, full of sweet, though vain, regrets. Alasl

We shall ne'er go back again, back again to Hamilton, Heart o' mc, out track is toward the heart of burning day; Hills beyond the call of hills beaconing and beckoning—

Westward, westward winds the track, a thread of dusky grey.

But there! The limited number and restricted, length of "The Worker's" columns compel mc reluctantly to refrain from quoting further. I recommend "Worker" readers to Mrs. Pitt's book for a fuller draught of that true poetic vintage of which I have enabled them herein but to sip. Comrade Marie Pitt, you have sung your way into my heart, and yen are right welcome there.