NOTES

New Zealand Tablet, 15 May 1919, Page 26

NOTES

Our Peace Hymn We are pleased to be able to announce that we will in a short time present to our readers as a supplement to the Tablet a new Peace Hymn of great literary and musical distinction. The words were written by Miss Eileen Duggan, whose poems have been received with unstinted praise, by Tablet readers during the past few years. Mr. Albert Yallis, the organist of St. Joseph’s Cathedral, kindly composed the musical accompaniment, for which .his name is in itself a high guarantee to the cognoscenti of musical circles in the Dominion. Capable critics who have heard the hymn played and sung have expressed their appreciation and approval. We hope it will be welcomed, by our Catholic teachers and that it will be used by them universally for the approaching Peace Celebrations. Arrangements wild be made, if necessary, to supply numbers of copies at a cheap rate to Catholic choirs, schools, and institutions. We recommend them to avail themselves of this opportunity of securing a really fine piece of original work, in which both the words and the accompaniment are artistic and beautiful. It has been suggested by that there are too many verses in the hymn for ordinary singing, but we prefer to publish it a? WP received it from Miss Duggan, whose wqrk we regard as too precious for emendation on our part, They who find it too long can easily omit a verse or two to suit their own views. We are confident that when our supplement finds its way to our readers .they will be grateful to Miss Duggan and Mr. Yallis for a real treat. Good Wine Needs No Bush We do violence to our own judgment by repeating for the benefit of a few anti-Irish Irishmen who go round the country reviling us because we did not put their judgment before the truth, some recent tributes to the Tablet. Good wine needs no bush, but ft may be a consolation to our loyal friends to knpw how little the opinions of *ur disgruntled critics, who say pf us the thing they would fain have true, matter. We had a letter from L. J. Walshe, the author pf a new Irish novel highly praised in the New. Witness (and in the Tabled), telling us that he was delighted whenever he came across a copy of the N.Z. Tablet, and that he prayed that God might bless our efforts to further the cause of Irish freedom- A tribute reached us from a well-known Australian clergyman, who - recognises' that we were the first to strike out honestly for Sinn Fein, I-while so many others sat on the fence -watchin" how the cat would jump. * Lastly, Horn Rome, from

Ireland, and from various places in New Zealand we have, time and again, been told that our columns of literary notes are the best of the kind in any periodical, within the knowledge of the writers. One correspondent tells’us that he has made a book of cuttings' from that department, and that it cheers him in many a lonely hour ; another suggests that we should do the same' for the benefit of readers in general. And, as a distinguished scholar and writer- recently said to us, the best test is the approbation of the Catholic press, and “the Tablet is now quoted far more than any other of its contemporaries in Australasia.” Lastly, we have a high testimony of another sort: Father Hull, S.J., whose approval is a high compliment, embodies a Tablet editorial in a recent leading article of the Bombay Examiner, while in the leading Catholic weekly in the United States we find our remarks on the necessity of home training commended for the meditation of the American Catholics. We can afford to be charitable to a few sore-heads. William Sharp William Sharp managed during his lifetime to •achieve distinction as a writer under two names, and not until alter his death was it definitely known that he and Fiona MacLeod were one and the same. In his short poems there is a simple bcantv and a spontaneity reminiscent of older poets, but combined with an individuality of his own. A good example of his work is the following fancy; The Song of Flowers. What is a bird but a living flower ? A flower but the soul of some dead bird I And what is a weed but the dying breath Of a perjured word? A flower is the soul of a singing bird. The scent is the breath of an old-time song: But a weed and a thorn spring forth each day For a new-done wrong. Dead souls of song-birds, thro’ the green grass. Or deep in the midst of the golden grain, In woodland valley where hill-streams pass. We flourish again. he flowers are the joy of the whole wide earth, Sweet Nature’s laughter and secret tears Whoso hearkens a bird in its spring-time mirth The song of a flower-soul hears. As a specimen of his sonnets we quote the following: The Spring Wind. O full-voiced herald of immaculate spring, With clarion gladness striking every tree To answering raptures, as a resonant sea Fills rockbound shores with thunders echoing—■ O thou each beat of whose tempestuous wing Shakes the long winter sleep from bill and lea, And rouses with loud, reckless, jubilant glee The birds that have not dared as yet to sing. O wind that comest with prophetic cries, Hast thou indeed beheld the face that, is The joy of poets and the glory of birds Spring’s face itself— thou ’neath blqer skies Met the warm lips that are the gates of bliss. And heard June’s leaf-like whisper of sweet words ?