--
* George Meredith.
--

One word more of "light and fleeting shadow". In the greatness of his nature
he must be ranked with Milton, Defoe, and Scott. His very shortcomings,
such as they were, were never baneful growths, but mere weeds,
with a certain pleasant though pungent savour moreover,
growing upon a rich, an exuberant soil. Pluck one of the least lovely --
rather call it the unworthy arrow shot at the body of a dead comrade,
so innocent of ill intent: yet it too has a beauty of its own,
for the shaft was aflame from the fulness of a heart whose love had withstood
the chill passage of the years.

--------

On the night of Browning's death a new star suddenly appeared in Orion.*
The coincidence is suggestive if we like to indulge in the fancy
that in that constellation --

"No more subjected to the change or chance
Of the unsteady planets ----"

gleam those other "abodes where the Immortals are." Certainly,
a wandering fire has passed away from us. Whither has it gone?
To that new star in Orion: or whirled to remote silences
in the trail of lost meteors? Whence, and for how long,
will its rays reach our storm and gloom-beleaguered earth?