But my song shall see, and wake, like a flower that dawn-winds shake,
And sigh with joy the odours of its meaning.
O Lily of the King, remember then the thing
That this dead mouth sang; and thy daughters,
As they dance before His way, sing there on the Day,
What I sang when the Night was on the waters!

There is a man of genius living in England today who has been writing
verse for sixty years, but who received no public recognition as a
poet until the twentieth century. This man is Thomas Hardy. He has the
double distinction of being one of the great Victorian novelists, and
one of the most notable poets of the twentieth century. At nearly
eighty years of age, he is in full intellectual vigour, enjoys a
creative power in verse that we more often associate with youth, and
writes poetry that in matter and manner belongs distinctly to our
time. He could not possibly be omitted from any survey of contemporary
production.

As is so commonly the case with distinguished novelists, Thomas Hardy
practised verse before prose. From 1860 to 1870 he wrote many poems,
some of which appear among the Love Lyrics in _Time's
Laughingstocks,_ 1909. Then he began a career in prose fiction
which has left him today without a living rival in the world. In 1898,
with the volume called _Wessex Poems,_ embellished with
illustrations from his own hand, he challenged criticism as a
professional poet. The moderate but definite success of this
collection emboldened him to produce in 1901, _Poems of the Past and
Present._ In 1904, 1906, 1908, were issued successively the three
parts of _The Dynasts,_ a thoroughly original and greatly-planned
epical drama of the Napoleonic wars. This was followed by three books