'Yet he was a loyal German, with a childlike faith in the views of his country's rulers. In October 1914, he signed the notorious declaration of the ninety-three intellectuals to the world, › and he was not among those who, since the close of the war, have explained that they signed it hurriedly without reading it through, or who definitely repudiated it.

"That which appeals mostly to the imagination about the X-rays is undoubtedly their quality of mystery. What really are these invisible radiations, endowed with such marvelous attributes, which project themselves in a straight line, like light, but which can neither be bent, broken, nor interrupted? Their discoverer himself declared his inability to answer the question. Just X-rays-and they permit us to examine the interior of the human body. The world loves the marvelous, the incomprehensible.

'Who of us has not preserved some memory of his old chemistry classes, of the bright-colored Gessler tubes and those of Sir William Crookes with their cathodic rays, very curious even then, and destined eventually to give birth to the X-rays when they were directed against a surface of glass, of platinum, or of some other substance? In reality, Röntgen's discovery falls into its place as one of a logical series of research problems. And in this series, whose future development the dazzled imagination cannot perceive, Wilhelm Röntgen will have an honored place as one of the principal pioneers. It was he who made to a visitor a remark still remembered by the wise: "I have no preconceived ideas-I experiment."'

DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS OF POETS AND MUSICIANS

Do 'music and sweet poetry' really agree, or can they ever agree? The in

quiry is made by the musical critic of the London Times, whose interest is roused by the advocacy by Mr. Herbert Bedford, the English musician, of modern unaccompanied song. Mr. Bedford would have more attention paid to the words, and if he could arrange things to suit himself, the accompaniment would vanish altogether. But the Times critic has his doubts. He admits that there is a kinship between words and music among uncivilized peoples or among the uneducated.

The identity survives in the mind of the natural unlettered folk-singer, and collectors of folk-song have often remarked that the singer of a ballad of some dozen verses is quite unable to hum the tune without the words, or to recite the words without the tune. The two together form a single concept of his brain.

Yet lately, that is in the last five centuries or so- a mere trifle of time in the life of both arts the two have fallen out, and have gone through life bickering as grown-up brother and sister are apt to do when a mutual affection and a common interest in each other's welfare are too much taken for granted. This seems largely due to the emancipation of the sister— music. She has become a very independent young woman, has discovered that she has a life of her own and has asserted her right to

live it in her own way.

That is the musical attitude, but what does the poet think about it? As the Times critic points out:

We do not often find the modern poet crying out that his art is stultified for want of the vivifying power of a musical counterpart. On the contrary we find at best a good-humored tolerance of musical 'settings,' at worst considerable irritation at the refusal of music to let the matter alone. Milton patted Henry Lawes on the back in a famous sonnet, because his tunes meddled less with the poetic values of the words set than did those of greater musicians of an earlier generation. Tennyson was generally inclined to quarrel with the musical setting of his poetry; but he thought

Sullivan less tiresome than most composers, and he consented to dress up for him 'a puppet whose almost only merit is, perhaps, that it can dance to Mr. Sullivan's instrument.' How often do we find that the poet who writes for music is just dressing up a puppet, Tennyson-wise, in the hope that his real art may be allowed to escape the attentions of the musician?

action of the drama takes place in England at the time of the Luddite Riots, over a hundred years ago. The central figure of the play is the great steam-engine that rouses the frenzy of the miserable mill-workers and dominates such characters as the author dimly sketches out. Herr Toller is always aiming for a powerful emo

most extreme liberties with the verse and

then we get a 'Song of the high hills' with a chorus of three hundred people singing 'Ah' interminably, or 'Rout' with a solo voice singing 'Ce-vril-ni-ta-sa-la-vi-a.'

The wordless song, or the admittedly nonsense-word song, is a type of composition far more widely cultivated by the composers of the moment than the unaccompanied song staking everything on the words. One claims the absolute independence of music, the other makes the too generous recantation of the claim. Neither, we may be fairly sure, represents any definite 'movement' capable of materially altering the relations of the two arts in song.

" THE MACHINE-WRECKERS'

SUCH plays as 'R. U. R.' and 'From Morn to Midnight' have given American audiences a bowing acquaintance with the new theatre of Middle Europe. The latest of the younger Continental playwrights to appear in English is Ernst Toller, whose greatest achievement to date, "The Machine-Wreckers,' has just been translated into English by Mr. Ashley Dukes, a London dramatic critic and the brother of Sir Paul Dukes. Curiously enough, the

intellect or acute analysis of character. There is no doubt that he succeeds in producing the desired result and English readers can only guess how much better the play is adapted to theatrical representation than to library perusal.

"The Machine-Wreckers' was produced with great success last summer at the Grosses Schauspielhaus, part of the interest in it being due to the way modern conditions are paralleled. But even apart from this, as the Times Literary Supplement says, 'Its claim to attention as a work of art is strong enough to stand alone. The author handles his characters with a masterly hand, using them in numbers to produce an orchestral effect.' The final scene around the great steam-engine in the mill brings the play to a terrifically impressive climax, the machine predominating horribly.

Some of the lines in the play are verse, most of them are prose, and the effect of this variety, though in some ways excellent, is not entirely pleasing. Mr. Dukes's translation is admirable and his preface sketches briefly and competently the work of Ernst Toller in particular, and the modern Connitental drama in general.

Laughter from a Cloud, by Walter Raleigh. London: Constable, 1923.

[Spectator]

Laughter from a Cloud is such a very charming book partly because in it we have been allowed to see Sir Walter Raleigh at his worst. The little plays in it are almost bad, almost commonplace; some of the fables are careless and derivative. But by the inclusion of these inferior pieces we are given a sort of intimacy. The reader has the sense of privilege that a social climber would experience if he were received in shirt-sleeves and braces by a great man.

Some of the occasional papers and some of the poems are, however, very good indeed. One of the most amusing is an extract from a periodical which was called The Milan. It is called 'Meat for Babes,' and purports to be a primer. The first page of 'reading' is arranged in words only of one syllable, the second of two, the third of three, the fourth of four, and the fifth of words of five syllables. In the spoof preface Sir Walter remarks that he purposes issuing a sequel where all is narrated in words of five, six, and seven syllables. "This would be invaluable for journalists.' The first extract is entitled "The Good Dean,' and begins as follows:

'Do you know old Slops? He has been made a Dean. You must not call him a fat fraud, or I will whip you.'

They are all concerned with ecclesiastical subjects, and the extract in five syllables begins:

'Enthusiastic poverty-stricken individuals, tumultuously accelerating Disestablishment, indubitably underestimate theological tergiversation. Irresponsible ecclesiastics, unanimously accumulating simoniacal remunerations, unanimously anathematize unapostolic sectarianism, irrelevantly depreciating impecunious heterodoxy.'

Some of the poems are charming. We quote in its entirety 'Wishes of an Elderly Man' (Wished at a Garden Party, June, 1914):·

'I wish I loved the Human Race;

I wish I loved its silly face;

I wish I liked the way it walks;

I wish I liked the way it talks;
And when I'm introduced to one,
I wish I thought What Jolly Fun!'

The aphorisms, too, are often startling and profound, as such things should be:

'In examinations those who do not wish to know ask questions of those who cannot tell.'

'When three Examiners agree, then is the time to study the psychology of middle-aged pedagogues.'

"The nightingale got no prize at the poultry show.'

'No race was ever won except on the race course.'

"The Oxford Final Schools and the Day of Judgment are two examinations, not one.'

Laughter from a Cloud is a book which will make those who knew and loved the man or his work regret Sir Walter Raleigh's death more than ever. He was that infrequent, but not unknown, creature, a wide-minded and truly civilized professor.

Memories of the Future: Being Memoirs of the Years 1915-1972, written in the Year of Grace 1988 by Opal, Lady Porstock, edited by Ronald A. Knox. London: Methuen, 1923. 73. 6d. net.

[Times Literary Supplement]

AFTER a long abstinence from the delights of satire, Father Ronald A. Knox, professing merely to 'edit' these Memories of the Future, has given us a work fit to stand by Absolute and Abitofhell. There is no decline in wit, no loss of savor in his curious humor, which blends an almost cynical joy in irony with an almost childish glee at the purely absurd. If anything, there is growth in fertility and resource; it was no light feat to keep this mock-panorama of the future turning without monotony for the length of a good-sized book. What is best in the fun, as fun, eludes the critic. It is the author's privilege, not the reviewer's, to tell the jokes, nor is there any point in giving the reader formal leave to laugh. We must not do more, therefore, than hint at the good things inside the show. Among them we should select the great mid-European republic, Magiria, based on the pacific principles of hotel-keeping, where all the officials wear the initials T. C. on their caps; the picture of America torn by the conflict of 'Sticky' and 'Clean' on the chewing-gum issue; the wonderful school where they realize the maxim, "Try to get a boy interested in something and he will immediately become interested in something quite different.'

Three Studies in English Literature, by André Chevrillon. London: Heinemann, 1923. 8s. 6d. [W. L. Courtney in the Daily Telegraph] THE judgment of the foreigner is our nearest approach to the judgment of posterity. If this