Page:Poet Lore, volume 1, 1889.djvu/17



N the legends of King Arthur it is narrated that when men sat at meat the Holy Grail entered the hall and filled the whole court with sweet odors. It proceeded to the place of every knight at the board, though none might see who carried it. As it passed, each guest who had proved himself fearless, daring, and true found his trencher "filled with every kind of meat that a man would wish to have;" but the cowardly and faithless companion had his dish left empty, and was forthwith thrust out from the feasting chamber.

If in the populous symposium of modern poets we had some such sweet and facile arbiter to red-letter the meritorious, so that we might devote our attention to them, and scratch those devoid of merit, so that we might pass them by unheeded, it would be a pleasing circumstance to those of us whose tastes prompt to the study of contemporary literature.