Page:The Pathfinder, Swiggett, June 1911.djvu/13

1911 is, of course, present,—though of so personal a sort that the late Richard Henry Stoddard was but one of several critics to comment upon the 'unbookishness' of the poems. The reader feels the heart beating warm behind the hand that writes; he realizes, albeit unconsciously, a mingling here of the ethical and the æsthetic; and when the strain rises higher on the wing of imagination or passion, he appreciates that the poet's inward eye rests on an ideal spiritually true.

Mrs. Coates's latest published volume, Lyrics of Life, is happily named. Possibly no other three words could more suggestively describe her work,—music and thoughtful song, and a clear-eyed contemplation of life—life at its purest and truest, highest and strongest.