their own emotions. Inconstancy is the breath of love's nostrils, and the inspiration of love's songs, which enchant us because they express an exquisite sentiment in its brief moment of ascendency. The tell-tale past, the dubious future, are alike discreetly ignored. Love in the drama and in the romance plays rather a heavy part. It is too obtrusively omniscient. It is far too self-assertive. Yet the average taxpayer, as has been well remarked, is no more capable of a grand passion than of a grand opera. The utmost he can achieve is some fair, fleeting hour, and with the imperative gladness of such an hour the love-song thrills sympathetically. It is not its business to
recapture
That first fine careless rapture.
It does not essay the impossible.
Now the old and nameless French poet who wrote—
Femme, plaisir de demye heure,
Et ennuy qui sans fins demeure,
was perhaps too ungraciously candid. Such things, when said at all, should be said prettily.
