parison with the rest of his writing as Mr. Hardy's verses are in comparison with the rest of his writing, for they are not needed to explain a philosophy of life as are Mr. Hardy's verses. Fortunately, Synge attempted no philosophy, had the rare wisdom to rest content with observation.
In regard to poetry, as to all his art, Synge had, however, definite views, though his verse is almost too little in bulk to exemplify them. It was the poetry of exaltation, as it was the drama of exaltation, as it was the exaltation in living, of change and speed and danger and love, that meant most to him. He held further that "in these days poetry is usually a flower of evil or good; but it is the timber of poetry that wears most surely, and there is no timber that has not strong roots among the clay and worms." The verse of Synge, as all his art, was so rooted, surely. "Even if we grant," he continues, "that exalted poetry can be kept successful by itself, the strong things of life are needed in poetry also, to show that what is exalted or tender is not made by feeble blood. It may almost be said that before verse can be human again it must learn to be brutal."
It is sayings of this sort that bring to mind his kinship with Whitman, to whom he is also bound by the freemasonry of the roads. Both men felt the call of the road; both loved the changing landscape and the little adventures of the caravansaries; both loved most of all the men and women they met. Once only Synge seems to have forgotten humanity when he took to the road, that time which he has recorded in "Prelude":—
