Probably the only writer of verse who is at the same time a poet and has acquired a large popularity and public influence is Mr.Kipling.His work as a novelist we mentioned in the last chapter.

It remains to say something of his achievements in verse.
Let us grant at once his faults.

He can be violent, and over-rhetorical; he belabours you with sense impressions, and with the polysyllabic rhetoric he learned from Swinburne--and (though this is not the place for a discussion of political ideas) he can offend by the sentimental brutalism which too often passes for patriotism in his poetry.

Not that this last represents the total impression of his attitude as an Englishman.

His later work in poetry and prose, devoted to the reconstruction of English history, is remarkable for the justness and saneness of its temper.