But the Western mind has not been accustomed to think of spiritual life as outside of man; and much of natural poetry has consequently remained undeveloped in Western countries.

A strange little poem, "The White Moth," is an exception to the general rule that I have indicated; but I am almost certain that its author, A.T.

Quiller-Couch, must have read Oriental books, or obtained his fancy from some Eastern source.

As the knowledge of Indian literature becomes more general in England, we may expect to find poetry much influenced by Oriental ideas.

At the present time, such a composition as this is quite a strange anomaly.
_If a leaf rustled, she would start: And yet she died, a year ago.
How had so frail a thing the heart To journey where she trembled so?
And do they turn and turn in fright, Those little feet, in so much night ?_ The light above the poet's head Streamed on the page and on the cloth, And twice and thrice there buffeted On the black pane a white-winged moth: 'Twas Annie's soul that beat outside, And "Open, open, open!" cried: "I could not find the way to God; There were too many flaming suns For signposts, and the fearful road Led over wastes where millions Of tangled comets hissed and burned-- I was bewildered and I turned.
"Oh, it was easy then! I knew Your window and no star beside.
Look up and take me back to you!" -- He rose and thrust the window wide.
'Twas but because his brain was hot With rhyming; for he heard her not.
But poets polishing a phrase Show anger over trivial things; And as she blundered in the blaze Towards him, on ecstatic wings, He raised a hand and smote her dead; Then wrote "_That I had died instead!_" The lover, or bereaved husband, is writing a poem of which a part is given in the first stanza--which is therefore put in italics.