‘Puissante, magnifique, illustre, grave, noble reine! O Tsaristsa [_sic!_] de glace et de fastes Souveraine! Matrone hiératique et solennelle et vénérée!... Toi qui me forces à rêver, toi qui me deconcertes, Et toi surtout que j’aime, Émail, Beauté, Poème, Femme. Néva! j’évoque ton spectacle et l’hymne de ton âme!’ And René Ghil, one of the best-known Symbolists (he is chief of a school entitled ‘évolutive-instrumentiste’), draws from his lyre these tones, which I also quote in French; in the first place because they would lose their ring in a translation, and, secondly, because if I were to translate them literally, it is hopeless to suppose that the reader would think I was serious: ‘Ouïs! ouïs aux nues haut et nues où Tirent-ils d’aile immense qui vire ... et quand vide et vers les grands pétales dans l’air plus aride-- ‘(Et en le lourd venir grandi lent stridule, et Titille qui n’alentisse d’air qui dure, et! Grandie, erratile et multiple d’éveils, stride Mixte, plainte et splendeur! la plénitude aride) ‘et vers les grands pétales d’agitations Lors évanouissait un vol ardent qui stride.... ‘(des saltigrades doux n’iront plus vers les mers....)’ One thing must be acknowledged, and that is, the Symbolists have an astonishing gift for titles. The book itself may belong to pure madhouse literature; the title is always remarkable. We have already seen that Moréas names one of his collection of verses _Les Syrtes_. He might in truth just as well call it the _North Pole_, or _The Marmot_, or _Abd-el-Kader_, since these have just as much connection with the poems in the little volume as _Syrtes_; but it is undeniable that this geographical name calls up the lustre of an African sun, and the pale reflection of classic antiquity, which may well please the eye of the hysteric reader. Edouard Dubus entitles his poem, _Quand les Violons sont partis_; Louis Dumur, _Lassitudes_; Gustave Khan, _Les Palais nomades_; Maurice du Plessis, _La Peau de Marsyas_; Ernest Raynaud, _Chairs profanes_ and _Le Signe_; Henri de Régnier, _Sites et Episodes_; Arthur Rimbaud, _Les Illuminations_; Albert Saint Paul, _L’Echarpe d’Iris_; Viélé-Griffin, _Ancæus_; and Charles Vignier, _Centon_.