Alone, alone I lie. Ah! bitter smarting! Thou to the last Didst cling, kiss fast, Yet art thou past Beyond me, in the hollow of a blast. * * * * * ‘Michael Field’ did not come into existence until the publication of _Callirrhoë_ in 1884. The poets put behind them, as experimental work, the two volumes which they had already published, and began afresh, changing their pen-names the better to close the past. The pseudonym under which they now hid themselves was chosen somewhat arbitrarily, ‘Michael’ because they liked the name and its associations, ‘Field’ because it went well with ‘Michael.’ But it is true also that they had a great admiration for the work of William Michael Rossetti, whom, Katharine says in one of her letters, they regarded as “a kind of god-father”; and it is true, too, that ‘Field’ had been an old nickname of Edith. Their family indulged freely in pet names, and Edith was teased by a nurse, from her boyish appearance during a fever in Dresden, as the “little Heinrich.” Thenceforth she became Henry for Katharine, and Katharine was Michael to her and to their intimates. _Callirrhoë_ was well received, and went to a second edition in November of the same year. It is amusing now to read the praises that were lavished upon ‘Mr Field’ upon his first appearance. Thus the _Saturday Review_ talked of “the immutable attributes of poetry ... beauty of conception ... strength and purity of language ... brilliant distinction and consistent development of the characters ... a poet of distinguished powers”--all of which is very true. The _Spectator_ announced “the ring of a new voice which is likely to be heard far and wide among the English-speaking peoples”--and that may yet become true, if the English-speaking peoples are allowed to hear the voice. The _Athenæum_ saw “something almost of Shakespearean penetration”; the _Academy_ rejoiced in “a gospel of ecstasy ... a fresh poetic ring ... a fresh gift of song ... a picturesque and vivid style.” The _Pall Mall Gazette_ quoted a lyric which “Drayton would not have refused to sign”; and, not to multiply these perfectly just remarks, the _Liverpool Mercury_ crowned them all in a flash of real perception, by noting that which I believe to be Michael Field’s first virtue as a dramatist in these terms: “A really imaginative creator ... will often make his dialogue proceed by abrupt starts, which seem at first like breaches of continuity, but are in reality true to a higher though more occult logic of evolution. This last characteristic we have remarked in Mr Field, and it is one he shares with Shakespeare.”