... he said (and dreary as a wind that moans thru the crosses of an old graveyard was his voice): "I will prove to you that these three men in the cage are criminals and murderers and that they ought to be put to death." Love, it was then that I heard for the first time the creak of the moth that was eating the old painting and the old books, and the worm that was gnawing the old bench, and it was then that I saw that all the old men around the great greenish room were dead. They were dead like the old man in the painting, save that they could still read the old books he could read no more, and still spoke and heard the old words he could speak and hear no more, and still passed the judgment of the dead, which he could no more pass, upon the mighty life of the world outside that throbbed and thundered and clamored and roared the wonderful anthem of human labor to the fatherly justice of the Sun. To me such stuff as this means a hundred times more than a thousand sonnets to a mistress' eye-lash, or than the weak maudlinities of an absinthe-soaked eroto-dabbler, wailing puling repentance to a pale Christ. It is compact of life--life as it is today, made, not for the tittillation of dilletantes, but for the enjoyment and inspiration of men who can appreciate the meat of life redolent of sweat and blood and tears. This is Giovannitti's picture of the Republic, after it had been gained with blood and sacrifice: When night with velvet-sandaled feet Stole in her chamber's solitude, Behold! she lay there naked, lewd, A drunken harlot of the street, With withered breasts and shaggy hair Soiled by each wanton, frothy kiss, Between a sergeant of police And a decrepit millionaire. Love poems also figure in the book, but the dominant note is that of conflict. Giovannitti has realized the pregnant fact that in struggle is the greatest joy, that the ecstasy of growth and striving is worth more that the bovine placidity of "happiness." At the end of his love-song, _The Praise of Spring_, he says: But shall I sing of love now, I who could only sing to the tune of the clarions of war? And shall I forget for a woman my black frothing horse that neighs after the twanging arrows in the wind? And shall I not lose my strength when her arms shall encircle me where thou hast girt me with the sword, O Gea, my mother immortal? Giovannitti makes no claim for inclusion in Parnassian galleries. He believes that deeds count for more than words, and he essays but to make a handful of war-songs for the pleasure of his comrades. Still may my song, before the sun's Reveille, speed the hours that tire, While they are cleaning up their guns Around the cheery bivouac fire.