With loving cheek pressed close against thy horny breast, I hear the roar of sap mounting within thy veins; Tingling with buds, thy great hands open towards the west, To catch the sweetheart wind that brings the sister rains. O winds that blow from out the fruitful mouth of God, O rains that softly fall from his all-loving eyes, You that bring buds to trees and daisies to the sod, O God's best Angel of the Spring, in me arise. Le Puy en Velay By Joseph Pennell _Reproduced by the Swan Electric Engraving Company_ [Illustration: Le Puy en Velay] A Defence of Cosmetics By Max Beerbohm Nay, but it is useless to protest. Artifice must queen it once more in the town, and so, if there be any whose hearts chafe at her return, let them not say, "We have come into evil times," and be all for resistance, reformation or angry cavilling. For did the king's sceptre send the sea retrograde, or the wand of the sorcerer avail to turn the sun from its old course? And what man or what number of men ever stayed that reiterated process by which the cities of this world grow, are very strong, fail and grow again? Indeed, indeed, there is charm in every period, and only fools and flutterpates do not seek reverently for what is charming in their own day. No martyrdom, however fine, nor satire, however splendidly bitter, has changed by a little tittle the known tendency of things. It is the times that can perfect us, not we the times, and so let all of us wisely acquiesce. Like the little wired marionettes, let us acquiesce in the dance.