A delightful impression of rain-washed, wind-swept morning is given by the frontispiece, in which Thel--a motive of perfect poetic grace--contemplates the wooing of the fairy Dew, whose home is in the calyx of the flowers, by the Cloud. Above their heads is a patch of blue sky, across which the title is written, while birds and angels wing their happy flight in the ethereal expanse. Exquisite also is the pale vision of the lily of the valley bowing before Thel. And the cloud, and the clod of the earth bending over Baby Worm, are alive with Blake's peculiar quality of imagination. The tail-piece represents a serpent of pale green hue coiling and rearing across the page. One naked infant drives him with reins, while two more ride joyously upon his back. About the same time Blake wrote a poem called "Tiriel," which will be found in the Aldine edition of his poetical works. It was never engraved in a book by him, and has little poetic beauty, being for the most part full of clamorous rage, dire slaughterings and cruel revenge, but he made some water-colour drawings illustrating the text. The Print Room does not possess a copy of the "Marriage of Heaven and Hell," which appeared in 1790, but the Reading Room has one which can be viewed in the large room set apart for rare books. None of Blake's prose writings, in sustained thought and power, are equal to it. It is an armoury containing flashing rapiers, whose thrusts reach home as suddenly as they are withdrawn again. The glitter of steel in sunlight is suggested by many of its aphorisms. I cannot forbear quoting one or two, in reading which one would seem to hear the very voice of Blake: "He whose face gives no light shall never become a star." "The roaring of lions, the howling of wolves, the raging of the stormy sea, and the destructive sword, are portions of eternity too great for the eye of man." "Prudence is a rich ugly old maid courted by Incapacity." "He who desires but acts not, breeds pestilence." "How do you know but ev'ry bird that cuts the airy way, Is an immense world of delight, clos'd by your senses five." "Damn braces; bless relaxes." "Sooner murder an infant in its cradle than nurse unacted desires." "All deities reside in the human breast." "Joys impregnate, sorrows bring forth." "Everything possible to be believed is an image of truth." "To create a little flower is the labour of ages." "Improvement makes straight roads, but the crooked roads without improvement are roads of genius." [Illustration: PRINTED AND COLOURED PLATE FROM THE BRITISH MUSEUM COPY OF THE "MARRIAGE OF HEAVEN AND HELL," PRODUCED 1790]