Excerpt from The Seagulls, and Other Poems Several years ago, her mother cautioned her against thinking much of any little power she might possess, such as that of writing verse. She instantly and nat urally replied, that it would be silly to be conceited about this; she was only the jug out of which the water was poured. No more striking illustration of what a recent writer calls a genuine uprush of sub liminal inspiration could well be found. Many, or indeed most, of the poems of childhood, written by those who subsequently became great poets, and preserved by the prophetic anticipations of a fond mother, though they may sometimes have been worth preserving in themselves, derive most of their inter est from the psychological point of view. They are cherished chiefly in the reflected light of the fame to which the writer subsequently attained. These poems, on the contrary, are published while the authoress is still a child. They stand on their own merits, and, whatever the future may have in store for the little authoress, few will be disposed to deny that the promise is as great as the performance is remarkable. R. Boswom'u smith. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.