rative, the mode of presentation is often that
of purely dramatic dialogue.

Take a contemporary illustration of this
blending of types. Mr. Vachel Lindsay has
told us the origins of his striking poem "The
Congo." He was already in a "national-
theme mood," he says, when he listened to
a sermon about missionaries on the Congo
River. The word "Congo" began to haunt
him. "It echoed with the war-drums and
cannibal yells of Africa." Then, for a list of
colors for his palette, he had boyish memories
of Stanley Darkest Africa, and of the dances
of the Dahomey Amazons at the World's Fair
in Chicago. He had seen the anti-negro riots
in Springfield, Illinois. He had gone through
a score of negro-saloons -- "barrel-houses"
-- on Eleventh Avenue, New York, and had
"accumulated a jungle impression that re-
mains with me yet." Above all, there was
Conrad Heart of Darkness. "I wanted to
reiterate the word Congo -- and the several
refrains in a way that would echo stories like
that. I wanted to suggest the terror, the
reeking swamp-fever, the forest splendor, the
black-lacquered loveliness, and above all the
eternal fatality of Africa, that Conrad has

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