4 NOVEMBER 1949, Page 7

Masks

How should our children guess We once were the same Who have so grotesquely outgrown that name ?

A frog-prince wins their credence, But what son or daughter delves Into our lost, unimaginable selves ?

In vain we advance proof ; Story or photograph Evoke silence, the incredulous laugh.

No more than a mirror Can they see within, Know the continuity under the skin, Or that past and present are one And there persists still, Under time's accretions, the original.

W. J. STRACHAN.