diff options
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 3 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 11154-0.txt | 8366 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/11154-8.txt | 8794 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/11154-8.zip | bin | 0 -> 206426 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/11154.txt | 8794 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/11154.zip | bin | 0 -> 206318 bytes |
8 files changed, 25970 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/11154-0.txt b/11154-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d5c9c20 --- /dev/null +++ b/11154-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8366 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 11154 *** + +THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + +A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS. + +VOL. VIII.--JULY, 1861.--NO. XLV. + + + + + + + + OUR ORDERS. + + Weave no more silks, ye Lyons looms, + To deck our girls for gay delights! + The crimson flower of battle blooms, + And solemn marches fill the nights. + + Weave but the flag whose bars to-day + Drooped heavy o'er our early dead, + And homely garments, coarse and gray, + For orphans that must earn their bread! + + Keep back your tunes, ye viols sweet, + That pour delight from other lands! + Rouse there the dancer's restless feet,-- + The trumpet leads our warrior bands. + + And ye that wage the war of words + With mystic fame and subtle power, + Go, chatter to the idle birds, + Or teach the lesson of the hour! + + Ye Sibyl Arts, in one stern knot + Be all your offices combined! + Stand close, while Courage draws the lot, + The destiny of humankind! + + And if that destiny could fail, + The sun should darken in the sky, + The eternal bloom of Nature pale, + And God, and Truth, and Freedom die! + + + + +AGNES OF SORRENTO. + + +CHAPTER VII. + +THE DAY AT THE CONVENT. + + +The Mother Theresa sat in a sort of withdrawing-room, the roof of which +rose in arches, starred with blue and gold like that of the cloister, +and the sides were frescoed with scenes from the life of the Virgin. +Over every door, and in convenient places between the paintings, tests +of Holy Writ were illuminated in blue and scarlet and gold, with a +richness and fancifulness of outline, as if every sacred letter had +blossomed into a mystical flower. The Abbess herself, with two of her +nuns, was busily embroidering a new altar-cloth, with a lavish profusion +of adornment; and, from time to time, their voices rose in the musical +tones of an ancient Latin hymn. The words were full of that quaint +and mystical pietism with which the fashion of the times clothed the +expression of devotional feeling:-- + + "Jesu, corona virginum, + Quem mater illa concepit, + Quae sola virgo parturit, + Haec vota clemens accipe. + + "Qui pascis inter lilia + Septus choreis virginum, + Sponsus decoris gloria + Sponsisque reddens praemia. + + "Quocunque pergis, virgines + Sequuntur atque laudibus + Post te canentes cursitant + Hymnosque dulces personant[A]." + +[Footnote A: + + "Jesus, crown of virgin spirits, + Whom a virgin mother bore, + Graciously accept our praises + While thy footsteps we adore. + + "Thee among the lilies feeding + Choirs of virgins walk beside, + Bridegroom crowned with glorious beauty + Giving beauty to thy bride. + + "Where thou goest still they follow + Singing, singing as they move, + All those souls forever virgin + Wedded only to thy love."] + +This little canticle was, in truth, very different from the hymns +to Venus which used to resound in the temple which the convent had +displaced. The voices which sang were of a deep, plaintive contralto, +much resembling the richness of a tenor, and us they moved in modulated +waves of chanting sound the effect was soothing and dreamy. Agnes +stopped at the door to listen. + +"Stop, dear Jocunda," she said to the old woman, who was about to push +her way abruptly into the room, "wait till it is over." + +Jocunda, who was quite matter-of-fact in her ideas of religion, made a +little movement of impatience, but was recalled to herself by observing +the devout absorption with which Agnes, with clasped hands and downcast +head, was mentally joining in the hymn with a solemn brightness in her +young face. + +"If she hasn't got a vocation, nobody ever had one," said Jocunda, +mentally. "Deary me, I wish I had more of one myself!" + +When the strain died away, and was succeeded by a conversation on the +respective merits of two kinds of gold embroidering-thread, Agnes and +Jocunda entered the apartment. Agnes went forward and kissed the hand of +the Mother reverentially. + +Sister Theresa we have before described as tall, pale, and sad-eyed,--a +moonlight style of person, wanting in all those elements of warm color +and physical solidity which give the impression of a real vital human +existence. The strongest affection she had ever known had been that +which had been excited by the childish beauty and graces of Agnes, and +she folded her in her arms and kissed her forehead with a warmth that +had in it the semblance of maternity. + +"Grandmamma has given me a day to spend with you, dear mother," said +Agnes. + +"Welcome, dear little child!" said Mother Theresa. "Your spiritual home +always stands open to you." + +"I have something to speak to you of in particular, my mother," said +Agnes, blushing deeply. + +"Indeed!" said the Mother Theresa, a slight movement of curiosity +arising in her mind as she signed to the two nuns to leave the +apartment. + +"My mother," said Agnes, "yesterday evening, as grandmamma and I were +sitting at the gate, selling oranges, a young cavalier came up and +bought oranges of me, and he kissed my forehead and asked me to pray for +him, and gave me this ring for the shrine of Saint Agnes." + +"Kissed your forehead!" said Jocunda, "here's a pretty go! it isn't like +you, Agnes, to let him." + +"He did it before I knew," said Agnes. "Grandmamma reproved him, and +then he seemed to repent, and gave this ring for the shrine of Saint +Agnes." + +"And a pretty one it is, too," said Jocunda. "We haven't a prettier in +all our treasury. Not even the great emerald the Queen gave is better in +its way than this." + +"And he asked you to pray for him?" said Mother Theresa. + +"Yes, mother dear; he looked right into my eyes and made me look into +his, and made me promise;--and I knew that holy virgins never refused +their prayers to any one that asked, and so I followed their example." + +"I'll warrant me he was only mocking at you for a poor little fool," +said Jocunda; "the gallants of our day don't believe much in prayers." + +"Perhaps so, Jocunda," said Agnes, gravely; "but if that be the case, he +needs prayers all the more." + +"Yes," said Mother Theresa. "Remember the story of the blessed Saint +Dorothea,--how a wicked young nobleman mocked at her, when she was going +to execution, and said, 'Dorothea, Dorothea, I will believe, when you +shall send me down some of the fruits and flowers of Paradise'; and she, +full of faith, said, 'To-day I will send them'; and, wonderful to tell, +that very day, at evening, an angel came to the young man with a basket +of citrons and roses, and said, 'Dorothea sends thee these, wherefore +believe.' See what grace a pure maiden can bring to a thoughtless young +man,--for this young man was converted and became a champion of the +faith." + +"That was in the old times," said Jocunda, skeptically. "I don't believe +setting the lamb to pray for the wolf will do much in our day. Prithee, +child, what manner of man was this gallant?" + +"He was beautiful as an angel," said Agnes, "only it was not a good +beauty. He looked proud and sad, both,--like one who is not at ease in +his heart. Indeed, I feel very sorry for him; his eyes made a kind of +trouble in my mind, that reminds me to pray for him often." + +"And I will join my prayers to yours, dear daughter," said the Mother +Theresa; "I long to have you with us, that we may pray together every +day;--say, do you think your grandmamma will spare you to us wholly +before long?" + +"Grandmamma will not hear of it yet," said Agnes; "and she loves me so, +it would break her heart, if I should leave her, and she could not be +happy here;--but, mother, you have told me we could carry an altar +always in our hearts, and adore in secret. When it is God's will I +should come to you, He will incline her heart." + +"Between you and me, little one," said Jocunda, "I think there will soon +be a third person who will have something to say in the case." + +"Whom do you mean?" said Agnes. + +"A husband," said Jocunda; "I suppose your grandmother has one picked +out for you. You are neither humpbacked nor cross-eyed, that you +shouldn't have one as well as other girls." + +"I don't want one, Jocunda; and I have promised to Saint Agnes to come +here, if she will only get grandmother to consent." + +"Bless you, my daughter!" said Mother Theresa; "only persevere and the +way will be opened." + +"Well, well," said Jocunda, "we'll see. Come, little one, if you +wouldn't have your flowers wilt, we must go back and look after them." + +Reverently kissing the hand of the Abbess, Agnes withdrew with her old +friend, and crossed again to the garden to attend to her flowers. + +"Well now, childie," said Jocunda, "you can sit here and weave your +garlands, while I go and look after the conserves of raisins and citrons +that Sister Cattarina is making. She is stupid at anything but her +prayers, is Cattarina. Our Lady be gracious to me! I think I got my +vocation from Saint Martha, and if it wasn't for me, I don't know what +would become of things in the Convent. Why, since I came here, our +conserves, done up in fig-leaf packages, have had quite a run at Court, +and our gracious Queen herself was good enough to send an order for a +hundred of them last week. I could have laughed to see how puzzled the +Mother Theresa looked;--much she knows about conserves! I suppose she +thinks Gabriel brings them straight down from Paradise, done up in +leaves of the tree of life. Old Jocunda knows what goes to their making +up; she's good for something, if she is old and twisted; many a scrubby +old olive bears fat berries," said the old portress, chuckling. + +"Oh, dear Jocunda," said Agnes, "why must you go this minute? I want to +talk with you about so many things!" + +"Bless the sweet child! it does want its old Jocunda, does it?" said the +old woman, in the tone with which one caresses a baby. "Well, well, it +should, then! Just wait a minute, till I go and see that our holy Saint +Cattarina hasn't fallen a-praying over the conserving-pan. I'll be back +in a moment." + +So saying, she hobbled off briskly, and Agnes, sitting down on the +fragment sculptured with dancing nymphs, began abstractedly pulling her +flowers towards her, shaking from them the dew of the fountain. + +Unconsciously to herself, as she sat there, her head drooped into the +attitude of the marble nymph, and her sweet features assumed the same +expression of plaintive and dreamy thoughtfulness; her heavy dark lashes +lay on her pure waxen cheeks like the dark fringe of some tropical +flower. Her form, in its drooping outlines, scarcely yet showed the full +development of womanhood, which after-years might unfold into the ripe +fulness of her countrywomen. Her whole attitude and manner were those of +an exquisitively sensitive and highly organized being, just struggling +into the life of some mysterious new inner birth,--into the sense of +powers of feeling and being hitherto unknown even to herself. + +"Ah," she softly sighed to herself, "how little I am! how little I can +do! Could I convert one soul! Ah, holy Dorothea, send down the roses of +heaven into his soul, that he also may believe!" + +"Well, my little beauty, you have not finished even one garland," said +the voice of old Jocunda, bustling up behind her. "Praise to Saint +Martha, the conserves are doing well, and so I catch a minute for my +little heart." + +So saying, she sat down with her spindle and flax by Agnes, for an +afternoon gossip. + +"Dear Jocunda, I have heard you tell stories about spirits that haunt +lonesome places. Did you ever hear about any in the gorge?" + +"Why, bless the child, yes,--spirits are always pacing up and down in +lonely places. Father Anselmo told me that; and he had seen a priest +once that had seen that in the Holy Scriptures themselves,--so it must +be true." + +"Well, did you ever hear of their making the most beautiful music?" + +"Haven't I?" said Jocunda,--"to be sure I have,--singing enough to draw +the very heart out of your body,--it's an old trick they have. Why, I +want to know if you never heard about the King of Amalfi's son coming +home from fighting for the Holy Sepulchre? Why, there's rocks not far +out from this very town where the Sirens live; and if the King's son +hadn't had a holy bishop on board, who slept every night with a piece of +the true cross under his pillow, the green ladies would have sung him +straight into perdition. They are very fair-spoken at first, and sing so +that a man gets perfectly drunk with their music, and longs to fly to +them; but they suck him down at last under water, and strangle him, and +that's the end of him." + +"You never told me about this before, Jocunda." + +"Haven't I, child? Well, I will now. You see, this good bishop, he +dreamed three times that they would sail past those rocks, and he was +told to give all the sailors holy wax from an altar-candle to stop their +ears, so that they shouldn't hear the music. Well, the King's son said +he wanted to hear the music, so he wouldn't have his ears stopped; but +he told 'em to tie him to the mast, so that he could hear it, but not to +mind a word he said, if he begged 'em ever so hard to untie him. + +"Well, you see they did it; and the old bishop, he had his ears sealed +up tight, and so did all the men; but the young man stood tied to the +mast, and when they sailed past he was like a demented creature. He +called out that it was his lady who was singing, and he wanted to go to +her,--and his mother, who they all knew was a blessed saint in paradise +years before; and he commanded them to untie him, and pulled and +strained on his cords to get free; but they only tied him the tighter, +and so they got him past,--for, thanks to the holy wax, the sailors +never heard a word, and so they kept their senses. So they all got safe +home; but the young prince was so sick and pining that he had to be +exorcised and prayed for seven times seven days before they could get +the music out of his head." + +"Why," said Agnes, "do those Sirens sing there yet?" + +"Well, that was a hundred years ago. They say the old bishop, he prayed +'em down; for he went out a little after on purpose, and gave 'em a +precious lot of holy water; most likely he got 'em pretty well under, +though my husband's brother says he's heard 'em singing in a small way, +like frogs in spring-time; but he gave 'em a pretty wide berth. You see, +these spirits are what's left of old heathen times, when, Lord bless us! +the earth was just as full of 'em as a bit of old cheese is of mites. +Now a Christian body, if they take reasonable care, can walk quit of +'em; and if they have any haunts in lonesome and doleful places, if one +puts up a cross or a shrine, they know they have to go." + +"I am thinking," said Agnes, "it would be a blessed work to put up some +shrines to Saint Agnes and our good Lord in the gorge, and I'll promise +to keep the lamps burning and the flowers in order." + +"Bless the child!" said Jocunda, "that is a pious and Christian +thought." + +"I have an uncle in Florence who is a father in the holy convent of San +Marco, who paints and works in stone,--not for money, but for the glory +of God; and when he comes this way I will speak to him about it," said +Agnes. "About this time in the spring he always visits us." + +"That's mighty well thought of," said Jocunda. "And now, tell me, little +lamb, have you any idea who this grand cavalier may be that gave you the +ring?" + +"No," said Agnes, pausing a moment over the garland of flowers she was +weaving,--"only Giulietta told me that he was brother to the King. +Giulietta said everybody knew him." + +"I'm not so sure of that," said Jocunda. "Giulietta always thinks she +knows more than she does." + +"Whatever he may be, his worldly state is nothing to me," said Agnes. "I +know him only in my prayers." + +"Ay, ay," muttered the old woman to herself, looking obliquely out of +the corner of her eye at the girl, who was busily sorting her flowers; +"perhaps he will be seeking some other acquaintance." + +"You haven't seen him since?" said Jocunda. + +"Seen him? Why, dear Jocunda, it was only last evening"-- + +"True enough. Well, child, don't think too much of him. Men are dreadful +creatures,--in these times especially; they snap up a pretty girl as a +fox does a chicken, and no questions asked." + +"I don't think he looked wicked, Jocunda; he had a proud, sorrowful +look. I don't know what could make a rich, handsome young man sorrowful; +but I feel in my heart that he is not happy. Mother Theresa says that +those who can do nothing but pray may convert princes without knowing +it." + +"May be it is so," said Jocunda, in the same tone in which thrifty +professors of religion often assent to the same sort of truths in our +days. "I've seen a good deal of that sort of cattle in my day; and one +would think, by their actions, that praying souls must be scarce where +they came from." + +Agnes abstractedly stooped and began plucking handfuls of lycopodium, +which was growing green and feathery on one side of the marble frieze on +which she was sitting; in so doing, a fragment of white marble, which +had been overgrown in the luxuriant green, appeared to view. It was +that frequent object in the Italian soil,--a portion of an old Roman +tombstone. Agnes bent over, intent on the mystic "_Dis Manibus_" in old +Roman letters. + +"Lord bless the child! I've seen thousands of them," said Jocunda; "it's +some old heathen's grave, that's been in hell these hundred years." + +"In hell?" said Agnes, with a distressful accent. + +"Of course," said Jocunda. "Where should they be? Serves 'em right, too; +they were a vile old set." + +"Oh, Jocunda, it's dreadful to think of, that they should have been in +hell all this time." + +"And no nearer the end than when they began," said Jocunda. + +Agnes gave a shivering sigh, and, looking up into the golden sky that +was pouring such floods of splendor through the orange-trees and +jasmines, thought, How could it be that the world could possibly be +going on so sweet and fair over such an abyss? + +"Oh, Jocunda!" she said, "it does seem _too_ dreadful to believe! How +could they help being heathen,--being born so,--and never hearing of the +true Church?" + +"Sure enough," said Jocunda, spinning away energetically, "but that's no +business of mine; my business is to save _my_ soul, and that's what I +came here for. The dear saints know I found it dull enough at first, for +I'd been used to jaunting round with my old man and the boys; but what +with marketing and preserving, and one thing and another, I get on +better now, praise to Saint Agnes!" + +The large, dark eyes of Agnes were fixed abstractedly on the old woman +as she spoke, slowly dilating, with a sad, mysterious expression, which +sometimes came over them. + +"Ah! how can the saints themselves be happy?" she said. "One might be +willing to wear sackcloth and sleep on the ground, one might suffer ever +so many years and years, if only one might save some of them." + +"Well, it does seem hard," said Jocunda; "but what's the use of thinking +of it? Old Father Anselmo told us in one of his sermons that the Lord +wills that his saints should come to rejoice in the punishment of all +heathens and heretics; and he told us about a great saint once, who took +it into his head to be distressed because one of the old heathen whose +books he was fond of reading had gone to hell,--and he fasted and +prayed, and wouldn't take no for an answer, till he got him out." + +"He did, then?" said Agnes, clasping her hands in an ecstasy. + +"Yes; but the good Lord told him never to try it again,--and He struck +him dumb, as a kind of hint, you know. Why, Father Anselmo said that +even getting souls out of purgatory was no easy matter. He told us of +one holy nun who spent nine years fasting and praying for the soul of +her prince, who was killed in a duel, and then she saw in a vision +that he was only raised the least little bit out of the fire,--and she +offered up her life as a sacrifice to the Lord to deliver him, but, +after all, when she died he wasn't quite delivered. Such things made me +think that a poor old sinner like me would never get out at all, if I +didn't set about it in earnest,--though it a'n't all nuns that save +their souls either. I remember in Pisa I saw a great picture of the +Judgment-Day in the Campo Santo, and there were lots of abbesses, and +nuns, and monks, and bishops too, that the devils were clearing off into +the fire." + +"Oh, Jocunda, how dreadful that fire must be!" + +"Yes," said Jocunda. "Father Anselmo said hell-fire wasn't like any kind +of fire we have here,--made to warm us and cook our food,--but a kind +made especially to torment body and soul, and not made for anything +else. I remember a story he told us about that. You see, there was an +old duchess that lived in a grand old castle,--and a proud, wicked old +thing enough; and her son brought home a handsome young bride to the +castle, and the old duchess was jealous of her,--'cause, you see, she +hated to give up her place in the house, and the old family-jewels, and +all the splendid things,--and so one time, when the poor young thing was +all dressed up in a set of the old family-lace, what does the old hag do +but set fire to it!" + +"How horrible!" said Agnes. + +"Yes; and when the young thing ran screaming in her agony, the old hag +stopped her and tore off a pearl rosary that she was wearing, for fear +it should be spoiled by the fire." + +"Holy Mother! can such things be possible?" said Agnes. + +"Well, you see, she got her pay for it. That rosary was of famous old +pearls that had been in the family a hundred years; but from that moment +the good Lord struck it with a curse, and filled it white-hot with +hell-fire, so that, if anybody held it a few minutes in their hand, it +would burn to the bone. The old sinner made believe that she was in +great affliction for the death of her daughter-in-law, and that it was +all an accident, and the poor young man went raving mad,--but that awful +rosary the old hag couldn't get rid of. She couldn't give it away,--she +couldn't sell it,--but back it would come every night, and lie right +over her heart, all white-hot with the fire that burned in it. She gave +it to a convent, and she sold it to a merchant, but back it came; and +she locked it up in the heaviest chests, and she buried it down in the +lowest vaults, but it always came back in the night, till she was worn +to a skeleton; and at last the old thing died without confession or +sacrament, and went where she belonged. She was found lying dead in her +bed one morning, and the rosary was gone; but when they came to lay her +out, they found the marks of it burned to the bone into her breast. +Father Anselmo used to tell us this, to show us a little what hell-fire +was like." + +"Oh, please, Jocunda, don't let us talk about it any more," said Agnes. + +Old Jocunda, with her tough, vigorous organization and unceremonious +habits of expression, could not conceive the exquisite pain with which +this whole conversation had vibrated on the sensitive being at her right +hand,--that what merely awoke her hard-corded nerves to a dull vibration +of not unpleasant excitement was shivering and tearing the tenderer +chords of poor little Psyche beside her. + +Ages before, beneath those very skies that smiled so sweetly over +her,--amid the bloom of lemon and citron, and the perfume of jasmine and +rose, the gentlest of old Italian souls had dreamed and wondered what +might be the unknown future of the dead, and, learning his lesson from +the glorious skies and gorgeous shores which witnessed how magnificent a +Being had given existence to man, had recorded his hopes of man's future +in the words--_Aut beatus, aut nihil_; but, singular to tell, the +religion which brought with it all human tenderness and pities,--the +hospital for the sick, the refuge for the orphan, the enfranchisement +of the slave,--this religion brought also the news of the eternal, +hopeless, living torture of the great majority of mankind, past and +present. Tender spirits, like those of Dante, carried this awful mystery +as a secret and unexplained anguish; saints wrestled with God and +wept over it; but still the awful fact remained, spite of Church and +sacrament, that the gospel was in effect, to the majority of the human +race, not the glad tidings of salvation, but the sentence of immitigable +doom. + +The present traveller in Italy sees with disgust the dim and faded +frescoes in which this doom is portrayed in all its varied refinements +of torture; and the vivid Italian mind ran riot in these lurid fields, +and every monk who wanted to move his audience was in his small way a +Dante. The poet and the artist give only the highest form of the ideas +of their day, and he who cannot read the "Inferno" with firm nerves may +ask what the same representations were likely to have been in the grasp +of coarse and common minds. + +The first teachers of Christianity in Italy read the Gospels by the +light of those fiendish fires which consumed their fellows. Daily made +familiar with the scorching, the searing, the racking, the devilish +ingenuities of torture, they transferred them to the future hell of the +torturers. The sentiment within us which asserts eternal justice and +retribution was stimulated to a kind of madness by that first baptism of +fire and blood, and expanded the simple and grave warnings of the gospel +into a lurid poetry of physical torture. Hence, while Christianity +brought multiplied forms of mercy into the world, it failed for many +centuries to humanize the savage forms of justice; and rack and wheel, +fire and fagot were the modes by which human justice aspired to a +faint imitation of what divine justice was supposed to extend through +eternity. + +But it is remarkable always to observe the power of individual minds +to draw out of the popular religious ideas of their country only those +elements which suit themselves, and to drop others from their thought. +As a bee can extract pure honey from the blossoms of some plants whose +leaves are poisonous, so some souls can nourish themselves only with the +holier and more ethereal parts of popular belief. + +Agnes had hitherto dwelt only on the cheering and the joyous features of +her faith; her mind loved to muse on the legends of saints and angels +and the glories of paradise, which, with a secret buoyancy, she hoped to +be the lot of every one she saw. The mind of the Mother Theresa was of +the same elevated cast, and the terrors on which Jocunda dwelt with such +homely force of language seldom made a part of her instructions. + +Agnes tried to dismiss these gloomy images from her mind, and, after +arranging her garlands, went to decorate the shrine and altar,--a +cheerful labor of love, in which she delighted. + +To the mind of the really spiritual Christian of those ages the air of +this lower world was not as it is to us, in spite of our nominal faith +in the Bible, a blank, empty space from which all spiritual sympathy +and life have fled, but, like the atmosphere with which Raphael has +surrounded the Sistine Madonna, it was full of sympathizing faces, a +great "cloud of witnesses." The holy dead were not gone from earth; +the Church visible and invisible were in close, loving, and constant +sympathy,--still loving, praying, and watching together, though with a +veil between. + +It was at first with no idolatrous intention that the prayers of the +holy dead were invoked in acts of worship. Their prayers were asked +simply because they were felt to be as really present with their former +friends and as truly sympathetic as if no veil of silence had fallen +between. In time this simple belief had its intemperate and idolatrous +exaggerations,--the Italian soil always seeming to have a fiery +and volcanic forcing power, by which religious ideas overblossomed +themselves, and grew wild and ragged with too much enthusiasm; and, as +so often happens with friends on earth, these too much loved and revered +invisible friends became eclipsing screens instead of transmitting +mediums of God's light to the soul. + +Yet we can see in the hymns of Savonarola, who perfectly represented the +attitude of the highest Christian of those times, how perfect might +be the love and veneration for departed saints without lapsing into +idolatry, and with what an atmosphere of warmth and glory the true +belief of the unity of the Church, visible and invisible, could inspire +an elevated soul amid the discouragements of an unbelieving and +gainsaying world. + +Our little Agnes, therefore, when she had spread all her garlands out, +seemed really to feel as if the girlish figure that smiled in sacred +white from the altar-piece was a dear friend who smiled upon her, and +was watching to lead her up the path to heaven. + +Pleasantly passed the hours of that day to the girl, and when at evening +old Elsie called for her, she wondered that the day had gone so fast. + +Old Elsie returned with no inconsiderable triumph from her stand. The +cavalier had been several times during the day past her stall, and once, +stopping in a careless way to buy fruit, commented on the absence of +her young charge. This gave Elsie the highest possible idea of her own +sagacity and shrewdness, and of the promptitude with which she had taken +her measures, so that she was in as good spirits as people commonly are +who think they have performed some stroke of generalship. + +As the old woman and young girl emerged from the dark-vaulted passage +that led them down through the rocks on which the convent stood to the +sea at its base, the light of a most glorious sunset burst upon them, in +all those strange and magical mysteries of light which any one who has +walked that beach of Sorrento at evening will never forget. + +Agnes ran along the shore, and amused herself with picking up little +morsels of red and black coral, and those fragments of mosaic pavements, +blue, red, and green, which the sea is never tired of casting up from +the thousands of ancient temples and palaces which have gone to wreck +all around these shores. + +As she was busy doing this, she suddenly heard the voice of Giulietta +behind her. + +"So ho, Agnes! where have you been all day?" + +"At the Convent," said Agnes, raising herself from her work, and smiling +at Giulietta, in her frank, open way. + +"Oh, then you really did take the ring to Saint Agnes?" + +"To be sure I did," said Agnes. + +"Simple child!" said Giulietta, laughing; "that wasn't what he meant you +to do with it. He meant it for you,--only your grandmother was by. You +never will have any lovers, if she keeps you so tight." + +"I can do without," said Agnes. + +"I could tell you something about this one," said Giulietta. + +"You did tell me something yesterday," said Agnes. + +"But I could tell you some more. I know he wants to see you again." + +"What for?" said Agnes. + +"Simpleton, he's in love with you. You never had a lover;--it's time you +had." + +"I don't want one, Giulietta. I hope I never shall see him again." + +"Oh, nonsense, Agnes! Why, what a girl you are! Why, before I was as old +as you I had half-a-dozen lovers." + +"Agnes," said the sharp voice of Elsie, coming up from behind, "don't +run on ahead of me again;--and you, Mistress Baggage, let my child +alone." + +"Who's touching your child?" said Giulietta, scornfully. "Can't a body +say a civil word to her?" + +"I know what you would be after," said Elsie,--"filling her head with +talk of all the wild, loose gallants; but she is for no such market, I +promise you! Come, Agnes." + +So saying, old Elsie drew Agnes rapidly along with her, leaving +Giulietta rolling her great black eyes after them with an air of +infinite contempt. + +"The old kite!" she said; "I declare he shall get speech of the little +dove, if only to spite her. Let her try her best, and see if we don't +get round her before she knows it. Pietro says his master is certainly +wild after her, and I have promised to help him." + +Meanwhile, just as old Elsie and Agnes were turning into the +orange-orchard which led into the Gorge of Sorrento, they met the +cavalier of the evening before. + +He stopped, and, removing his cap, saluted them with as much deference +as if they had been princesses. Old Elsie frowned, and Agnes blushed +deeply;--both hurried forward. Looking back, the old woman saw that he +was walking slowly behind them, evidently watching them closely, yet not +in a way sufficiently obtrusive to warrant an open rebuff. + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +THE CAVALIER. + + +Nothing can be more striking, in common Italian life, than the contrast +between out-doors and in-doors. Without, all is fragrant and radiant; +within, mouldy, dark, and damp. Except in the well-kept palaces of the +great, houses in Italy are more like dens than habitations, and a sight +of them is a sufficient reason to the mind of any inquirer, why their +vivacious and handsome inhabitants spend their life principally in the +open air. Nothing could be more perfectly paradisiacal than this evening +at Sorrento. The sun had sunk, but left the air full of diffused +radiance, which trembled and vibrated over the thousand many-colored +waves of the sea. The moon was riding in a broad zone of purple, low +in the horizon, her silver forehead somewhat flushed in the general +rosiness that seemed to penetrate and suffuse every object. The +fishermen, who were drawing in their nets, gayly singing, seemed to +be floating on a violet-and-gold-colored flooring that broke into a +thousand gems at every dash of the oar or motion of the boat. The old +stone statue of Saint Antonio looked down in the rosy air, itself tinged +and brightened by the magical colors which floated round it. And the +girls and men of Sorrento gathered in gossiping knots on the old Roman +bridge that spanned the gorge, looked idly down into its dusky shadows, +talking the while, and playing the time-honored game of flirtation which +has gone on in all climes and languages since man and woman began. + +Conspicuous among them all was Giulietta, her blue-black hair recently +braided and polished to a glossy radiance, and all her costume arranged +to show her comely proportions to the best advantage,--her great pearl +ear-rings shaking as she tossed her head, and showing the flash of +the emerald in the middle of them. An Italian peasant-woman may trust +Providence for her gown, but ear-rings she attends to herself,--for what +is life without them? The great pearl ear-rings of the Sorrento women +are accumulated, pearl by pearl, as the price of years of labor. +Giulietta, however, had come into the world, so to speak, with a gold +spoon in her mouth,--since her grandmother, a thriving, stirring, +energetic body, had got together a pair of ear-rings of unmatched size, +which had descended as heirlooms to her, leaving her nothing to do but +display them, which she did with the freest good-will. At present she +was busily occupied in coquetting with a tall and jauntily-dressed +fellow, wearing a plumed hat and a red sash, who seemed to be mesmerized +by the power of her charms, his large dark eyes following every +movement, as she now talked with him gayly and freely, and now pretended +errands to this and that and the other person on the bridge, stationing +herself here and there, that she might have the pleasure of seeing +herself followed. + +"Giulietta," at last said the young man, earnestly, when he found her +accidentally standing alone by the parapet, "I must be going to-morrow." + +"Well, what is that to me?" said Giulietta, looking wickedly from under +her eyelashes. + +"Cruel girl! you know"---- + +"Nonsense, Pietro! I don't know anything about you"; but as Giulietta +said this, her great, soft, dark eyes looked out furtively, and said +just the contrary. + +"You will go with me?" + +"Did I ever hear anything like it? One can't be civil to a fellow but he +asks her to go to the world's end. Pray, how far is it to your dreadful +old den?" + +"Only two days' journey, Giulietta." + +"Two days!" + +"Yes, my life; and you shall ride." + +"Thank you, Sir,--I wasn't thinking of walking. But seriously, Pietro, I +am afraid it's no place for an honest girl to be in." + +"There are lots of honest women there,--all our men have wives; and our +captain has put his eye on one, too, or I'm mistaken." + +"What! little Agnes?" said Giulietta. "He will be bright that gets her. +That old dragon of a grandmother is as tight to her as her skin." + +"Our captain is used to helping himself," said Pietro. "We might carry +them both off some night, and no one the wiser; but he seems to want to +win the girl to come to him of her own accord. At any rate, we are to +be sent back to the mountains while he lingers a day or two more round +here." + +"I declare, Pietro, I think you all little better than Turks or +heathens, to talk in that way about carrying off women; and what if one +should be sick and die among you? What is to become of one's soul, I +wonder?" + +"Pshaw! don't we have priests? Why, Giulietta, we are all very pious, +and never think of going out without saying our prayers. The Madonna is +a kind Mother, and will wink very hard on the sins of such good sons as +we are. There isn't a place in all Italy where she is kept better in +candles, and in rings and bracelets, and everything a woman could want. +We never come home without bringing her something; and then we have lots +left to dress all our women like princesses; and they have nothing to do +from morning till night but play the lady. Come now?" + +At the moment this conversation was going on in the balmy, seductive +evening air at the bridge, another was transpiring in the Albergo della +Torre, one of those dark, musty dens of which we have been speaking. +In a damp, dirty chamber, whose brick floor seemed to have been +unsuspicious of even the existence of brooms for centuries, was sitting +the cavalier whom we have so often named in connection with Agnes. His +easy, high-bred air, his graceful, flexible form and handsome face +formed a singular contrast to the dark and mouldy apartment, at whose +single unglazed window he was sitting. The sight of this splendid man +gave an impression of strangeness, in the general bareness, much as if +some marvellous jewel had been unaccountably found lying on that dusty +brick floor. + +He sat deep in thought, with his elbow resting on a rickety table, his +large, piercing, dark eyes seeming intently to study the pavement. + +The door opened, and a gray-headed old man entered, who approached him +respectfully. + +"Well, Paolo?" said the cavalier, suddenly starting. + +"My Lord, the men are all going back to-night." + +"Let them go, then," said the cavalier, with an impatient movement. "I +can follow in a day or two." + +"Ah, my Lord, if I might make so bold, why should you expose your person +by staying longer? You may be recognized and"---- + +"No danger," said the other, hastily. + +"My Lord, you must forgive me, but I promised my dear lady, your mother, +on her death-bed"---- + +"To be a constant plague to me," said the cavalier, with a vexed smile +and an impatient movement; "but speak on, Paolo,--for when you once get +anything on your mind, one may as well hear it first as last." + +"Well, then, my Lord, this girl,--I have made inquiries, and every one +reports her most modest and pious,--the only grandchild of a poor old +woman. Is it worthy of a great lord of an ancient house to bring her to +shame?" + +"Who thinks of bringing her to shame? 'Lord of an ancient house'!" +added the cavalier, laughing bitterly,--"a landless beggar, cast out of +everything,--titles, estates, all! Am I, then, fallen so low that my +wooing would disgrace a peasant-girl?" + +"My Lord, you cannot mean to woo a peasant-girl in any other way than +one that would disgrace her,--one of the House of Sarelli, that goes +back to the days of the old Roman Empire!" + +"And what of the 'House of Sarelli that goes back to the days of the old +Roman Empire'? It is lying like weeds' roots uppermost in the burning +sun. What is left to me but the mountains and my sword? No, I tell +you, Paolo, Agostino Sarelli, cavalier of fortune, is not thinking of +bringing disgrace on a pious and modest maiden, unless it would disgrace +her to be his wife." + +"Now may the saints above help us! Why, my Lord, our house in days past +has been allied to royal blood. I could tell you how Joachim VI."-- + +"Come, come, my good Paolo, spare me one of your chapters of genealogy. +The fact is, my old boy, the world is all topsy-turvy, and the bottom is +the top, and it isn't much matter what comes next. Here are shoals +of noble families uprooted and lying round like those aloes that the +gardener used to throw over the wall in spring-time; and there is that +great boar of a Caesar Borgia turned in to batten and riot over our +pleasant places." + +"Oh, my Lord," said the old serving-man, with a distressful movement, +"we have fallen on evil times, to be sure, and they say his Holiness has +excommunicated us. Anselmo heard that in Naples yesterday." + +"Excommunicated!" said the young man,--every feature of his fine face, +and every nerve of his graceful form seeming to quiver with the effort +to express supreme contempt. "Excommunicated! I should _hope_ so! One +would hope through Our Lady's grace to act so that Alexander, and his +adulterous, incestuous, filthy, false-swearing, perjured, murderous +crew, _would_ excommunicate us! In these times, one's only hope of +paradise lies in being excommunicated." + +"Oh, my dear master," said the old man, falling on his knees, "what is +to become of us? That I should live to hear you talk like an infidel and +unbeliever!" + +"Why, hear you, poor old fool! Did you never hear in Dante of the Popes +that are burning in hell? Wasn't Dante a Christian, I beg to know?" + +"Oh, my Lord, my Lord! a religion got out of poetry, books, and romances +won't do to die by. We have no business with the affairs of the Head of +the Church,--it's the Lord's appointment. We have only to shut our eyes +and obey. It may all do well enough to talk so when you are young and +fresh; but when sickness and death come, then we _must_ have religion,-- +and if we have gone out of the only true Roman Catholic Apostolic +Church, what becomes of our souls? Ah, I misdoubted about your taking so +much to poetry, though my poor mistress was so proud of it; but these +poets are all heretics, my Lord,--that's my firm belief. But, my Lord, +if you do go to hell, I'm going there with you; I'm sure I never could +show my face among the saints, and you not there." + +"Well, come, then, my poor Paolo," said the cavalier, stretching out his +hand to his serving-man, "don't take it to heart so. Many a better man +than I has been excommunicated and cursed from toe to crown, and been +never a whit the worse for it. There's Jerome Savonarola there in +Florence--a most holy man, they say, who has had revelations straight +from heaven--has been excommunicated; but he preaches and gives the +sacraments all the same, and nobody minds it." + +"Well, it's all a maze to me," said the old serving-man, shaking his +white head. "I can't see into it, I don't dare to open my eyes for fear +I should get to be a heretic; it seems to me that everything is getting +mixed up together. But one must hold on to one's religion; because, +after we have lost everything in this world, it would be too bad to burn +in hell forever at the end of that." + +"Why, Paolo, I am a good Christian. I believe, with all my heart, in the +Christian religion, like the fellow in Boccaccio,--because I think it +must be from God, or else the Popes and Cardinals would have had it out +of the world long ago. Nothing but the Lord Himself could have kept it +against them." + +"There you are, my dear master, with your romances! Well, well, well! I +don't know how it'll end. I say my prayers, and try not to inquire into +what's too high for me. But now, dear master, will you stay lingering +after this girl till some of our enemies hear where you are and pounce +down upon us? Besides, the troop are never so well affected when you are +away; there are quarrels and divisions." + +"Well, well," said the cavalier, with an impatient movement,--"one day +longer. I must get a chance to speak with her once more. I _must_ see +her." + + * * * * * + + +SUN-PAINTING AND SUN-SCULPTURE; + +WITH A STEREOSCOPIC TRIP ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. + + +There is one old fable which Lord Bacon, in his "Wisdom of the +Ancients," has not interpreted. This is the flaying of Marsyas by +Apollo. Everybody remembers the accepted version of it, namely,--that +the young shepherd found Minerva's flute, and was rash enough to enter +into a musical contest with the God of Music. He was vanquished, of +course,--and the story is, that the victor fastened him to a tree and +flayed him alive. + +But the God of Song was also the God of Light, and a moment's reflection +reveals the true significance of this seemingly barbarous story. Apollo +was pleased with his young rival, fixed him in position against an iron +rest, (the _tree_ of the fable,) and took a _photograph_, a sun-picture, +of him. This thin film or _skin_ of light and shade was absurdly +interpreted as being the _cutis_, or untanned leather integument of the +young shepherd. The human discovery of the art of photography enables us +to rectify the error and restore that important article of clothing to +the youth, as well as to vindicate the character of Apollo. There is +one spot less upon the sun since the theft from heaven of Prometheus +Daguerre and his fellow-adventurers has enabled us to understand the +ancient legend. + +We are now flaying our friends and submitting to be flayed ourselves, +every few years or months or days, by the aid of the trenchant sunbeam +which performed the process for Marsyas. All the world has to submit to +it,--kings and queens with the rest. The monuments of Art and the face +of Nature herself are treated in the same way. We lift an impalpable +scale from the surface of the Pyramids. We slip off from the dome of St. +Peter's that other imponderable dome which fitted it so closely that it +betrays every scratch on the original. We skim off a thin, dry cuticle +from the rapids of Niagara, and lay it on our unmoistened paper without +breaking a bubble or losing a speck of foam. We steal a landscape from +its lawful owners, and defy the charge of dishonesty. We skin the flints +by the wayside, and nobody accuses us of meanness. + +These miracles are being worked all around us so easily and so cheaply +that most people have ceased to think of them as marvels. There is a +photographer established in every considerable village,--nay, one may +not unfrequently see a photographic _ambulance_ standing at the wayside +upon some vacant lot where it can squat unchallenged in the midst of +burdock and plantain and apple-Peru, or making a long halt in the middle +of a common by special permission of the "Selectmen." + +We must not forget the inestimable preciousness of the new Promethean +gifts because they have become familiar. Think first of the privilege we +all possess now of preserving the lineaments and looks of those dear to +us. + + "Blest be the art which can immortalize," + +said Cowper. But remember how few painted portraits really give their +subjects. Recollect those wandering Thugs of Art whose murderous doings +with the brush used frequently to involve whole families; who passed +from one country tavern to another, eating and painting their +way,--feeding a week upon the landlord, another week upon the landlady, +and two or three days apiece upon the children; as the walls of those +hospitable edifices too frequently testify even to the present day. Then +see what faithful memorials of those whom we love and would remember are +put into our hands by the new art, with the most trifling expenditure of +time and money. + +This new art is old enough already to have given us the portraits of +infants who are now growing into adolescence. By-and-by it will show +every aspect of life in the same individual, from the earliest week to +the last year of senility. We are beginning to see what it will reveal. +Children grow into beauty and out of it. The first line in the forehead, +the first streak in the hair are chronicled without malice, but without +extenuation. The footprints of thought, of passion, of purpose are all +treasured in these fossilized shadows. Family-traits show themselves in +early infancy, die out, and reappear. Flitting moods which have escaped +one pencil of sunbeams are caught by another. Each new picture gives us +a new aspect of our friend; we find he had not one face, but many. + +It is hardly too much to say, that those whom we love no longer leave us +in dying, as they did of old. They remain with us just as they appeared +in life; they look down upon us from our walls; they lie upon our +tables; they rest upon our bosoms; nay, if we will, we may wear their +portraits, like signet-rings, upon our fingers. Our own eyes lose the +images pictured on them. Parents sometimes forget the faces of their own +children in a separation of a year or two. But the unfading artificial +retina which has looked upon them retains their impress, and a fresh +sunbeam lays this on the living nerve as if it were radiated from the +breathing shape. How these shadows last, and how their originals fade +away! + +What is true of the faces of our friends is still more true of the +places we have seen and loved. No picture produces an impression on the +imagination to compare with a photographic transcript of the home of our +childhood, or any scene with which we have been long familiar. The very +point which the artist omits, in his effort to produce general effect, +may be exactly the one that individualizes the place most strongly to +our memory. There, for instance, is a photographic view of our own +birthplace, and with it of a part of our good old neighbor's dwelling. +An artist would hardly have noticed a slender, dry, leafless stalk which +traces a faint line, as you may see, along the front of our neighbor's +house next the corner. That would be nothing to him,--but to us it marks +the stem of the _honeysuckle-vine_, which we remember, with its pink +and white heavy-scented blossoms, as long as we remember the stars in +heaven. + +To this charm of fidelity in the minutest details the stereoscope adds +its astonishing illusion of solidity, and thus completes the effect +which so entrances the imagination. Perhaps there is also some +half-magnetic effect in the fixing of the eyes on the twin +pictures,--something like Mr. Braid's _hypnotism_, of which many of our +readers have doubtless heard. At least the shutting out of surrounding +objects, and the concentration of the whole attention, which is a +consequence of this, produce a dream-like exaltation of the faculties, a +kind of clairvoyance, in which we seem to leave the body behind us +and sail away into one strange scene after another, like disembodied +spirits. + +"Ah, yes," some unimaginative reader may say; "but there is no color and +no motion in these pictures you think so life-like; and at best they are +but petty miniatures of the objects we see in Nature." + +But color is, after all, a very secondary quality as compared with form. +We like a good crayon portrait better for the most part in black and +white than in tints of pink and blue and brown. Mr. Gibson has never +succeeded in making the world like his flesh-colored statues. The color +of a landscape varies perpetually, with the season, with the hour of the +day, with the weather, and as seen by sunlight or moonlight; yet our +home stirs us with its old associations, seen in any and every light. + +As to motion, though of course it is not present in stereoscopic +pictures, except in those toy-contrivances which have been lately +introduced, yet it is wonderful to see how nearly the effect of motion +is produced by the slight difference of light on the water or on the +leaves of trees as seen by the two eyes in the double-picture. + +And lastly with respect to size, the illusion is on the part of those +who suppose that the eye, unaided, ever sees anything but miniatures +of objects. Here is a new experiment to convince those who have not +reflected on the subject that the stereoscope shows us objects of their +natural size. + +We had a stereoscopic view taken by Mr. Soule out of our parlor-window, +overlooking the town of Cambridge, with the river and the bridge in the +foreground. Now, placing this view in the stereoscope, and looking with +the left eye at the right stereographic picture, while the right eye +looked at the natural landscape, through the window where the view was +taken, it was not difficult so to adjust the photographic and real views +that one overlapped the other, and then it was shown that the two almost +exactly coincided in all their dimensions. + +Another point in which the stereograph differs from every other +delineation is in the character of its evidence. A simple photographic +picture may be tampered with. A lady's portrait has been known to come +out of the finishing-artist's room ten years younger than when it left +the camera. But try to mend a stereograph and you will soon find the +difference. Your marks and patches float above the picture and never +identify themselves with it. We had occasion to put a little cross on +the pavement of a double photograph of Canterbury Cathedral,--copying +another stereoscopic picture where it was thus marked. By careful +management the two crosses were made perfectly to coincide in the field +of vision, but the image seemed suspended above the pavement, and did +not absolutely designate any one stone, as it would have done, if it +had been a part of the original picture. The impossibility of the +stereograph's perjuring itself is a curious illustration of the law of +evidence. "At the mouth of _two witnesses_, or of three, shall he that +is worthy of death be put to death; but at the mouth of one he shall not +be put to death." No woman may be declared youthful on the strength of a +single photograph; but if the stereoscopic twins say she is young, let +her be so acknowledged in the high court of chancery of the God of Love. + +Some two or three years since, we called the attention of the readers +of this magazine to the subject of the stereoscope and the stereograph. +Some of our expressions may have seemed extravagant, as if heated by the +interest which a curious novelty might not unnaturally excite. We have +not lost any of the enthusiasm and delight which that article must have +betrayed. After looking over perhaps a hundred thousand stereographs +and making a collection of about a thousand, we should feel the same +excitement on receiving a new lot to look over and select from as +in those early days of our experience. To make sure that this early +interest has not cooled, let us put on record one or two convictions of +the present moment. + +First, as to the wonderful nature of the invention. If a strange planet +should happen to come within hail, and one of its philosophers were to +ask us, as it passed, to hand him the most remarkable material product +of human skill, we should offer him, without a moment's hesitation, a +stereoscope containing an _instantaneous_ double-view of some great +thoroughfare,--one of Mr. Anthony's views of Broadway, (No. 203,) for +instance. + +Secondly, of all artificial contrivances for the gratification of human +taste, we seriously question whether any offers so much, on the whole, +to the enjoyment of the civilized races as the self-picturing of Art +and Nature,--with three exceptions: namely, dress, the most universal, +architecture, the most imposing, and music, the most exciting, of +factitious sources of pleasure. + +No matter whether this be an extravagance or an over-statement; none +can dispute that we have a new and wonderful source of pleasure in +the sun-picture, and especially in the solid sun-_sculptures_ of the +stereograph. Yet there is a strange indifference to it, even up to the +present moment, among many persons of cultivation and taste. They do not +seem to have waked up to the significance of the miracle which the Lord +of Light is working for them. The cream of the visible creation has been +skimmed off; and the sights which men risk their lives and spend their +money and endure sea-sickness to behold,--the views of Nature and Art +which make exiles of entire families for the sake of a look at them, +and render "bronchitis" and dyspepsia, followed by leave of absence, +endurable dispensations to so many worthy shepherds,--these sights, +gathered from Alps, temples, palaces, pyramids, are offered you for +a trifle, to carry home with you, that you may look at them at your +leisure, by your fireside, with perpetual fair weather, when you are in +the mood, without catching cold, without following a _valet-de-place_, +in any order of succession,--from a glacier to Vesuvius, from Niagara +to Memphis,--as long as you like, and breaking off as suddenly as you +like;--and you, native of this incomparably dull planet, have hardly +troubled yourself to look at this divine gift, which, if an angel had +brought it from some sphere nearer to the central throne, would have +been thought worthy of the celestial messenger to whom it was intrusted! + +It seemed to us that it might possibly awaken an interest in some of our +readers, if we should carry them with us through a brief stereographic +trip,--describing, not from places, but from the photographic pictures +of them which we have in our own collection. Again, those who have +collections may like to compare their own opinions of particular +pictures mentioned with those here expressed, and those who are buying +stereographs may be glad of some guidance in choosing. + +But the reader must remember that this trip gives him only a glimpse of +a few scenes selected out of our gallery of a thousand. To visit them +all, as tourists visit the realities, and report what we saw, with the +usual explanations and historical illustrations, would make a formidable +book of travels. + +Before we set out, we must know something of the sights of our own +country. At least we must see Niagara. The great fall shows infinitely +best on glass. Thomson's "Point View, 28," would be a perfect picture of +the Falls in summer, if a lady in the foreground had not moved her shawl +while the pictures were taking, or in the interval between taking the +two. His winter view, "Terrapin Tower, 37," is perfection itself. Both +he and Evans have taken fine views of the rapids, _instantaneous_, +catching the spray as it leaped and the clouds overhead. Of Blondin on +his rope there are numerous views; standing on one foot, on his head, +carrying a man on his back, and one frightful picture, where he hangs by +one leg, head downward, over the abyss. The best we have seen is Evans's +No. 5, a front view, where every muscle stands out in perfect relief, +and the symmetry of the most unimpressible of mortals is finely shown. +It literally makes the head swim to fix the eyes on some of these +pictures. It is a relief to get away from such fearful sights and look +up at the Old Man of the Mountain. There stands the face, without any +humanizing help from the hand of an artist. Mr. Bierstadt has given it +to us very well. Rather an imbecile old gentleman, one would say, +with his mouth open; a face such as one may see hanging about +railway-stations, and, what is curious, a New-England style of +countenance. Let us flit again, and just take a look at the level sheets +of water and broken falls of Trenton,--at the oblong, almost squared +arch of the Natural Bridge,--at the ruins of the Pemberton Mills, still +smoking,--and so come to Mr. Barnum's "Historical Series." Clark's +Island, with the great rock by which the Pilgrims "rested, according to +the commandment," on the first Sunday, or Sabbath, as they loved to call +it, which they passed in the harbor of Plymouth, is the most interesting +of them all to us. But here are many scenes of historical interest +connected with the great names and events of our past. The Washington +Elm, at Cambridge, (through the branches of which we saw the first +sunset we ever looked upon, from this planet, at least,) is here in all +its magnificent drapery of hanging foliage. Mr. Soule has given another +beautiful view of it, when stripped of its leaves, equally remarkable +for the delicacy of its pendent, hair-like spray. + +We should keep the reader half an hour looking through this series, +if we did not tear ourselves abruptly away from it. We are bound for +Europe, and are to leave _via_ New York immediately. + +Here we are in the main street of the great city. This is Mr. Anthony's +miraculous instantaneous view in Broadway, (No. 203,) before referred +to. It is the Oriental story of the petrified city made real to our +eyes. The character of it is, perhaps, best shown by the use we make of +it in our lectures, to illustrate the physiology of walking. Every foot +is caught in its movement with such suddenness that it shows as clearly +as if quite still. We are surprised to see, in one figure, how long the +stride is,--in another, how much the knee is bent,--in a third, how +curiously the heel strikes the ground before the rest of the foot,--in +all, how singularly the body is accommodated to the action of walking. +The facts which the brothers Weber, laborious German experimenters and +observers, had carefully worked out on the bony frame, are illustrated +by the various individuals comprising this moving throng. But what a +wonder it is, this snatch at the central life of a mighty city as it +rushed by in all its multitudinous complexity of movement! Hundreds of +objects in this picture could be identified in a court of law by their +owners. There stands Car No. 33 of the Astor House and Twenty-Seventh +Street Fourth Avenue line. The old woman would miss an apple from that +pile which you see glistening on her stand. The young man whose back is +to us could swear to the pattern of his shawl. The gentleman between two +others will no doubt remember that he had a headache the next morning, +after this walk he is taking. Notice the caution with which the man +driving the dapple-gray horse in a cart loaded with barrels holds his +reins,--wide apart, one in each hand. See the shop-boys with their +bundles, the young fellow with a lighted cigar in his hand, as you see +by the way he keeps it off from his body, the _gamin_ stooping to +pick up something in the midst of the moving omnibuses, the stout +philosophical carman sitting on his cart-tail, Newman Noggs by the +lamp-post at the corner. Nay, look into Car No. 33 and you may see the +passengers;--is that a young woman's face turned toward you looking +out of the window? See how the faithful sun-print advertises the rival +establishment of "Meade Brothers, Ambrotypes and Photographs." What a +fearfully suggestive picture! It is a leaf torn from the book of God's +recording angel. What if the sky is one great concave mirror, which +reflects the picture of all our doings, and photographs every act on +which it looks upon dead and living surfaces, so that to celestial eyes +the stones on which we tread are written with our deeds, and the leaves +of the forest are but undeveloped negatives where our summers stand +self-recorded for transfer into the imperishable record? And what a +metaphysical puzzle have we here in this simple-looking paradox! Is +motion but a succession of rests? All is still in this picture of +universal movement. Take ten thousand instantaneous photographs of the +great thoroughfare in a day; every one of them will be as still as the +_tableau_ in the "Enchanted Beauty." Yet the hurried day's life of +Broadway will have been made up of just such stillnesses. Motion is as +rigid as marble, if you only take a wink's worth of it at a time. + +We are all ready to embark now. Here is the harbor; and there lies the +Great Eastern at anchor,--the biggest island that ever got adrift. +Stay one moment,--they will ask us about secession and the revolted +States,--it may be as well to take a look at Charleston, for an instant, +before we go. + +These three stereographs were sent us by a lady now residing in +Charleston. The Battery, the famous promenade of the Charlestonians, +since armed with twenty-four-pounders facing Fort Sumter; the interior +of Fort Moultrie, with the guns spiked by Major Anderson; and a more +extensive view of the same interior, with the flag of the seven stars, +(corresponding to the seven deadly sins,)--the free end of it tied to +a gun-carriage, as if to prevent the winds of the angry heaven from +rending it to tatters. In the distance, to the right, Fort Sumter, +looking remote and inaccessible,--the terrible rattle which our foolish +little spoiled sister Caroline has insisted on getting into her +rash hand. How ghostly, yet how real, it looms up out of the dim +atmosphere,--the guns looking over the wall and out through the +embrasures,--meant for a foreign foe,--this very day (April 13th) turned +in self-defence against the children of those who once fought for +liberty at Fort Moultrie! It is a sad thought that there are truths +which can be got out of life only by the _destructive analysis_ of war. +Statesmen deal in _proximate principles_,--unstable compounds; but war +reduces facts to their simple elements in its red-hot crucible, with its +black flux of carbon and sulphur and nitre. Let us turn our back on this +miserable, even though inevitable, fraternal strife, and, closing our +eyes for an instant, open them in London. + +Here we are at the foot of Charing Cross. You remember, of course, how +this fine equestrian statue of Charles I. was condemned to be sold and +broken up by the Parliament, but was buried and saved by the brazier who +purchased it, and so reappeared after the Restoration. To the left, the +familiar words "Morley's Hotel" designate an edifice about half windows, +where the plebeian traveller may sit and contemplate Northumberland +House opposite, and the straight-tailed lion of the Percys surmounting +the lofty battlement which crowns its broad _façade_. We could describe +and criticize the statue as well as if we stood under it, but other +travellers have done that. Where are all the people that ought to be +seen here? Hardly more than three or four figures are to be made out; +the rest were moving, and left no images in this slow, old-fashioned +picture,--how unlike the miraculous "instantaneous" Broadway of Mr. +Anthony we were looking at a little while ago! But there, on one side, +an omnibus has stopped long enough to be caught by the sunbeams. There +is a mark on it. Try it with a magnifier. + + Charing + + Strand + 633. + +Here are the towers of Westminster Abbey. A dead failure, as we well +remember them,--miserable modern excrescences, which shame the noble +edifice. We will hasten on, and perhaps by-and-by come back and enter +the cathedral. + +How natural Temple Bar looks, with the loaded coach and the cab going +through the central arch, and the blur of the hurrying throng darkening +the small lateral ones! A fine old structure,--always reminds a +Bostonian of the old arch over which the mysterious _Boston Library_ was +said still to linger out its existence late into the present century. +But where are the spikes on which the rebels' heads used to grin until +their jaws fell off? They must have been ranged along that ledge which +forms the chord of the arch surmounting the triple-gated structure. To +the left a woman is spreading an awning before a shop;--a man would do +it for her here. Ghost of a boy with bundle,--seen with right eye only. +Other ghosts of passers or loiterers,--one of a pretty woman, as we +fancy at least, by the way she turns her face to us. To the right, +fragments of signs, as follow: + + 22 + PAT + + CO + BR + PR + +What can this be but 229, _Patent Combs and Brushes_, PROUT? At any +rate, we were looking after Front's good old establishment, (229, +Strand,) which we remembered was close to Temple Bar, when we discovered +these fragments, the rest being cut off by the limits of the picture. + +London Bridge! Less imposing than Waterloo Bridge, but a massive pile of +masonry, which looks as if its rounded piers would defy the Thames as +long as those of the Bridge of Sant' Angelo have stemmed the Tiber. +Figures indistinct or invisible, as usual, in the foreground, but +farther on a mingled procession of coaches, cabs, carts, and people. +See the groups in the recesses over the piers. The parapet is +breast-high;--a woman can climb over it, and drop or leap into the dark +stream lying in deep shadow under the arches. Women take this leap +often. The angels hear them like the splash of drops of blood out of the +heart of our humanity. In the distance, wharves, storehouses, stately +edifices, steeples, and rising proudly above them, "like a tall bully," +London Monument. + +Here we are, close to the Monument. Tall, square base, with reliefs, +fluted columns, queer top;--looks like an inverted wineglass with a +shaving-brush standing up on it: representative of flame, probably. +Below this the square _cage_ in which people who have climbed the stairs +are standing; seems to be ten or twelve feet high, and is barred or +wired over. Women used to jump off from the Monument as well as from +London Bridge, before they made the cage safe in this way. + +"Holloa!" said a man standing in the square one day, to his +companion,--"there's the flag coming down from the Monument!" + +"It's no flag," said the other, "it's a woman!" + +Sure enough, and so it was. + +Nobody can mistake the four pepper-boxes, with the four weathercocks on +them, surmounting the corners of a great square castle, a little way +from the river's edge. That is the Tower of London. We see it behind the +masts of sailing-vessels and the chimneys of steamers, gray and misty in +the distance. Let us come nearer to it. Four square towers, crowned by +four Oriental-looking domes, not unlike the lower half of an inverted +balloon: these towers at the angles of a square building with buttressed +and battlemented walls, with two ranges of round-arched windows on the +side towards us. But connected with this building are other towers, +round, square, octagon, walls with embrasures, moats, loop-holes, +turrets, parapets,--looking as if the beef-eaters really meant to hold +out, if a new army of Boulogne should cross over some fine morning. We +can't stop to go in and see the lions this morning, for we have come in +sight of a great dome, and we cannot take our eyes away from it. + +That is St. Paul's, the Boston State-House of London. There is a +resemblance in effect, but there is a difference in dimensions,--to the +disadvantage of the native edifice, as the reader may see in the plate +prefixed to Dr. Bigelow's "Technology." The dome itself looks light +and airy compared to St. Peter's or the Duomo of Florence, not only +absolutely, but comparatively. The colonnade on which it rests divides +the honors with it. It does not brood over the city, as those two others +over their subject towns. Michel Angelo's forehead repeats itself in the +dome of St. Peter's. Sir Christopher had doubtless a less ample frontal +development; indeed, the towers he added to Westminster Abbey would +almost lead us to doubt if he had not a vacancy somewhere in his brain. +But the dome of the London "State-House" is very graceful,--so light +that it looks as if Its lineage had been crossed by a spire. Wait until +we have gilded the dome of our Boston St. Paul's before drawing any +comparisons. + +We have seen the outside of London. What do we care for the Crescent, +and the Horseguards, and Nelson's Monument, and the statue of Achilles, +and the new Houses of Parliament? The Abbey, the Tower, the Bridge, +Temple Bar, the Monument, St. Paul's: these make up the great features +of the London we dream about. Let us go into the Abbey for a few +moments. The "dim religious light" is pretty good, after all. We can +read every letter on that mural tablet to the memory of "the most +illustrious and most benevolent John Paul Howard, Earl of Stafford," +"a Lover of his Country, A _Relation to Relations_" (what a eulogy and +satire in that expression!) and in many ways virtuous and honorable, as +"The Countess Dowager, in Testimony of her great Affection and Respect +to her Lord's Memory," has commemorated on his monument. We can see all +the folds of the Duchess of Suffolk's dress, and the meshes of the net +that confines her hair, as she lies in marble effigy on her sculptured +sarcophagus. It looks old to our eyes,--for she was the mother of Lady +Jane Grey, and died three hundred years ago,--but see those two little +stone heads lying on their stone pillow, just beyond the marble Duchess. +They are children of Edward III.,--the Black Prince's baby-brothers. +They died five hundred years ago,--but what are centuries in Westminster +Abbey? Under this pillared canopy, her head raised on two stone +cushions, her fair, still features bordered with the spreading cap +we know so well in her portraits, lies Mary of Scotland. These fresh +monuments, protected from the wear of the elements, seem to make twenty +generations our contemporaries. Look at this husband warding off the +dart which the grim, draped skeleton is aiming at the breast of his +fainting wife. Most famous, perhaps, of all the statues in the Abbey is +this of Joseph Gascoigne Nightingale and his Lady, by Roubilliac. You +need not cross the ocean to see it. It is here, literally to every +dimple in the back of the falling hand, and every crinkle of the +vermiculated stone-work. What a curious pleasure it is to puzzle out the +inscriptions on the monuments in the background!--for the beauty of your +photograph is, that you may work out minute derails with the microscope, +just as you can with the telescope in a distant landscape in Nature. +There is a lady, for instance, leaning upon an urn,--suggestive, a +little, of Morgiana and the forty thieves. Above is a medallion of one +wearing a full periwig. Now for a half-inch lens to make out the specks +that seem to be letters. "Erected to the Memory of William Pulteney, +Earl of Bath, by his Brother"--That will do,--the inscription operates +as a cold bath to enthusiasm. But here is our own personal namesake, +the once famous Rear Admiral of the White, whose biography we can find +nowhere except in the "Gentleman's Magazine," where he divides the glory +of the capture of Quebec with General Wolfe. A handsome young man with +hyacinthine locks, his arms bare and one hand resting on a cannon. We +remember thinking our namesake's statue one of the most graceful in the +Abbey, and have always fallen back on the memory of that and of Dryden's +Achates of the "Annus Mirabilis," as trophies of the family. + +Enough of these marbles; there is no end to them; the walls and floor of +the great, many-arched, thousand-pillared, sky-lifted cavern are crusted +all over with them, like stalactites and stalagmites. The vast temple is +alive with the images of the dead. Kings and queens, nobles, statesmen, +soldiers, admirals, the great men whose deeds we all know, the great +writers whose words are in all our memories, the brave and the beautiful +whose fame has shrunk into their epitaphs, are all around us. What is +the cry for alms that meets us at the door of the church to the mute +petition of these marble beggars, who ask to warm their cold memories +for a moment in our living hearts? Look up at the mighty arches +overhead, borne up on tall clustered columns,--as if that avenue of +Royal Palms we remember in the West India Islands (photograph) had been +spirited over seas and turned into stone. Make your obeisance to the +august shape of Sir Isaac Newton, reclining like a weary swain in the +niche at the side of the gorgeous screen. Pass through Henry VII.'s +Chapel, a temple cut like a cameo. Look at the shining oaken stalls of +the knights. See the banners overhead. There is no such speaking record +of the lapse of time as these banners,--there is one of them beginning +to drop to pieces; the long day of a century has decay for its +dial-shadow. + +We have had a glimpse of London,--let us make an excursion to +Stratford-on-Avon. + +Here you see the Shakspeare House as it was,--wedged in between, and +joined to, the "Swan and Maidenhead" Tavern and a mean and dilapidated +brick building, not much worse than itself, however. The first +improvement (as you see in No. 2) was to pull down this brick building. +The next (as you see in No. 3)--was to take away the sign and the +bay-window of the "Swan and Maidenhead" and raise two gables out of its +roof, so as to restore something like its ancient aspect. Then a rustic +fence was put up and the outside arrangements were completed. The +cracked and faded sign projects as we remember it of old. In No. 1 you +may read "THE IMMORTAL SHAKES_peare ... Born in This House_" about as +well as if you had been at the trouble and expense of going there. + +But here is the back of the house. Did little Will use to look out at +this window with the bull's-eye panes? Did he use to drink from this old +pump, or the well in which it stands? Did his shoulders rub against this +angle of the old house, built with rounded bricks? It a strange picture, +and sets us dreaming. Let us go in and up-stairs. In this room he was +born. They say so, and we will believe it. Rough walls, rudely boarded +floor, wide window with small panes, small bust of him between two +cactuses in bloom on window-seat. An old table covered with prints and +stereographs, a framed picture, and under it a notice "Copies of this +Portrait" ... the rest, in fine print, can only be conjectured. + +Here is the Church of the Holy Trinity, in which he lies buried. The +trees are bare that surround it; see the rooks' nests in their tops. +The Avon is hard by, dammed just here, with flood-gates, like a canal. +Change the season, if you like,--here are the trees in leaf, and in +their shadow the tombs and graves of the mute, inglorious citizens of +Stratford. + +Ah, how natural this interior, with its great stained window, its mural +monuments, and its slab in the pavement with the awful inscription! That +we cannot see here, but there is the tablet with the bust we know so +well. But this, after all, is Christ's temple, not Shakspeare's. Here +are the worshippers' seats,--mark how the polished wood glistens,--there +is the altar, and there the open prayer-book,--you can almost read the +service from it. Of the many striking things that Henry Ward Beecher +has said, nothing, perhaps, is more impressive than his account of his +partaking of the communion at that altar in the church where Shakspeare +rests. A memory more divine than his overshadowed the place, and he +thought of Shakspeare, "as he thought of ten thousand things, without +the least disturbance of his devotion," though he was kneeling directly +over the poet's dust. + +If you will stroll over to Shottery now with me, we can see the Ann +Hathaway cottage from four different points, which will leave nothing +outside of it to be seen. Better to look at than to live in. A fearful +old place, full of small vertebrates that squeak and smaller articulates +that bite, if its outward promise can be trusted. A thick thatch covers +it like a coarse-haired hide. It is patched together with bricks and +timber, and partly crusted with scaling plaster. One window has the +diamond panes framed in lead, such as we remember seeing of old in one +or two ancient dwellings in the town of Cambridge, hard by. In this view +a young man is sitting, pensive, on the steps which Master William, too +ardent lover, used to climb with hot haste and descend with lingering +delay. Young men die, but youth lives. Life goes on in the cottage just +as it used to three hundred years ago. On the rail before the door sits +the puss of the household, of the fiftieth generation, perhaps, from +that "harmless, necessary cat" which purred round the poet's legs as he +sat talking love with Ann Hathaway. At the foot of the steps is a huge +basin, and over the rail hangs--a dishcloth, drying. In these homely +accidents of the very instant, that cut across our romantic ideals with +the sharp edge of reality, lies one of the ineffable charms of the +sun-picture. It is a little thing that gives life to a scene or a face; +portraits are never absolutely alive, because they do not _wink_. + +Come, we are full of Shakspeare; let us go up among the hills and see +where another poet lived and lies. Here is Rydal Mount, the home of +Wordsworth. Two-storied, ivy-clad, hedge-girdled, dropped into a crease +among the hills that look down dimly from above, as if they were hunting +after it as ancient dames hunt after a dropped thimble. In these walks +he used to go "booing about," as his rustic neighbor had it,--reciting +his own verses. Here is his grave in Grasmere. A plain slab, with +nothing but his name. Next him lies Dora, his daughter, beneath a taller +stone bordered with a tracery of ivy, and bearing in relief a lamb and +a cross. Her husband lies next in the range. The three graves have just +been shorn of their tall grass,--in this other view you may see them +half-hidden by it. A few flowering stems have escaped the scythe in the +first picture, and nestle close against the poet's headstone. Hard by +sleeps poor Hartley Coleridge, with a slab of freestone graven with a +cross and a crown of thorns, and the legend, "By thy Cross and Passion, +Good Lord, deliver us."[A] All around are the graves of those whose +names the world has not known. This view, (302,) from above Rydal Mount, +is so Claude-like, especially in its trees, that one wants the solemn +testimony of the double-picture to believe it an actual transcript of +Nature. Of the other English landscapes we have seen, one of the most +pleasing on the whole is that marked 43,--Sweden Bridge, near Ambleside. +But do not fail to notice St. Mary's Church (101) in the same +mountain-village. It grows out of the ground like a crystal, with +spur-like gables budding out all the way up its spire, as if they were +ready to flower into pinnacles, like such as have sprung up all over the +marble multiflora of Milan. + +[Footnote A: Miss Martineau, who went to his funeral, and may be +supposed to describe after a visit to the churchyard, gives the +inscription incorrectly. See Atlantic Monthly for May, 1861, p. 552. +Tourists cannot be trusted; stereographs can.] + +And as we have been looking at a steeple, let us flit away for a moment +and pay our reverence at the foot of the tallest spire in England,--that +of Salisbury Cathedral. Here we see it from below, looking up,--one of +the most striking pictures ever taken. Look well at it; Chichester has +just fallen, and this is a good deal like it,--some have thought raised +by the same builder. It has bent somewhat (as you may see in these other +views) from the perpendicular; and though it has been strengthened with +clamps and framework, it must crash some day or other, for there has +been a great giant tugging at it day and night for five hundred years, +and it will at last shut up into itself or topple over with a sound and +thrill that will make the dead knights and bishops shake on their stone +couches, and be remembered all their days by year-old children. This is +the first cathedral we ever saw, and none ever so impressed us since. +Vast, simple, awful in dimensions and height, just beginning to grow +tall at the point where our proudest steeples taper out, it fills the +whole soul, pervades the vast landscape over which it reigns, and, like +Niagara and the Alps, abolishes that five- or six-foot personality in +the beholder which is fostered by keeping company with the little life +of the day in its little dwellings. In the Alps your voice is as the +piping of a cricket. Under the sheet of Niagara the beating of your +heart seems to trivial a movement to take reckoning of. In the +buttressed hollow of one of these palaeozoic cathedrals you are ashamed +of your ribs, and blush for the exiguous pillars of bone on which your +breathing structure reposes. Before we leave Salisbury, let us look for +a moment into its cloisters. A green court-yard, with a covered gallery +on its level, opening upon it through a series of Gothic arches. You may +learn more, young American, of the difference between your civilization +and that of the Old World by one look at this than from an average +lyceum-lecture an hour long. Seventy years of life means a great deal to +you; how little, comparatively, to the dweller in these cloisters! You +will have seen a city grow up about you, perhaps; your whole world will +have been changed half a dozen times over. What change for him? The +cloisters are just as when he entered them,--just as they were a hundred +years ago,--just as they will be a hundred years hence. + +These old cathedrals are beyond all comparison what are best worth +seeing, of a man's handiwork, in Europe. How great the delight to be +able to bring them, bodily, as it were, to our own firesides! A hundred +thousand pilgrims a year used to visit Canterbury. Now Canterbury visits +us. See that small white mark on the pavement. That marks the place +where the slice of Thomas à Becket's skull fell when Reginald Fitz Urse +struck it off with a "Ha!" that seems to echo yet through the vaulted +arches. And see the broad stains, worn by the pilgrims' knees as they +climbed to the martyr's shrine. For four hundred years this stream of +worshippers was wearing itself into these stones. But there was the +place where they knelt before the altar called "Beckets's Crown." +No! the story that those deep hollows in the marble were made by the +pilgrims' knees is too much to believe,--but there are the hollows, and +that is the story. + +And now, if you would see a perfect gem of the art of photography, and +at the same time an unquestioned monument of antiquity which no person +can behold without interest, look upon this,--the monument of the Black +Prince. There is hardly a better piece of work to be found. His marble +effigy lies within a railing, with a sounding board. Above this, on a +beam stretched between two pillars, hang the arms he wore at the Battle +of Poitiers,--the tabard, the shield, the helmet, the gauntlets, and +the sheath that held his sword, which weapon it is said that Cromwell +carried off. The outside casing of the shield has broken away, as you +observe, but the lions or lizards, or whatever they were meant for, and +the flower-de-laces or plumes may still be seen. The metallic scales, if +such they were, have partially fallen from the tabard, or frock, and the +leather shows bare in parts of it. + +Here, hard by, is the sarcophagus of Henry IV. and his queen, also +inclosed with a railing like the other. It was opened about thirty years +ago, in presence of the dean of the cathedral. There was a doubt, so +it was said, as to the monarch's body having been really buried there. +Curiosity had nothing to do with it, it is to be presumed. Every +over-ground sarcophagus is opened sooner or later, as a matter of +course. It was hard work to get it open; it had to be sawed. They found +a quantity of hay,--fresh herbage, perhaps, when it was laid upon the +royal body four hundred years ago,--and a cross of twigs. A silken mask +was on the face. They raised it and saw his red beard, his features +well preserved, a gap in the front-teeth, which there was probably no +court-dentist to supply,--the same the citizens looked on four centuries +ago + + "In London streets that coronation-day, + When Bolingbroke rode on roan Barbary"; + +then they covered it up to take another nap of a few centuries, +until another dean has an historical doubt,--at last, perhaps, to be +transported by some future Australian Barnum to the Sidney Museum and +exhibited as the mummy of one of English Pharaohs. Look, too, at the +"Warriors' Chapel," in the same cathedral. It is a very beautiful +stereograph, and may be studied for a long time, for it is full of the +most curious monuments. + +Before leaving these English churches and monuments, let us enter, if +but for a moment, the famous Beauchamp Chapel at Warwick. The finest +of the views (323, 324) recalls that of the Black Prince's tomb, as a +triumph of photography. Thus, while the whole effect of the picture is +brilliant and harmonious, we shall find, on taking a lens, that we can +count every individual bead in the chaplet of the monk who is one of the +more conspicuous reliefs on the sarcophagus. The figure of this monk +itself is about half an inch in height, and its face may be completely +hidden by the head of a pin. The whole chapel is a marvel of workmanship +and beauty. The monument of Richard Beauchamp in the centre, with the +frame of brass over the recumbent figure, intended to support the +drapery thrown upon it to protect the statue,--with the mailed shape of +the warrior, his feet in long-pointed shoes resting against the muzzled +bear and the griffin, his hands raised, but not joined,--this monument, +with the tomb of Dudley, Earl of Leicester,--Elizabeth's Leicester, +--and that of the other Dudley, Earl of Warwick,--all enchased in these +sculptured walls and illuminated through that pictured window, where we +can dimly see the outlines of saints and holy maidens,--form a group of +monumental jewels such as only Henry VII.'s Chapel can equal. For these +two pictures (323 and 324) let the poor student pawn his outside-coat, +if he cannot have them otherwise. + +Of abbeys and castles there is no end, ago No. 4, Tintern Abbey, is the +finest, on the whole, we have ever seen. No. 2 is also very perfect and +interesting. In both, the masses of ivy that clothe the ruins are given +with wonderful truth and effect. Some of these views have the advantage +of being very well colored. Warwick Castle (81) is one of the best and +most the interesting of the series of castles; Caernarvon is another +still more striking. + +We may as well break off here as anywhere, so far as England is +concerned. England is one great burial-ground to an American. As islands +are built up out of the shields of insects, so her soil is made the land +of Burns, and see what one man can do to idealize and glorify the common +life about him! Here is a poor "ten-footer", as we should call it, the +cottage William "Burness" built with his own hands, where he carried his +young bride Agnes, and where the boy Robert, his first-born, was given +to the light and air which he made brighter and freer for mankind. Sit +still and do not speak,--but see that your eyes do not grow dim as these +pictures pass before them: The old hawthorn under which Burns sat with +Highland Mary,--a venerable duenna-like tree, with thin arms and sharp +elbows, and scanty _chevelure_ of leaves; the Auld Brig o' Doon (No. +4),--a daring arch that leaps the sweet stream at a bound, more than +half clad in a mantle of ivy, which has crept with its larva-like +feet beyond the key-stone; the Twa Brigs of Ayr, with the beautiful +reflections in the stream that shines under their eyebrow-arches; and +poor little Alloway Kirk, with its fallen roof and high gables. Lift +your hand to your eyes and draw a long breath,--for what words would +come so near to us as these pictured, nay, real, memories of the dead +poet who made a nation of a province, and the hearts of mankind its +tributaries? + +And so we pass to many-towered and turreted and pinnacled Abbotsford, +and to large-windowed Melrose, and to peaceful Dryburgh, where, under a +plain bevelled slab, lies the great Romancer whom Scotland holds only +second in her affections to her great poet. Here in the foreground of +the Melrose Abbey view (436) is a gravestone which looks as if it might +be deciphered with a lens. Let us draw out this inscription from the +black archives of oblivion. Here it is: + + In Memory of + Francis Cornel, late + Labourer in Greenwell, + Who died 11th July, 1827, + aged 89 years. Also + Margaret Betty, his + Spouse, who died 2'd Dec'r, + 1831, aged 89 years. + +This is one charm, as we have said over and over, of the truth-telling +photograph. We who write in great magazines of course float off from the +wreck of our century, on our life-preserving articles, to immortality. +What a delight it is to snatch at the unknown head that shows for an +instant through the wave, and drag it out to personal recognition and +a share in our own sempiternal buoyancy! Go and be photographed on the +edge of Niagara, O unknown aspirant for human remembrance! Do not throw +yourself, O traveller, into Etna, like Empedocles, but be taken by the +camera standing on the edge of the crater! Who is that lady in the +carriage at the door of Burns's cottage? Who is that gentleman in the +shiny hat on the sidewalk in front of the Shakspeare house? Who are +those two fair youths lying dead on a heap of dead at the trench's side +in the cemetery of Melegnano, in that ghastly glass stereograph in our +friend Dr. Bigelow's collection? Some Austrian mother has perhaps seen +her boy's features in one of those still faces. All these seemingly +accidental figures are not like the shapes put in by artists to fill the +blanks in their landscapes, but real breathing persons, or forms that +have but lately been breathing, not found there by chance, but brought +there with a purpose, fulfilling some real human errand, or at least, as +in the last-mentioned picture, waiting to be buried. + +Before quitting the British Islands, it would be pleasant to wander +through the beautiful Vale of Avoca in Ireland, and to look on those +many exquisite landscapes and old ruins and crosses which have been so +admirably rendered in the stereograph. There is the Giant's Causeway, +too,--not in our own collection, but which our friend Mr. Waterston +has transplanted with all its basaltic columns to his Museum of Art in +Chester Square. Those we cannot stop to look at now, nor these many +objects of historical or poetical interest which lie before us on our +own table. Such are the pictures of Croyland Abbey, where they kept that +jolly drinking-horn of "Witlaf, King of the Saxons", which Longfellow +has made famous; Bedd-Gelert, the grave of the faithful hound +immortalized by--nay, who has immortalized--William Spencer; the stone +that marks the spot where William Rufus fell by Tyrrel's shaft; the +Lion's Head in Dove Dale, fit to be compared with our own Old Man of the +Mountain; the "Bowder Stone," or the great boulder of Borrowdale; and +many others over which we love to dream at idle moments. + +When we began these notes of travel, we meant to take our +fellow-voyagers over the continent of Europe, and perhaps to all the +quarters of the globe. We should make a book, instead of an article, if +we attempted it. Let us, instead of this, devote the remaining space to +an enumeration of a few of the most interesting pictures we have met +with, many of which may be easily obtained by those who will take the +trouble we have taken to find them. + +Views of Paris are everywhere to be had, good and cheap. The finest +illuminated or transparent paper view we have ever seen is one of the +Imperial Throne. There is another illuminated view, the Palace of the +Senate, remarkable for the beauty with which it gives the frescoes on +the cupola. We have a most interesting stereograph of the Amphitheatre +of Nismes, with a _bull-fight_ going on in its arena at the time when +the picture was taken. The contrast of the vast Roman structure, with +its massive arched masonry, and the scattered assembly, which seems +almost lost in the spaces once filled by the crowd of spectators who +thronged to the gladiatorial shows, is one of the most striking we have +ever seen. At Quimperlé is a house so like the curious old building +lately removed from Dock Square in Boston, that it is commonly taken for +it at the first view. The Roman tombs at Arles and the quaint streets at +Troyes are the only other French pictures we shall speak of, apart from +the cathedrals to be mentioned. + +Of the views in Switzerland, it may be said that the Glaciers are +perfect, in the glass pictures, at least. Waterfalls are commonly poor: +the water glares and looks like cotton-wool. Staubbach, with the Vale +of Lauterbrunnen, is an exquisite exception. Here are a few signal +specimens of Art. No. 4018, Seelisberg,--unsurpassed by any glass +stereograph we have ever seen, in all the qualities that make a +faultless picture. No. 4119, Mont Blanc from Sta. Rosa,--the finest +view of the mountain for general effect we have met with. No. 4100, +Suspension-Bridge of Fribourg,--very fine, but makes one giddy to look +at it. Three different views of Goldau, where the villages lie buried +under these vast masses of rock, recall the terrible catastrophe of +1806, as if it had happened but yesterday. + +Almost everything from Italy is interesting. The ruins of Rome, the +statues of the Vatican, the great churches, all pass before us but in +a flash, as we are expressed by them on our ideal locomotive. Observe: +next to snow and ice, stone is best rendered in the stereograph. Statues +are given absolutely well, except where there is much foreshortening to +be done, as in this of the Torso, where you see the thigh is unnaturally +lengthened. See the mark on the Dying Gladiator's nose. That is where +Michel Angelo mended it. There is Hawthorne's Marble Faun, (the one +called of Praxiteles,) the Laocoön, the Apollo Belvedere, the Young +Athlete with the Strigil, the Forum, the Cloaca Maxima, the Palace of +the Caesars, the bronze Marcus Aurelius,--those wonders all the world +flocks to see,--the God of Light has multiplied them all for you, and +you have only to give a paltry fee to his servant to own in fee-simple +the best sights that earth has to show. + +But look in at Pisa one moment, not for the Leaning Tower and the other +familiar objects, but for the interior of the Campo Santo, with its +holy earth, its innumerable monuments, and the fading frescoes on its +walls,--see! there are the Three Kings of Andrea Orgagna. And there hang +the broken chains that once, centuries ago, crossed the Arno,--standing +off from the wall, so that it seems as if they might clank, if you +jarred the stereoscope. Tread with us the streets of Pompeii for a +moment: there are the ruts made by the chariots of eighteen hundred +years ago,--it is the same thing as stooping down and looking at the +pavement itself. And here is the amphitheatre out of which the Pompeians +trooped when the ashes began to fall round them from Vesuvius. Behold +the famous gates of the Baptistery at Florence,--but do not overlook the +exquisite iron gates of the railing outside; think of them as you enter +our own Common in Boston from West Street, through those portals which +are fit for the gates of--not paradise. Look at this sugar-temple,--no, +it is of marble, and is the monument of one of the Scalas at Verona. +What a place for ghosts that vast _palazzo_ behind it! Shall we stand in +Venice on the Bridge of Sighs, and then take this stereoscopic gondola +and go through it from St. Mark's to the Arsenal? Not now. We will only +look at the Cathedral,--all the pictures under the arches show in our +glass stereograph,--at the Bronze Horses, the Campanile, the Rialto, +and that glorious old statue of Bartholomew Colleoni,--the very image of +what a partisan leader should be, the broad-shouldered, slender-waisted, +stern-featured old soldier who used to leap into his saddle in full +armor, and whose men would never follow another leader when he died. +Well, but there have been soldiers in Italy since his day. Here are +the encampments of Napoleon's army in the recent campaign. This is the +battle-field of Magenta with its trampled grass and splintered trees, +and the fragments of soldiers' accoutrements lying about. + +And here (leaving our own collection for our friend's before-mentioned) +here is the great trench in the cemetery of Melegnano, and the heap of +dead lying unburied at its edge. Look away, young maiden and tender +child, for this is what war leaves after it. Flung together, like sacks +of grain, some terribly mutilated, some without mark of injury, all +or almost all with a still, calm look on their faces. The two youths, +before referred to, lie in the foreground, so simple-looking, so like +boys who had been overworked and were lying down to sleep, that one can +hardly see the picture for the tears these two fair striplings bring +into the eyes. + +The Pope must bless us before we leave Italy. See, there he stands on +the balcony of St. Peter's, and a vast crowd before him with uncovered +heads as he stretches his arms and pronounces his benediction. + +Before entering Spain we must look at the Circus of Gavarni, a +natural amphitheatre in the Pyrenees. It is the most picturesque of +stereographs, and one of the best. As for the Alhambra, we can show that +in every aspect; and if you do not vote the lions in the court of the +same a set of mechanical h----gs and nursery bugaboos, we have no skill +in entomology. But the Giralda, at Seville, is really a grand tower, +worth looking at. The Seville Boston-folks consider it the linchpin, +at least, of this rolling universe. And what a fountain this is in the +Infanta's garden! what shameful beasts, swine and others, lying about on +their stomachs! the whole surmounted by an unclad gentleman squeezing +another into the convulsions of a galvanized frog! Queer tastes they +have in the Old World. At the Fountain of the Ogre in Berne, the giant, +or large-mouthed private person, upon the top of the column, is eating a +little infant as one eats a radish, and has plenty more,--a whole bunch +of such,--in his hand, or about him. + +A voyage down the Rhine shows us nothing better than St. Goar, (No. +2257,) every house on each bank clean and clear as a crystal. The +Heidelberg views are admirable;--you see a slight streak in the +background of this one: we remember seeing just such a streak from the +castle itself, and being told that it was the Rhine, just visible, afar +off. The man with the geese in the goose-market at Nuremberg gives +stone, iron, and bronze, each in perfection. + +So we come to quaint Holland, where we see windmills, _ponts-levis_, +canals, galiots, houses with gable-ends to the streets and little +mirrors outside the windows, slanted so as to show the frows inside what +is going on. + +We must give up the cathedrals, after all: Santa Maria del Fiore, with +Brunelleschi's dome, which Michel Angelo wouldn't copy and couldn't +beat; Milan, aflame with statues, like a thousand-tapered candelabrum; +Tours, with its embroidered portal, so like the lace of an archbishop's +robe; even Notre Dame of Paris, with its new spire; Rouen, Amiens, +Chartres,--we must give them all up. + +Here we are at Athens, looking at the buttressed Acropolis and the +ruined temples,--the Doric Parthenon, the Ionic Erechtheum, the +Corinthian temple of Jupiter, and the beautiful Caryatides. But see +those steps cut in the natural rock. Up those steps walked the Apostle +Paul, and from that summit, Mars Hill, the Areopagus, he began his noble +address, "Ye men of Athens!" + +The Great Pyramid and the Sphinx! Herodotus saw them a little fresher, +but of unknown antiquity,--far more unknown to him than to us. The +Colossi of the Plain! Mighty monuments of an ancient and proud +civilization standing alone in a desert now. + + My name is Osymandyas, King of Kings; + Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair! + +But nothing equals these vast serene faces of the Pharaohs on the +great rock-temple of Abou Simbel (Ipsambul) (No. 1, F. 307). It Is the +sublimest of stereographs, as the temple of Kardasay, this loveliest of +views on glass, is the most poetical. But here is the crocodile lying in +wait for us on the sandy bank of the Nile, and we must leave Egypt for +Syria. + +Damascus makes but a poor show, with its squalid houses, and glaring +clayed roofs. We always wanted to invest in real estate there in Abraham +Street or Noah Place, or some of its well-established thoroughfares, but +are discouraged since we have had these views of the old town. Baalbec +does better. See the great stones built into the wall there,--the +biggest 64 x 13 x 13! What do you think of that?--a single stone bigger +than both your parlors thrown into one, and this one of three almost +alike, built into a wall as if just because they happened to be lying +round, handy! So, then, we pass on to Bethlehem, looking like a fortress +more than a town, all stone and very little window,--to Nazareth, with +its brick oven-like houses, its tall minaret, its cypresses, and the +black-mouthed, open tombs, with masses of cactus growing at their +edge,--to Jerusalem,--to the Jordan, every drop of whose waters seems +to carry a baptismal blessing,--to the Dead Sea,--and to the Cedars of +Lebanon. Almost everything may have changed in these hallowed places, +except the face of the stream and the lake, and the outlines of hill and +valley. But as we look across the city to the Mount of Olives, we know +that these lines which run in graceful curves along the horizon are the +same that He looked upon as he turned his eyes sadly over Jerusalem. We +know that these long declivities, beyond Nazareth, were pictured in the +eyes of Mary's growing boy just as they are now in ours sitting here by +our own firesides. + +This is no _toy_, which thus carries us into the very presence of all +that is most inspiring to the soul in the scenes which the world's +heroes and martyrs, and more than heroes, more than martyrs, have +hallowed and solemnized by looking upon. It is no toy: it is a divine +gift, placed in our hands nominally by science, really by that +inspiration which is revealing the Almighty through the lips of the +humble students of Nature. Look through it once more before laying it +down, but not at any earthly sight. In these views, taken through the +telescopes of De la Rue of London and of Mr. Rutherford of New York, and +that of the Cambridge Observatory by Mr. Whipple of Boston, we see +the "spotty globe" of the moon with all its mountains and chasms, its +mysterious craters and groove-like valleys. This magnificent stereograph +by Mr. Whipple was taken, the first picture February 7th, the second +April 6th. In this way the change of position gives the solid effect of +the ordinary stereoscopic views, and the sphere rounds itself out so +perfectly to the eye that it seems as if we could grasp it like an +orange. + +If the reader is interested, or like to become interested, in the +subject of sun-sculpture and stereoscopes, he may like to know what the +last two years have taught us as to the particular instruments best +worth owning. We will give a few words to the subject. Of simple +instruments, for looking at one slide at a time, Smith and Beck's is the +most perfect we have seen, but the most expensive. For looking at paper +slides, which are light, an instrument which may be held in the hand +is very convenient. We have had one constructed which is better, as +we think, than any in the shops. Mr. Joseph L. Bates, 129, Washington +Street, has one of them, if any person is curious to see it. In buying +the instruments which hold many slides, we should prefer two that hold +fifty to one that holds a hundred. Becker's small instrument, containing +fifty paper slides, back to back, is the one we like best for these +slides, but the top should be arranged so as to come off,--the first +change we made in our own after procuring it. + +We are allowed to mention the remarkable instrument contrived by our +friend Dr. H.J. Bigelow, for holding fifty glass slides. The spectator +looks in: all is darkness. He turns a crank: the gray dawn of morning +steals over some beautiful scene or the _façade_ of a stately temple. +Still, as he turns, the morning brightens through various tints of rose +and purple, until it reaches the golden richness of high noon. Still +turning, all at once night shuts down upon the picture as at a tropical +sunset, suddenly, without blur or gradual dimness,--the sun of the +picture going down, + + "Not as in Northern climes obscurely bright, + But one unclouded blaze of living light." + +We have not thanked the many friendly dealers in these pictures, who +have sent us heaps and hundreds of stereographs to look over and select +from, only because they are too many to thank. Nor do we place any price +on this advertisement of their most interesting branch of business. But +there are a few stereographs we wish some of them would send us, +with the bill for the same: such as Antwerp and Strasbourg +Cathedrals,--Bologna, with its brick towers,--the Lions of Mycenae, if +they are to be had,--the Walls of Fiesole,--the Golden Candlestick in +the Arch of Titus,--and others which we can mention, if consulted; +some of which we have hunted for a long time in vain. But we write +principally to wake up an interest in a new and inexhaustible source of +pleasure, and only regret that the many pages we have filled can do no +more than hint the infinite resources which the new art has laid open to +us all. + + + + +THE LONDON WORKING-MEN'S COLLEGE. + + +In what is now as near the centre of the Map of London as any house +can properly be said to be is an old-fashioned dwelling-house on +Great-Ormond Street, which is occupied, and densely occupied, by +Frederic Denison Maurice's "Working-Men's College." The house looks, I +suppose, very much as it did in 1784, when Great-Ormond Street bordered +on the country,--when Lord Thurlow, the Chancellor of England, lived in +this house,--when some thieves jumped over his garden-wall, forced +two bars from the kitchen-window, entered a room adjoining the Lord +Chancellor's study, and stole the Great Seal of England, "inclosed in +two bags, one of leather and one of silk." London has grown so much +since, that anything that is stolen from the Working-Men's College +will not be stolen by thieves entering from the fields. I may say, in +passing, that this theft "threw London into consternation"; there being +an impression, that, for want of the Great Seal, all the functions of +the Executive Government must be suspended. The Privy-Council, however, +did not share this impression. They had a new seal made before night; +and though the Government of England has often moved very slowly since, +it has never confessedly stopped, as some Governments nearer home have +done, from that day to this day. + +In view of what is done in Lord Thurlow's old house now, it is worth +while to linger a moment on what it was then and what he was. He was the +Keeper of George III.'s conscience, until he caballed against Mr. Pitt, +and was unceremoniously turned out by him. As Lord High-Chancellor, he +was guardian-in-chief of all the wards in Chancery; and I suppose, for +instance, without looking up the quotation in Boswell, that he was the +particular Lord Chancellor to whom Dr. Johnson said he should like to +intrust the making of all the matches in England. Louis Napoleon has +just now undertaken to make all the friction-matches in France,--but Dr. +Johnson's proposal referred to the matrimonial matches, the _dénouemens_ +of the comedies and tragedies of domestic life. To us Americans, Thurlow +is notable for the strong and uncompromising language which he used +against us all through our Revolution, which excessively delighted the +King. As to his faculty for keeping a conscience, it may be said, that, +though he never married, he resided in this Great-Ormond Street house +with his own mistress and his illegitimate children. Lord Campbell, who +mentions this fact, informs us, that, as early as his own youth, the +British Bench had reached such purity that judges were expected to marry +their mistresses when they were appointed to the Bench. He adds, that +it is long since any such condition as that was necessary. In Thurlow's +time this stage of decency had not been attained even by Lord +Chancellors. His humanity may be indicated by his stiff opposition to +every reform ever proposed in the English criminal law, or in the social +order of the time. He battled the bills for suppressing the slave-trade +with all his might. "I desire of you, my Lords, in your humane +frenzy, to show some humanity to the whites as well as to the +negroes",--illustrating this remark by a picture of the sufferings of an +English trader who had risked thirty thousand pounds on the slave-trade +that year. When an entering wedge was attempted for the improvement of +the bloody code of criminal law, Thurlow opposed it with passion. The +particular clause selected by the reformers was one which demanded that +women who had been connected with any treasonable movements should be +burnt alive. It was proposed to reduce their punishment to the same +scale as men's. Thurlow made it his duty to defend the ancient practice. +He was, in short, mixed up with every effort of his time, which we now +consider disgraceful, for arresting the gradual progress of reform. + +Now that Thurlow's wine-cellar is a college-chapel, that young men study +arithmetic in the room the Great Seal was stolen from, that Mr. Ruskin +teaches water-color drawing in Thurlow's bed-chamber, that Tom Brown, +_alias_ Mr. Hughes, presides over a weekly tea-party in the three-pair +back, and drills the awkward squad of the working-men's battalion in the +garden, it seems worth while to show that at least some places in the +world have improved in eighty years, whether the world itself is to +be given up as a mistake or not. We will let Lord Thurlow go, as Lord +Campbell does, with this charitable wish:--"I have not learned," he +says, "any particulars of his end, but I will hope that it was a +good one. I trust, that, conscious of the approaching change, having +sincerely repented of his violence of temper, of the errors into which +he had been led by worldly ambition, and of the irregularities of his +private life, he had seen the worthlessness of the objects by which he +had been allured; that, having gained the frame of mind which his awful +situation required, he received the consolations of religion; and that, +in charity with mankind, he tenderly bade a long and last adieu to the +relations and friends who surrounded him." There is not an atom of fact +known on which to found Lord Campbell's hope. But I, also, will leave +Lord Thurlow with this charitable wish, and I will now ask the readers +of the "Atlantic," who may be enough interested in social reform and a +mutual education, to see what has happened between his wine-cellar and +ridge-pole since the "London Working-Men's College" was established +there. + +The founder of the Working-Men's College, as I have intimated, is the +Rev. Frederic Denison Maurice, the eminent practical theologian. Its +age is now six years,--as it was founded in the autumn of 1854. He says +himself, in a striking speech he made at Manchester not long since, that +the plan originated in that "awful year 1848, which I shall always look +upon as one of the great epochs in history." He says that "a knot of +men, of different professions, lawyers, doctors, parsons, artists, +chemists, and such like," thought they saw, in the convulsions of 1848, +a handwriting on the wall, sent them by God himself, testifying, "that, +if either rank or wealth or knowledge is not held as a trust for men, if +any one of these things is regarded as a possession of our own, it must +perish." In a real desire, then, to "make their own little education of +use to such persons as had less," and, in so doing, to establish a +vital and effective relation between themselves and the men of the +working-classes below them, they looked round for opportunities to work +in the education of _men_. Anybody who remembers "Amyas Leigh" will +remember how earnestly Charles Kingsley there presses the theory that +most of what we learn as children should be left to be learned by men, +as it was in the days of Queen Bess. I suppose that Maurice's "knot of +parsons and such like" shared that view. At all events, they lectured to +Mechanics' Institutes, and did other such wish-wash work, which is not +good for much, except for the motive it shows; and having found that +out, they were all the more willing to join in arrangements more +definite and profitable. According to Mr. Maurice, the formation of the +People's College in Sheffield started them on the plan of a college, +and determined them, as far as they could, to give consistency to +their dreams by carrying out the plan of an English college in their +arrangements for working-men. + +At this point I must beg the accomplished company of readers to +recollect what an English college is. In its organization, and in much +of its consequent _esprit du corps_, it is as different from an American +college as an Odd-Fellows' lodge is from a country academy. The +difference is also of precisely the same sort. The man or the boy who +connects himself with an English college is, in theory, still the +student of a thousand years ago, who came on foot to Oxford or +Cambridge, because he had heard, in the wilds of Mercia or of Wessex, +that there were some books at those places,--and that some Alfred or +Ethelred or Eldred had given some privileges to students coming there. +When he has arrived, he joins one or other of the societies of students +whom he may find there, just as the Mercian Athelstan may have done. +From the moment that the established society has tested him,--and the +tests are very mild,--he is admitted as a member of a fraternity, +sharing the privileges of that fraternity, and, to a certain extent, its +duties. He is at first a junior member, it is true. Among his duties, +therefore, will be obedience to some of the senior members, and respect +to all. But none the less is he a neophyte member of a corporation which +extends back hundreds of years perhaps,--he is a co-proprietor of its +honors and privileges, is responsible for their preservation, and is, +from the first, inoculated with its _esprit du corps_. + +Now in an American college there is _esprit du corps_ enough, and sense +of college dignity enough. But the student's _esprit du corps_ is one +thing, and the government's is another. The Commons Hall, for instance, +has died out of most of our colleges. Why? Why, because it had ceased to +be a _Commons_ Hall. It was not the place where the junior and senior +members of a college, the pupils and all their instructors, met +together. It was the place where the undergraduates were fed,--and where +a few wretched tutors were fed at their sides. But every member of the +governing body who could possibly escape did so. At our Cambridge, +they even went so far as to set apart a Commons Hall for each class of +undergraduates at last,--for fear men should see each other eat; as at +"Separate Prisons" the idea of communion in worship is carried out by +introducing each prisoner into a state-pew or royal-box whose partitions +are so high that he cannot see his neighbors. This was before they gave +the _coup-de-grace_ to the whole thing, and scattered the members of +their college just as widely as they could at meal-times, as at all +other times. The recitation, again, probably the only occasion when an +American student meets his instructor, is conducted according to an +arrangement by which the instructor meets all of a large section or +class together, meeting them for recitation simply. In a word, the +American college differs from any other American school chiefly in +having larger endowments and older pupils. + +In the English college, on the other hand, before a freshman has +been there three months, he may have established his claim to some +"scholarship," which shall be his post and his "foundation" there +for years. From the very beginning, one or another honor or prize +is proposed to him,--which is the first stepping-stone on a line of +promotion of which the last may be his appointment to the highest +dignities in the University or in the Church. From the beginning, +therefore, he has his duties in the college assigned to him, if he have +earned any right to such honors. Thus, it may be his place to read the +Scripture Lesson at prayers, or to read the Latin grace at the end of +dinner,--the President and Vice-President of his college having done the +same at the beginning. + +These arrangements are not to be confounded with the services rendered +by charity students. We have imitated some of these, which are so sadly +described in "Tom Brown at Oxford." But we have no arrangements which +correspond at all to those of the system which in England brings +graduates and undergraduates to a certain extent into a common life, +mutually interested in the honor and popularity of "Our College." + +When Mr. Maurice and his friends spoke of "a college," they meant to +carry to the utmost these social and mutual views of college life. They +wanted to come into closer connection with the working-men of London, +and formed the Working-Men's College that they might do so. + +They had, therefore, something in mind very different from sitting for +an hour in presence of a dozen students, hearing them recite a lesson, +saying then, "_Ite, missa est_," and departing all, every man to his +own way. They foresaw their difficulties, undoubtedly, and they have +undoubtedly met some which they did not foresee. But they meant to +establish, on paper, if nowhere else, a mutual society,--a society, it +is true, in which those who knew the most should teach those who knew +the least, but still a society where the learners and the teachers met +as members of the same fraternity,--equals so far as the laws of that +society went,--and with certain common interests arising from their +connection with it. + +Not only does the necessity for such an undertaking appear in England +as it does not here, but the difficulty of it is, on a moderate +calculation, ten thousand times greater than it is here. Here, in the +first place, if the "working-man" as a boy has felt any particular fancy +for algebra or Greek or Latin, (and those fancies, in a fast country, +are apt to develop before the boy is eighteen,) he has e'en gone to a +high-school, and, if he wanted, to a "college," where, if he had not the +means himself, some State Scholarship or Education Society has floated +him through, and he has gained his fill of algebra, Latin, or Greek, or +is on the way to do so. Or, if he have not done this,--if the appetite +for these things, or for physical science, historical science, or +political science, has developed itself a little later in life, he has +hoarded up books for a few years, and has made himself meanwhile rather +more necessary to his master than he was before, so that, when he says, +some day, "I think we must arrange so that I can leave the shop earlier +in the afternoon," the master has bowed submiss, and the incipient +chemist, historian, or politician has worked his own sweet will. Or, +thirdly, if he wanted instruction from anybody in the category we first +named, who had tried the high-school and college plan, he had only to go +and ask for it. + +Very likely the man is his brother; at all events, he is somebody's +brother: and there is no difference in their social _status_ which makes +any practical difficulty in their meeting together, man-fashion, to +teach and to learn. But in saying all this, we speak of things which +London understands no more than it does the system of society of the +Chinese Empire. To begin: the thriving Oxford-Street retailer will tell +you very frankly, perhaps, that he had rather his son should not learn +to read, if he could only sign his name without learning. Reason: that +the father has observed that his older son read so much more of bad than +good, that he is left to doubt the benefits conferred by letters. I do +not mean, that, practically, the London tradesman's son does not learn +to read; but I do mean that that process meets this sort of prejudice. +Grant, however, that he does learn to read, and has appetite for more; +grant that he gets well through with A B C, and what follows; grant that +he can read well enough to read the translations from French filth which +his father is afraid of; but grant that his father and his mother, +working with the blessing of his God, have kept him pure enough to steer +clear of that temptation; grant that he becomes one-and-twenty, eager +for algebra, for chemistry, for Latin, or for Greek. What are you going +to do about it then? Then comes in the necessity which Mr. Maurice +wanted to meet,--and there comes in, by the same steps, the exceeding +difficulty of his experiment. + +It is the difficulty of caste. I do not know how many castes there are +in England; but I should think there were about thirty-seven. Any member +of either of these finds it as hard to associate with a member of any +other as a Sudra does to associate with a Brahmin, or a Brahmin with a +Sudra. It is not that people are unwilling to condescend to the castes +below them. At least, it is not that chiefly. It is, quite as much or +more, that, with a good, solid, English pride, they do not care to be +snobbish, and do not choose to put themselves upon people who are above +them. They "know their place," they say. And, for a race which has as +good reason as the English for pride in its ability to stand firm, +to "know one's place" is a great thing to boast of. People who have +travelled on the Continent have been amused to see how zealously Sir +John and Lady Jane and Miss Jeanette talked together at the _table +d'hôte_ for a week, never by accident speaking to Mr. Williams, Mrs. +Williams, and Miss Williamina, who sat next them. This is not inability +to condescend, however. The Ws are as unwilling to speak to the Js. This +difficulty is the same difficulty which Mr. Litchfield describes in an +account of his "Five Years' Teaching at Working-Men's College." "When a +man first comes to our college," he says, "he is apt to walk into his +class-room in the solemn and discreet manner befitting an entry into a +public institution, and generally for a night or two will persist in +regarding his teacher as a severely official personage, whose dignity is +not to be lightly trifled with. Now nothing, I believe, can really be +done, till this notion is extinguished,--till teacher and students have +got to understand each other, and have agreed to banish the foolish +_mauvaise honte_ which makes every Englishman shy of talking to a +fellow-creature. The freer the colloquial intercourse between teacher +and students, the more is learned in the time. To establish this is not +easy; but harder still is the task of setting the students on a familiar +footing with each other. There seems to be _some impassable obstacle to +the fraternization of a dozen Londoners_, though sitting side by side, +week after week, doing the same work." The truth being, that the dozen +Londoners might belong to twelve different castes. And just as in "the +Rifle Movement" the clerks in the Queen's civil service could not serve +in the same battalion with architects' clerks on the one hand, or +students at law on the other,--you may have, in your algebra class, +a goldsmith who is afraid of being snobbish if he speaks to a +map-engraver, or a tailor who does not presume to address an opinion on +Archimedes' square to a piano-forte maker. + +But the Brahmin and the Sudra may both be converted to Christianity. In +that case, though it seems very odd to both, the distinction of caste +goes to the wall. And the "knot of parsons and such like," spoken of +above, having, very fortunately for the world, been born into the +Christian Church, made it, as we have seen, their business to face the +difficulty because of the necessity,--and the Working-Men's College is +the result of their endeavor. Mr. Maurice himself took the first step. +Before the College itself was opened, he undertook a Bible-class. He +invited whoever would to come. He read a portion of the Scriptures, +explained its meaning as he could,--and invited all possible +questioning. He testifies, in the most public way, that he got more good +than he gave in the intercourse which followed. "I have learned more +myself than I have imparted. Again and again the wish has come into my +mind, when I have left those classes, 'Would to God that anything I have +said to them has been as useful to them as what they have said to me has +been to me!'" + +If now the American reader will free his mind from any comparisons +with an American college, and take, instead, his notion of this +"Bible-class," we can give him some conception of what the Working-Men's +College is. For there is not a clergyman in America who has not +conducted such a class, for the benefit of any who would come. And +such classes are considered as mutual classes. Everybody may ask +questions,--everybody may bring in any contribution he can to the +conversation. Very clearly there is no reason why chemistry, algebra, +Latin, or Greek may not be taught from the same motive, in classes +gathered in much the same way, and with a like feeling of cooperation +among those concerned. This is what the Working-Men's College attempts. +The instructors volunteer their services. They go, for the love of +teaching, or to be of use, or to extend their acquaintance among their +fellow-men. The students go, in great measure, doubtless, to learn. But +they are encouraged to feel themselves members of a great coöperation +society. So soon as possible, they are commissioned as teachers +themselves, and are put in a position to take preparatory classes in the +College. A majority of the finance-board consists of students. Let us +now see what is the programme which grows out of such a plan. I have not +at hand the schedule of exercises for the current year. I must therefore +give that which was in force in the autumn of 1859, when by paying +half-a-crown I became a member of the Working-Men's College. As I +make this boast, I must confess that I never took any certificate of +proficiency there, nor was I ever "sent up" for any, even the humblest, +degree. For the Working-Men's College may send up students to the +University of London for degrees. + +Remember, then, that to accommodate London working-hours, all the +classes begin as late as seven o'clock in the evening. There are some +Women's Classes in the afternoon, but they are under a wholly different +management. From seven to ten every evening, Lord Thurlow's house is, so +to speak, in full blast. Mr. Ruskin is the earliest professor. He comes +at seven on Thursday, to teach drawing in landscape from seven till +half-past ten. Work begins on other evenings and in other classes at +half-past seven. Four other teachers of drawing are at work with their +pupils on different evenings of the week. Monday and Thursday are the +Latin days, Monday and Wednesday the Greek,--all taught by graduates of +the Universities. The mathematics are Arithmetic, Algebra, Geometry in +two classes, and Trigonometry. There was a class in Geology the winter I +knew the College,--there had been classes in Botany and Chemistry. There +were also classes in French, in German, in English Grammar, in Logic, +in Political Economy, and in Vocal Music, a class on the Structure and +Functions of the Human Body, and some general lectures or studies in +History. There were also "practice classes," where the students worked +with others more advanced than themselves on the subjects of the several +exercises,--there were preparatory classes, and an adult school to teach +men to read. + +Now this is rather a rambling conspectus of a curriculum of study. But +it teaches, I suppose, first, what the right men would volunteer to +teach,--second, what the working-men wanted to learn. It is pretty +clear, that, if the plan succeeds, it will bring up a body of young men +who will know what is the advantage of a systematic line of study a good +deal better than any of them can be expected to know at the beginning. +Meanwhile here is certainly a very remarkable exhibition of instruction +to any man in London for a price merely nominal. After he has once paid +an entrance-fee,--half-a-crown, as I have said,--he may join any +class in the College whenever he wishes, on the payment of a very +insignificant additional fee. For the drawing-classes this fee is five +shillings. For the courses of one hour a week it is two shillings +sixpence, for those of two hours it is four shillings. The +drawing-classes are a trifle more costly, because the room for drawing +is kept open ready for practice-work every evening in the week. There +is also open for everybody every evening a Library, and the Principal's +Bible-class is open to all comers. + +So much for the instruction side. Now to describe the social side, I +had best perhaps give the detail of one or two of my own visits at the +College. Walk into the front room on the lower floor of any house in +Colonnade Row in Boston, where the entry is on the right of the house, +and you see such a room as the present "Library" was when Lord Thurlow +lived there. Here is the office of the College. Here I found Mr. +Shorter, the Secretary, in a corner, at a little desk piled with +catalogues, circulars, "Working-Men's College Magazines," etc. There +was a coal fire in a grate, [_Mem._ Hot-air furnaces hardly known in +England,] a plain suite of book-shelves on one or more sides of the +room, and a suite of narrow tables for readers running across. There +were, perhaps, a dozen young men sitting there to read. This is +virtually a club-room for the College, and serves just the same +purpose that the reading-room of the Christian Union or the Christian +Association does with us, but that they take no newspapers. [_Mem. 2d_. +If you are in England, you say, "They _take in_ none." In America, the +newspapers take in the subscribers.] + +I told Mr. Shorter that I wanted to learn about the practical working +of the College. He informed me very pleasantly of all that I inquired +about. It proved that they published a monthly magazine, "The +Working-Men's College Magazine," which was devoted to their interests. +The subscription is a trifle, and I took the volume for the year. It +proved, again, that I could become a member of the College by paying +half-a-crown; so I paid, was admitted to the privilege of the +reading-room, and sat down to read up, from the Magazine, as to the +working of the College. It appeared, that, after my initiation, I might +join any class, though it were not at the beginning of the term. So I +boldly proposed to Mr. Shorter that I would join Mr. Ruskin's class. +To tell the whole truth, I thought the experiment would be well worth +making, if I only gained by it a single personal interview with the +Oxford graduate, though I was doubtful about the quality of my impromptu +skies. + + "Says Paddy, 'There's few play + This music,--can you play?'-- + Says I, 'I don't know, for I never did try.'" + +I could at least have said this to the distinguished critic, if I found +that his class was more advanced than I. But it proved that their +session was within quarter of an hour of its end,--and with some +lingering remains of native modesty, I waited for another occasion,--a +morrow which never came,--before putting myself under Mr. Ruskin's +volunteer tuition. But I tell the story to illustrate what might have +been. Had I been legitimately a working-man in London, whatever the +character of my work, I had a right to that privilege. + +The Library proved to be one of those miscellaneous collections, such as +all new establishments have, so long as they rely on the books which +are given to them. I took down a volume of the "Reports of the Social +Association,"--an institution which they have in England now, for the +double purpose of giving an additional chance to philanthropists to +talk, and of saving the world from the Devil by drainage, statistics, +statutes, and machinery generally. But I looked over the edge of the +book a good deal to see who drifted in and out. As different classes +finished their work, one and another member came in,--and a few lingered +to read. The aspect of activity and resolute purpose was the striking +thing about the whole. The men were all young,--seemed at home, and +interested in what they were doing. Half-past nine, or thereabouts, +came, and a bell announced that all instruction was over, and that +evening prayers would close the work of the day. Down-stairs I went, +therefore, with those who stayed, into Lord Thurlow's wine-cellar, +which, as I said, is the chapel. + +The arrangements for this religious service, if I understood the matter +rightly, are in the hands of Mr. Hughes, the well-known biographer +of Tom Brown at Rugby and at Oxford. In an amusing speech about his +connection with the College, Mr. Hughes gives an account of the way his +services as a law professor were gradually dispensed with, and says, +"Being a loose hand, they cast round to see what should be done with +me." Then, he says, they gave him the charge of the common room of the +College,--and that he considers it his business to promote, in whatever +way he can, the "common life," or the communion, we may say, of the +members who belong to different classes. In this view, for instance, in +the tea-room, where there is always tea for any one who wants it, he +presides at a social party weekly;--he had charge, when I was there, of +the drill class, and, I think, at other seasons, conducted the cricket +club, the gymnastics, or had an eye to them. In such a relation as that, +such a man would think of the union in worship as an essential feature +in his plans. And here I am tempted to say, that in a thousand things +in England which seem a hopeful improvement on English lethargy, one +catches sight of Dr. Arnold as being, behind all, the power that is +moving. Hodson, in the East-Indian army, seems so different from anybody +else, that you wonder where he came from, till it proves he was one +of Arnold's boys. Price's Candle-Works, in London, and Spottiswoode's +Printing-House have been before us here, in all our studies for the +Christian oversight of great workshops,--and it turns out that it was +Arnold who started the men who set these successes in order. The Bishop +of London would not thank me for intimating that he gained something +from being Arnold's successor; but I am sure Mr. Hughes would be +pleased to think that Arnold's spirit still lives and works in his +cellar-chapel. + +The chapel is but one of the recitation-rooms,--and, like all the +others, is fitted with the plainest unpainted tables and benches. Two +gentlemen read the lessons and a short form of prayer, prepared, I +think, by Mr. Maurice himself,--and so adapted to the place and the +occasion. Thirty or more of the students were present. + +I dare not say that it was a piece of Working-Men's College +good-fellowship,--but, led either by that or by English hospitality, one +of the gentlemen who officiated, to whom I had introduced myself with +no privilege but that of a "fellow-commoner" at the College, not only +showed me every courtesy there, but afterwards offered me every service +which could facilitate my objects in London. This fact is worth +repeating, because it shows, at least, what is possible in such an +institution. + +After an introduction so cordial, it may well be supposed that I often +looked in on the College of an evening. If I were in that part of the +town when evening came on, I made the Library my club-room, to write a +note or to waste an hour. I am sure, that, had it been in my power, I +should have dropped in often,--so pleasant was it to watch the modest +work of the place, and the energy of the crowded rooms,--and so new +to me the aspects of English life it gave. I felt quite sure that the +College was gaining ground, on the whole. I can easily understand that +some classes drag,--perhaps some studies, which the managers would be +most glad to see successful. But, on the whole, there seems spirit and +energy,--and of course success. + +My travelling companion, Chiron, is fond of twitting me as to the +success of one of the "social meetings" to which I dragged him, +promising to show him something of working-men's life. We arrived too +early. But the Secretary told us that the garden was lighted up for +drill, and that the working-men's battalion was drilling there. It was +under the charge of Sergeant Reed, a medal soldier from the Crimea. At +that time England was in one of her periodical fits of expecting an +invasion. For some reason they will not call on every able-bodied man to +serve in a militia;--I thought because they were afraid to arm all their +people,--though no Englishman so explained it to me. They did, however, +call for volunteers from those classes of society which could afford +to buy uniforms and obtain "practice-grounds three hundred yards in +length." This included, I should say, about eleven of the thirty-seven +castes of English society. It intentionally left out those beneath,--as +it did all Ireland. Mr. Hughes, however, seized on it as an admirable +chance for his College,--its common feeling, its gymnastics,--and many +other "good things," looking down the future. In general, the drills +which were going on all over England were sad things to me. This idea +of staking guineas against _sous_, when the contest with Napoleon did +come,--staking an English judge, for instance, with his rifle, against +some wretched conscript whom Napoleon had been drilling thoroughly, with +his, seemed and seems to me wretched policy. But--if it were to be done +this way--of course the best thing possible was to work as widely as you +could in getting your recruits; and,--if England were too conservative +to say, "We are twenty-eight millions, one-fifth fighting men,"--too +conservative to put rifles or muskets into the hands of those five or +six million fighters,--the next best thing was to rank as many as you +could in your handful of upper-class riflemen. However, I offered my +advice liberally to all comers, and explained that at home I was a +soldier when the Government wanted me,--was registered somewhere,--and +could be marched to San Juan, about which General Harney was vaporing +just then, whenever the authorities chose. So it was that I and Chiron +stood superior to see Sergeant Reed drill thirty-nine working-men. Mr. +Hughes was on the terrace, teaching an awkward squad their facings. + +Sergeant Reed paraded his men,--and wanted one or two more. He came and +asked Mr. Hughes for them,--and he in turn told us very civilly, that, +if "we knew our facings," we might fall in. Alas for the theory of the +_Landsturm!_ Alas for the fame of the Massachusetts militia! Here are +two of the "one hundred and fifty-two thousand eight hundred and fifty +non-commissioned officers, musicians, artificers, and privates" whom +Massachusetts that year registered at Washington,--two soldiers for +whom somebody, somewhere, has two cartridge-boxes, two muskets, two +shoulder-straps, and the rest;--here is an opportunity for them to show +the gentlemen of a foreign service how much better we know our facings +than they theirs,--and, alas, the representative two do not know their +facings at all! We declined the invitation as courteously as it was +offered. Perhaps we thus escaped a prosecution under the Act of 1819, +when we came home,--for having entered the service of a foreign power. +Certainly we avoided the guilt of felony, in England; for it is felony +for an alien to take any station of trust or honor under the Queen,--and +when Mr. Bates and Louis Napoleon were sworn in as special constables on +the Chartists' day, they might both have been tried for felony on the +information of Fergus O'Connor, and sent to some Old Bailey or other. +None the less did we regret our ignorance of the facings, and, after a +few minutes, sadly leave the field of glory. + +My last visit to the Working-Men's College was to attend one of Mr. +Maurice's Sunday-evening classes, and this was the only occasion when I +ever appeared as a student. It was held at nine in the evening,--out of +the way, therefore, of any Church-service. There gathered nearly twenty +young men, who seemed in most instances to be personally strangers to +each other. Mr. Maurice is so far an historical person that I have a +right, I believe, to describe his appearance. He must be about fifty +years old now. He looks as if he had done more than fifty years' worth +of work,--and yet does not look older than that, on the whole. His hair +is growing white; his face shows traces of experience of more sorts +than one, but is very gentle and winning in its expression, both in his +welcome, and in the vivid conversation which is called his lecture. He +sat at a large table, and we gathered around it with our Testaments and +note-books. The subject was the fourth chapter of the Epistle to the +Hebrews,--the conversation turning mostly, of course, on the "rest" +which the people of God enter into. This is not the place for a +report of the exposition, at once completely devout and completely +transcendental, by which this distinguished theologian lighted up this +passage for that cluster of young men. But I may say something of the +manner of one so well known and so widely honored among a "present +posterity" in America, for his works. He read the chapter through,--with +a running commentary at first,--blocking out, as it were, his ground +notion of it. This was the first _ébauche_ of his criticism; but you +felt after its details without quite finding them. In a word, the +impression was precisely the uneasy impression you feel after the first +reading of one of his sermons or lectures,--that there is a very grand +general conception, but that you do not see how it is going to "fay in" +in its respective parts. One of the students intimated some such doubt +regarding some of the opening verses,--and there at once appeared enough +to show how frank was the relation, in that class at least, between the +teacher and the pupils. Then began the real work and the real joy of the +evening. Then on the background he had washed in before he began to put +in his middle-distance, and at last his foreground, and, last of all, +to light up the whole by a set of flashes, which he had reserved, +unconsciously, to the close. He dropped his forehead on his hand, worked +it nervously with his fingers, as if he were resolved that what was +within should serve him, went over the whole chapter in much more detail +a second time, held us all charged with his electricity, so that we +threw in this, that, or another question or difficulty,--till he fell +back yet a third time, and again went through it, weaving the whole +together, and making part illustrate part under the light of the comment +and illumination which it had received before,--and so, when we read +it with him for the fourth and last time, it was no longer a string +of beads,--a set of separate verses,--Jewish, antiquated, and +fragmentary,--but one vivid illustration of the "peace which passeth all +understanding" into which the Christian man may enter. + +With this fortunate illustration and exposition of the worth and work of +the Working-Men's College my connection with it closed. It seems to me a +beautiful monument of the love and energy of its founder. Perhaps we are +all best known through our friends, or, as the proverb says, "by the +company we keep." Let the reader know Mr. Maurice, then, by remembering +that he is the godfather of Tennyson's son,-- + + "Come, when no graver cares annoy, + Godfather, come and see your boy,"-- + +that Charles Kingsley has a Frederic Maurice among his children,--and +that Thomas Hughes has a Maurice also. The last was lost, untimely, from +this world, in bathing in the Thames. The magnetism of such a man has +united the group of workers who have formed the Working-Men's College. +We need not wonder that with such a spirit it succeeds. + + + + +EMANCIPATION IN RUSSIA. + + +Two great nations are peculiarly entitled to be considered modern +in their general character, though each is living under ancient +institutions. They are the _United States_ and _Russia_. Neither of +these nations is a century old, regarded as a power that largely affects +affairs by its action, and into the composition of each there enters a +great variety of elements. The United States may be said to date from +1761, just one hundred years ago, when the American debate began on the +question of granting Writs of Assistance to the revenue-officers of the +crown. The struggle between England and America was then commenced in +the chief court of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay, and the Declaration +of Independence was but the logical conclusion of the argument of James +Otis; but that conclusion would not have established anything, had it +not been confirmed by the inexorable logic of cannon. The last resort of +kings was then on the side of the people, and gave them the victory. +The fifteen years that passed between the time when James Otis spoke +in Boston and the time when John Adams spoke in Philadelphia belong +properly to our national history, and should be so regarded. The +grandson and biographer of John Adams says that Mr. Adams "was attending +the court as a member of the bar, and heard, with enthusiastic +admiration, the argument of Otis, the effect of which was to place him +at the head of that race of orators, statesmen, and patriots, by whose +exertions the Revolution of American Independence was achieved. This +cause was unquestionably the incipient struggle for that independence. +It was to Mr. Adams like the oath of Hamilcar administered to Hannibal. +It is doubtful whether Otis himself, or any person of his auditory, +perceived or imagined the consequences which were to flow from the +principles developed in that argument. For although, in substance, +it was nothing more than the question upon the legality of general +warrants,--a question by which, when afterward raised in England, in +Wilkes's case, Lord Camden himself was taken by surprise, and gave at +first an incorrect decision,--yet, in the hands of James Otis, this +question involved the whole system of the relations of authority and +subjection between the British government and their colonies in America. +It involved the principles of the British Constitution, and the whole +theory of the social compact and the natural rights of mankind." + +In the summer of 1762, about seventeen months after Otis had made his +argument, the existence of modern Russia began. Catharine II. then +commenced her wonderful reign, having dethroned and murdered her +husband, Peter III., the last of the sovereigns of Russia who could make +any pretensions to possession of the blood of the Romanoffs. A minor +German princess, who originally had no more prospect of becoming +Empress-Regnant of Russia than she had of becoming Queen-Regnant of +France, Sophia-Augusta of Anhalt-Zerbst was elevated to the throne of +the Czars on the 9th of July, 1762; and a week later her miserable +husband learned how true was the Italian dogma, that the distance +between the prisons of princes and their graves is but short. Catharine +II. founded a new dynasty in Russia, and gave to that country the +peculiar character which it has ever since borne, and which has enabled +it on more than one occasion to decide the fate of Europe, and therefore +of the world. Important as were the labors of Peter the Great, it does +not appear to admit of a doubt that their force was wellnigh spent when +Peter III. ascended the throne; and his conduct indicated the triumph of +the old Russian party and policy, as the necessary consequence of his +violent feeling in behalf of German influences, ideas, and practices. +The Czarina, like those Romans who became more German than the Germans +themselves, affected to be fanatically Russian in her sentiments and +purposes, and so acquired the power to Europeanize the policy of her +empire. She it was who definitely placed the face of Russia to the West, +and prepared the way for the entrance of Russian armies into Italy and +France, and for the partition of Poland, the ultimate effect of which +promises to be the reunion of that country under the sceptre of the +Czar. It was the seizure of so much of Poland by Russia that fixed the +latter's international character; and it was Catharine II. who destroyed +Poland, and added so much of its territory to the dominions of the +Czars. After the first partition had been effected, it was no longer +in Russia's power to refrain from taking a leading part in European +politics; and when her grandson, in 1814, was on the point of making +war on England, France, and Austria, rather than abandon the new Polish +spoil which he had torn from Napoleon I., he was but carrying out the +great policy of the Great Catharine. If we look into the political +literature of the last century, we shall find that Peter I.'s action +had very little effect in the way of increasing the influence of Russia +abroad. His eccentric conduct caused him to be looked upon as a sort of +royal wild man of the woods, rather than as a great reformer whose aim +it was to elevate his country to an equality with kingdoms that had +become old while Russia was ruled by barbarians of the remote East. He +was "a self-made man" on a throne, and displayed all the oddities and +want of breeding that usually mark the demeanor of persons whose youth +has not had the advantages that proceed from good examples and regular +instruction. Of the courtly graces, and of those accomplishments +which are most valued in courts, he had as many as belong to an +ill-conditioned baboon. A railway-car on a cattle-train does not require +more cleaning, at the end of a long journey, than did a room in a palace +after it had been occupied by Peter and his clever spouse. Some of his +best-authenticated acts could not be paralleled outside of a piggery. +The Prussian court, one hundred and sixty years since, was not a very +nice place, and its members were by no means remarkable for refinement; +but they were shocked by the proceedings of the Czar and the Czarina, +some of which greatly resembled those which are not uncommon in a very +wild "wilderness of monkeys." The last of Peter's descendants who +reigned _and ruled_ was his daughter Elizabeth, who died in 1761, and +who was a most admirable representative of her admirable parents. +Neither the manners nor the morals of the Russian court and the Russian +empire had improved during the twenty years that she governed; and as to +policy in government, she had none, and apparently she was incapable of +comprehending a political principle. Had her reign been followed by that +of some Russian prince of kindred character as well as of kindred blood, +and had that reign extended to twenty years' time, Russia would have +fallen back to the position she had held in 1680, and never could have +become a European power. Fortunately or unfortunately,--who shall as yet +undertake to decide which, considering as well European interests as +Russian interests?--the reign of Peter III. was too short to be worth +historical counting, and Elizabeth's real successor was a foreigner, +who not only was capable of comprehending Peter the Great's ideas and +purpose, but who had the advantage of understanding that world the +civilization and vices of which Peter had sought to engraft on the +Russian stock. The grand barbarian himself never could understand more +than one-half of the work to which he devoted his life, as there was +nothing in his nature to which Occidental thought could firmly fasten +itself. He knew little of that the effects of which he so much admired. +His mind was essentially Oriental in its cast, and the creation of his +Northern capital was a piece of work that might have been done by some +Eastern despot; and in the preceding century something like it had +been done by Shah Jehan, when he created the new city of Delhi. In no +European country could such an undertaking have been attempted. It +pleased Catharine II., in after-days, to say of Peter, that "he +introduced European manners and European costumes amongst a European +people"; but this was only a piece of flattery to her subjects, whom +she did so much to Europeanize by making them believe that they were of +Europe, and were destined to rule that continent. She it was who did +what Peter planned, and by making use of Russians as her agents. Her +statesmen, her generals, and her "favorites" were Russians; and it was +after her character and purposes became known that the rulers of Western +Europe were forced to the conclusion that a change of policy was +inevitable. But for the occurrence of the French Revolution, that +Anglo-French Alliance which has been regarded as one of the prodigies of +our prodigy-creating age would have been anticipated by more than sixty +years. By destroying Poland and humiliating Turkey, Catharine forever +settled the character of the Russian Empire; and her successors were +enabled to solidify her work in consequence of the course which events +took after the overthrow of the old French monarchy. Russian support +was highly bidden for by both those parties in Europe which were headed +respectively by France and by England; and it is difficult to decide +from which Russia most profited in those days, the friendship of England +or the enmity of France. One thing was sufficiently clear,--and that +was, that, when the war had been decided in favor of the reactionists, +Russia was the greatest power in the world. In the autumn of 1815, a +Russian army one hundred and sixty thousand strong was reviewed near +Paris, a spectacle that must have caused the sovereigns and statesmen of +the West to have some doubts as to the wisdom of their course in paying +so very high a price for the overthrow of Napoleon. It was certain that +the genie had broken from his confinement, and that, while he towered to +the skies, his shadow lay upon the world. The hegemony which Russia held +for almost forty years after that date justified the fears which then +were expressed by reflecting men. It only remained to be seen whether +the Russian sovereigns, proceeding in the spirit that had moved Peter +and Catharine, would take those measures by which alone a _Russian +People_ could be formed; and to that end, the abolition of serfdom was +absolutely necessary: the masses of their subjects, the very population +from which their victorious armies were conscribed, being in a certain +sense slaves, a state of things that had no parallel in the condition of +any European country.[A] + +[Footnote A: At what precise time Russia's policy began to influence +the action of the European powers it would not be easy to say. +Unquestionably, Peter I.'s conduct was not without its effect, and his +triumph over Charles XII. makes itself felt even to this day, and it +ever will be felt. "Pultowa's day" was one of the grand field-days of +history. Sweden had obtained a high place in Europe, in consequence of +the grand part she played in the Thirty Years' War, to which contest she +contributed the greatest generals, the ablest statesmen, and the best +soldiers; and the successes of Charles XII. in the first half of his +reign promised to increase the power of that country, which had become +great under the rule and direction of Gustavus Adolphus and Oxenstierna. +This fair promise was lost with the Battle of Pultowa; and a country +that might have successfully resisted Russia, and which, had its +greatness continued, could have protected Poland,--if, indeed, +Poland could have been threatened, had Russia been unsuccessful at +Pultowa,--was thrown into the list of third-rate nations. Poland was +virtually given up to Russia through the defeat of Charles XII., just +as, a century later, she failed of revival through the defeat of +Napoleon I. in his Russian expedition. But the effect of Sweden's defeat +was not fully seen until many years after its occurrence. Prussia became +alarmed at the progress of Russia at an early day. The War of the Polish +Succession was decided by Russian intervention, in 1733. In 1741 Maria +Theresa relied on Russia, and in 1746 Russia and the Empress of Germany +formed a defensive alliance. The _Cotillon_ Coalition of the Seven +Years' War, formed for the destruction of Frederic II., and the parties +to which were the Czarina Elizabeth, Maria Theresa, and Madame de +Pompadour,--a drunkard, a prude, and a harlot,--brought Russia famously +forward in Europe. In the Eighty-Seventh Letter of Goldsmith's _Citizen +of the World_, published a century ago, are some very just and +discriminating remarks on "the folly of the Western parts of Europe in +employing the Russians to fight their battles," which show that their +author was far in advance of his time, and that he foresaw the growth +of Russia in importance before she had seized upon Poland. In Catharine +II.'s time, the Russian Empire was the object of much adulation from +Western envoys, and the English sought to obtain the assistance of +the barbarians in the American War, but with not such success as they +desired, though they managed to keep our envoy from the court, and to +make Russia unfriendly to us. Our diplomatic relations with Russia did +not begin until a generation after the Declaration of Independence.] + +Thus the United States and Russia began their careers at the same time, +as nations destined to have influence in the ordering of Western life. +They were then, as they are now, very unlike to each other. In one +respect only was there any resemblance between them: In this country +there were some myriads of slaves, and in Russia there were many +millions of serfs. Now who, of all the sagacious, far-sighted men then +living, could have ventured to predict that at the end of one hundred +years the American nation that was so soon to be should be engaged in a +civil contest having for its object, on the part of those who began +it, the perpetuation and extension of slavery, while Russia should be +threatened with such a contest because her government, an autocracy, +had abolished serfdom? Many years earlier, Berkeley had predicted that +Time's last and noblest offspring would be the nation that was growing +up in North America; and when he died, in 1753, he would not have +admitted that slavery was an institution which his favorite land could +hug to its bosom, or that America would be less benevolent than that +semi-barbarous empire which was rising in the East,--an empire, to use +his own thought, which Europe was breeding in her decay. Franklin was +then at the height of his fame as a philosopher, and his merits as a +statesman were beginning to be acknowledged; but, wise as he was, he +would have smiled, had there been a prophet capable of telling him the +exact truth as to the future of America. Probably there was not a person +then on earth who could have supposed that that would be which was +written in the Book of Fate. That freedom should come to a people from +a despot's throne was almost as hard to understand as that the rankest +kind of despotism should rise up from among a people the most boastful +of their liberty that ever existed. There are, unhappily, but too many +instances of free nations that have behaved oppressively. The first +African slaves that were brought into the territory of the American +nation came under the flag of a people who had most heroically struggled +for their rights, and the recollection of whose efforts has been revived +by the brilliant labors of the most accomplished of living American +historians. The Greeks, who had so much to say about their own liberty, +believed that they had the right to enslave all other men; and the +Romans, who sometimes talked as if they had a Fourth of July of their +own, assumed that it was in the power of society to enslave any race +whose services its members required. The slaves of free peoples have +generally fared worse than the slaves of men themselves despotically +governed. Thus there is nothing so very strange in the conduct of those +Americans who, concerned for their "right" to trade in black humanity, +and to live on the sweat of black humanity's brows. That which is +strange in the condition of the world is the contrast which is furnished +to the action of our Southern population by the action of the rulers of +Russia. Since American democrats have endeavored to show that no such +contrast exists,--that between the enslavement of black men and the +granting of freedom to white men there is a close resemblance,--and that +the two proceedings are one in fact, how much soever they may differ in +name; that it is not because he is an enemy of slavery, as it is here +understood, that the Czar has become an emancipationist, but because he +is hostile to the slavery of white men,--that, were the Russian serfs as +dark as American slaves, his heart would have remained as hard toward +them as that of Pharaoh toward the Israelites when the plague-pressure +was temporarily removed from his people,--that he would as soon have +thought of washing the Ethiopian white with his own imperial hands as of +conferring freedom upon this race. Such is the theory of those of our +democrats who would still maintain their regard for the Czar and their +worship of Czarism. Alexander has not, they aver, been so bad as the +Abolitionists have drawn him. Like another illustrious personage, he +is not half so black as he is painted. Nay, he is not black at all. He +worships the white theory, and might run for the Montgomery Congress in +South Carolina without any danger of being numbered among the victims +of Lynch-law. Other democrats are not so well disposed toward the Czar, +their feelings respecting him having changed as completely as did those +of certain earlier democrats in regard to Mr. O'Connell, when the great +Irishman denounced slavery in America. It is a sore subject with our +pro-slavery people, this faithlessness of Russia to the cause of human +oppression. How they sympathized with her in the war with the Western +powers, and prophesied the defeat of the Allies in the Crimea, is well +remembered; but when the new Czar announced his purpose to abolish +serfdom, they, as Lord Castlereagh would have said, "turned their backs +upon themselves," and could see no good in the great Northern Empire. +Russia as the great revolution-queller, reading the Riot Act to the +liberals of Europe, and sending one hundred and fifty thousand men to +"crush out" the nationality of Hungary, and to revivify the power of +Austria, was to them an object of reverence; but Russia the liberator of +serfs, and the backer of France in the Italian War, became an object of +hate and fear. Nicholas might have patronized our Secessionists, for he +was partial to rebels who supported his opinions; but his son can +have no sympathy with men whose every act is a condemnation of those +principles which govern his conduct as a Russian ruler,--though in his +bearing toward Poland and others of the conquered portions of his empire +he may prove himself no more lenient than Mr. Jefferson Davis would +toward a Northern State that had declared itself independent of Southern +supremacy, could he "subdue" it. + +It would, however, be most unjust so to speak of Russian serfdom as to +convey the impression that it ever was quite so bad as American slavery +is. It is the peculiarity of American slavery, that it has no redeeming +features. Long before it had become so odious as we see it, and before +its existence was found incompatible with the peaceful prevalence of +a constitutional system of government, its character was emphatically +summed up in a few words by a great man, who called it "the sum of +all villanies." Time has not improved its character, but has made the +institution worse, by extending the effect of its operations. The +political character which American slavery has had ever since the +formation of the Constitution has not only stood in the way of every +emancipation project, but it has made slaveholders, and men who have +sought political preferment through working on the prejudices of +slaveholders, supporters of the institution on grounds that have had no +existence in other countries; and the contest in which this country is +now involved is the natural effect of the more rapid growth of the Free +States in everything that leads to political power in modern times. Had +the Slave States in 1860 been found relatively as strong as they were in +1840, the Secession movement could not have occurred; for most of the +men who lead in it would have preferred to rule the United States, and +would have cared little for the defeat of any political party, confident +as they would have been in their capacity to control all American +parties. As slavery is the foundation of political power in this +country, its friends cannot abandon their ideas without abdicating their +position. Hence the fierceness with which they have put forth, and +advocated with all their strength, opinions that never were held by any +other class of man-owners, and which would have been scouted in Barbary +even in those days when religious animosity added additional venom to +the feelings of the Mussulmans toward their Christian captives, and when +Spain and Italy were Africa's Africa. The slave population of the United +Slates are forbidden to hope. They form a doomed race, the physical +peculiarities of which are forever to keep them out of the list of +the elect. They are slaves, they and their ancestors always have been +slaves, and they and their descendants always must be slaves. Such is +the Southern theory, and the practice under it does that theory no +violence. In Russia the condition of the enslaved has never been so +bad as this, nor anything like it. Between the slave and the serf the +difference has been almost as great as that between the serf and the +free citizen. + +Nothing certain is known as to the origin of Russian serfage. Able men +have found the institution existing in very early times; and other men, +of not less ability, and well acquainted with Russian history, are +confident that it is a modern institution. Count Gurowski, whose +authority on such a point he ought to be a very bold man to question, +says,--"In Russia, slavery dates, with the utmost probability, since the +introduction of the Northmen, originating with prisoners of war, and +being established over conquered tribes of no Slavic descent. This was +done when Rurik and his successors descended the Dwina, the Dnieper, and +established there new dominions. In the course of time, the conquerors +cleared the forests, established villages and cities. As, in other +feudal countries, the tower, the _Schloss_, was outside of the village +or of the borough,--so was In Russia the _dwor_ or manor, where the +conqueror or master dwelt,--and from which was derived his name of +_dworianin_. That the genuine Russian of that time, whatever may have +been his social position, was free in his village, is beyond doubt,--as, +according to old records, the boroughs and villages, dependencies of the +manor, were settled principally with prisoners of war and the conquered +population. It was during the centuries of the Tartar dominion that the +people, the peasantry, became nailed to the soil, and deprived of +the right of freely changing their domicile. Then successively every +peasant, that is, every agriculturist tilling the soil with his own +hands, became enslaved. Only in estates owned by monasteries and +convents, which were very numerous and generally very rich, slavery +being judged to be opposed to Christian doctrine, it did not take +root at once. Generally, monks were reluctant to the utmost, and even +directly opposed to the sale of men in the markets, and the dependants +of a monastery were never sold in such a manner." The common view is, +that Borys Gudenoff, who reigned at the beginning of the seventeenth +century, established serfage age in Russia; but though the exact +character of his legislation is yet in dispute, it is obvious that no +Czar, and least of all one situated as was Borys, could have enslaved a +people. His legislation is involved in as much doubt as for a long time +were the Sempronian Laws of Rome. If we could believe that he instituted +the system of serfage, or seriously strengthened it, we should find that +Russian slavery came into existence but a few years before American +slavery; but such a "coincidence" cannot be rigidly insisted upon. It +would, however, we think, be difficult to show that the condition of +the Russian laboring classes was not made worse by the action of the +usurper. + +Peter the Great was so affected by the circumstance that men and women +and children could be sold like cattle, as American slaves now are, that +he sought to put a stop to the infamous traffic, but without success. +Catharine II. was a philosopher, and a patron of that eighteenth-century +philosophy which so largely favored human rights, and she regretted +the existence of serfage; but, in spite of this regret, and of some +sentimental efforts toward emancipation, she strengthened the system of +slavery under which so great a majority of her subjects lived. She gave +peasants to her "favorites," and to others whom she wished to reward +or to bribe. The brothers Orloff are said to have received forty-five +thousand peasants from her, being in part payment for what was done by +their family in setting up the new Russian dynasty founded by the German +princess. Potemkin received myriads of peasants. Some outrageous abuses +were practised by wealthy landholders, in consequence of the Czarina +having proclaimed that the laborers in Little Russia should belong to +the soil on which they were at that date employed. Thousands of persons +were entrapped into serfdom through a measure which the sovereign had +intended should lessen the evils of that institution. Catharine's +authority was never but once seriously disputed at home, and that was +by the rebellion of Pugatscheff, which is sometimes spoken of as an +outbreak against serfdom, which it was not in any proper sense, though +the abuses of the owners of serfs may have contributed to swell the +ranks of the pretender,--Pugatscheff calling himself Peter III. The Czar +Paul would not allow serfs to be sold apart from the soil to which they +belonged. It is a curious incident, that, when Paul restored Kosciusko +to liberty, he offered to give him a number of Russian peasants. The +Polish patriot had no hesitation in refusing to accept the Emperor's +offer, for which, in these times, there are Americans who think he was a +fool; but in 1797 certain lights had not been vouchsafed to the American +mind, that have since led some of our countrymen to become champions of +the cause of darkness. + +Alexander, whose reign began in 1801, was moved by a sincere desire to +get rid of serfdom. Schnitzler says that he "solemnly declared that he +would not endure the habit of making grants of peasants, a practice +hitherto common with the autocrats, and forbade the announcement in +public papers of the sales of human beings,"--and that "he permitted his +nobles to sell to their serfs, together with their personal liberty, +portions of land, which should thus become the _bona fide_ property of +the serf purchaser. This was a most important act; for Alexander thus +laid the basis of a class of free cultivators." A public man having +requested an estate with its serfs as hereditary possessions, the Czar +replied as follows:--"The peasants of Russia are for the most part +_slaves_. I need not expatiate upon the degradation or the misfortune +of such a condition. Accordingly, I have made a vow not to augment the +number; and to this end I have laid down the principle, that I will not +give away peasants as property." The Czar was determined to go farther +than this. Not only would he not increase the number of the serfs, but +he would lessen their number. The serfs of Esthonia were first favored, +their emancipation beginning in 1802, and being completed in 1816, the +year in which Alexander may be regarded as having been at the height of +his greatness, for he had completed the overthrow of Napoleon, and had +seen France saved from partition through his influence and exertions. +The Courland serfs were emancipated in 1817. Two years later, the nobles +of Livonia formed a plan of emancipation in their country, and when they +submitted it to the Czar, his answer was,--"I am delighted to see that +the nobility of Livonia have fulfilled my expectations. You have set an +example that ought to be imitated. You have acted in the spirit of our +age, and have felt that liberal principles alone can form the basis of +the people's happiness." So long as Alexander remained true to liberal +principles himself, there was some hope that he might abolish serfdom +throughout his dominions. He abhorred the "peculiar institution" of his +empire with all the force of a mind that certainly was generous, and +which had a strong bias in the direction of justice. Once he made a +solemn religious vow that he would abolish it. It is probable that +he would have made an attempt at complete emancipation, if the +circumstances of his time and his country had enabled him to concentrate +his thoughts and his labors upon domestic affairs. Unhappily for Russia, +and for the Czar's fame, he was soon drawn into the European vortex, and +became one of the principal actors in the grand drama of that age, so +that Russian interests were sacrificed to ambition, to the love of +military glory, and to the Czar's desire to become Don Quixote with an +imperial crown and sceptre. He wished to reconstruct the map of Europe, +which had been so terribly deranged by those terrible map-destroyers and +map-makers, the French republicans. Catharine II. had had the sense to +keep out of the war that had been waged against France, though no person +in Europe--not even George III. himself--hated the revolutionists more +intensely. She wished to see them subdued, but she preferred that the +work of subjugation should be done by others, so that she might be at +liberty to pursue her designs against Poland and Turkey and Persia. The +destruction of Poland she completed, but she was called away before she +could conquer the followers of Omar and of Ali. Paul was a party to the +second coalition against France, and his armies tore Italy from its +conquerors, and but for the stupidity of Austria there might have been +a Russian restoration of the Bourbons in 1709. Alexander resumed the +policy which his father had adopted only to discard, and though at one +period of his reign he appeared well inclined to Napoleon, there never +was any sincerity in the alliance between the two masters of so many +millions. The Czar was easily induced to favor the strange scheme of +an Italian adventurer for the rehabilitation of Europe, which had been +adopted by his friend and counsellor, the Prince Czartoryski, and +which ultimately furnished the basis, and many of the details, of that +pacification which was effected in 1815. We have seen the treaties of +that memorable year torn to tatters by Napoleon III., but the adoption +of Piatoli's project by Alexander affected the last generation as +intimately as the French Emperor's conduct has affected the men of +to-day. It led the Czar away from his original purpose, and converted +him, from a benevolent ruler, into a harsh, suspicious, unfeeling +despot. There could be nothing done for Russian serfs while their +sovereign was crusading it for the benefit of the Bourbons in particular +and of legitimacy in general. "God is in heaven, and the Czar is afar +off!" words once common with the suffering serfs, were of peculiar force +when the Czar, who believed himself to be the chosen instrument of +Heaven, was at Paris or Vienna, laboring for the settlement of Europe +according to ideas adopted in the early years of his reign. Napoleonism +and Liberalism were the same thing in the mind of Alexander, and he +finally came to regard serfdom itself as something that should not be +touched. It was a stone in that social edifice which he was determined +to maintain at all hazards. The plan of emancipation had worked well in +the outlying Baltic provinces, where there were few or no Russians, but +he discouraged its application to other portions of his dominions. +Some of his greatest nobles were anxious to take the lead as +emancipationists, but he would not allow them to proceed in the only way +that promised success, and so the bondage system was continued with the +approbation of the Czar. In his last years, Alexander, though still +quite a young man,--he was but forty-eight when he died,--was the most +determined enemy of liberty in Europe or Asia. + +The Emperor Nicholas began his remarkable reign with the desire strong +in his mind to emancipate the serfs,--or, if that be too sweeping +an expression, so to improve their condition as to render their +emancipation by his successors a comparatively easy proceeding. Much of +his legislation shows this, and that he was aware that the time must +come when the serfs could no longer be deprived of their freedom. Such +was the effect of his conduct, however, that all that he did in +behalf of the serfs was attributed to a desire on his part to create +ill-feeling between the nobility and the peasants. Then he was so +thoroughly arbitrary in his disposition, that he often neutralized the +good he did by his manner of doing it. But that which mainly prevented +him from doing much for his people was his determination to maintain the +position which Russia had acquired in Europe, and to maintain it, too, +in the interest of despotism, "pure and simple." A succession of events +caused the Czar's attention to be drawn to foreign affairs. The French +Revolution of 1830, the Polish Revolution of the same year, the troubles +in Germany, the Reform contest in England, the change in the order of +the Spanish succession, the outbreaks in Italy,--these things, and +others of a similar character, all of which were protests against +that European system which Russia had established and still favored, +compelled Nicholas to look abroad, and to neglect, measurably, domestic +government. At a later period, he was one of the parties to that +combination of great powers which threatened France with a renewal of +those invasions from which she had suffered so much in 1814 and 1815. +Turkey was the source of perpetual trouble to the Czar; and his eyes +were frequently drawn to India, where one of his envoys half threatened +an English minister that the troops of their two countries might meet, +and was curtly answered by the minister that he cared not how soon the +interview should begin. The extinction of Cracow served to show how +close was the watch which the Czar kept upon the West, and that he was +ready to crush even the smallest of those countries in which the spirit +of liberty should show itself. Had San Marino lain within his reach, he +would have been induced neither by its weakness nor its age to spare +it. The struggle with the Circassians was long, vexatious, and costly. +Finally, the Revolutions of 1848, leading, as they did, to the invasion +of Hungary, in the first place, and then to the war with the Western +Powers, operated to prejudice the Imperial mind against every form of +freedom, and to provide too much occupation for the Emperor and his +ministers to permit them to labor with care and effect in behalf of the +oppressed serfs at home. It would have been a strange spectacle, had +the man who was trampling down the Hungarians employed his leisure in +raising his own serfs from the dust. + +The Emperor Nicholas died in March, 1855, having lived long enough after +the beginning of that great war which he had so rashly provoked to see +his armies everywhere beaten and his fleets everywhere blockaded, while +the Russian leadership of Europe was struck down at a blow, never to be +resumed, unless there should be a radical change effected in Russian +institutions. Nearly thirty years of the most arrogant rule ever known +to the world came to an end in a moment, because the Emperor took "a +slight cold." A breath of the Northern winter served to stop the breath +of the Emperor of the North. He slept with his fathers, and his +son, Alexander II., reigned in his stead. The new Czar, who has the +reputation of being a much milder man than his father, and to bear +considerable resemblance to his uncle, as that uncle was in his best +days, was soon reported to be an emancipationist; but as the same +reports had prevailed respecting both Alexander I. and Nicholas, the +world gave little heed to what was said on the subject. It was not until +he had reigned for almost two years that something definite was done in +relation to it by the Czar; and then as many obstacles were thrown in +the way of the reform as would have served to disgust any man who had +not been in downright earnest. The Czar then took matters into his own +hands, so far as that was possible, and the work was pushed forward +with considerable speed. There was much discussion, and there were many +disappointments, in the course of the business; but through all the Czar +held to his determination, with a pertinacity that was not expected of +him, and which leaves the impression that his character has not been +properly understood. The history of the undertaking is yet to be +written, but, from what little is known of its details, we should say +that Alexander II. experienced more opposition, and that of an extremely +disagreeable character, from the nobility, than Alexander I. would +have encountered from the nobles of his time, had he resolved upon +emancipation in good faith, and adhered to his resolution, as his nephew +has done. Persons who suppose that a Russian Czar cannot be drowned, +because belonging to that select class who are born to be strangled, +would have it that the question would be settled by an application of +the bowstring, or the sash of some guardsman, to the Imperial throat; +and so a successful palace revolution lead to the postponement of the +plan of emancipation for another quarter of a century. But Russian +morality is of a much higher character than it was, and the members +of the reigning house are models of decorum, and know how to defer to +opinion. The nobles, too, are men of a very different stamp from their +predecessors of 1762 and 1801. The Russian polity is no longer a +despotism tempered by the cord. Fighting the good fight with something +of a Puritanical perseverance, the Czar was enabled to triumph over all +opposition to his preliminary project; and on the 3d of March, (N.S.,) +1861, the "Imperial Manifesto" emancipating the serfs was published. + +In the opening paragraph of this document, the Autocrat declares, that, +on ascending the throne, he took a vow in his innermost heart so to +respond to the mission which was intrusted to him as to surround with +his affection and his Imperial solicitude all his faithful subjects of +every rank and of every condition, from the warrior who nobly bears arms +for the defence of the country to the humble artisan devoted to the +works of industry,--from the official in the career of the high offices +of the State to the laborer whose plough furrows the soil; and then +proceeds to say,--"In considering the various classes and conditions +of which the State is composed, we came to the conviction that the +legislation of the empire, having wisely provided for the organization +of the upper and middle classes, and having defined with precision their +obligations, their rights, and their privileges, has not attained the +same degree of efficiency as regards the peasants attached to the soil, +thus designated because either from ancient laws or from custom they +have been hereditarily subjected to the authority of the proprietors, on +whom it was incumbent at the same time to provide for their welfare. +The rights of the proprietors have been hitherto very extended and very +imperfectly defined by the law, which has been supplied by tradition, +custom, and the good pleasure of the proprietors. In the most favorable +cases this state of things has established patriarchal relations founded +upon a solicitude sincerely equitable and benevolent on the part of +the proprietors, and on an affectionate submission on the part of the +peasants; but in proportion as the simplicity of morals diminished, +as the diversity of the mutual relations became complicated, as the +paternal character of the relations between the proprietors and the +peasants became weakened, and, moreover, as the seigneurial authority +fell sometimes into hands exclusively occupied with their personal +interests, those bonds of mutual good-will slackened, and a wide opening +was made for an arbitrary sway which weighed upon the peasants, was +unfavorable to their welfare, and made them indifferent to all progress +under the conditions of their existence. These facts had already +attracted the notice of our predecessors of glorious memory, and they +had taken measures for improving the condition of the peasants; but +among those measures some were not stringent enough, insomuch as they +remained subordinate to the spontaneous initiative of such proprietors +as showed themselves animated with liberal intentions; and others, +called forth by peculiar circumstances, have been restricted to certain +localities, or simply adopted as an experiment. It was thus that +Alexander I. published the regulation for the free cultivators, and that +the late Emperor Nicholas, our beloved father, promulgated that one +which concerns the peasants bound by contract. ... We thus came to the +conviction that the work of a serious improvement of the condition +of the peasants was a sacred inheritance bequeathed to us by our +ancestors,--a mission which, in the course of events, Divine Providence +called upon us to fulfil." + +It will be observed that the Czar goes no farther back than the +beginning of the reign of his uncle, sixty years since, in speaking of +the measures that have been taken for the improvement of the peasants' +condition; and he names only his father and his uncle as reforming +Emperors, though his language is such as to warrant the belief that +all his ancestors, who had reigned, had been friends of the serf, +and anxious to promote their welfare. But Alexander II. is too well +acquainted with the history of his family to venture to speak of the +actions of either the Great Peter or the Grand Catharine toward the +peasants. Gurowski tells us of the effect of one of Peter's acts in very +plain language. "In 1718," he says, "Peter the Great ordered a general +census to be taken all over the empire. The census officials, most +probably through thoughtlessness or caprice, divided the whole rural +population into two sections: First, the free peasants belonging to the +crown or its domains; and, secondly, all the rest of the peasantry, +the _krestianins_, or serfs living on private estates, were inscribed +_khrepostnoie kholopy_, that is, as chattels. The primitive Slavic +communal organization thus survived only on the royal domain, and there +it exists till the present day. The census of Peter having thus fairly +inaugurated chattelhood, it immediately began to develop itself in all +its turpitude. The masters grew more reckless and cruel; they sold +chattels separately from the lands; they brought them singly into +market, disregarding all family-ties and social bonds. Estates were no +more valued according to the area of land they contained, but according +to the number of their chattels, who were now called souls. In short, +all the worst features of chattelism, as it exists at the present day in +the American Slave States, immediately followed the publication of this +accursed census."[B] The same authority states that Nicholas in reality +was the first Emperor who granted estates excepting therefrom the +resident peasantry. + +[Footnote B: _Slavery in History_, pp. 245, 246.] + +Alexander II., in his Manifesto, expresses his confidence in the +nobility of Russia, which compliment is pronounced ironical, inasmuch as +they did not yield their consent to emancipation until they discovered +that the Czar and the serfs had united to extort it. "It is to the +nobles themselves," says the Czar, "conformably to their own wishes, +that we have reserved the task of drawing up the propositions for the +new organization of the peasants,--propositions which make it incumbent +upon them to limit their rights over the peasants, and to accept the +_onus_ of a reform which could not be accomplished without some material +losses. Our confidence has not been deceived. We have seen the nobles +assembled in committees in the districts, through the medium of their +confidential agents, making the voluntary sacrifice of their rights as +regards the personal servitude of the peasants. These committees, +after having collected the necessary _data_, have formulated their +propositions concerning the new organization of the peasants attached +to the soil in their relations with the proprietors. These propositions +having been found very diverse, as was to be expected from the nature +of the question, they have been compared, collated, and reduced to a +regular system, then rectified and completed in the superior committee +instituted for that purpose; and these new dispositions thus formulated +relative to the peasants and domestics of the proprietors have been +examined in the Council of the Empire." Invoking the Divine assistance, +the Czar says that he is resolved to carry this work into execution. In +virtue of the new dispositions, the peasants attached to the soil are to +be invested with all the rights of free cultivators. The proprietors are +to retain their rights of property in all the land belonging to them, +but they are to grant to the peasants for a fixed regulated rental the +full enjoyment of their _close_, or homestead; and, to assure their +livelihood, and to guaranty the fulfilment of their obligations toward +the Government, the quantity of arable land is fixed, as well as other +rural appurtenances. In return for the enjoyment of these territorial +allotments, the peasants are obligated to acquit the rentals fixed +to the profit of the proprietors; but in this state, which must be a +transitory one, the peasants shall be designated as "temporarily bound." +The peasants are granted the right of purchasing their homesteads, and, +with the consent of the proprietors, they may acquire in full property +the arable lands and other appurtenances which are allotted to them as a +permanent holding. By the acquisition in full property of the quantity +of land fixed the peasants will become free from their obligations +toward the proprietors for land thus purchased, and they will enter +definitively into the condition of free peasants, or landholders. A +transitory state is fixed for the domestics, adapted to their callings, +and to the exigencies of their position. At the close of two years, +they are to receive their full enfranchisement, and some temporary +immunities. "It is according to these fundamental principles," says the +Manifesto, "that the dispositions have been formulated which define +the future organization of the peasants and of the domestics, which +establish the order of the general administration of this class, and +specify in all their details the rights given to the peasants and to +the domestics, as well as the obligations imposed upon them toward the +Government and toward the proprietors. Although these dispositions, +general as well as local, and the special supplementary rules for some +particular localities, for the lands of small proprietors, and for +the peasants who work in the manufactories and establishments of the +proprietors, have been, as far as was possible, adapted to economical +necessities and local customs, nevertheless, to preserve the existing +state where it presents reciprocal advantages, we leave it to the +proprietors to come to amicable terms with the peasants, and to conclude +transactions relative to the extent of the territorial allotment, and to +the amount of rental to be fixed in consequence, observing at the +same time the established rules to guaranty the inviolability of such +agreements." The new organization, however, cannot be immediately put in +execution, in consequence of the inevitable complexity of the changes +which it necessitates. Not less than two years, or thereabout, will be +required to perfect the work; and to avoid all misunderstanding, and to +protect public and private interests during this interval, the existing +system will be maintained up to the moment when a new one shall have +been instituted by the completion of the required preparatory measures. +To this end, the Czar has deemed it advisable,-- + +"1. To establish in each district a special court for the question of +the peasants; it will have to investigate the affairs of the rural +communes established on the land of the lords of the soil. + +"2. To appoint in each district justices of the peace to investigate +on the spot all misunderstandings and disputes which may arise on the +occasion of the introduction of the new regulation, and to form district +assemblies with these justices of the peace. + +"3. To organize in the seigneurial properties communal administrations, +and to this end to leave the rural communes in their actual composition, +and to open in the large villages district administrations (provincial +boards) by uniting the small communes under one of these district +administrations. + +"4. To formulate, verify, and confirm in each rural district or estate +a charter of rules, in which shall be enumerated, on the basis of the +local statute, the amount of land reserved to the peasants in permanent +enjoyment, and the extent of the charges which may be exacted from them +for the benefit of the proprietor, as well for the land as for other +advantages granted by him. + +"5. To put these charters of rules into execution as they are gradually +confirmed in each estate, and to introduce their definitive execution +within the term of two years, dating from the day of publication of the +present manifesto. + +"6. Up to the expiration of this term the peasants and domestics are to +remain in the same obedience towards their proprietors, and to fulfil +their former obligations without scruple. + +"7. The proprietors will continue to watch over the maintenance of order +on their estates, with the right of jurisdiction and of police, until +the organization of the districts and of the district tribunals has been +effected." + +In the concluding portion of the Manifesto, the Czar expresses his +confidence in the nobility, and his belief that they will so labor as to +perfect the great work upon which all parties in Russia are engaged; but +there is something in the language he employs that sounds hollow, as +if he were not altogether so certain of support as he claims to be. He +speaks less like a man stating a fact than like one appealing to the +controllers of powerful interests. He also warns those persons who +have misunderstood the Imperial purpose, "individuals more intent upon +liberty than mindful of the duties which it imposes," and whose conduct +was not beyond reproach when the first news of the great reform became +diffused among the rural population. The serfs are called upon, with +much unction, to appreciate and recognize the considerable sacrifices +which the nobility have made on their behalf. They are expected to +understand that the blessings of an existence supported upon the +basis of guarantied property, as well as a greater liberty in the +administration of their goods, entail upon them, with new duties toward +society and themselves, the obligation of justifying the protecting +designs of the law by a loyal and judicious use of the rights which are +now accorded to them. "For," says the Autocrat, "if men do not labor +themselves to insure their own well-being under the shield of the laws, +the best of those laws cannot guaranty it to them." These are "noble +sentiments"; but the shrewder portion of the serfs will probably attach +more importance to the declaration, that, "to render the transactions +between the proprietors and the peasants more easy, in virtue of which +the latter may acquire in full property their homestead and the land +they occupy, the Government will advance assistance, according to +a special regulation, by means of loans, or a transfer of debts +encumbering an estate." + +Such are the principal details of this great measure, the most important +undertaking of modern days, whether we refer only to the measure itself, +or take its probable consequences into consideration. That forty-five +millions of human beings should be lifted out of the slough of slavery, +and placed in a condition to become _men_, would alone be a proceeding +that ought to take first rank among the illustrations of this age. But +we cannot consider it solely by itself. Every deed that is likely to +influence the life of a nation that is endowed with great vitality and +energy must be considered in connection with its probable consequences. +Russia stands in the fore-front rank of the leading nations of the +world. In the European Pentarchy, she is the superior of Austria, the +controller of Prussia, and the equal of France and England. The growth +of the United States in political power having received a check through +the occurrence of the Secession Rebellion, the relations of the great +empires, which our advance had threatened to disturb in an essential +manner, will probably remain unchanged; and so Russia, unless she should +become internally convulsed, will maintain her place. Assuming that the +work of emancipation is to be peacefully and successfully accomplished, +it would be fair to argue that the power of the Russian Empire will +be incalculably increased through the elevation of the masses of its +population. The Czar is doing for his dominions what Tiberius Gracchus +sought to do for the Roman Republic when he began that course of much +misunderstood agrarian legislation which led to his destruction, and to +the overthrow of the constitutional party in his country. As the Roman +Tribune sought to renew the Roman people, and to substitute a nation of +independent cultivators for those slaves who had already begun to eat +out the heart of the republic, so does the Russian Autocrat seek to +create a nation of freemen to take the place of a nation of serfs. If +the Roman had succeeded, the course of history must have been entirely +changed; and if the Russian shall succeed, we may feel assured that his +success will have prodigious results, though different from what are +expected, perhaps, by the Imperial reformer himself. His motives +of action are probably of that mixed character which governs the +proceedings of most men. Undoubtedly he wishes well to the millions for +whose freedom he has labored and is laboring; but then he would improve +their condition in order that he may become more powerful than ever +were his predecessors. He would rule over men rather than over slaves, +because men make better subjects and better soldiers than slaves ever +could be expected to make. The Russian serf has certainly proved himself +to be possessed of high military qualities in the past, but it admits +of a good deal of doubt whether he is equal to the present military +standard; and Russia cannot safely fall behind her neighbors and +contemporaries in the matter of soldiership. The events of all the wars +in which Russia has been engaged since 1815 prove that her armies +have not kept pace with those of most other countries. The first of +Nicholas's wars with Turkey would have ended in his total defeat, if the +Turks had been able to find a leader of ordinary capacity and average +integrity. The Persian War was successful because Persia is weak, and +she had not the means of making a powerful resistance to her old enemy. +The Poles, in 1831, held the Russians at bay for months, and would have +established their independence but for their own dissensions; and even +then Russia was much assisted by Prussia. The invasion of Hungary was a +military promenade, and the failure of the patriots was owing less to +the ability of Paskevitch than to the treason of Görgei. In the contest +between Russia and the Western powers, (1854-6,) the former was beaten +in every battle; and when she had only the Turks on her hands, in 1853, +her every purpose was foiled, and not one victory did her armies in +Europe win over that people. The world saw that a new breed of men had +taken the places of those soldiers who had been so prominent in the work +of overthrowing Napoleon; and even the heroes of 1812-15 were admitted +to be inferior to _their_ predecessors, the soldiers of Zürich and +Trebbia and Novi. It is the fact, and one upon which military men can +ruminate at their leisure, that the Russian armies showed more real +power and "pluck" a century ago than they have exhibited in any of +the wars of the last sixty years. They fought better at Zorndorf and +Kunersdorf, against the great Frederic, than they did at Austerlitz +and Friedland, against the greater Napoleon, or than we have seen them +fight, at the Alma, and at Inkerman, and at Eupatoria, against Raglan, +and St. Arnaud, and Omar Pacha. There was no falling off in the soldiers +of Suvaroff; but personal character had much to do with his successes, +as he was a man of genius, and the only original soldier that Russia +has ever had; and the men whom he led to victory in Turkey, Poland, +and Italy were trained by officers who had learned their trade of the +warriors who had fought against Frederic. But in the nineteenth Century +the change in the Russian army was perceptible to all men, and in none +could that change have produced more serious feelings than in the +present Czar and his father. Nicholas is supposed to have died of +mortification because his army, the instrument of his power over Europe, +had been cut through by the swords of the West; and Alexander II. +succeeded to a disgraced throne because his troops had proved themselves +unworthy successors of the men of Kulm. Wishing to have better soldiers +than he found in his armies, or than had served his father, Alexander +II. hastened that scheme of emancipation which he had been thinking of, +we may presume, for years, and which, he asserts, is the hereditary +idea of his line. We do not suppose that he is less inclined to rule +despotically than was his father, or that he would be averse to the +recovery of the position which was held by his uncle and his father. We +find not the slightest evidence, in all the proceedings of the Russian +Government, that the _people_ whom the Czar means to create are to +be endowed with political freedom. A more vigorous race of Russians, +morally speaking, is needed, and, except in some parts of the United +States, there are no men to be found capable of arguing that any portion +of the human family is susceptible of improvement through servitude. The +serf is naturally clever, and can "turn his hand" to almost anything. +The inference that freedom would exalt his mind and improve his +condition is one that was logically drawn at St. Petersburg and Moscow, +though they reason differently at Richmond and Montgomery. An army +recruited from slaves could not, in these times, when even bayonets +think and cannon reason much more accurately than they did when Louis +XIV. was a pattern monarch, ever look in the face the intelligent +trained legions of France or England or Germany. A combination of +political circumstances, similar to those of 1840, might give victory to +a grand Russian army, like that laurelless triumph which was then won +in Hungary, when the victors were nothing but the bloodhounds and +gallows-feeders of the House of Austria; but of _military_ glory the +present Russians could hope to have no more. To regain the place they +had held, it was necessary that they should be made personally free. +That they might be the better prepared to enslave others, they were +themselves to be converted into men. The freedom of the individuals +might be the means of supplying soldiers who should equal the fanatics +who followed Suvaroff, or the patriots who followed Kutusoff, or the +avengers who followed the first Alexander to Paris. The experiment, at +all events, was worth trying; and the Czar is trying it on a scale that +most impressively affects both the mind and the imagination of mankind, +who may learn that his works are destined greatly to bear upon their +interests. + +In war, it is not only men that are wanted, and in large numbers, but +money, and in large sums. Always of importance to the military monarch, +money is now the first thing that he must think of and provide, or his +operations will be checked effectually. War is a luxury that no poor +nation or poor king can now long enjoy. It is reserved for wealthy +nations, and for sovereigns who may possess the riches of Solomon +without being endowed with his wisdom. Having impressed so many agents +into its service, and subdued science itself to the condition of a +bondman, war consumes gold almost as rapidly as the searches and labors +of millions can produce it. The only sure, enduring source of wealth +is industry,--industry as enlightened in its modes and processes as +imperfect man will allow to exist. Russia is an empire that abounds with +the means of wealth, rather than with wealth itself. It is a country, or +collection of countries, of which almost anything in the way of +riches may be predicated, should intelligent labor be directed to the +development of its immense and various resources. Russian sovereigns +have frequently sought to do something for the people; but Alexander +II., a wiser man than any of his predecessors, is willing that the +people should do something for themselves, because he knows that all +that they shall gain, each man for himself, will be so much added to the +common stock of the empire. The many must become wealthy, in order that +one, the head of all, may become strong. Time and again has Russia found +her armies paralyzed and her victories barren because she was moneyless; +and but for the gold of foreign nations she must have halted in her +course, and never have become a European power. With a nation of freemen +all this may be, and most probably it will be, changed,--though it is +not so certain that the change will be attended with exactly that +order of results which the Czar may have arranged in his own mind. The +mightiest of monarchs are not exempt from the rule, that, while man +proposes, it is God who disposes the things of this world. Not one of +those reforming kings who broke down the power of the great nobles of +Western Europe, and so created absolute monarchies, appears to have had +any just conception of the business in which he was engaged; but all +were instruments in the hands of that mighty Power which overrules the +ambition of individuals so that it shall promote the welfare of the +world. + +The two years that are set apart for the completion of the plan of +emancipation will be the trial time of Russia. They may expire, and +nothing have been done, and the condition of the peasants be no more +hopeful than it was in those years which followed the "good intentions" +of Alexander I. It is not difficult to see that there are numerous and +powerful disturbing causes to the success of the project. These causes +are of a twofold character. They are to be found in the internal state +of the empire, and in the relations which it holds to foreign +countries. There is still a powerful party in Russia who are opposed to +emancipation, and who, though repulsed for the time, are far from being +disheartened. One-half the nobility are supposed to be enemies of the +Imperial plan, and they will continue to throw every possible obstacle +in the way of its success. There is nothing so pertinacious, so +unrelenting, and so difficult to change, as an aristocratical body. The +best liberals the world has seen have been of aristocratical origin, +or democracy would have made but little advance; but what is true of +individuals is not true of the mass, which is obstinate and unyielding. +There is nothing that men so reluctantly abandon as direct power over +their fellows. The chief of egotists is the slaveholder, unless he +happen to be the wisest and best of men. Man loves his fellow-man--as +a piece of property, as a chattel, above all things. It is a striking +proof of superiority to be able to command men with the certainty of +being as blindly obeyed as was the Roman centurion. The sense of power +that is created by the possession of slaves is sure to render men +arbitrary of disposition and insolent in their conduct. The troubles of +our own country ought to be sufficient to convince every one that there +must be nobles in Russia who would prefer resistance to the Czar to the +elevation of millions whose depression is evidence of the power of the +privileged classes. But for the conviction that the United States could +no longer be ruled in the interest of the slaveholders, the Secession +movement would have been postponed for another generation, and certain +traitors would have gone to their graves with the reputation of having +been honest men. There are Secessionists in Russia, and for the next two +years they may be able to do much to prevent the completion of the work +so well begun by Alexander II. But he appears to be as resolute as they +can be, and even fanatically determined upon having his way. Supported +by one-half the nobles, and by all the serfs, and confident of the +army's loyalty, he ought to be able to triumph over all internal +opposition. What he has already effected has been extorted from a +powerful foe; and that costly step, the first step, having been taken, +the Russian reformers, headed by the Emperor, ought to prove victorious +in so vitally important a contest as that in which they have voluntarily +engaged. + +The greatest danger to the emancipation project proceeds from the side +of foreign countries. As we have seen, both Alexander I. and Nicholas +were led away from the pursuit of a policy that might long since have +converted the Russian serfs into a Russian people, through their desire +to interfere in the affairs of other nations. They could not reform +Russia and crush reformers elsewhere. That they might decide grand +contests in which Russia had no immediate interest, it was necessary +that Russians should remain enslaved. What was it to Russia whether +Bourbons or Bonapartes should reign over France? If she had an interest +in the question, it was rather favorable to the Bonapartes, whom she +overthrew, than to the Bourbons, whom she set up in order that the +French might again overthrow them. The old Bourbons were never friendly +to Russia, and would gladly have headed a coalition to drive her back to +her forests; and the first Bonaparte was very desirous of being on good +terms with the Northern Colossus, as if he were dimly forewarned of his +coming fate at its hands. Led away from the true path, Alexander I. +squandered on foreign affairs the time, the industry, and the money that +should have been devoted to the prosecution of those internal reforms +that were necessary to convert his subjects into men. Nicholas inherited +from his unwise brother that policy which he so vehemently supported, +and which caused him to waste on France and Austria the attention and +the energy which, as a conscientious sovereign, he was bound to bestow +upon Russia. The danger now is that Alexander II. will walk in the same +wrong path that was found to lead only to destruction by his uncle and +his father. The world was never so unsettled as it is now, and wars of +the most extensive character threaten every country that is competent to +put an army into the field. The Italian question is yet to be solved, +and its solution concerns Russia, which is strongly interested in +every movement that threatens to break up the Austrian Empire, or that +promises to create in the Kingdom of Italy a new Mediterranean nation. +The Schleswig-Holstein question is yet to be settled, and Russia has an +immediate interest in its settlement, as Denmark, she expects, will one +day be her own. The Eastern question is as unanswerable as ever it has +been, and it is but a few weeks since the belief was common that Russia +and France were to unite for the purpose of settling it, which could +have meant nothing less than the partition of the Turkish Empire,--the +union of one of the "sick man's" old protectors with his enemy, for the +perfect plundering of his possessions. This arrangement, had it been +completed, would have led to a war between France and Russia, on the one +side, and England and Austria on the other, while half a dozen lesser +nations would have been drawn into the conflict. But if an alliance for +any such purpose was ever thought of by the Autocrat and the Stratocrat, +it is supposed that it fell through in consequence of the occurrence of +troubles in Russian Poland,--the Polish question, after having been kept +entirely out of sight for years, having suddenly forced itself on the +attention of Europe's monarchs, to the no small increase of their +perplexities. Here are four great questions that are intimately +connected with Russia's interests, any one of which, if pressed by +circumstances to a decision, would probably plunge her into a long +and costly war, one of the effects of which would be to postpone the +emancipation of the serfs for many years. No empire could effect an +internal change like that which the Czar has begun, and at the same time +carry on a war that would require immense expenditures and the active +services of a million of men. The Czar is in constant danger of being +"coerced" into a foreign war; and the enemies of emancipation would +throw all their weight on the side of the war faction, even if they +should feel but little interest in the fortunes of either party to +a contest into which Russia might be plunged. Leaving aside all the +questions mentioned but that of Turkey, that alone is ever threatening +to bring Russia into conflict with some of her neighbors. Neither +England nor Austria could allow her to have her will of Turkey, no +matter how excellent an opportunity might be presented by the death of +the Sultan, or some similar event, to strike an effectual blow at that +tottering, doomed empire. So that war ever hangs over the Czar from that +side, unless he should, for the sake of the domestic reform he so much +desiderates, disregard the traditions and abandon the purpose of his +house. Were he to do so, it would be a splendid example of self-denial, +and such as few men who have reigned have ever been capable of affording +either to the admiration or the derision of the world. But could he +safely do it? Then it does not altogether depend either upon the Czar or +upon his subjects whether he or they shall preserve the peace of their +country. Suppose Poland to rise,--and she has been becoming very wakeful +of late,--then war would be forced upon Russia; and that war might be +extended over most of Continental Europe. A Polish war could hardly +fail to draw Prussia and Austria into it, they being almost as much +interested in the maintenance of the partition as Russia; and France +could scarcely be kept out of such a contest, she having been the patron +of Poland ever since the partition was effected. + +Considering the matter in its various bearings, and noting how +inflammable is the condition of the world, and observing that a Russian +war would be fatal to emancipation, we can but say, that the freedom of +the serfs is something that may be hoped for, but which we should not +speak of as assured. Alexander II. wishes to complete his work, but he +is only an instrument in the hands of Fate, and things may so fall +out as to cover the present fair prospect with those clouds and +that darkness in which have been forever enveloped some of the best +undertakings for the promotion of man's welfare. We may hope and pray +for a good ending to the reform that has been commenced, but it is not +without fear and trembling that we do so. + + * * * * * + + +THE HAUNTED SHANTY. + + +As the principal personage of this story is dead, and there is no +likelihood that any of the others will ever see the "Atlantic Monthly," +I feel free to tell it without reservation. + +The mercantile house of which I was until recently an active member +had many business connections throughout the Western States, and I was +therefore in the habit of making an annual journey through them, in the +interest of the firm. In fact, I was always glad to escape from the dirt +and hubbub of Cortland Street, and to exchange the smell of goods and +boxes, cellars and gutters, for that of prairie grass and even of +prairie mud. Although wearing the immaculate linen and golden studs of +the city Valentine, there still remained a good deal of the country +Orson in my blood, and I endured many hard, repulsive, yea, downright +vulgar experiences for the sake of a run at large, and the healthy +animal exaltation which accompanied it. + +Eight or nine years ago, (it is, perhaps, as well not to be very +precise, as yet, with regard to dates,) I found myself at Peoria, in +Illinois, rather late in the season. The business I had on hand was +mostly transacted; but it was still necessary that I should visit +Bloomington and Terre Haute before returning to the East. I had come +from Wisconsin and Northern Illinois, and, as the great railroad spider +of Chicago had then spun but a few threads of his present tremendous +mesh, I had made the greater part of my journey on horseback. By the +time I reached Peoria the month of November was well advanced, and the +weather had become very disagreeable. I was strongly tempted to sell my +horse and take the stage to Bloomington, but the roads were even worse +to a traveller on wheels than to one in the saddle, and the sunny day +which followed my arrival flattered me with the hope that others as fair +might succeed it. + +The distance to Bloomington was forty miles, and the road none of the +best; yet, as my horse "Peck" (an abbreviation of "Pecatonica") had had +two days' rest, I did not leave Peoria until after the usual dinner at +twelve o'clock, trusting that I should reach my destination by eight or +nine in the evening, at the latest. Broad bands of dull, gray, felt-like +clouds crossed the sky, and the wind had a rough edge to it which +predicted that there was rain within a day's march. + +The oaks along the rounded river-bluffs still held on to their leaves, +although the latter were entirely brown and dead, and rattled around me +with an ominous sound, as I climbed to the level of the prairie, leaving +the bed of the muddy Illinois below. Peck's hoofs sank deeply into the +unctuous black soil, which resembled a jetty tallow rather than earth, +and his progress was slow and toilsome. The sky became more and more +obscured: the sun faded to a ghastly moon, then to a white blotch in the +gray vault, and finally retired in disgust. Indeed, there was nothing in +the landscape worth his contemplation. Dead flats of black, bristling +with short corn-stalks, flats of brown grass, a brown belt of low woods +in the distance,--that was all the horizon inclosed: no embossed bowl, +with its rim of sculptured hills, its round of colored pictures, but a +flat earthen pie-dish, over which the sky fell like a pewter cover. + +After riding for an hour or two over the desolate level, I descended +through rattling oaks to the bed of a stream, and then ascended through +rattling oaks to the prairie beyond. Here, however, I took the wrong +road, and found myself, some three miles farther, at a farm-house, where +it terminated. "You kin go out over the perairah yander," said the +farmer, dropping his maul beside a rail he had just split off,--"there's +a plain trail from Sykes's that'll bring you onto the road not fur from +Sugar Crick." With which knowledge I plucked up heart and rode on. + +What with the windings and turnings of the various cart-tracks, the +family resemblance in the groves of oak and hickory, and the heavy, +uniform gray of the sky, I presently lost my compass-needle,--that +natural instinct of direction, on which I had learned to rely. East, +west, north, south,--all were alike, and the very doubt paralyzed the +faculty. The growing darkness of the sky, the _watery_ moaning of +the wind, betokened night and storm; but I pressed on, hap-hazard, +determined, at least, to reach one of the incipient villages on the +Bloomington road. + +After an hour more, I found myself on the brink of another winding +hollow, threaded by a broad, shallow stream. On the opposite side, a +quarter of a mile above, stood a rough shanty, at the foot of the rise +which led to the prairie. After fording the stream, however, I found +that the trail I had followed continued forward in the same direction, +leaving this rude settlement on the left. On the opposite side of the +hollow, the prairie again stretched before me, dark and flat, and +destitute of any sign of habitation. I could scarcely distinguish the +trail any longer; in half an hour, I knew, I should be swallowed up in a +gulf of impenetrable darkness; and there was evidently no choice left +me but to return to the lonely shanty, and there seek shelter for the +night. + +To be thwarted in one's plans, even by wind or weather, is always +vexatious; but in this case, the prospect of spending a night in such +a dismal corner of the world was especially disagreeable. I am--or at +least I consider myself--a thoroughly matter-of-fact man, and my first +thought, I am not ashamed to confess, was of oysters. Visions of a +favorite saloon, and many a pleasant supper with Dunham and Beeson, (my +partners,) all at once popped into my mind, as I turned back over the +brow of the hollow and urged Peck down its rough slope. "Well," thought +I, at last, "this will be one more story for our next meeting. Who knows +what originals I may not find, even in a solitary settler's shanty?" + +I could discover no trail, and the darkness thickened rapidly while I +picked my way across dry gullies, formed by the drainage of the prairie +above, rotten tree-trunks, stumps, and spots of thicket. As I approached +the shanty, a faint gleam through one of its two small windows showed +that it was inhabited. In the rear, a space of a quarter of an acre, +inclosed by a huge worm-fence, was evidently the vegetable patch, at one +corner of which a small stable, roofed and buttressed with corn-fodder, +leaned against the hill. I drew rein in front of the building, and was +about to hail its inmates, when I observed the figure of a man issue +from the stable. Even in the gloom, there was something forlorn and +dispiriting in his walk. He approached with a slow, dragging step, +apparently unaware of my presence. + +"Good evening, friend!" I said. + +He stopped, stood still for half a minute, and finally responded,-- + +"Who air you?" + +The tone of his voice, querulous and lamenting, rather implied, "Why +don't you let me alone?" + +"I am a traveller," I answered, "bound from Peoria to Bloomington, and +have lost my way. It is dark, as you know, and likely to rain, and I +don't see how I can get any farther to-night." + +Another pause. Then he said, slowly, as if speaking to himself,-- + +"There a'n't no other place nearer 'n four or five mile." + +"Then I hope you will let me stay here." + +The answer, to my surprise, was a deep sigh. + +"I am used to roughing it," I urged; "and besides, I will pay for any +trouble I may give you." + +"It a'n't _that_," said he; then added, hesitatingly,--"fact is, we're +lonesome people here,--don't often see strangers; yit I s'pose you can't +go no furder;--well, I'll talk to my wife." + +Therewith he entered the shanty, leaving me a little disconcerted with +so uncertain, not to say suspicious, a reception. I heard the sound of +voices--one of them unmistakable in its nasal shrillness--in what seemed +to be a harsh debate, and distinguished the words, "I didn't bring +it on," followed with, "Tell him, then, if you like, and let him +stay,"--which seemed to settle the matter. The door presently opened, +and the man said,-- + +"I guess we'll have t' accommodate you. Give me your things, an' then +I'll put your horse up." + +I unstrapped my valise, took off the saddle, and, having seen Peck to +his fodder-tent, where I left him with some ears of corn in an +old basket, returned to the shanty. It was a rude specimen of the +article,--a single room of some thirty by fifteen feet, with a large +fireplace of sticks and clay at one end, while a half-partition of +unplaned planks set on end formed a sort of recess for the bed at the +other. A good fire on the hearth, however, made it seem tolerably +cheerful, contrasted with the dismal gloom outside. The furniture +consisted of a table, two or three chairs, a broad bench, and a +kitchen-dresser of boards. Some golden ears of seed-corn, a few sides of +bacon, and ropes of onions hung from the rafters. + +A woman in a blue calico gown, with a tin coffee-pot in one hand and a +stick in the other, was raking out the red coals from under the burning +logs. At my salutation, she partly turned, looked hard at me, nodded, +and muttered some inaudible words. Then, having levelled the +coals properly, she put down the coffee-pot, and, facing about, +exclaimed,--"Jimmy, git off that cheer!" + +Though this phrase, short and snappish enough, was not worded as an +invitation for me to sit down, I accepted it as such, and took the chair +which a lean boy of some nine or ten years old had hurriedly vacated. +In such cases, I had learned by experience, it is not best to be too +forward: wait quietly, and allow the unwilling hosts time to get +accustomed to your presence. I inspected the family for a while, in +silence. The spare, bony form of the woman, her deep-set gray eyes, +and the long, thin nose, which seemed to be merely a scabbard for her +sharp-edged voice, gave me her character at the first glance. As for the +man, he was worn by some constant fret or worry, rather than naturally +spare. His complexion was sallow, his face honest, every line of it, +though the expression was dejected, and there was a helpless patience +in his voice and movements, which I have often seen in women, but never +before in a man. "Henpecked in the first degree," was the verdict I +gave, without leaving my seat. The silence, shyness, and puny appearance +of the boy might be accounted for by the loneliness of his life, and +the usual "shakes"; but there was a wild, frightened look in his eye, a +nervous restlessness about his limbs, which excited my curiosity. I +am no believer in those freaks of fancy called "presentiments," but I +certainly felt that there was something unpleasant, perhaps painful, in +the private relations of the family. + +Meanwhile, the supper gradually took shape. The coffee was boiled, (far +too much, for my taste,) bacon fried, potatoes roasted, and certain +lumps of dough transformed into farinaceous grape-shot, called +"biscuits." Dishes of blue queensware, knives and forks, cups and +saucers of various patterns, and a bowl of molasses were placed upon the +table; and finally the woman said, speaking to, though not looking at, +me,-- + +"I s'pose you ha'n't had your supper." + +I accepted the invitation with a simple "No," and ate enough of the rude +fare (for I was really hungry) to satisfy my hosts that I was not proud. +I attempted no conversation, knowing that such people never talk when +they eat, until the meal was over, and the man, who gladly took one of +my cigars, was seated comfortably before the fire. I then related my +story, told my name and business, and by degrees established a mild flow +of conversation. The woman, as she washed the dishes and cleared up +things for the night, listened to us, and now and then made a remark +to the coffee-pot or frying-pan, evidently intended for our ears. Some +things which she said must have had a meaning hidden from me, for I +could see that the man winced, and at last he ventured to say,-- + +"Mary Ann, what's the use in talkin' about it?" + +"Do as you like," she snapped back; "only I a'n't a-goin' to be blamed +for _your_ doin's. The stranger'll find out, soon enough." + +"You find this life rather lonely, I should think," I remarked, with a +view of giving the conversation a different turn. + +"Lonely!" she repeated, jerking out a fragment of malicious laughter. +"It's lonely enough in the daytime, Goodness knows; but you'll have your +fill o' company afore mornin'." + +With that, she threw a defiant glance at her husband. + +"Fact is," said he, shrinking from her eye, "we're sort o' troubled +with noises at night. P'raps you'll be skeered, but it's no more 'n +noise,--onpleasant, but never hurts nothin'." + +"You don't mean to say this shanty is haunted?" I asked. + +"Well,--yes: some folks 'd call it so. There _is_ noises an' things +goin' on, but you can't see nobody." + +"Oh, if that is all," said I, "you need not be concerned on my account. +Nothing is so strange, but the cause of it can be discovered." + +Again the man heaved a deep sigh. The woman said, in rather a milder +tone,-- + +"What's the good o' knowin' what makes it, when you can't stop it?" + +As I was neither sleepy nor fatigued, this information was rather +welcome than otherwise. I had full confidence in my own courage; and if +anything _should_ happen, it would make a capital story for my first +New-York supper. I saw there was but one bed, and a small straw mattress +on the floor beside it for the boy, and therefore declared that I should +sleep on the bench, wrapped in my cloak. Neither objected to this, and +they presently retired. I determined, however, to keep awake as long as +possible. I threw a fresh log on the fire, lit another cigar, made a few +entries in my note-book, and finally took the "Iron Mask" of Dumas from +my valise, and tried to read by the wavering flashes of the fire. + +In this manner another hour passed away. The deep breathing--not to say +snoring--from the recess indicated that my hosts were sound asleep, and +the monotonous whistle of the wind around the shanty began to exercise a +lulling influence on my own senses. Wrapping myself in my cloak, with my +valise for a pillow, I stretched myself out on the bench, and strove to +keep my mind occupied with conjectures concerning the sleeping family. +Furthermore, I recalled all the stories of ghosts and haunted houses +which I had ever heard, constructed explanations for such as were still +unsolved, and, so far from feeling any alarm, desired nothing so much as +that the supernatural performances might commence. + +My thoughts, however, became gradually less and less coherent, and I +was just sliding over the verge of slumber, when a faint sound in the +distance caught my ear. I listened intently: certainly there _was_ a +far-off, indistinct sound, different from the dull, continuous sweep +of the wind. I rose on the bench, fully awake, yet not excited, for my +first thought was that other travellers might be lost or belated. By +this time the sound was quite distinct, and, to my great surprise, +appeared to proceed from a drum, rapidly beaten. I looked at my watch: +it was half-past ten. Who could be out on the lonely prairie with +a drum, at that time of night? There must have been some military +festival, some political caucus, some celebration of the Sons of Malta, +or jubilation of the Society of the Thousand and One, and a few of the +scattered members were enlivening their dark ride homewards. While I was +busy with these conjectures, the sound advanced nearer and nearer,--and, +what was very singular, without the least pause or variation,--one +steady, regular roll, ringing deep and clear through the night. + +The shanty stood at a point where the stream, leaving its general +southwestern course, bent at a sharp angle to the southeast, and faced +very nearly in the latter direction. As the sound of the drum came from +the east, it seemed the more probable that it was caused by some person +on the road which crossed the creek a quarter of a mile below. Yet, on +approaching nearer, it made directly for the shanty, moving, evidently, +much more rapidly than a person could walk. It then flashed upon my mind +that _this_ was the noise I was to hear, _this_ the company I was to +expect! Louder and louder, deep, strong, and reverberating, rolling +as if for a battle-charge, it came on: it was now but a hundred +yards distant,--now but fifty,--ten,--just outside the rough +clapboard-wall,--but, while I had half risen to open the door, it passed +directly through the wall and sounded at my very ears, inside the +shanty! + +The logs burned brightly on the hearth: every object in the room could +be seen more or less distinctly: nothing was out of its place, nothing +disturbed, yet the rafters almost shook under the roll of an invisible +drum, beaten by invisible hands! The sleepers tossed restlessly, and a +deep groan, as if in semi-dream, came from the man. Utterly confounded +as I was, my sensations were not those of terror. Each moment I doubted +my senses, and each moment the terrific sound convinced me anew. I do +not know how long I sat thus in sheer, stupid amazement. It may have +been one minute, or fifteen, before the drum, passing over my head, +through the boards again, commenced a slow march around the shanty. When +it had finished the first, and was about commencing the second round, I +shook off my stupor, and determined to probe the mystery. Opening the +door, I advanced in an opposite direction to meet it. Again the sound +passed close beside my head, but I could see nothing, touch nothing. +Again it entered the shanty, and I followed. I stirred up the fire, +casting a strong illumination into the darkest corners; I thrust my hand +into the very heart of the sound, I struck through it in all directions +with a stick,--still I saw nothing, touched nothing. + +Of course, I do not expect to be believed by half my readers,--nor can +I blame them for their incredulity. So astounding is the circumstance, +even yet, to myself, that I should doubt its reality, were it not +therefore necessary, for the same reason, to doubt every event of my +life. + +At length the sound moved away in the direction whence it came, becoming +gradually fainter and fainter until it died in the distance. But +immediately afterwards, from the same quarter, came a thin, sharp blast +of wind,--or what seemed to be such. If one could imagine a swift, +intense stream of air, no thicker than a telegraph-wire, producing a +keen, whistling rush in its passage, he would understand the impression +made upon my mind. This wind, or sound, or whatever it was, seemed to +strike an invisible target in the centre of the room, and thereupon +ensued a new and worse confusion. Sounds as of huge planks lifted at +one end and then allowed to fall, slamming upon the floor, hard, wooden +claps, crashes, and noises of splitting and snapping, filled the shanty. +The rough boards of the floor jarred and trembled, and the table and +chairs were jolted off their feet. Instinctively, I jerked away my legs, +whenever the invisible planks fell too near them. + +It never came into my mind to charge the family with being the authors +of these phenomena: their care and distress were too evident. There was +certainly no other human being but myself in or near the shanty. +My senses of sight and touch availed me nothing, and I confined my +attention, at last, to simply noting the manifestations, without +attempting to explain them. I began to experience a feeling, not of +terror, but of disturbing uncertainty. The solid ground was taken from +beneath my feet. + +Still the man and his wife groaned and muttered, as if in a nightmare +sleep, and the boy tossed restlessly on his low bed. I would not disturb +them, since, by their own confession, they were accustomed to the +visitation. Besides, it would not assist me, and, so long as there was +no danger of personal injury, I preferred to watch alone. I recalled, +however, the woman's remarks, remembering the mysterious blame she had +thrown upon her husband, and felt certain that she had adopted some +explanation of the noises, at his expense. + +As the confusion continued, with more or less violence, sometimes +pausing for a few minutes, to begin again with renewed force, I felt an +increasing impression of somebody else being present. Outside the shanty +this feeling ceased, but every time I opened the door I fully expected +to see some one standing in the centre of the room. Yet, looking through +the little windows, when the noises were at their loudest, I could +discover nothing. Two hours had passed away since I first heard the +drum-beat, and I found myself at last completely wearied with my +fruitless exertions and the unusual excitement. By this time the +disturbances had become faint, with more frequent pauses. All at once, +I heard a long, weary sigh, so near me that it could not have proceeded +from the sleepers. A weak moan, expressive of utter wretchedness, +followed, and then came the words, in a woman's voice,--came I know not +whence, for they seemed to be uttered close beside me, and yet far, far +away,--"How great is my trouble! How long shall I suffer? I was married, +in the sight of God, to Eber Nicholson. Have mercy, O Lord, and give him +to me, or release me from him!" + +These were the words, not spoken, but rather moaned forth in a slow, +monotonous wail of utter helplessness and broken-heartedness. I have +heard human grief expressed in many forms, but I never heard or imagined +anything so desolate, so surcharged with the despair of an eternal woe. +It was, indeed, too hopeless for sympathy. It was the utterance of a +sorrow which removed its possessor into some dark, lonely world girdled +with iron walls, against which every throb of a helping or consoling +heart would beat in vain for admittance. So far from being moved or +softened, the words left upon me an impression of stolid apathy. When +they had ceased, I heard another sigh,--and some time afterwards, +far-off, retreating forlornly through the eastern darkness, the wailing +repetition,--"I was married, in the sight of God, to Eber Nicholson. +Have mercy, O Lord!" + +This was the last of those midnight marvels. Nothing further disturbed +the night except the steady sound of the wind. The more I thought of +what I had heard, the more I was convinced that the phenomena were +connected, in some way, with the history of my host. I had heard his +wife call him "Ebe," and did not doubt that he was the Eber Nicholson +who, for some mysterious crime, was haunted by the reproachful ghost. +Could murder, or worse than murder, lurk behind these visitations? It +was useless to conjecture; yet, before giving myself up to sleep, I +determined to know everything that could be known, before leaving the +shanty. + +My rest was disturbed: my hip-bones pressed unpleasantly on the hard +bench; and every now and then I awoke with a start, hearing the +same despairing voice in my dreams. The place was always quiet, +nevertheless,--the disturbances having ceased, as nearly as I could +judge, about one o'clock in the morning. Finally, from sheer weariness, +I fell into a deep slumber, which lasted until daylight. The sound of +pans and kettles aroused me. The woman, in her lank blue gown, was +bending over the fire; the man and boy had already gone out. As I rose, +rubbing my eyes and shaking myself, to find out exactly where and who +I was, the woman straightened herself and looked at me with a keen, +questioning gaze, but said nothing. + +"I must have been very sound asleep," said I. + +"There's no sound sleepin' here. Don't tell me that." + +"Well," I answered, "your shanty is rather noisy; but, as I'm neither +scared nor hurt, there's no harm done. But have you never found out what +occasions the noise?" + +Her reply was a toss of the head and a peculiar snorting interjection, +"Hngh!" (impossible to be represented by letters,) "it's all _her_ +doin'." + +"But who is _she_?" + +"You'd better ask _him_." + +Seeing there was nothing to be got out of her, I went down to the +stream, washed my face, dried it with my pocket-handkerchief, and then +looked after Peck. He gave a shrill whinny of recognition, and, I +thought, seemed to be a little restless. A fresh feed of corn was in the +old basket, and presently the man came into the stable with a bunch of +hay, and commenced rubbing off the marks of Peck's oozy couch which were +left on his flanks. As we went back to the shanty I noticed that he +eyed me furtively, without daring to look me full in the face. As I was +apparently none the worse for the night's experiences, he rallied at +last, and ventured to talk _at_, as well as to, me. + +By this time, breakfast, which was a repetition of supper, was ready, +and we sat down to the table. During the meal, it occurred to me to make +an experimental remark. Turning suddenly to the man, I asked,-- + +"Is your name Eber Nicholson?" + +"There!" exclaimed the woman, "I knowed he'd heerd it!" + +He, however, flushing a moment, and then becoming move sallow than ever, +nodded first, and then--as if that were not sufficient--added, "Yes, +that's my name." + +"Where did you move from?" I continued, falling back on the first plan I +had formed in my mind. + +"The Western Reserve, not fur from Hudson." + +I turned the conversation on the comparative advantages of Ohio and +Illinois, on farming, the price of land, etc., carefully avoiding the +dangerous subject, and by the time breakfast was over had arranged, +that, for a consideration, he should accompany me as far as the +Bloomington road, some five miles distant. + +While he went out to catch an old horse, ranging loose in the +creek-bottom, I saddled Peck, strapped on my valise, and made myself +ready for the journey. The feeling of two silver half-dollars in her +hard palm melted down the woman's aggressive mood, and she said, with a +voice the edge whereof was mightily blunted,-- + +"Thankee! it's too much fur sich as you had." + +"It's the best you can give," I replied. + +"That's so!" said she, jerking my hand up and down with a pumping +movement, as I took leave. + +I felt a sense of relief when we had climbed the rise and had the open +prairie again before us. The sky was overcast and the wind strong, +but some rain had fallen during the night, and the clouds had lifted +themselves again. The air was fresh and damp, but not chill. We rode +slowly, of necessity, for the mud was deeper than ever. + +I deliberated what course I should take, in order to draw from my guide +the explanation of the nightly noises. His evident shrinking, whenever +his wife referred to the subject, convinced me that a gradual approach +would render him shy and uneasy; and, on the whole, it seemed best to +surprise him by a sudden assault. Let me strike to the heart of the +secret, at once,--I thought,--and the details will come of themselves. + +While I was thus reflecting, he rode quietly by my side. Half turning +in the saddle, I looked steadily at his face, and said, in an earnest +voice,-- + +"Eber Nicholson, who was it to whom you were married in the sight of +God?" + +He started as if struck, looked at me imploringly, turned away his eyes, +then looked back, became very pale, and finally said, in a broken, +hesitating voice, as if the words were forced from him against his +will,-- + +"Her name is Rachel Emmons." + +"Why did you murder her?" I asked, in a still sterner tone. + +In an instant his face burned scarlet. He reined up his horse with a +violent pull, straightened his shoulders so that he appeared six inches +taller, looked steadily at me with a strange, mixed expression of anger +and astonishment, and cried out,-- + +"Murder her? _Why, she's livin' now!_" + +My surprise at the answer was scarcely less great than his at the +question. + +"You don't mean to say she's not dead?" I asked. + +"Why, no!" said he, recovering from his sudden excitement, "she's not +dead, or she wouldn't keep on troublin' me. She's been livin' in Toledo, +these ten year." + +"I beg your pardon, my friend," said I; "but I don't know what to think +of what I heard last night, and I suppose I have the old notion in my +head that all ghosts are of persons who have been murdered." + +"Oh, if I had killed her," he groaned, "I'd 'a' been hung long ago, an' +there 'd 'a' been an end of it." + +"Tell me the whole story," said I. "It's hardly likely that I can help +you, but I can understand how you must be troubled, and I'm sure I pity +you from my heart." + +I think he felt relieved at my proposal,--glad, perhaps, after long +silence, to confide to another man the secret of his lonely, wretched +life. + +"After what you've heerd," said he, "there's nothin' that I don't care +to tell. I've been sinful, no doubt,--but, God knows, there never was a +man worse punished. + +"I told you," he continued, after a pause, "that I come from the Western +Reserve. My father was a middlin' well-to-do farmer,--not rich, nor yit +exactly poor. He's dead now. He was always a savin' man,--looked after +money a _leetle_ too sharp, I've often thought sence: howsever, 't isn't +my place to judge him. Well, I was brought up on the farm, to hard work, +like the other boys. Rachel Emmons,--she's the same woman that haunts +me, you understand,--she was the girl o' one of our neighbors, an' poor +enough _he_ was. His wife was always sickly-like,--an' you know it +takes a woman as well as a man to git rich farmin'. So they were always +scrimped, but that didn't hinder Rachel from bein' one o' the likeliest +gals round. We went to the same school in the winter, he an' me, ('t +isn't much schoolin' I ever got, though,) an' I had a sort o' nateral +hankerin' after her, as fur back as I can remember. She was different +lookin' then from, what she is now,--an' me, too, for that matter. + +"Well, you know how boys an' gals somehow git to likin' each other afore +they know it. Me an' Rachel was more an' more together, the more we +growed up, only more secret-like; so by the time I was twenty an' she +was nineteen, we was promised to one another as true as could be. I +didn't keep company with her, though,--leastways, not reg'lar: I was +afeard my father 'd find it out, an' I knowed what _he_ 'd say to it. He +kep' givin' me hints about Mary Ann Jones,--that was my wife's maiden +name. Her father had two hundred acres an' money out at interest, an' +only three children. He'd had ten, but seven of 'em died. I had nothin' +agin Mary Ann, but I never thought of her that way, like I did towards +Rachel. + +"Well, things kep' runnin' on; I was a good deal worried about it, but +a young feller, you know, don't look fur ahead, an' so I got along. One +night, howsever,--'t was jist about as dark as last night was,--I'd been +to the store at the Corners, for a jug o' molasses. Rachel was +there, gittin' a quarter of a pound o' tea, I think it was, an' some +sewin'-thread. I went out a little while after her, an' follered as fast +as I could, for we had the same road nigh to home. + +"It weren't long afore I overtook her. 'T was mighty dark, as I was +sayin', an' so I hooked her arm into mine, an' we went on comfortable +together, talkin' about how we jist suited each other, like we was cut +out o' purpose, an' how long we'd have to wait, an' what folks 'd say. +O Lord! don't I remember every word o' _that_ night? Well, we got quite +tender-like when we come t' Old Emmons's gate, an' I up an' giv' her a +hug and a lot o' kisses, to make up for lost time. Then she went into +the house, an' I turned for home; but I hadn't gone ten steps afore I +come agin somebody stan'in' in the middle o' the road. 'Hullo!' says +I. The next thing he had a holt o' my coat-collar an' shuck me like a +tarrier-dog shakes a rat. I knowed who it was afore he spoke; an' I +couldn't 'a' been more skeered, if the life had all gone out o' me. He'd +been down to the tavern to see a drover, an' comin' home he'd follered +behind us all the way, hearin' every word we said. + +"I don't like to think o' the words he used that night. He was a +professin' member, an' yit he swore the awfullest I ever heerd."--Here +the man involuntarily raised his hands to his ears, as if to stop them +against even the memory of his father's curses.--"I expected every +minute he'd 'a' struck me down. I've wished, sence, he _had_: I don't +think I could 'a' stood _that_. Howsever, he dragged me home, never +lettin' go my collar, till we got into the room where mother was settin' +up for us. Then he told _her_, only makin' it ten times harder 'n it +really was. Mother always kind o' liked Rachel, 'cause she was mighty +handy at sewin' an' quiltin', but she'd no more dared stan' up agin +father than a sheep agin a bull-dog. She looked at me pityin'-like, I +must say, an' jist begun to cry,--an' I couldn't help cryin' nuther, +when I saw how it hurt her. + +"Well, after that, 't wa'n't no use thinkin' o' Rachel any more. I _had_ +to go t' Old Jones's, whether I wanted to or no. I felt mighty mean when +I thought o' Rachel, an' was afeard no good 'd come of it; but father +jist managed things _his_ way, an' I couldn't help myself. Old Jones had +nothin' agin me, for I was a stiddy, hard-workin' feller as there was +round,--an' Mary Ann was always as pleasant as could be, _then_;--well, +I oughtn't to say nothin' agin her now; she's had a hard life of it, +'longside o' me. Afore long we were bespoke, an' the day set. Father +hurried things, when it got that fur. I don't think Rachel knowed +anything about it till the day afore the weddin', or mebby the very day. +Old Mr. Larrabee was the minister, an' there was only the two families +at the house, an' Miss Plankerton,--her that sewed for Mary Ann. I never +felt so oneasy in my life, though I tried hard not to show it. + +"Well, 't was all jist over, an' the kissin' about to begin, when I +heerd the house-door bu'st open, suddent. I felt my heart give one jump +right up to the root o' my tongue, an' then fall back ag'in, sick an' +dead-like. + +"The parlor-door flew open right away, an' in come Rachel without a +bunnet, an' her hair all frowzed by the wind. She was as white as a +sheet, an' her eyes like two burnin' coals. She walked straight through +'em all an' stood right afore me. They was all so taken aback that they +never thought o' stoppin' her. Then she kind o' screeched out,--'Eber +Nicholson, what are you doin'?' Her voice was strange an' +onnatural-like, an' I'd never 'a' knowed it to be hern, if I hadn't 'a' +seen her. I couldn't take my eyes off of her, an' I couldn't speak: I +jist stood there. Then she said ag'in,--'Eber Nicholson, what are you +doin'? You are married to me, in the sight of God. You belong to me an' +I to you, forever an' forever!' Then they begun cryin' out,--'Go 'way!' +'Take her away!' 'What d's she mean?' an' old Mr. Larrabee ketched holt +of her arm. She begun to jerk an' trimble all over; she drawed in her +breath in a sort o' groanin' way, awful to hear, an' then dropped down +on the floor in a fit. I bu'st out in a terrible spell o' cryin';--I +couldn't 'a' helped it, to save my life." + +The man paused, drew his sleeve across his eyes, and then timidly looked +at me. Seeing nothing in my face, doubtless, but an expression of the +profoundest commiseration, he remarked, with a more assured voice, as if +in self-justification,-- + +"It was a pretty hard thing for a man to go through with, now, wasn't +it?" + +"You may well say that," said I. "Your story is not yet finished, +however. This Rachel Emmons,--you say she is still living,--in what way +does she cause the disturbances?" + +"I'll tell you all I know about it," said he,--"an' if you understand +it _then_, you're wiser 'n I am. After they carried her home, she had a +long spell o' sickness,--come near dyin', they said; but they brought +her through, at last, an' she got about ag'in, lookin' ten year older. +I kep' out of her sight, though. I lived awhile at Old Jones's, till I +could find a good farm to rent, or a cheap un to buy. I wanted to git +out o' the neighborhood: I was oneasy all the time, bein' so near +Rachel. Her mother was wuss, an' her father failin'-like, too. Mother +seen 'em often: she was as good a neighbor to 'em as she dared be. Well, +I got sort o' tired, an' went out to Michigan an' bought a likely farm. +Old Jones giv' me a start. I took Mary Ann out, an' we got along well +enough, a matter o' two year. We heerd from home now an' then. Rachel's +father an' mother both died, about the time we had our first boy,--him +that you seen,--an' she went off to Toledo, we heerd, an' hired out to +do sewin'. She was always a mighty good hand at it, an' could cut out as +nice as a born manty-maker. She'd had another fit after the funerals, +an' was older-lookin' an' more serious than ever, they said. + +"Well, Jimmy was six months old, or so, when we begun to be woke up +every night by his cryin'. Nothin' seemed to be the matter with him: +he was only frightened-like, an' couldn't be quieted. I heerd noises +sometimes,--nothin' like what come afterwards,--but sort o' crackin' an' +snappin', sich as you hear in new furnitur', an' it seemed like somebody +was in the room; but I couldn't find nothin'. It got wuss and wuss: Mary +Ann was sure the house was haunted, an' I had to let her go home for a +whole winter. When she was away, it went on the same as ever,--not every +night,--sometimes not more 'n onst a week,--but so loud as to wake me +up, reg'lar. I sent word to Mary Ann to come on, an' I'd sell out an' go +to Illinois. Good perairah land was cheap then, an' I'd ruther go furder +off, for the sake o' quiet. + +"So we pulled up stakes an' come out here: but it weren't long afore the +noise follered us, wuss 'n ever, an' we found out at last what it was. +One night I woke up, with my hair stan'in' on end, an' heerd Rachel +Emmons's voice, jist as you heerd it last night. Mary Ann heerd it too, +an' it's little peace she's giv' me sence that time. An' so it's been +goin' on an' on, these eight or nine year." + +"But," I asked, "are you sure she is alive? Have you seen her since? +Have you asked her to be merciful and not disturb you?" + +"Yes," said he, with a bitterness of tone which seemed quite to +obliterate the softer memories of his love, "I've seen her, an' I've +begged her on my knees to let me alone; but it's no use. When it got to +be so bad I couldn't stan' it, I sent her a letter, but I never got no +answer. Next year, when our second boy died, frightened and worried to +death, I believe, though he _was_ scrawny enough when he was born, I +took some money I'd saved to buy a yoke of oxen, an' went to Toledo o' +purpose to see Rachel. It cut me awful to do it, but I was desprit. I +found her livin' in a little house, with a bit o' garden, she'd bought. +I s'pose she must 'a' had five or six hundred dollars when the farm was +sold, an' she made a good deal by sewin', besides. She was settin' at +her work when I went in, an' knowed me at onst, though I don't believe +I'd ever 'a' knowed _her_. She was old, an' thin, an' hard-lookin'; her +mouth was pale an' sot, like she was bitin' somethin' all the time; an' +her eyes, though they was sunk into her head, seemed to look through an' +through an' away out th' other side o' you. + +"It jist shut me up when she looked at me. She was so corpse-like I was +afraid she'd drop dead, then and there: but I made out at last to say, +'Rachel, I've come all the way from Illinois to see you.' She kep' +lookin' straight at me, never sayin' a word. 'Rachel,' says I, 'I know +I've acted bad towards you. God knows I didn't mean to do it. I don't +blame you for payin' it back to me the way you're doin', but Mary Ann +an' the boy never done you no harm. I've come all the way o' purpose +to ask your forgiveness, hopin' you'll be satisfied with what's _been_ +done, an' leave off bearin' malice agin us.' She looked kind o' +sorrowful-like, but drawed a deep breath, an' shuck her head, 'Oh, +Rachel,' says I,--an' afore I knowed it I was right down on my knees at +her feet,--'Rachel, don't be so hard on me. I'm the onhappiest man that +lives. I can't stan' it no longer. Rachel, you didn't use to be so +cruel, when we was boys an' girls together. Do forgive me, an' leave +off' hauntin' me so.' + +"Then she spoke up, at last, an' says she,-- + +"'Eber Nicholson, I was married to you, in the sight o' God!' + +"'I know it,' says I; 'you say it to me every night; an' it wasn't my +doin's that you're not my wife now: but, Rachel, if I'd 'a' betrayed +you, an' ruined you, an' killed you, God couldn't 'a' punished me wuss +than you're a-punishin' me.' + +"She giv' a kind o' groan, an' two tears run down her white face. 'Eber +Nicholson,' says she, 'ask God to help you, for I can't. There might 'a' +been a time,' says she, 'when I could 'a' done it, but it's too late +now.' + +"'Don't say that, Rachel,' says I; 'it's never too late to be merciful +an' forgivin'.' + +"'It doesn't depend on myself,' says she; 'I'm _sent_ to you. It's th' +only comfort I have in life to be near you; but I'd give up that, if I +could. Pray to God to let me die, for then we shall both have rest.' + +"An' that was all I could git out of her. + +"I come home ag'in, knowin' I'd spent my money for nothin'. Sence then, +it's been jist the same as before,--not reg'lar every night, but sort o' +comes on by spells, an' then stops three or four days, an' then comes +on ag'in. Fact is, what's the use o' livin' in this way? We can't be +neighborly; we're afeard to have anybody come to see us; we've got no +peace, no comfort o' bein' together, an' no heart to work an' git ahead, +like other folks. It's jist killin' me, body an' soul." + +Here the poor wretch fairly broke down, bursting suddenly into an +uncontrollable fit of weeping. I waited quietly until the violence of +his passion had subsided. A misery so strange, so completely out of the +range of human experience, so hopeless apparently, was not to be reached +by the ordinary utterances of consolation. I had seen enough to enable +me fully to understand the fearful nature of the retribution which had +been visited upon him for what was, at worst, a weakness to be pitied, +rather than a sin to be chastised. "Never was a man worse punished," he +had truly said. But I was as far as ever from comprehending the secret +of those nightly visitations. The statement of Rachel Emmons, that they +were now produced without her will, overturned--supposing it to be +true--the conjecture which I might otherwise have adopted. However, it +was now plain that the unhappy victim sobbing at my side could throw no +further light on the mystery. He had told me all he knew. + +"My friend," said I, when he had become calmer, "I do not wonder at your +desperation. Such continual torment as you must have endured is enough +to drive a man to madness. It seems to me to spring from the malice of +some infernal power, rather than the righteous justice of God. Have you +never tried to resist it? Have you never called aloud, in your heart, +for Divine help, and gathered up your strength to meet and defy it, as +you would to meet a man who threatened your life?" + +"Not in the right way, I'm afeard," said he. "Fact is, I always tuck it +as a judgment hangin' over me, an' never thought o' nothin' else than +jist to grin and bear it." + +"Enough of that," I urged,--for a hope of relief had suggested itself to +me,--"you have suffered enough, and more than enough. Now stand up to +meet it like a man. When the noises come again, think of what you have +endured, and let it make you indignant and determined. Decide in your +heart that you _will_ be free from it, and perhaps you may be so. If +not, build another shanty and sleep away from your wife and boy, so +that they may escape, at least. Give yourself this claim to your wife's +gratitude, and she will be kind and forbearing." + +"I don't know but you're more 'n half right, stranger," he replied, in +a more cheerful tone. "Fact is, I never thought on it that way. It's +lightened my heart a heap, tellin' you; an' if I'm not too broke an' +used-up-like, I'll try to foller your advice. I couldn't marry Rachel +now, if Mary Ann _was_ dead, we've been druv so fur apart. I don't know +how it'll be when we're _all_ dead: I s'pose them 'll go together that +belongs together;--leastways, 't ought to be so." + +Here we struck the Bloomington road, and I no longer needed a guide. +When we pulled our horses around, facing each other, I noticed that the +flush of excitement still burned on the man's sallow cheek, and his +eyes, washed by probably the first freshet of feeling which had +moistened them for years, shone with a faint lustre of courage. + +"No, no,--none o' that!" said he, as I was taking out my porte-monnaie; +"you've done me a mighty sight more good than I've done you, let alone +payin' me to boot. Don't forgit the turn to the left, after crossin' +Jackson's Run. Good-bye, stranger! Take good keer o' yourself!" + +And with a strong, clinging, lingering grasp of the hand, in which the +poor fellow expressed the gratitude which he was too shy and awkward +to put into words, we parted. He turned his horse's head, and slowly +plodded back through the mud towards the lonely shanty. + +On my way to Bloomington, I went over and over the man's story, in +memory. The facts were tolerably clear and coherent: his narrative was +simple and credible enough, after my own personal experience of the +mysterious noises, and the secret, whatever it was, must be sought for +in Rachel Emmons. She was still living in Toledo, Ohio, he said, and +earned her living as a seamstress; it would, therefore, not be difficult +to find her. I confess, after his own unsatisfactory interview, I +had little hope of penetrating her singular reserve; but I felt the +strongest desire to see her, at least, and thus test the complete +reality of a story which surpassed the wildest fiction. After visiting +Terre Haute, the next point to which business called me, on the homeward +route, was Cleveland; and by giving an additional day to the journey, I +could easily take Toledo on my way. Between memory and expectation the +time passed rapidly, and a week later I registered my name at the Island +House, Toledo. + +After wandering about for an hour or two, the next morning, I +finally discovered the residence of Rachel Emmons. It was a small +story-and-a-half frame building, on the western edge of the town, with a +locust-tree in front, two lilacs inside the paling, and a wilderness of +cabbage-stalks and currant-bushes in the rear. After much cogitation, I +had not been able to decide upon any plan of action, and the interval +between my knock and the opening of the door was one of considerable +embarrassment to me. A small, plumpish woman of forty, with peaked nose, +black eyes, and but two upper teeth, confronted me. She, certainly, was +not the one I sought. + +"Is your name Rachel Emmons?" I asked, nevertheless. + +"No, I'm not her. This is her house, though." + +"Will you tell her a gentleman wants to see her?" said I, putting my +foot inside the door as I spoke. The room, I saw, was plainly, but +neatly furnished. A rag-carpet covered the floor; green rush-bottomed +chairs, a settee with chintz cover, and a straight-backed rocking-chair +were distributed around the walls; and for ornament there was an +alphabetical sampler in a frame, over the low wooden mantel-piece. + +The woman, however, still held the door-knob in her hand, saying, "Miss +Emmons is busy. She can't well leave her work. Did you want some sewin' +done?" + +"No," said I; "I wish to speak with her. It's on private and particular +business." + +"Well," she answered with some hesitation, "I'll _tell_ her. Take a +cheer." + +She disappeared through a door into a back room, and I sat down. In +another minute the door noiselessly reopened, and Rachel Emmons came +softly into the room. I believe I should have known her anywhere. Though +from Eber Nicholson's narrative she could not have been much over +thirty, she appeared to be at least forty-five. Her hair was streaked +with gray, her face thin and of an unnatural waxy pallor, her lips of a +whitish-blue color and tightly pressed together, and her eyes, seemingly +sunken far back in their orbits, burned with a strange, ghastly--I had +almost said phosphorescent--light. I remember thinking they must shine +like touch-wood in the dark. I have come in contact with too many +persons, passed through too wide a range of experience, to lose my +self-possession easily; but I could not meet the cold, steady gaze of +those eyes without a strong internal trepidation. It would have been the +same, if I had known nothing about her. + +She was probably surprised at seeing a stranger, but I could discern no +trace of it in her face. She advanced but a few steps into the room, and +then stopped, waiting for me to speak. + +"You are Rachel Emmons?" I asked, since a commencement of some sort must +be made. + +"Yes." + +"I come from Eber Nicholson," said I, fixing my eyes on her face. + +Not a muscle moved, not a nerve quivered, but I fancied that a faint +purple flush played for an instant under the white mask. If I were +correct, it was but momentary. She lifted her left hand slowly, pressed +it on her heart, and then let it fall. The motion was so calm that I +should not have noticed it, if I had not been watching her so steadily. + +"Well?" she said, after a pause. + +"Rachel Emmons," said I,--and more than one cause conspired to make my +voice earnest and authoritative,--"I know all. I come to you not to +meddle with the sorrow--let me say the sin--which has blighted your +life; not because Eber Nicholson sent me; not to defend him or to +accuse you; but from that solemn sense of duty which makes every man +responsible to God for what he does or leaves undone. An equal pity +for him and for you forces me to speak. He cannot plead his cause; you +cannot understand his misery. I will not ask by what wonderful power you +continue to torment his life; I will not even doubt that you pity while +you afflict him; but I ask you to reflect whether the selfishness of +your sorrow may not have hardened your heart, and blinded you to that +consolation which God offers to those who humbly seek it. You say that +you are married to Eber Nicholson, in His sight. Think, Rachel Emmons, +think of that moment when you will stand before His awful bar, and the +poor, broken, suffering soul, whom your forgiveness might still make +yours in the holy marriage of heaven, shrinks from you with fear and +pain, as in the remembered persecutions of earth!" + +The words came hot from my very heart, and the ice-crust of years under +which hers lay benumbed gave way before them. She trembled slightly; +and the same sad, hopeless moan which I had heard at midnight in the +Illinois shanty came from her lips. She sank into a chair, letting her +hands fall heavily at her side. There was no movement of her features, +yet I saw that her waxy cheeks were moist, as with the slow ooze of +tears so long unshed that they had forgotten their natural flow. + +"I do pity him," she murmured at last, "and I believe I forgive him; +but, oh! I've become an instrument of wrath for the punishment of both." + +If any feeling of reproof still lingered in my mind, her appearance +disarmed me at once. I felt nothing but pity for her forlorn, helpless +state. It was the apathy of despair, rather than the coldness of +cherished malice, which had so frozen her life. Still, the mystery of +those nightly persecutions! + +"Rachel Emmons," I said, "you certainly know that you still continue to +destroy the peace of Eber Nicholson and his family. Do you mean to say +that you _cannot_ cease to do so, if you would?" + +"It is too late," said she, shaking her head slowly, as she clasped both +hands hard against her breast. "Do you think I would suffer, night after +night, if I could help it? Haven't I stayed awake for days, till my +strength gave way, rather than fall asleep, for _his_ sake? Wouldn't I +give my life to be free?--and would have taken it, long ago, with my own +hands, but for the sin!" + +She spoke in a low voice, but with a wild earnestness which startled me. +She, then, was equally a victim! + +"But," said I, "this thing had a beginning. Why did you visit him in the +first place, when, perhaps, you might have prevented it?" + +"I am afraid that was my sin," she replied, "and this is the punishment. +When father and mother died, and I was layin' sick and weak, with +nothin' to do but think of _him_, and me all alone in the world, and not +knowin' how to live without him, because I had nobody left,--that's when +it begun. When the deadly kind o' sleeps came on--they used to think I +was dead, or faintin', at first--and I could go where my heart drawed +me, and look at him away off where he lived, 't was consolin', and I +didn't try to stop it. I used to long for the night, so I could go and +be near him for an hour or two. I don't know how I went: it seemed to +come of itself. After a while I felt I was troublin' him and doin' no +good to myself, but the sleeps came just the same as ever, and then I +couldn't help myself. They're only a sorrow to me now, but I s'pose I +shall have 'em till I'm laid in my grave." + +This was all the explanation she could give. It was evidently one of +those mysterious cases of spiritual disease which completely baffle our +reason. Although compelled to accept her statement, I felt incapable of +suggesting any remedy. I could only hope that the abnormal condition +into which she had fallen might speedily wear out her vital energies, +already seriously shattered. She informed me, further, that each attack +was succeeded by great exhaustion, and that she felt herself growing +feebler, from year to year. The immediate result, I suspected, was a +disease of the heart, which might give her the blessing of death sooner +than she hoped. Before taking leave of her, I succeeded in procuring +from her a promise that she would write to Eber Nicholson, giving him +that free forgiveness which would at least ease his conscience, and make +his burden somewhat lighter to bear. Then, feeling that it was not in my +power to do more, I rose to depart. Taking her hand, which lay cold and +passive in mine,--so much like a dead hand that it required a strong +effort in me to repress a nervous shudder,--I said, "Farewell, Rachel +Emmons, and remember that they who seek peace in the right spirit will +always find it at last." + +"It won't be many years before I find it", she replied, calmly; and the +weird, supernatural light of her eyes shone upon me for the last time. + +I reached New York in due time, and did not fail, sitting around the +broiled oysters and celery, with my partners, to repeat the story of the +Haunted Shanty. I knew, beforehand, how they would receive it; but the +circumstances had taken such hold of my mind,--so _burned_ me, like a +boy's money, to keep buttoned up in the pocket,--that I could no more +help telling the tale than the man I remember reading about, a great +while ago, in a poem called "The Ancient Mariner". Beeson, who, I +suspect, don't believe much of anything, is always apt to carry +his raillery too far; and thenceforth, whenever the drum of a +target-company, marching down Broadway, passed the head of our street, +he would whisper to me, "There comes Rachel Emmons!" until I finally +became angry, and insisted that the subject should never again be +mentioned. + +But I none the less recalled it to my mind, from time to time, with +a singular interest. It was the one supernatural, or, at least, +inexplicable experience of my life, and I continued to feel a profound +curiosity with regard to the two principal characters. My slight +endeavor to assist them by such counsel as had suggested itself to me +was actuated by the purest human sympathy, and upon further reflection +I could discover no other means of help. A spiritual disease could be +cured only by spiritual medicine,--unless, indeed, the secret of Rachel +Emmons's mysterious condition lay in some permanent dislocation of the +relation between soul and body, which could terminate only with their +final separation. + +With the extension of our business, and the increasing calls upon my +time during my Western journeys, it was three years before I again found +myself in Toledo, with sufficient leisure to repeat my visit. I had +some difficulty in finding the little frame house; for, although it +was unaltered in every respect, a number of stately brick "villas" had +sprung up around it and quite disguised the locality. The door was +opened by the same little black-eyed woman, with the addition of four +artificial teeth, which were altogether too large and loose. They were +attached by plated hooks to her eye-teeth, and moved up and down when +she spoke. + +"Is Rachel Emmons at home?" I asked. + +The woman stared at me in evident surprise. + +"She's dead," said she, at last, and then added,--"let's see,--ain't you +the gentleman that called here, some three or four years ago?" + +"Yes", said I, entering the room; "I should like to hear about her +death." + +"Well,--_'twas_ rather queer. She was failin' when you was here. After +that she got softer and weaker-like, an' didn't have her deathlike +wearin' sleeps so often, but she went just as fast for all that. The +doctor said 'twas heart-disease, and the nerves was gone, too; so he +only giv' her morphy, and sometimes pills, but he knowed she'd no chance +from the first. 'Twas a year ago last May when she died. She'd been +confined to her bed about a week, but I'd no thought of her goin' so +soon. I was settin' up with her, and 'twas a little past midnight, +maybe. She'd been layin' like dead awhile, an' I was thinkin' I could +snatch a nap before she woke. All't onst she riz right up in bed, with +her eyes wide open, an' her face lookin' real happy, an' called out, +loud and strong,--'Farewell, Eber Nicholson! farewell! I've come for the +last time! There's peace for me in heaven, an' peace for you on earth! +Farewell! farewell!' Then she dropped back on the piller, stone-dead. +She'd expected it, 't seems, and got the doctor to write her will. She +left me this house and lot,--I'm her second cousin on the mother's +side,--but all her money in the Savin's Bank, six hundred and +seventy-nine dollars and a half, to Eber Nicholson. The doctor writ +out to Illinois, an' found he'd gone to Kansas, a year before. So the +money's in bank yit; but I s'pose he'll git it, some time or other." + +As I returned to the hotel, conscious of a melancholy pleasure at the +news of her death, I could not help wondering,--"Did he hear that last +farewell, far away in his Kansas cabin? Did he hear it, and fall asleep +with thanksgiving in his heart, and arise in the morning to a liberated +life?" I have never visited Kansas, nor have I ever heard from him +since; but I know that the _living ghost_ which haunted him is laid +forever. + +Reader, you will not believe my story: BUT IT IS TRUE. + + * * * * * + + + RHOTRUDA. + + + In the golden reign of Charlemaign the king, + The three-and-thirtieth year, or thereabout, + Young Eginardus, bred about the court, + (Left mother-naked at a postern-door,) + Had thence by slow degrees ascended up,-- + First page, then pensioner, lastly the king's knight + And secretary; yet held these steps for nought, + Save as they led him to the Princess' feet, + Eldest and loveliest of the regal three, + Most gracious, too, and liable to love: + For Bertha was betrothed; and she, the third, + Giselia, would not look upon a man. + So, bending his whole heart unto this end, + He watched and waited, trusting to stir to fire + The indolent interest in those large eyes, + And feel the languid hands beat in his own, + Ere the new spring. And well he played his part,-- + Slipping no chance to bribe or brush aside + All that would stand between him and the light: + Making fast foes in sooth, but feeble friends. + But what cared he, who had read of ladies' love, + And how young Launcelot gained his Guenovere,-- + A foundling, too, or of uncertain strain? + And when one morning, coming from the bath, + He crossed the Princess on the palace-stair, + And kissed her there in her sweet disarray, + Nor met the death he dreamed of in her eyes, + He knew himself a hero of old romance,-- + Not seconding, but surpassing, what had been. + + And so they loved; if that tumultuous pain + Be love,--disquietude of deep delight, + And sharpest sadness: nor, though he knew her heart + His very own,--gained on the instant, too, + And like a waterfall that at one leap + Plunges from pines to palms, shattered at once + To wreaths of mist and broken spray-bows bright,-- + He loved not less, nor wearied of her smile; + But through the daytime held aloof and strange + His walk; mingling with knightly mirth and game; + Solicitous but to avoid alone + Aught that might make against him in her mind; + Yet strong in this,--that, let the world have end, + He had pledged his own, and held Rhotruda's troth. + + But Love, who had led these lovers thus along, + Played them a trick one windy night and cold: + For Eginardus, as his wont had been, + Crossing the quadrangle, and under dark,-- + No faint moonshine, nor sign of any star,-- + Seeking the Princess' door, such welcome found, + The knight forgot his prudence in his love; + For lying at her feet, her hands in his, + And telling tales of knightship and emprise + And ringing war, while up the smooth white arm + His fingers slid insatiable of touch, + The night grew old: still of the hero-deeds + That he had seen he spoke, and bitter blows + Where all the land seemed driven into dust, + Beneath fair Pavia's wall, where Loup beat down + The Longobard, and Charlemaign laid on, + Cleaving horse and rider; then, for dusty drought + Of the fierce tale, he drew her lips to his, + And silence locked the lovers fast and long, + Till the great bell crashed One into their dream. + + The castle-bell! and Eginard not away! + With tremulous haste she led him to the door, + When, lo! the courtyard white with fallen snow, + While clear the night hung over it with stars! + A dozen steps, scarce that, to his own door: + A dozen steps? a gulf impassable! + What to be done? Their secret must not lie + Bare to the sneering eye with the first light; + She could not have his footsteps at her door! + Discovery and destruction were at hand: + And, with the thought, they kissed, and kissed again; + When suddenly the lady, bending, drew + Her lover towards her half-unwillingly, + And on her shoulders fairly took him there,-- + Who held his breath to lighten all his weight,-- + And lightly carried him the courtyard's length + To his own door; then, like a frightened hare, + Fled back in her own tracks unto her bower, + To pant awhile, and rest that all was safe. + + But Charlemaign the king, who had risen by night + To look upon memorials, or at ease + To read and sign an ordinance of the realm,-- + The Fanolehen or Cunigosteura + For tithing corn, so to confirm the same + And stamp it with the pommel of his sword,-- + Hearing their voices in the court below, + Looked from his window, and beheld the pair. + + Angry the king,--yet laughing-half to view + The strangeness and vagary of the feat: + Laughing indeed! with twenty minds to call + From his inner bed-chamber the Forty forth, + Who watched all night beside their monarch's bed, + With naked swords and torches in their hands, + And test this lover's-knot with steel and fire; + But with a thought, "To-morrow yet will serve + To greet these mummers," softly the window closed, + And so went back to his corn-tax again. + + But, with the morn, the king a meeting called + Of all his lords, courtiers and kindred too, + And squire and dame,--in the great Audience Hall + Gathered; where sat the king, with the high crown + Upon his brow, beneath a drapery + That fell around him like a cataract, + With flecks of color crossed and cancellate; + And over this, like trees about a stream, + Rich carven-work, heavy with wreath and rose, + Palm and palmirah, fruit and frondage, hung. + + And more the high hall held of rare and strange: + For on the king's right hand Leoena bowed + In cloudlike marble, and beside her crouched + The tongueless lioness; on the other side, + And poising this, the second Sappho stood,-- + Young Erexcéa, with her head discrowned, + The anadema on the horn of her lyre: + And by the walls there hung in sequence long + Merlin himself, and Uterpendragon, + With all their mighty deeds, down to the day + When all the world seemed lost in wreck and rout, + A wrath of crashing steeds and men; and, in + The broken battle fighting hopelessly, + King Arthur, with the ten wounds on his head. + + But not to gaze on these appeared the peers. + Stern looked the king, and, when the court was met,-- + The lady and her lover in the midst,-- + Spoke to his lords, demanding them of this: + "What merits he, the servant of the king, + Forgetful of his place, his trust, his oath, + Who, for his own bad end, to hide his fault, + Makes use of her, a Princess of the realm, + As of a mule,--a beast of burden!--borne + Upon her shoulders through the winter's night + And wind and snow?" "Death!" said the angry lords; + And knight and squire and minion murmured, "Death!" + Not one discordant voice. But Charlemaign-- + Though to his foes a circulating sword, + Yet, as a king, mild, gracious, exorable, + Blest in his children too, with but one born + To vex his flesh like an ingrowing nail-- + Looked kindly on the trembling pair, and said: + "Yes, Eginardus, well hast thou deserved + Death for this thing; for, hadst thou loved her so, + Thou shouldst have sought her Father's will in this,-- + Protector and disposer of his child,-- + And asked her hand of him, her lord and thine. + Thy life is forfeit here; but take it, thou!-- + Take even two lives for this forfeit one; + And thy fair portress--wed her; honor God, + Love one another, and obey the king." + + Thus far the legend; but of Rhotrude's smile, + Or of the lords' applause, as truly they + Would have applauded their first judgment too, + We nothing learn: yet still the story lives, + Shines like a light across those dark old days, + Wonderful glimpse of woman's wit and love, + And worthy to be chronicled with hers + Who to her lover dear threw down her hair, + When all the garden glanced with angry blades; + Or like a picture framed in battle-pikes + And bristling swords, it hangs before our view,-- + The palace-court white with the fallen snow, + The good king leaning out into the night, + And Rhotrude bearing Eginard on her back. + + + + +GREEK LINES. + + +[Concluded.] + + + "As when a ship, by skilful steersman wrought + Nigh river's mouth or foreland, where the + wind + Veers oft, as oft so steers, and shifts her sail,-- + So varied he, and of his tortuous train + Curl'd many a wanton wreath in sight of + Eve + To lure her eye." + +And Eve, alas! yielded to the blandishments of the wily serpent, as we +moderns, in our Art, have yielded to the licentious, specious life-curve +of Hogarth. When I say Art, I mean that spirit of Art which has made us +rather imitative than creative, has made us hold a too faithful mirror +up to Nature, and has been content to let the great Ideal remain +petrified in the marbles of Greece. + +I have endeavored to show how this Ideal may be concentrated in a +certain abstract line, not only of sensuous, but of intellectual +Beauty,--a line which, while it is as wise and subtle as the serpent, is +as harmless and loving as the sacred dove of Venus. I have endeavored +to prove how this line, the gesture of Attic eloquence, expresses the +civilization of Pericles and Plato, of Euripides and Apelles. It is now +proposed briefly to relate how this line was lost, when the politeness +and philosophy, the literature and the Art of Greece were chained to the +triumphal cars of Roman conquerors,--and how it seems to have been found +again in our own day, after slumbering so long in ruined temples, broken +statues, and cinerary urns. + +The scholar who studies the aesthetical anatomy of Greek Art has +a melancholy pleasure, like a surgeon, in watching its slow, but +inevitable atrophy under the incubus of Rome. The wise, but childlike +serenity and cheerfulness of soul, so tenderly pictured in the white +stones from the quarries of Pentelicus, had, it is true, a certain +sickly, exoteric life in Magna Graecia, as Pompeii and Herculaneum have +proved to us. But the brutal manhood of Rome overshadowed and tainted +the gentle exotic like a Upas-tree. Where, as in these places, +the imported Greek could have some freedom, it grew up into a dim +resemblance of its ancient purity under other skies. It had, I think, +an elegiac plaintiveness in it, like a song of old liberty sung in +captivity. Yet there was added to it a certain fungus-growth, never +permitted by that far-off Ideal whose seeds were indigenous in the +Peloponnesus, but rather springing from the rank ostentation of Rome. In +its more monumental developments, under these new influences, the true +line of Beauty became gradually vulgarized, and, by degrees, less +intellectual and pure, till its spirit of fine and elegant reserve was +quite lost in a coarse splendor. It must be admitted, however, that the +Greek colonies of Italy expressed not a little of the old refinement +in the lamps and candelabra and vases and _bijouterie_ which we have +exhumed from the ashes of Vesuvius. + +But, turning to Rome herself, the most casual examination will impress +us with the fact that there the lovely Greek lines were seized by rude +conquerors, and at once were bent to answer base and brutal uses. To +narrow a broad subject down to an illustration, let us look at a single +feature, the _Cymatium_, as it was understood in Greece and Rome. This +is a moulding of very frequent occurrence in classic entablatures, a +curved surface with a double flexure. Perhaps the type of Greek lines, +as represented in the previous paper on this subject, may be safely +accepted as a fair example of the Greek interpretation of this feature. +The Romans, on the other hand, not being able to understand and +appreciate the delicacy and deep propriety of this line, seized their +compasses, and, without thought or love, mechanically produced a gross +likeness to it by the union of two quarter-circles thus:-- + +[Illustration: + +Greek. + +Roman.] + +Look upon this picture, and on this!--the one, refined, delicate, +sensitive, fastidious, severe, never repeated; the other, thoughtless, +vulgar, mathematical, common-sense, sensuous, reappearing ever with a +stolid monotony. And such is the sentiment pervading all Roman Art. +The conquerors took the _letter_ from the Greeks, but never had the +slightest feeling for its Ideal. But even this _letter_, when they +transcribed it, writhed and was choked beneath hands which knew better +the iron caestus of the gladiator than the subtile and spiritual touch +of the artist. + +We can have no stronger and more convincing proof that Architecture is +the truest record of the various phases of civilization than we find in +this. There was Greek Art, living and beautiful, full of inductive power +and capacities of new expressions; and there were the boundless wealth +and power of Rome. But Rome had her own ideas to enunciate; and so +possessed was she with the impulse to give form to these ideas, to +her ostentatious brutality, her barbarous pride, her licentious +magnificence, that she could not pause to learn calm and serious lessons +from the Greeks who walked her very forums, but, seizing their fair +sanctuaries, she stretched them out to fit her standard; she took the +pure Greek orders to decorate her arches, she piled these orders one +above the other, she bent them around her gigantic circuses, till at +last they had become acclimated and lost all their peculiar refinement, +all their intellectual and dignified humanity. Every moulding, every +capital, every detail was changed. The Romans had neither time nor +inclination to bestow any love or thought on the expressiveness and +tender meaning of subordinate parts. But out of the suggestions and +reminiscences of Greek lines they made a rigid and inflexible grammar of +their own,--a grammar to suit the mailed clang of Roman speech, which, +in its cruel martial strength, sought no refinements, no delicate +inflections from a distant Acropolis. The result was the coarse splendor +of the Empire. How utterly the still Greek Ideal was forgotten in this +noisy splendor, how entirely the chaste spirituality of the Greek line +was lost in the round and lusty curves which are the _inevitable_ +footprints of Sensual Life, scarcely needs further amplification. I +have referred to the Ionic capital of the Erechtheum as containing a +microcosm of Attic Art, as presenting a fair epitome of the thought and +love which Hellenic artists offered in the worship of their gods. Turn +now to the Roman Ionic, as developed in any one of the most familiar +examples of it, in the Temple of Concord, near the Via Sacra, in the +Theatre of Marcellus, or the Colosseum. What a contrast! How formal, +mechanical, pattern-like it has become! The grace of its freedom, the +intellectual reserve of its strength, the secret humanity that thrilled +through all its lines, the divine Art which obtained such sweet repose +there,--all these are gone. Quality has yielded to quantity, and nothing +is left save those external characteristics which he who runs may read, +and he who pauses to study finds cold, vacant, and unsatisfactory. What +the Ionic capital of Rome wants, and what all Roman Art wants, is _the +inward life_, the living soul, which gives a peculiar expressiveness +to every individual work, and raises it infinitely above the dangerous +academic formalism of the schools. + +In view of our own architecture, that which touches our own experience +and is of us and out of us, the danger of this academic formalism +cannot be too emphatically spoken of. When one carefully examines the +transition from Greek to Roman Art, he cannot but be impressed with the +fact, that the spirit which worked in this transition was the spirit of +a vulgar and greedy conqueror. To illustrate his rude magnificence +and to give a finer glory to his triumph, by right of conquest he +appropriated the Greek orders. But the living soul which was in those +orders, and gave them an infinity of meaning, an ever-varying poetry of +expression, could not be enslaved; nor could the worshipful Love which +created them find a home under the helmet of the soldier. So they became +lifeless; they were at once formally systematized and classified, +subjected to strict proportions and rules, and cast, as it were, in +moulds. This arrangement enabled the conqueror, without waste of time in +that long contemplative stillness out of which alone the beauty of the +true Ideal arises, out of which alone man can create like a god, to +avail himself at once of the Greek orders, not as a sensitive and +delicate means of fine aesthetic expression, but as a mechanical +language of contrasts of form to be used according to the exigencies of +design. The service of Greek Art was perfect freedom; enslaved at Rome, +it became academic. Thus systematized, it is true, it awes us by the +superb redundancy and sumptuousness of its use in the temples and forums +reared by that omnipresent power from Britannia to Baalbec. But the Art +which is systematized is degraded. Emerson somewhere remarks that man +descends to meet his fellows,--meaning, I suppose, that he has to +sacrifice some of the higher instincts of his individuality when he +desires to become social, and to meet his fellows on that low level of +society, which, made up as it is of many individualities, has none of +those secret aspirations which arise out of his own isolation. Society +is a systematic aggregation for the benefit of the multitude, but great +men lift themselves above it into a purer atmosphere. As Longfellow +says, "They rise like towers in the city of God." So with Art,--when we +systematize it for the indiscriminate use of thoughtless and unloving +men, we degrade it. And a singular proof of this is found in the fact +that the Roman academical orders never have anything in them reserved +from the common ken. They are superficial. They say all that they have +to say and express all that they have to express at once, and disturb +the mind with no doubt about any hidden meaning. They are at once +understood. All their intention and purpose are patent to the most +casual observer. He does not pause to inquire what motives actuated the +architect in the composition of any Corinthian capital, because he feels +that it is made according to the dictates of a rigid school created for +the convenience of an unartistic age, and there is no individual love or +aspiration in it. + +Virtually, the Roman orders died in the first century of the Christian +era. We all know how, when the authority of the Pagan schools was gone +and the stern Vitruvian laws had become lost in the mists of antiquity, +these orders gradually fell from their strict allegiance, and imbibed a +new and healthy life from that rude but earnest Romanesque spirit, as in +Byzantium and Lombardy. And we know, too, how, in after Gothic times, +the spirit of the forgotten Aphrodite, Ideal Beauty, sometimes +lurked furtively in the image of the Virgin Mary, and inspired the +cathedral-builders with somewhat of the old creative impulse of Love. +But the workings of this impulse are singularly contrasted in the +productions of the Greek and Mediaeval artists. Nature, we have seen, +offered to the former mysterious and oracular Sibylline leaves, +profoundly significant of an indwelling humanity diffused through all +her woods and fields and mountains, all her fountains, streams, and +seas. Those meditative creators sat at her feet, earnest disciples, +but gathering rather the spirit and motive of her gifts than the gifts +themselves, making an Ideal and worshipping it as a deity. But for the +cathedral-builder, Dryads and Hamadryads, Oreads, Fauns, and Naiads did +not exist,--the Oak of Dodona uttered no oracles. + + "A primrose by the river's brim + A yellow primrose was to him, + And it was nothing more." + +To him Nature was an open book, from which he continually quoted with a +loving freedom, not to illustrate his own deep relationships with her, +but to give greater glory to that vast Power which stood behind her +beautiful text and was revealed to him in the new religion from +Palestine. He loved fruits and flowers and leaves because they were +manifestations of the Love of God; and he used them in his Art, not as +motives out of which to create abstract forms, out of which to eliminate +an ideal humanity, but to show his intense appreciation of the Divine +Love which gave them. Had he been a Pantheist, as Orpheus was, it is +probable he would have idealized these things and created Greek lines. +But believing in a distinct God, the supreme Originator of all things, +he was led to a worship of sacrifice and offerings, and needed no Ideal. +So, with a lavish hand, he appropriated the abundant Beauty of Nature, +imitating its external expressions with his careful chisel, and +suffering his sculptured lines to throw their wayward tendrils and +vagrant leaflets outside the strict limits of his spandrels. The life of +Gothic lines was in their sensuous liberty; the life of Greek lines +was in their intellectual reserve. Those arose out of a religion of +emotional ardor; these, out of a religion of philosophical reflection. +Hence, while the former were wild and picturesque, the latter were +serious, chaste, and very human. + +Doubtless the nearest approach to ideal abstractions to be found in +Mediaeval Art is contained in that remarkable and very characteristic +system of foliations and cuspidations in tracery, which were suggested +by the leaf-forms in Nature. In this adaptation, when first it was +initiated in the earliest phases of Gothic, there is something like +Greek Love. The simple trefoil aperture seems a fair architectural +version of the clover-leaves. But the propriety of the use of these +clover-lines was hinted by a constructive exigency, the pointed arch. +The inevitable assimilation of the natural forms of leaves with this +feature was too evident not to be improved by such active and ardent +worshippers as the Freemasons. Thus originated Gothic tracery, which +afterwards branched out into such sumptuous and unrestrained luxury as +we find in the Decorated styles of England, the Flamboyant of France, +the late Geometric of Germany. Thus were the masons true to the zealous +and passionate enthusiasm of their religion. They used foliations, not +on account of their subjective significance, as the Greek artists did, +but on account of their objective and material applicability to the +decoration of their architecture. But no natural form was ever made +use of by a Greek artist merely because suggested by a constructive +exigency. It was the inward life of the thing itself which he saw, and +it was his love for it which made him adopt it. This love refined and +purified its object, and never would have permitted it to grow into any +wild and licentious Flamboyant under the serene and quiet skies of the +Aegean. + +And so the Greek lines slept in patient marble through the long Dark +Ages, and no one came to awaken them into beautiful life again. No one, +consecrated Prince by the chrism of Nature, wandered into the old land +to kiss the Sleeping Beauty into life, and break the deep spell which +was around her kingdom. + +Then came the Renaissance in the fifteenth century. But--alas that we +must say it!--it was fundamentally a Renaissance of error rather than of +truth. It was a revival of Roman Art, and not of Greek. The line which +we call Hogarth's, but which in reality is as old as human life and its +passions, was the key-note of it all. So wanton were the wreaths it +curled in the sight of the great masters of that period, that they all +yielded to its subtle fascinations and sinned,--sinned, inasmuch as they +devoted their vast powers to the revival and refinement of a sensuous +academic formalism, instead of breathing into all the architectural +forms and systems then known (a glorious material to work with) the pure +life of the Ideal. Had such men as Michel Angelo, San Gallo, Palladio, +Scamozzi, Vignola, San Michele, Bernini, been inspired by the highest +principles of Art, and known the thoughtful lines of Greece, so catholic +to all human moods, and so wisely adapted to the true spirit of +reform,--had they known these, all subsequent Art would have felt the +noble impulse, and been developed into that sphere of perfection +which we see rendering illustrious the primitive posts and lintels of +antiquity, and which we picture to ourselves in the imaginary future of +Hope as glorifying a far wider scope of human knowledge and ingenuity. + +The Gothic architecture of the early part of the fifteenth century +was ripe for the spirit of healthy reform. It had been actively +accumulating, during the progress of the age of Christianity, a +boundless wealth of forms, a vast amount of constructive resources, and +material fit for innumerable architectural expressions of human power. +But in the last two centuries of this era the Love which gave life to +this architecture in its earlier developments gradually became swallowed +up in the Pride of the workman; and the luscious and abandoned luxury of +line led it farther and farther astray from the true path, till at last +it became like an unweeded garden run to seed, and there was no health +in it. In the year 1555, at Beauvais, the masonic workmen uttered their +last cry of defiance against the old things made new in Italy. Jean Wast +and François Maréchal of that town, two cathedral-builders, said,--"that +they had heard of the Church of St. Peter at Rome, and would maintain +that their Gothic could be built as high and on as grand a scale as the +antique orders of this Michel Angelo." And with this spirit they built a +wonderful pyramid over the cross of their cathedral. But, alas! it fell +in the fifth year of its arrogant pride, and this is the last we hear of +Gothic architecture in those times. Over the wild and picturesque ruins +the spirits of the old conquerors of Gaul once more strode with measured +tread, and began to set up their prevailing standards in the very +strongholds of Gothic supremacy. These conquerors trampled down the true +as well as the false in the Mediaeval _régime_, and utterly extinguished +that sole lamp of knowledge which had given light to the Ages of +Darkness and had kindled into life and beauty the cathedrals of Europe. + +This was the error of the Renaissance. Its apostles would not recognize +the capacities existing in the great architecture they displaced, +for opening into a new life under the careful culture of a revived +knowledge. But they rooted it out bodily, and planted instead an exotic +of the schools. It was the re-birth of an Art _system_, which in its +former existence had developed in an atmosphere of conquest. It taught +them to kill, burn, and destroy all that opposed the progress of its +triumph. It was eminently revolutionary in its character, and its reign, +to all those multitudinous expressions of life and thought which had +arisen under the intermediate and more liberal dynasty, was one of +terror. Truly, it was a fierce and desolating instrument of reform. + +It would be a tempting theme of speculation to follow in the imagination +the probable progress of a Greek, instead of a Roman Renaissance, into +such active, but misguided schools as those of Rouen and Tours in the +latter part of the fifteenth century,--of Rouen, with its Roger Arge, +its brothers Leroux, who built the old and famous Hôtel Bourgtheroulde +there, its Pierre de Saulbeaux, and all that legion of architects and +builders who were employed by the Cardinal Amboise in his castle of +Gaillon,--of Tours, with its Pierre Valence, its François Marchant, its +Viart and Colin Byart, out of whose rich and picturesque craft-spirit +arose the quaint fancies of the palaces of Blois and Chambord, and the +playfulness of many an old Flemish house-front. Such a Renaissance +would not have come among these venial sins of _naïveté_, this sportive +affluence of invention, to overturn ruthlessly and annihilate. Its +mission would inevitably have been, not to destroy, but to fulfil,--to +invest these strange results of human frailty and human power with that +grave ideal beauty which nineteen centuries before had done a good work +with the simple columns and architraves on the banks of the Ilissus, and +which, under the guidance of Love, would have made the arches and vaults +and buttresses and pinnacles of a later civilization illustrious with +even more eloquent expressions of refinement. For Greek lines do not +stand apart from the sympathies of men by any spirit of ceremonious and +exclusive rigor, as is undeniably the case with those which were adopted +from Rome. They are not a _system_, but a _sentiment_, which, wisely +directed, might creep into the heart of any condition of society, and +leaven all its architecture with a purifying and pervading power without +destroying its independence, where an inflexible system could assume a +position only by tyrannous oppression. + +Yet when we examine the works of the Renaissance, after the system had +become more manageable and acclimated under later Italian and French +hands, we cannot but admire the skill with which the lightest fancies +and the most various expressions of human contrivance were reconciled to +the formal rules and proportions of the Roman orders. The Renaissance +palaces and civil buildings of the South and West of Europe are so full +of ingenuity, and the irrepressible inventive power of the artist moves +with so much freedom and grace among the stubborn lines of that revived +architecture, that we cannot but regard the results with a sort of +scholastic pride and pleasure. We cannot but ask ourselves, If the +spirit of those architects could obtain so much liberty under the +restrictions of such an unnatural and unnecessary despotism, what would +have been the result, if they had been put in possession of the very +principles of Hellenic Art, instead of these dangerous and complex +models of Rome, which were so far removed from the purity and simplicity +of their origin? Up to a late day, the great aim of the Renaissance has +been to interpret an advanced civilization with the sensuous line; and +_so far as this line is capable of such expression_, the result has been +satisfactory. + +Thus four more weary centuries were added to the fruitless slumbers +of Ideal Beauty among the temples of Greece. Meanwhile, in turn, the +Byzantine, the Northman, the Frank, the Turk, and finally the bombarding +Venetian, left their rude invading footprints among her most cherished +haunts, and defiled her very sanctuary with the brutal touch of +barbarous conquest. But the kiss which was to dissolve this enchantment +was one of Love; and not Love, but cold indifference, or even scorn, +was in the hearts of the rude warriors. So she slept on undisturbed in +spirit, though broken and shattered in the external type, and it was +reserved for a distant future to be made beautiful by her disenchantment +and awakening. + +In 1672, a pupil of the artist Lebrun, Jacques Carrey, accompanied the +Marquis Ollier de Nointee, ambassador of Louis XIV., to Constantinople. +On his way he spent two months at Athens, making drawings of the +Parthenon, then in an excellent state of preservation. These drawings, +more useful in an archaeological than an artistic point of view, are +now preserved in the Bibliothèque Impériale of Paris. In 1676, two +distinguished travellers, one a Frenchman, Dr. Spon, the other an +Englishman, Sir George Wheler, tarried at Athens, and gave valuable +testimony, in terms of boundless admiration, to the beauty and splendor +of the temples of the Acropolis and its neighborhood, then quite unknown +to the world. Other travellers followed these pioneers in the traces of +that old civilization. But in 1687 Königsmark and his Venetian forces +threw their hideous bombshells among the exquisite temples of the +Acropolis, and, igniting thereby the powder-magazine with which the +Turks had desecrated the Parthenon, tore into ruins that loveliest of +the lovely creations of Hellas. It was not until the publishing of the +famous work of Stuart and Revett on "The Antiquities of Athens," in +1762, that the world was made familiar with the external expressions +of Greek Architecture. This publication at once created a curious +revolution in the practice of architecture,--a revolution extending in +its effects throughout Europe. A fever arose to reproduce Greek temples; +and to such an extent was this vacant and thoughtless reproduction +carried out, that at one time it bid fair to supplant the older +Renaissance. The spirit of the new Renaissance, however, was one of mere +imitation, and had not the elements of life and power to insure its +ultimate success. No attempt was made to acclimate the exotic to suit +the new conditions it was thus suddenly called upon to fulfil; for the +_sentiment_ which actuated it, and the Love with which it was created, +were not understood. It was the mere setting up of old forms in new +places; and the Grecian porticos and pediments and columns, which were +multiplied everywhere from the models supplied by Stuart and Revett, +and found their way profusely into this New World, still stare upon us +gravely with strange alien looks. The impetuous current of modern life +beats impatiently against that cumbrous solidity of peristyle which +sheltered well in its day the serene philosophers of the Agora, but +which is now the merest impediment in the way of modern traffic and +modern necessities. But presently the spirit of formalism, engendered by +the old Renaissance, took hold of the revived Greek lines, and +stiffened them into acquiescence with a base mathematical system, which +effectually deprived them of that life and reproductive power which +belong only to a state of artistic freedom. They were reduced to rule +and deadened in the very process of their revival. + +So the Greek Ideal, though strangely transplanted thus into the noise of +modern streets, was not awakened from its long repose by the clatter and +roaring of our new civilization. As regarded the uses of life, it still +slept in petrifactions of Pentelic marble. And when those petrifactions +were repeated in modern quarries, it was merely the shell they gave; the +spirit within had not yet broken through. + +Greek lines, therefore, owed their earliest revival to the vagaries of a +capricious taste, and the desire to give zest to the architecture of the +day by their novelty. It was not for the sake of the new life there was +in them, and of that pliable spirit of refinement so suited to the wise +re-birth of ancient Love in Art. It is not surprising that some of the +more modern masters of the old Renaissance, with whom that system had +become venerable, from its universal use as the vehicle by which +the greatest artists of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries had +expressed their thoughts and inspirations, regarded with peculiar +distrust these outlandish innovations on the exclusive walks of their +own architecture. For they saw only a few external forms which the +beautiful principles of Hellenic Art had developed to fit an old +civilization; the applicability of these primary principles to the +refinement of the architectural expressions of a modern state of society +they could not of course comprehend. About the year 1786, we find Sir +William Chambers, the leading architect of his day in England, in his +famous treatise on "The Decorative Part of Civil Architecture," giving +elaborate and emphatic expression to his contempt of that Greek Art, +which had presented itself to him in a guise well suited to cause +misapprehension and error. "It must candidly be confessed," he says, +"that the Grecians have been far excelled by other nations, not only in +the magnitude and grandeur of their structures, but likewise in point of +fancy, ingenuity, variety, and elegant selection." A heresy, indeed! + +Two distinguished German artists--the one, Schinkel of Berlin, born in +1781,--the other, Klenze of Munich, born in 1784--were children when +Chambers uttered these treasonable sentiments concerning Greek Art. +Later, at separate times, these artists visited Greece, and so filled +themselves with the feeling and sentiment of the Art there, so +consecrated their souls with the appreciative study of its divine Love, +that the patient Ideal at last awoke from its long slumbers, entered +into the breathing human temples thus prepared for it by the pure rites +of Aphrodite, _and once more lived_. Thus in the opening years of the +nineteenth century was a new and reasonable Renaissance, not of an +antique type, but of a spirit which had the gift of immortal youth, and +uttered oracles of prophecy to these chosen Pythians of Art. + +Through Schinkel, the pure Hellenic style, only hinted at previously in +the attempts of less inspired Germans, such as Langhaus, who embodied +his crude conceptions in the once celebrated Brandenburg Gate, was +fairly and grandly revived in the Hauptwache Theatre and the beautiful +Museum and the Bauschule and Observatory of Berlin. He competed with +Klenze in a series of designs for the new palace at Athens, rich with a +truly royal array of courts, corridors, saloons, and colonnades. But the +evil fate which ever hangs over the competitions of genius was baleful +even here, and the barrack-like edifice of Gütner was preferred. His +latest conception was a design of a summer palace at Orianda, in the +Crimea, for the Empress of Russia, where the purity of the old Greek +lines was developed into the poetry of terraces and hanging-gardens and +towers, far-looking over the Black Sea. Schinkel was called the Luther +of Architecture; and the spiritual serenity which he breathed into the +pomp and ceremonious luxury of the Art of his day seems to give him some +title to this distinction. Yet, with all the freedom and originality +with which he wrought out the new advent, he was perhaps rather too +timid than too bold in his reforms,--adhering too strictly to the +original letter of Greek examples, especially with regard to the orders. +He could not entirely shake off the old incubus of Rome. + +And so, though in a less degree, with Klenze. When, in 1825, Louis of +Bavaria came to the throne, he was appointed Government Architect, and +in this capacity gave shape to the noble dreams of that monarch, in the +famous Glyptothèque, the Pinacothèque, the palace, and those civil and +ecclesiastical buildings which render Munich one of the most monumental +cities of Europe. It was his confessed aim to take up the work of the +Renaissance artists, having regard to our increased knowledge of that +antique civilization of which the masters of the sixteenth century could +study only the most complex developments, and those models of Rome which +were farthest removed from the pure fountain-head of Greece. "To-day," +he said, "put in possession of the very principles of Hellenic Art, +we can apply them to all our actual needs,--learning from the Greeks +themselves to preserve our independence, and at the same time to be duly +novel and unrestrained according to circumstances." These are certainly +noble sentiments; and one cannot but wish, that, when, in 1830, Klenze +was called upon to prepare plans for the grand Walhalla of Bavaria, he +had remembered his sublime theory and worked up to its spirit, instead +of recalling the Parthenon in his exterior and the Olympian temple of +Agrigentum in his interior. The last effort of this distinguished artist +was the building of three superb palaces for the museum of the Emperor +at St. Petersburg, finished in 1851. + +The seed thus planted fell upon good ground and brought forth a +hundred-fold. Then, throughout Germany, the scholastic formalism of the +old Renaissance began to fall into disrepute, and a finer feeling for +the eloquence of pure lines began to show itself. The strict limitations +of the classic orders were no longer recognized as impassable; a +sentiment of artistic freedom, a consciousness of enlarged resources, +a far wider range of form and expression, were evident in town and +country, in civil and ecclesiastical structures; and with all this +delightful and refreshing liberty was mingled that peculiar refinement +of line which was revived from Greece and was the secret of this change. +It was not over monumental edifices alone that this calm and thoughtful +spirit was breathed, but the most playful fancies of domestic +architecture derived from it an increased grace and purity, and the +study of Love moved over them, elegant and light-footed as Camilla. + + "The flower she touched on dipped and rose, + And turned to look at her." + +This revival of Hellenic principles is now infusing life into modern +German designs; and so well are these principles beginning to be +understood, that architects do not content themselves with the mere +reproduction of that narrow range of motives which was uttered in the +temples of heroic Greece, but, under these new impulses, they gather in +for their use all that has been done in ancient or modern Italy, in the +Romanesque of Europe, in the Gothic period, in Saracenic or Arabic Art, +in all the expressions of the old Renaissance. By the very necessity +of the Greek line, they are rendered catholic and unexcluding in their +choice of forms, but fastidious and hesitating in their interpretation +of them into this new language of Art. Thus the good work is going on in +Germany, and architecture _lives_ there, thanks to those two illustrious +pilgrims who brought back from the land of epics, not only the +scallop-shells upon their shoulders, but in their hearts the +consecration of Ideal Beauty. + +According to the usual custom, in the year 1827, a scholar of the École +des Beaux Arts in Paris, having achieved the distinguished honor of +being named _Grand Pensionnaire_ of Architecture for that year,--was +sent to the Académie Française in the Villa Medici at Rome, to pursue +his studies there for five years at the expense of the Government. This +scholar was Henri Labrouste. While in Italy, his attention was directed +to the Greek temples of Paestum. Trained, as he had been, in the +strictest academic architecture of the Renaissance, he was struck by +many points of difference between these temples and the Palladian +formulae which had hitherto held despotic sway over his studies. In +grand and minor proportions, in the disposition of triglyphs in the +frieze, in mouldings and general sentiment, he perceived a remarkable +freedom from the restraints of his school,--a freedom which, so far from +detracting from the grandeur of the architecture, gave to it a degree of +life and refinement which his appreciative eye now sought for in vain +among the approved models of the Academy. Studying these new revelations +with love and veneration, it was not long before the pure Hellenic +spirit, confined in the severe peristyles and cellas of the Paestum +temples, entered into his heart, with all its elastic capacities, all +its secret and mysterious sympathies for the new life which had sprung +up during its long imprisonment in those stained and shattered marbles. +Labrouste, on his return to Paris, in 1830, surprised the grave +professors of the Academy, Le Bas, Baltard, and the rest, by presenting +to them, as the result of his studies, carefully elaborated drawings +of the temples at Paestum. Witnessing, with pious horror, the grave +departures from their rules contained in the drawings of their former +favorite, they charged him with error, even as a copyist. True to their +prejudices, their eyes did not penetrate beyond the outward type, and +they at once began to find technical objections. They told him, never +did such an absurdity occur in classic architecture as a triglyph on a +corner! Palladio and the Italian masters never committed such an obvious +crime against propriety, nor could an instance of it be found in all +Roman antiquities. It was in vain that poor Labrouste upheld the +accuracy of his work, and reminded the Academy that among the Roman +models no instance had been found of a Doric corner,--that this order +occurred only so ruined that no corner was left for examination, or in +the grand circumferences of the Colosseum and the Theatre of Marcellus, +where, from the nature of the case, no corner could be. The professors +still maintained the integrity of their long-established ordinances, +and, to disprove the assertions of the young pretender, even sent +a commission to examine the temples in question. The result was a +confirmation of the fact, the ridicule of Paris, the consequent branding +of the young artist as an architectural heretic, and a continued +persecution of him by the École des Beaux Arts. Undaunted, however, +Labrouste established an _atelier_ in Paris, to which flocked many +intelligent students, sympathizing with the courage which could be +so strong in the conviction of truth as to brave in its defence the +displeasure of the powerful hierarchy of the School. + +Thus was founded the new Renaissance in France; and, in this genial +atmosphere, Greek lines began to exercise an influence far more thorough +and healthy than had hitherto been experienced in the whole history of +Art. To the lithe and elegant fancy of the French this Revelation was +especially grateful. For the youth of this nation soon learned that +in these newly opened paths, their invention and sentiment, so long +straitened and confined within the severe limits of the old system, +could move with the utmost freedom, and at the same time be preserved +from licentious excess by the delicate spirit of the new lines. Thus +natural fervor, grace, and fecundity of thought found here a most +welcome outlet. + +For some time the designs of the new school were not recognized in the +competitions of the École des Beaux Arts; but when, in the course of +Nature, some two or three of the more strenuous and bigoted professors +of Palladio's golden rules were removed from the scene of contest, the +_Romantique_ (for so the new system had been named) was received at +length into the bosom of the architectural church, and now it may be +justly deemed _the distinctive architectural expression of French Art_. + +Labrouste was not alone in his efforts; but Duban and Constant Dufeux +seconded him with genius and energy. Most of the important buildings +which have been erected in France within the last six or eight years +have either been unreservedly and frankly in the new style, or been +refined by more limited applications of Hellenic principles. Even the +revived Mediaeval school, which, under the distinguished leadership of +M. Viollet le Duc and the lamented M. J.B.A. Lassus, has lately been +strengthened to a remarkable degree in France, and which shared with +the _Romantique_ the displeasure of the Academy,--even this has tacitly +acknowledged the power of Greek lines, and instinctively suffered them +to purify, to a certain degree, the old grotesque Gothic license. Most +of the modern buildings of Paris along the new Boulevards, around the +tower of St. Jacques, and wherever else the activity of the Emperor +has made itself felt in the improvements of the French capital, are by +masters or pupils of the _Romantique_ persuasion, and, in their design, +are distinguished by that tenderness of Love and earnestness of Thought +which are the fountains of living Art. One of the most remarkable +peculiarities of this school is, that it brings out of every mind which +studies and builds in it strong traits of individuality; so that every +work appears as if its author had something particular to express in +it,--something to say with especial grace and emphasis. The ordinary +decorations of windows and doors are not made in conventional shapes, +as of yore, but are highly idiosyncratic. The designer had a distinct +thought about this window or that door,--and when he would use his +thought to ornament these features, he idealized it with his Greek lines +to make it architectural, just as a poet attunes his thought to the +harmony and rhythm of verse. Antique prejudices, bent into rigid +conformity with antique rubrics, are often shocked at the strange +innovations of these new Dissenters from the faith of Palladio and +Philibert Delorme,--shocked at the naked humanity in the new works, +and would cover it with the conventional fig-leaves prescribed in the +homilies of Vignola. Laymen, accustomed to the cold architectural +proprieties of the old Renaissance, and habituated to the formalities +of the five orders, the prudish decorum of Italian window-dressings and +pediments and pilasters and scrolls, are apt to be surprised at such +strange dispositions of unprecedented and heretical features, that the +intention of the building in which they occur is at once patent to the +most casual observer, and the story of its destination told with the +eloquence of a poetical and monumental language. All great revolutions +have proved how hard it is to break through the crust of custom, and +this has been no exception to the rule; yet in justice it must be said +that every intelligent mind, every eye possessing the "gifted simplicity +of vision", to use a happy phrase of Hawthorne's, recognizes the truth +and wisdom there are in the blessed renovations of the _Romantique_, +and looks upon them as the sweeps of a besom clearing away the dust +and cobwebs which ages of prejudice have spread thickly around the +magnificent art of architecture. + +Unlike the unwieldy and ponderous classic or Italian systems, whose +pride cannot stoop to anything beneath the haughtiest uses of life +without being broken into the whims of the grotesque and _Rococo_, the +_Romantique_ has already exhibited the graceful ease with which it may +be applied to the most playful as well as the most serious employments +of Art. It has decorated the perfumer's shop on the Boulevards with the +most delicate fancies woven out of the odor of flowers and the finest +fabrics of Nature, and, in the hands of Labrouste, has built the great +Bibliothèque Ste. Geneviève, the most important work with pure Greek +lines, and perhaps the most exquisite, while it is one of the most +serious, of modern buildings. The lore of the classics and the knowledge +of the natural world, idealized and harmonized by affectionate study, +are built up in its walls, and, internally and externally, it is a work +of the highest Art. The _Romantique_ has also been used with especial +success in funereal monuments. Structures of this character, demanding +earnestly in their composition the expression of human sentiment, have +hitherto been in most cases unsatisfactory, as they have been built +out of a narrow range of Renaissance, Egyptian and Gothic _motives_, +originally invented for far different purposes, and, since then, +_classified_, as it were, for use, and reduced to that inflexible system +out of which have come the formal restrictions of modern architecture. +Hence these _motives_ have never come near enough to human life, in its +individual characteristics, to be plastic for the expression of those +emotions to which we desire to give the immortality of stone in memory +of departed friends. The _Romantique_, however, confined to no rigid +types of external form, out of its noble freedom is capable of giving +"a local habitation and a name" to a thousand affections which hitherto +have wandered unseen from heart to heart, or been palpable only in words +and gestures which disturb our sympathies for a while and then die. +Probably the most remarkable indication of this capacity, as yet shown, +is contained in a tomb erected by Constant Dufeux in the Cimetière du +Sud, near Paris, for the late Admiral Dumont d'Urville. This structure +contains in its outlines a symbolic expression of human life, death, +and immortality, and in its details an architectural version of the +character and public services of the distinguished deceased. The finest +and most eloquent resources of color and the chisel are brought to bear +on the work; and the whole, combined by a very sensitive and delicate +feeling for proportion, thus embodies one of the most expressive elegies +ever written. The tomb of Madame Delaroche, _née_ Vernet, in the +Cimetière Montmartre, by Duban, is another remarkable instance of this +elastic capacity of Greek lines; and though taken frankly, in its +general form, from a common Gothic type, its chaste and graceful +freedom from Gothic restrictions in detail gives it a life and poetic +expressiveness which must be exceedingly grateful to the Love which +commanded its erection. + +Paris thus affords us, in its modern architecture, a happy proof of the +inevitable reforming and refining tendencies of the abstract lines +of Greece, when properly understood and fairly applied. Under their +influence old things have been made new, and the coldness and hardness +of Academic Art have been warmed and softened into life. Through the +agency of the _Romantique_ school, perhaps more new and directly +symbolic architectural expressions have been uttered within the last +four years than within the last four centuries combined. Like the +gestures of pantomime, which constitute an instinctive and universal +language, these abstract lines, coming out of our humanity and rendered +elegant by the idealization of study, are restoring to architecture its +highest capacity of conveying thought in a monumental manner. One of the +most dangerous results of that eclecticism which the advanced state of +our archaeological knowledge has made the principal characteristic +of modern design consists in the fatal facility thus afforded us +of availing ourselves of vast resources of forms and combinations +ready-made to suit almost all the exigencies of composition, as we have +understood it. The public has thus been made so familiar with the set +variations of classic orders and Palladian windows and cornices, with +all manner of Gothic chamfers and cuspidations and foliations, and the +other conventional symbols of architecture, which undeniably have more +of _knowledge_ than _love_ in them,--so accustomed have the people +become to these things, that the great art of which these have been the +only language now almost invariably fails to strike any responsive chord +in the human heart or to do any of that work which it is the peculiar +province of the fine arts to accomplish. Instead of leading the age, it +seems to lag behind it, and to content itself with reflecting into our +eyes the splendor of the sun which has set, instead of facing the east +and foretelling the glory which is coming. Architecture, properly +conceived, should always contain within itself a direct appeal to the +sense of fitness and propriety, the common-sense of mankind, which is +ever ready to recognize reason, whether conveyed by the natural motions +of the mute or the no less natural motions of lines. Now history has +proved to us, as has been shown, how, when the eloquence of these +simple, instinctive lines has been used as the primary element of +design, great eras of Art have arisen, full of the sympathies of +humanity, immortal records of their age. It cannot be denied, on the +other hand, that our eclectic architecture, popularly speaking, is not +comprehended, even by the most intelligent of cultivated people; and +this is plainly because it is based on learning and archeology, +instead of that natural love which scorns the limitations of any other +_authorities and precedents_ than those which can be found in the human +heart, where the true architecture of our time is lying unsuspected, +save in those half-conscious Ideals which yearn for free expression in +Art. + +Let our artists turn to Greece, and learn how, in the meditative repose +of that antiquity, these Ideals arose to life beneficent with the +baptism of grace, and became visible in the loveliness of a hundred +temples. Let them there learn how in our own humanity is the essence of +form as a language, and that _to create_, as true artists, we must +know ourselves and our own distinctive capacities for the utterance of +monumental history. After this sublime knowledge comes the necessity +of the knowledge of precedent. The great Past supplies us with the raw +material, with orders, colonnades and arcades, pediments, consoles, +cornices, friezes and architraves, buttresses, battlements, vaults, +pinnacles, arches, lintels, rustications, balustrades, piers, pilasters, +trefoils, and all the innumerable conventionalities of architecture. It +is plainly our duty not to revive and combine these in those cold and +weary changes which constitute modern design, but to make them live and +speak intelligibly to the people through the eloquent modifications of +our own instinctive lines of Life and Beauty. + +The riddle of the modern Sphinx is, How to create a new architecture? +and we find the Oedipus who shall solve it concealed in our own hearts. + + + * * * * * + + +THE ORDEAL BY BATTLE. + + +Virginia, which began by volunteering as peacemaker in our civil +troubles, seems likely to end by being their battleground; as Mr. +Pickwick, interfering between the belligerent rival editors, only +brought upon his own head the united concussion of their carpet-bags. +And as Dickens declares that the warriors engaged far more eagerly in +that mimic strife, on discovering that all blows were to be received +by deputy, so there is evidently an increased willingness to deal hard +knocks on both sides, in the present case, so long as it is clear that +only Virginia will take them. Maryland, under protection of our army, +adroitly contrives to shift the scene of action farther South. The Gulf +States, with profuse courtesies for the Old Dominion, consent to shift +it farther North. The Southern Confederacy has talked about +paying Richmond the "compliment" of selecting it for the seat of +government;--as if a bully, about to be lynched in his own house by the +crowd, should compliment his next-door neighbor by climbing in at his +window. It is very pleasant to have a hospitable friend; but it is +counting on his hospitality rather too strongly, when you make choice of +his apartments to be tarred and feathered in. + +Thus fades the fancy of an "independent neutrality" for the Old +Dominion. It ought to fade;--for neutrality is a crime, where one's +mother's life is at stake; and the Border theory of independence only +reminds one of Pitt's definition of an independent statesman, "a +statesman not to be depended on". How sad has been the decline of +Virginia! How strange, that in 1790, of the ten American post-offices +yielding more than a thousand dollars annually, that stately old +commonwealth held five! Now "a poverty-stricken State", by confession of +her own newspapers,--beleaguered, blockaded,--with no imports but +hungry and moneyless soldiers, and no exports save fugitives of all +colors,--what has she to hope from the present warfare? Elsewhere riches +have wings; in Virginia they are yet more transitory, having legs. Two +hundred million dollars' worth of her property has become unsalable, if +not worthless, within two months. She has but two great staples: tobacco +to send North, and slaves to send South. The slaves at present go only +to the wrong point of the compass, at rates remunerative to themselves +alone; and the tobacco-trade, for this season, will not even end in +smoke. + +But that which is now the condition of Virginia must ultimately be +the condition of the other seceding States. The tide of Secession has +already turned, and such tides never turn twice. The conspirators in +Maryland and Missouri had but one opportunity, and it was lost; with it +also went the whole cause of the Secessionists. For one week the North +shuddered, knowing the defenceless condition of Washington. Now no +Northern man shudders, except those whose Southern female cousins have +not yet found a refuge with the household gods of the eminent Senator +from Texas. + +The man who ever doubted that the first gun fired by the insurgents +would instantly unite the nation against them knew as little of the +American people as if he were editor of the London "Times." There is no +chemical solvent like gunpowder. Even the Mexican War, utterly opposed +to the moral convictions of the majority of Northern men, swept them +away in such a current that the very party which opposed it could find +no path to the Presidency but for its chief hero. Had the present +outbreak occurred far less favorably than it has, had the discretion of +President Lincoln been much less, or that of Mr. Davis much greater, +still the unanimity would have been merely a question of time, and +the danger of Washington would have reconciled all minor feuds. The +Democratic party would inevitably have embraced the war, when once +declared; Douglas would have made speeches for it, Buchanan subscribed +money for it, and Butler joined in it; Bennett would still have floated +triumphant on the tide of zeal, and Caleb Cushing still have offered to +the Government his cavalry company of one. It is a grace not given to +any American party, to stand out long against the enthusiasm of a war. + +No doubt the Secession leaders have treated us very handsomely, as to +amount of provocation. It is rare that any great contest begins by a +blow so unequivocal as the bombardment of Fort Sumter; and rare in +recent days for any set of belligerents to risk the ignominy of +privateering. But, after all, it is the startling social theories +announced by the new "government" which form the chief strength of its +enemies. Either slavery is essential to a community, or it must be fatal +to it,--there is no middle ground; and the Secessionists have taken one +horn of the dilemma with so delightful a frankness as to leave us no +possible escape from taking the other. Never, in modern days, has there +been a conflict in which the contending principles were so clearly +antagonistic. The most bigoted royal house in Europe never dreamed of +throwing down the gauntlet for the actual ownership of man by man. Even +Russia never fought for serfdom, and Austria has only enslaved nations, +not individuals. In civil wars, especially, all historic divergences +have been trivial compared to ours, so far as concerned the avowed +principles of strife. In the French wars of the Fronde, the only +available motto for anybody was the _Tout arrive en France_, "Anything +may happen in France," which gayly recognized the absurd chaos of the +conflict. In the English civil wars, the contending factions first +disagreed upon a shade more or less of royal prerogative, and it took +years to stereotype the hostility into the solid forms with which we now +associate it. Even at the end of that contest, no one had ventured to +claim such a freedom as our Declaration of Independence asserts, on +the one side,--nor to recognize the possibility of such a barbarism +as Jefferson Davis glorifies, on the other. The more strongly the +Secessionists state their cause, the more glaringly it is seen to differ +from any cause for which any sane person has taken up arms since the +Roman servile wars. Their leaders may be exhibiting very sublime +qualities; all we can say is, as Richardson said of Fielding's heroes, +that their virtues are the vices of a decent man. + +We are now going through not merely the severest, but the only danger +which has ever seriously clouded our horizon. The perils which harass +other nations are mostly traditional for us. Apart from slavery, +democratic government is long since _un fait accompli_, a fixed fact, +and the Anglo-American race can no more revert in the direction of +monarchy than of the Saurian epoch. Our geographical position frees us +from foreign disturbance, and there is no really formidable internal +trouble, slavery alone excepted. Let us come out of this conflict +victorious in the field, escaping also the more serious danger of +conquering ourselves by compromise, and the case of free government is +settled past cavil. History may put up her spy-glass, like Wellington at +Waterloo, saying, "The field is won. Let the whole line advance." + +There has been a foolish suspicion that the North was strong in +diplomacy and weak in war. The contrary is the case. We are proving +ourselves formidable enough in war to cover our shortcomings in +diplomacy. How narrowly we escaped demoralizing ourselves, at the last +moment before Congress adjourned, by some concession which would have +destroyed our consistency without strengthening our position! If we +could even now bind our generals to imitate our Cabinet in its admirable +and novel policy of silence,--to eschew pen and ink as carefully as if +they were in training for the Presidency! The country is safe so long as +they shut their mouths and open their batteries. + +The ordeal by battle is a stern test of the solid power of a nation. +There must always be some great quality to produce great military +superiority,--skill, or daring, or endurance, or numbers, or wealth, +or all together. Except the first two, neither of these special +qualifications has been even claimed by the Secessionists; and these two +have been taken for granted with such superfluous boastfulness as to +yield strong internal evidence against the claim. Certainly their +general strategy, up to this moment, has yielded not a single evidence +of far-sighted judgment or conscious power, while it has shown decided +glimpses of weakness and indecision. Indeed, how can an army like theirs +be strong? Its members mostly unaccustomed to steady exertion or precise +organization; without mechanic skill or invention; without cash or +credit; fettered in their movements by the limited rolling stock of +their scanty railways; tethered to their own homes by the fear of +insurrection;--what element of solid strength have they, to set against +these things? In the present state of the world, strong in peace is +strong in war. In modern times an army of heroes is useless without +facilities for arming, transporting, and feeding it, to say nothing of +the more ignoble circumstance of pay. Considerations of simple political +economy render it almost impossible for a slaveholding army to be strong +collectively, nor do the habits of Southern life usually fit its members +to be strong singly. + +In remembering the Battle of New Orleans, we forget that the Southwest +was then a region of hardy pioneers, such as are now rather to be sought +for in Kansas and California. The famous Tennessee riflemen of that day +were not necessarily slaveholders, and their legitimate descendants are +yet to be found among the brave men who rally round the nearest approach +to Andrew Jackson whom the State now boasts,--a tolerable fac-simile +both as to character and etymology,--Andrew Johnson. There is no need of +disparaging the personal courage of any man, and the Southern army has +some good officers,--too good, probably, in spite of themselves, to +bring to bear their clearest judgment and their best energies in +striking down the flag they have all sworn to die for. They have +eminent foreign advisers also, or one at least; for Mr. W.H. Russell, +self-appointed plenipotentiary near the Court of St. Jefferson, is +said to have lent the aid of his valuable military experience to that +commanding officer so appropriately named Captain Bragg. But, Bragg or +no brag, it is almost a moral impossibility that a slaveholding army +should be strong. + +The Secessionists have suggested to us a fatal argument. "The superior +race must control the inferior." Very well; if they insist on invoking +the ordeal by battle to decide which is the superior, let it be so. It +will be found that they have made the common mistake of confounding +barbarism with strength. Because the Southern masses are as ignorant of +letters and of arts as the Scottish Highlanders, they infer themselves +to be as warlike. But even the brave and hardy Highlanders proved +powerless against the imperfect military resources of England, a century +ago, and it is not easy to see why those who now parody them should +fare better. The absence of the alphabet does not necessarily prove the +presence of strength, nor is the ignorance of all useful arts the best +preparation for the elaborate warfare of modern times. The nation is +grown well weary of this sham "chivalry," that would sell Bayard or Du +Gueselin at auction, if it could be shown that the mother of either had +a drop of marketable blood in her veins. It had always been charitably +fancied that in South Carolina at least there was some remnant of more +knightly honor, until a kind Providence sent Preston S. Brooks to dispel +the illusion. It may be possible that even a brave man, in some moment +of insane inconsistency, may commit some act which is the consummation +of all cowardice; but it is utterly and absolutely impossible that any +brave community should approve it. Time has long since carried the +perpetrator of that dastardly outrage to a higher tribunal, but nothing +can ever redeem the State of his birth from the crowning shame of its +indorsement. + +It is not recorded whether the proverbial English army in Flanders lied +as terribly as they swore; the genius of the nation did not take that +direction. But if they did, they have now met their match in audacity of +falsehood. Captain Bobadil in the play, who submitted a plan of killing +off an army of forty thousand men by the prowess of twenty, each man to +do his twenty _per diem_ in successive single combats, might have raised +his proposed score of heroes among any handful of Secessionists. There +seems to be no one to stop these prodigious fellows as a party of +Buford's men were once checked by their commander, in the writer's +hearing, on their way down the Missouri River, in 1856. "Boys," quoth +the contemptuous official, "you had better shut up. Whenever we came in +sight of the enemy, you always took a vote whether to fight or run, +and you always voted to run." Then the astounding tales they have told +respecting our people, down to the last infamous fabrication of "Booty +and Beauty," as the supposed war-cry for the placid Pennsylvanians! +Booty, forsooth! In the words of the "Richmond Whig," "there is more +rich spoil within a square mile of New York and Philadelphia than can be +found in the whole of the poverty-stricken State of Virginia"; and the +imaginary war-cry suggests Wilkes's joke about the immense plunder +carried off by some freebooter from the complete pillage of seven Scotch +isles: he reëmbarked with three-and-sixpence. + +It might not be wise to claim that the probable lease of life for our +soldiers is any longer than for the Secessionists, but it certainly +looks as if ours would have the credit of dying more modestly. Indeed, +the men of the Free States, as was the wont of their ancestors, have +made up their minds to this fight with a slow reluctance which would +have been almost provoking but for the astonishing promptness which +marked their action when once begun. It is interesting to notice how +clearly the future is sometimes foreseen by foreigners, while still +veiled from the persons most concerned. Thus, twelve years before the +Battle of Bunker's Hill, the Duc de Choiseul predicted and prepared for +the separation of the American colonies from England. One month after +that, the Continental Congress still clung to the belief that they +should escape a division. And so, some seven years ago, the veteran +French advocate Guépin, in a most able essay suggested by the "Burns +affair" in Boston, prophesied civil war in America within ten years. +"_Une grande lutte s'apprête donc_," he wrote; "A great contest is at +hand." + +Thus things looked to foreigners, both in 1775 and in 1854, while in +both cases our people were yielding only step by step to the inevitable +current which swept events along. It is the penalty of caution, that it +sometimes appears, even to itself, like irresolution, or timidity. Not a +foolish charge has been brought against Northern energy in this contest, +that was not urged equally in the time of the Revolution. The royal +troops thought Massachusetts as easy to subdue as the South +Carolinians affect to think, and expressed it in almost the same +language:--"Whenever it comes to blows, he that can run the fastest will +think himself best off." The revolutionists admitted that "the people +abroad have too generally got the idea that the Americans are all +cowards and poltroons." A single regiment, it was generally asserted, +could march triumphant through New England. The people took no pains to +deny it. The guard in Boston captured thirteen thousand cartridges at +a stroke. The people did not prevent it. A citizen was tarred and +feathered in the streets by the royal soldiery, while the band played +"Yankee Doodle." The people did not interfere. "John Adams writes, there +is a great spirit in the Congress, and that we must furnish ourselves +with artillery and arms and ammunition, but avoid war, if possible,--if +possible." At last, one day, these deliberate people finally made up +their minds that it was time to rise,--and when they rose, everything +else fell. In less than a year afterwards, Boston being finally +evacuated, one of General Howe's mortified officers wrote home to +England, in words which might form a Complete Letter-Writer for every +army-officer who has turned traitor, from Beauregard downward,--"Bad +times, my dear friend. The displeasure I feel in the small share I have +in our present insignificancy is so great, that I do not know the thing +so desperate I would not undertake, in order to change our situation." + +It is fortunate that the impending general contest has also been +recently preceded by a local one, which, though waged under +circumstances far less favorable to the North, yet afforded important +hints by its results. It was worth all the cost of Kansas to have +the lesson she taught, in passing through her ordeal. It was not the +Emigrant Aid Society which gave peace at last to her borders, nor was it +her shifting panorama of evanescent governors; it was the sheer physical +superiority of her Free-State emigrants, after they took up arms. Kansas +afforded the important discovery, as some Southern officers once naïvely +owned at Lecompton, that "Yankees _would_ fight." Patient to the verge +of humiliation, the settlers rose at last only to achieve a victory so +absurdly rapid that it was almost a new disappointment; the contest was +not so much a series of battles as a succession of steeplechases, of +efforts to get within shot,--Missouri, Virginia, and South Carolina +invariably disappearing over one prairie-swell, precisely as the +Sharp's rifles of the emigrants appeared on the verge of the next. The +slaveholders had immense advantages: many of the settlers were in league +with them to drive out the remainder; they had the General Government +always aiding them, more or less openly, with money, arms, provisions, +horses, men, and leaders; they had always the Missouri border to retreat +upon, and the Missouri River to blockade. Yet they failed so miserably, +that every Kansas boy at last had his story to tell of the company of +ruffians whom he had set scampering by the casual hint that Brown or +Lane was lurking in the bushes. The terror became such a superstition, +that the largest army which ever entered Kansas--three thousand men, by +the admission of both sides--turned back before a redoubt at Lawrence +garrisoned by only two hundred, and retreated over the border without +risking an engagement. + +It is idle to say that these wore not fair specimens of Southern +companies. They were composed of precisely the same material as the +flower of the Secession army,--if flower it have. They were members of +the first families, planters' sons and embryo Wigfalls. South Carolina +sent them forth, like the present troops, with toasts and boasts and +everything but money. They had officers of some repute; and they had +enthusiasm with no limit except the supply of whiskey. Slavery was +divine, and Colonel Buford was its prophet. The city of Atchison was +before the dose of 1857 to be made the capital of a Southern republic. +Kansas was to be conquered: "We will make her a Slave State, or form a +chain of locked arms and hearts together, and die in the attempt." Yet +in the end there were no chains, either of flesh or iron,--no chains, +and little dying, but very liberal running away. Thus ended the war in +Kansas. It seems impossible that Slavery should not make in this case a +rather better fight, where all is at stake. But it is well to remember +that no Border Ruffian of Secession can now threaten more loudly, swear +more fiercely, or retreat more rapidly, than his predecessors did then. + +One does not hear much lately of that pleasant fiction, so abundant a +year or two ago, that North and South really only needed to visit each +other and become better acquainted. How cordially these endearing words +sounded, to be sure, from the lips of Southern gentlemen, as they sat at +Northern banquets and partook unreluctantly of Northern wine! Can those +be the gay cavaliers who are now uplifting their war-whoops with such a +modest grace at Richmond and Montgomery? Can the privations of the +camp so instantaneously dethrone Bacchus and set up Mars? It is to be +regretted; they appeared more creditably in their cups, and one would +gladly appeal from Philip sober to Philip drunk. Intimate intercourse +has lost its charm. New York merchants more than ever desire an +increased acquaintance with the coffers of their repudiating debtors; +but so far as the knowledge of their peculiar moral traits is concerned, +enough is as good as a feast. No Abolitionist has ever dared to pillory +the slave-propagandists so conspicuously as they are doing it for +themselves every day. Sumner's "Barbarism of Slavery" seemed tolerably +graphic in its time, but how tamely it reads beside the "New Orleans +Delta"! + +A Scotchman once asked Dr. Johnson what opinion he would form of +Scotland from what strangers had said of it. + +"Sir," said the Doctor, "I should think it a region of the earth to be +avoided, so far as convenient." + +"But how," persisted the patriot, "if you listened to what its natives +say of it?" + +"Then, Sir," roared Old Obstinacy, "I should avoid it altogether." + +Take the seceded States upon their own showing, and it is absurd to +suppose that they can ever resume their former standing in the nation. +Are there any stronger oaths than their generals have broken, any closer +ties to honesty than their financiers have spurned, any deeds more +damning than their legislatures have voted thanks for? No one supposes +that the individual traitors can be restored to confidence, that Twiggs +can re-dye his reputation, or any deep-sea-soundings fish up Maury's +drowned honor. But the influence of the States is gone with that of +their representatives. They may worship the graven image of President +Lincoln in Mobile; they may do homage to the ample stuffed regimentals +of General Butler in Charleston; but it will not make the nation forget. +Could their whole delegation resume its seat in Congress to-morrow, with +the three-fifths representation intact, it would not help them. Can we +ever trust them to build a ship or construct a rifle again? No time, +no formal act can restore the past relations, so long as slavery shall +live. It is easy for the Executive to pardon some convict from the +penitentiary; but who can pardon him out of that sterner prison of +public distrust which closes its disembodied walls around him, moves +with his motions, and never suffers him to walk unconscious of it +again? Henceforth he dwells as under the shadow of swords, and holds +intercourse with men only by courtesy, not confidence. And so will they. + +Not that the United States Government is yet prepared to avow itself +anti-slavery, in the sense in which the South is pro-slavery. We +conscientiously strain at gnats of Constitutional clauses, while they +gulp down whole camels of treason. We still look after their legal +safeguards long after they have hoisted them with their own petards. But +both sides have trusted themselves to the logic of events, and there is +no mistaking the direction in which that tends. In times like these, men +care more for facts than for phrases, and reason quite as rapidly as +they act. It is impossible to blink the fact that Slavery is the root +of the rebellion; and so War is proving itself an Abolitionist, whoever +else is. Practically speaking, the verdict is already entered, and the +doom of the destructive institution pronounced, in the popular mind. +Either the Secessionists will show fight handsomely, or they will fail +to do so. If they fail to do it, they are the derision of the world +forever,--since no one ever spares a beaten bully,--and thenceforward +their social system must go down of itself. If, on the other hand, they +make a resistance which proves formidable and costly, then the adoption +of the John-Quincy-Adams policy of military emancipation is an ultimate +necessity, and there is nobody more likely to put it in effective +operation than a certain gentleman who lately wrote an eloquent +letter to his Governor on the horrors of slave-insurrection. No doubt +insurrection is a terrible thing, but so is all war, and every man of +humanity approaches either with a shudder. But if the truth were told, +it would be that the Anglo-Saxon habitually despises the negro because +he is _not_ an insurgent, for the Anglo-Saxon would certainly be one in +his place. Our race does not take naturally to non-resistance, and has +far more spontaneous sympathy with Nat Turner than with Uncle Tom. But +be it as it may with our desires, the rising of the slaves, in case of +continued war, is a mere destiny. We must take facts as they are. + +Insurrection is one of the risks voluntarily assumed by Slavery,--and +the greatest of them. The slaves know it, and so do the masters. When +they seriously assert that they feel safe on this point, there is really +no answer to be made but that by which Traddles in "David Copperfield" +puts down Uriah Heep's wild hypothesis of believing himself an innocent +man. "But you don't, you know," quoth the straightforward Traddles; +"therefore, if you please, we won't suppose any such thing." They cannot +deceive us, for they do not deceive themselves. Every traveller who has +seen the faces of a household suddenly grow pale, in a Southern +city, when some street tumult struck to their hearts the fear of +insurrection,--every one who has seen the heavy negro face brighten +unguardedly at the name of John Brown, though a thousand miles away +from Harper's Ferry,--has penetrated the final secret of the military +weakness which saved Washington for us and lost the war for them. + +It is time to expose this mad inconsistency which paralyzes common sense +on all Southern tongues, so soon as Slavery becomes the topic. These +same negroes, whom we hear claimed, at one moment, as petted darlings +whom no allurements can seduce, are denounced, next instant, as fiends +whom a whisper can madden. Northern sympathizers are first ridiculed +as imbecile, then lynched as destructive. Either position is in itself +intelligible, but the combination is an absurdity. We can understand +why the proprietor of a powder-house trembles at the sight of flint +and steel; and we can also understand why some new journeyman, being +inexperienced, may regard the peril without due concern. But we should +decide either to be a lunatic, if he in one breath proclaimed his +gunpowder to be incombustible, and at the next moment assassinated a +visitor for lighting a cigar on the premises. A slave population is +either contented and safe, or discontented and unsafe; it cannot at the +same time be friendly and hostile, blissful and desperate. + +The result described is inevitable, should the Secessionists dare to +tempt the ordeal by battle long enough. If it stop short of this, it +will be because the prestige of Southern military power is so easily +broken down that there is no temptation to declare the Adams policy. +But even this consummation must have the most momentous results, and +entirely modify the whole anti-slavery movement of the nation. Should +the war cease to-morrow, it has inaugurated a new era in our nation's +history. The folly of the Gulf States, in throwing away a political +condition where the conservative sentiment stood by them only too well, +must inevitably recoil on their own heads, whether the strife last a day +or a generation. No man can estimate the new measures and combinations +to which it is destined to give rise. There stands the Constitution, +with all its severe conditions,--severe or weak, however, according to +its interpretations;--which interpretations, again, will always prove +plastic before the popular will. The popular will is plainly destined +to a change; and who dare predict the results of its changing? The +scrupulous may still hold by the letter of the bond; but since the +South has confessedly prized all legal guaranties only for the sake of +Slavery, the North, once free to act, will long to construe them, up to +the very verge of faith, in the interest of Liberty. Was the original +compromise, a Shylock bond?--the war has been our Portia. Slavery long +ruled the nation politically. The nation rose and conquered it with +votes. With desperate disloyalty, Slavery struck down all political +safeguards, and appealed to arms. The nation has risen again, ready to +meet it with any weapons, sure to conquer with any Twice conquered, what +further claim will this defeated desperado have? If it was a disturbing +element before, and so put under restriction, shall it be spared when it +has openly proclaimed itself a destroying element also? Is this to be +the last of American civil wars, or only the first one? These are the +questions which will haunt men's minds, when the cannon are all bushed, +and the bells are pealing peace, and the sons of our hearth-stones come +home. The watchword "Irrepressible Conflict" only gave the key, but War +has flung the door wide open, and four million slaves stand ready to +file through. It is merely a question of time, circumstance, and method. +There is not a statesman so wise but this war has given him new light, +nor an Abolitionist so self-confident but must own its promise better +than his foresight. Henceforth, the first duty of an American legislator +must be, by the use of all legitimate means, to weaken Slavery. _Delenda +est Servitudo_. What the peace which the South has broken was not doing, +the war which she has instituted must secure. + + * * * * * + + +THE UNITED STATES AND EUROPE. + + +The modern world differs from the world of antiquity in nothing more +than in the existence of a brotherhood of nations, which was unknown to +the ancients, who seem to have been incapable of understanding that it +was impossible for either good or evil to be confined within certain +limits. The attempts of the Persians to extend their dominion into +Europe did for a time cause some faint approach to ideas and practices +that are common to the moderns; but, as a general rule, every monarchy +or people had its own system, to which it adhered until it was worn out +by internal decay, or was overthrown by foreign conquest. It was owing +to this exclusiveness, and to the inability of ancient statesmen to work +out an international system, that the Romans were enabled to extend +their dominion until it comprehended the best parts of the world. Had +the rulers and peoples of Carthage, Macedonia, Greece, and Syria been +capable of forming an alliance for common defence, the conquests of Rome +in the East might have been early checked, and her efforts have been +necessarily confined to the North and the West. But no international +system then existed, and the rude attempts at mutual assistance that +were occasionally made, as the conquering race strode forward, were of +no avail; and the swords of the legionaries reaped the whole field. It +is singular that what is so well known to the moderns, and was known +to them at times when they were far inferior to the best races of +antiquity, should have remained unknown to the latter. The chief reason +of this want of combining power in men who have never been surpassed in +ability is to be found in the then prevailing idea, that every stranger +was an enemy. There was a total want of confidence in one another among +the peoples of the ante-Christian period. Differences of race were +augmented by differences in religion, and by the absence of strong +business interests. Christianity had not been vouchsafed to man, and +commerce had very imperfectly done its work, while war was carried on in +the most ruthless and destructive manner. + +The modern world differs in this matter entirely from the ancient world; +and though the change is perfect only in Christendom, the effect of it +is felt in countries where the Christian religion does not prevail, but +into which Christian armies and Christian merchants have penetrated. +Christendom is the leading portion of the world, and is fast giving +law to lands in which Christianity is still hated. It is the policy of +Christendom that orders the world. A Christian race rules over the whole +of that immense country, or collection of countries, which is known as +India. Another Christian race threatens to seize upon Persia. Christians +from the extreme West of Europe have dictated the terms of treaties to +the Tartar lords of China; and Christians from America have led the way +in breaking through the exclusive system of Japan. Christian soldiers +have for a year past acted as the police of Syria, Christianity's early +home, but now held by the most bigoted and cruel of Mussulmans; and it +is only the circumstance that they cannot agree upon a division of the +spoil that prevents the five great powers of Europe--the representatives +of the leading branches of the Christian religion--from partitioning +the vast, but feeble Ottoman Empire. The Christian idea of man's +brotherhood, so powerful in itself, is supported by material forces so +vast, and by ingenuity and industry so comprehensive and so various in +themselves and their results, that it must supersede all others, and +be accepted in every country where there are people capable of +understanding it. From the time of the first Crusade there has been a +steady tendency to the unity of Christian countries; and notwithstanding +all their conflicts with one another, and partly as one of the effects +of those conflicts, they have "fraternized," until now there exists a +mighty Christian Commonwealth, the members of which ought to be able to +govern the world in accordance with the principles of a religion that is +in itself peace. Under the influence of these principles, the Christian +nations, though not in equal degrees, have developed their resources, +and a commercial system has been created which has enlisted the material +interests of men on the same side with the highest teachings of the +purest religion. Selfishness and self-denial march under the same +banner, and men are taught to do unto others as they would that others +should do unto them, because the rule is as golden economically as it is +morally. This teaching, however, it must be allowed, is very imperfectly +done, and it encounters so many disturbing forces to its proper +development that an observer of the course of Christian nations might be +pardoned, if he were at times to suppose there is little of the spirit +of Christianity in the ordering of the policy of Christendom, and also +that the true nature of material interests is frequently misunderstood. +Still, it is undeniable that there is a general bond of union in +Christendom, and that no part of that division of the world can be +injured or improved without all the other parts of it being thereby +affected. What is known as "the business world" exists everywhere, but +it is in Christendom that it has its principal seats, and in which its +mightiest works are done. It forms one community of mankind; and what +depresses or exalts one nation is felt by its effects in all nations. +There cannot be a Russian war, or a Sepoy mutiny, or an Anglo-French +invasion of China, or an emancipation of the serfs of Russia, without +the effect thereof being sensibly experienced on the shores of Superior +or on the banks of the Sacramento; and the civil war that is raging in +the United States promises to produce permanent consequences to the +inhabitants of Central India and of Central Africa. The wars, floods, +plagues, and famines of the farthest East bear upon the people of the +remotest West. The Oregon flows in sympathy with the Ganges; and a very +mild winter in New England might give additional value to the ice-crop +of the Neva. So closely identified are all nations at this time, that +the hope that there may be no serious difficulties between the United +States and the Western powers of Europe, as a consequence of the Federal +Government's blockade of the Southern ports of the Union, is based as +much upon the prospect of the European food-crops being small this year +as upon the sense of justice that may exist in the bosoms of the rulers +of France and England. If those crops should prove to be of limited +amount, peace could be counted upon; if abundant, we might as well make +ample preparation for a foreign war. Nations threatened with scarcity +cannot afford to begin war, though they may find themselves compelled +to wage it. A cold season in Europe would be the best security that we +could have that we shall not be vexed with European intervention in +our troubles; for then Europeans would desire to have the privilege +of securing that portion of our food which should not be needed for +home-consumption. This is the fair side of the picture that is presented +by the bond of nations. There is another side to the picture, which is +far from being so agreeable to us, and which may be called the Cotton +side; and it is because England, and to a lesser degree France, is +of opinion that American cotton must be had, that our civil troubles +threaten to bring upon us, if not a foreign war, at least grave disputes +and difficulties with those European nations with which we are most +desirous of remaining on the best of terms, and to secure the friendship +of which all Americans are disposed to make every sacrifice that is +compatible with the preservation of national honor. + +From the beginning of the troubles in this country that have led to +civil war, the desire to know what course would be pursued by the +principal nations of Europe toward the contending parties has been very +strongly felt on both sides; but the feeling has been greater on the +side of the rebels than on that of the nation, because the rebellion has +depended even for the merest chance of success upon the favorable view +of European governments, and the nation has got beyond the point of +caring much for the opinions or the actions of those governments. The +Union's existence depends not upon European friendship or enmity; but +without the aid of the Old World, the new Confederacy could not look for +success, had it received twice the assistance it did from the Buchanan +administration, and were it formed of every Slaveholding State, with +not a Union man in it to wound the susceptible minds of traitors by his +presence. The belief among the friends of order was, that Europe would +maintain a rigid neutrality, not so much from regard to this country as +from disgust at the character of the Confederacy's polity, and at the +opinions avowed by its officers, its orators, and its journals, opinions +which had been most forcibly illustrated in advance by acts of the +grossest robbery. That any civilized nation should be willing to afford +any countenance, and exclusively on grounds of interest, to a band of +ruffians who avowed opinions that could not now find open supporters +in Bokhara or Barbary, was what the American people could not believe. +Conscious that the Southern rebellion was utterly without provocation, +and that it had been brought about by the arts of disappointed +politicians, most of us were convinced that the rebels would be +discountenanced by the rulers of every European state to whom their +commissioners should apply either for recognition or for assistance. +We knew the power of King Cotton was great, though much exaggerated in +words by his servile subjects; but we did not, because we could not, +believe that he was able to control the policy of old empires, to +subvert the principle of honor upon which aristocracies profess to rely +as their chief support, and to turn whole nations from the roads in +which they had been accustomed to travel. That Cotton has done this we +do not assert; but it has done not a little to show how feeble; the +regard of certain classes in Europe for morality, when adherence to +principle may possibly cause them some trouble, and perhaps lead to some +loss. If the Southern plant has not become the tyrant of Europe, as for +a long time it was of America, it has certainly done much in a brief +time to unsettle English opinion, and to convert the Abolitionists of +Great Britain, the men who could tax the whites of their empire in the +annual interest of one hundred million dollars in order that the slavery +of the blacks in that empire might come to an end, into the supporters +of American slavery, and of its extension over this continent, which +might be made into a Cotton paradise, if the supply of negroes from +Africa should not be interrupted; and the logical conclusion from the +position laid down by Lord John Russell is, that the slave-trade must +be revived, as that is what his "belligerent" friends of the Southern +Confederacy are contending for. The American people had long been +taunted by the English with their subserviency to the slaveholding +interest, and with their readiness to sacrifice the welfare of a weak +and wronged race on the altars of Mammon. Whether these taunts were +well deserved by us, we shall not stop to inquire; but it is the most +melancholy of facts, that, no sooner have we given the best evidence +which it is in our power to give of our determination to confine slavery +within its present limits, and to put an end to the abuse of our +Government's power by the slaveholders, than the Government of Great +Britain, acting as the agent and representative of the British nation, +places itself directly across our path, and prepares to tell us to +stay our hand, and not dare to meddle with the institution of slavery, +because from the success of that institution proceeds cotton, and upon +the supply of cotton not being interfered with depend the welfare and +the strength of the liberty-and-order loving and morality-and-religion +worshipping race! So far as they have dared to do it, the British +ministers have placed their country on the side of those men who have +revolted in America because they saw that they could no longer make use +of slavery to misgovern the Union; and we must wait to see how far they +are to be supported by the opinion of that country, before a distinction +can be made between the ministers and the people. Left to themselves, +and unbiased by any of those selfish motives that go to make up the sum +of politics, we have not the slightest doubt that the English people, in +the proportion of ten to one, would decide in behalf of the supporters +of freedom in this country; but we are by no means so sure that the +ministers would not be sustained, were they to plunge their country into +a third American War, and sustained, too, in sending fleets to raise +our blockade of the American coast of Africa, and armies to fight the +battles of Slavery in Virginia and the Carolinas, where British officers +stole negroes eighty years ago, and sent them to the West India markets, +and found that that kind of commerce flourished well in war. A war for +the maintenance of American slavery, and to secure for slaveholders +the full and perfect enjoyment of all the "rights" of their "peculiar" +property, would be no worse than was the war which was waged against our +ancestors of the Revolution, or than those wars which were carried on +against Republican and Imperial France, ostensibly for the preservation +of order, but really for the restoration of a despotism which cannot now +find a single apologist on earth. There is often a wide distinction to +be made between a nation and its government, as our own recent history +but too deplorably proves; and the men who govern England may be enabled +to do that now which has more than once been done by their predecessors, +array their country in support of evil against that country's sense and +wishes. We should be prepared for this, and should look the evil that +threatens us fairly in the face, as the first thing to be done to +prevent it from getting beyond the threatening-point. The words of Sir +Boyle Roche, that the best way to avoid danger is to meet it plump, are +strikingly applicable to our condition. If we would not have a foreign +war on our hands before we shall have settled with the rebels, we should +make it very clear to foreigners that to fight with us would be a sort +of business that would be sure not to pay. + +That war may follow from the course which England has elected to pursue +toward the parties to our civil conflict will not appear a strange view +of affairs to those who know something of the history of Great Britain +and the United States in the early part of this century. That which the +British Government is now doing bears strong resemblance to the course +which the same Government, with different ministers, pursued toward the +United States during the war with Napoleon I., and which led to the +contest of 1812,--a contest which Franklin had predicted, and which he +said would be our War of _Independence_, as that of 1775-83 had been +our War of _Revolution_. The same ignorance of America, and the same +disposition to insult, to annoy, and to injure Americans, that were so +common under the ministries of Pitt, Portland, and Perceval, and which +move both our mirth and our indignation when we read of them long after +the tormentors and the tormented have gone to their last repose, are +exhibited by the Palmerston Ministry,--though it is but justice to Lord +Palmerston to say, that he has borne himself more manfully toward us +than have his associates. England treats us as she would not dare to +treat any European power, making an exception in our case to her +general policy, which has been, since 1815, to truckle before her +contemporaries. She has crouched before France repeatedly, when she +had much better ground for fighting her than she now has for taking +preliminary steps to fight us. We are not entitled to the same treatment +that she thinks is due to the nations of the continent of Europe. She +cannot rid herself of the feeling that we still are colonists, and that +the rules which apply to her intercourse with old nations cannot apply +to her intercourse with us, the United States having been a portion of +the British Empire within the recollection of persons yet living. No +sooner, therefore, had a state of things arisen here that seemed to +warrant a renewal of the insulting treatment that was a thing of course +in 1807, than we were made to see how hollow were those professions of +friendship for America that were not uncommon in the mouths of British +statesmen during the ten or twelve years that preceded the advent of +Secession. So long as we were deemed powerful, we received assurances of +"the most distinguished consideration"; but we have at last ascertained +that those assurances were as false as they are when they are appended +to the letter of some diplomatist who is engaged in the work of cheating +some one who is neither better nor worse than himself. It is positively +mortifying to think how shockingly we have been taken in, and that the +"cordial understanding" that had, apparently, been growing up between +the two nations was a misunderstanding throughout, though we were +sincere in desiring its existence. Perhaps, when the evidences of the +strength that we possess, in spite of Secession, shall have all been +placed before the rulers of England, they will be found less ready to +quarrel with the American people than they were a month ago. A nation +that is capable of placing a quarter of a million of men in the field in +sixty days, and of giving to that immense force a respectable degree of +consistency and organization, is worth being conciliated after having +been insulted. But would any amount of conciliation suffice to restore +the feeling that existed here when the Prince of Wales was our guest? We +fear that it would not, and that for some years to come the sentiment +in America toward England will be as hostile as it was in the last +generation, when it was in the power of any politician to make political +capital by assailing the mother-land. The belief is created that England +in her heart hates us as profoundly as ever she did, that the forty-six +years' peace has produced no change in her feeling with respect to us, +and that she is watching ever for an opportunity to gratify the grudge +of which we are the object. Practically it will matter very little +whether this belief shall be well founded or not, so long as English +ministers, whether from want of judgment or from any other cause, shall +omit no occasion for the insulting and annoying of the United States. An +opinion that is sincerely held by the people of a powerful nation is in +itself a fact of the first importance, no matter whether it be founded +in truth or not; and if the blundering of another powerful nation shall +help to maintain that opinion, that nation would have no right to +complain of any consequences that should follow from its inability to +comprehend the condition of its neighbor. This country will not submit +to the degradation which England would inflict upon it, and which no +other European nation appears inclined to aid the insular empire in +inflicting. Even Spain, proverbially foolish in her foreign policy, and +seemingly unable to get within a hundred years of the present time, +observes a decorum in the premises to which Great Britain is a stranger. + +The manner of proceeding on the part of the British Government, and +the arguments which have been put forward in justification of its +pro-slavery policy, are serious aggravations of its original offence. +The first declaration of Lord John Russell, Secretary of State for +Foreign Affairs, was to the effect that England would not show any favor +to the Secessionists. His subordinate (Lord Wodehouse, Under-Secretary +of State for Foreign Affairs) was even more emphatic than his chief in +speaking to the same purpose. Suddenly, the Foreign Secretary turned +about, with a facility and promptness for which men had not been +prepared even by his rapid changes on the questions of the Russian War +and Italian Nationality, and said that the Southern Confederacy would be +recognized as a belligerent, which is, to all intents and purposes of a +practical character, the same thing as acknowledging it to be a nation. +What was the cause of this sudden change? We have only to look at the +dates of the events that, followed the fall of Fort Sumter to find an +answer. Lord John Russell believed that the capital of the United States +had fallen into the hands of the rebels, and he was anxious to please +the masters of the cotton-fields by showing them that he had not waited +to hear of their victory to behold their virtues. There was some excuse +for his belief that the raid upon Washington had succeeded; for down to +the 27th of April there was but too much reason for supposing that that +city was in serious danger of becoming the prey of the Confederates, +who might have taken it, if they had been half as forward in their +preparations for war as they were supposed to have been by the chiefs of +the British Government. But this belief that the rebels had delivered +an effective blow at the Union only places the meanness of Lord John +Russell and his associates in a worse light than we could view it in, +if they had acted solely upon principle. Their political opinions had +pledged them to oppose the principles of the Secessionists; but they +were in a hurry to give all the support they could to those principles, +because they had come to the conclusion that victory was to be with the +Secessionists. They desired to appropriate the merit of being the first +of European statesmen to welcome the destroyers of the American Union +into the family of nations. Had the event justified their expectations, +they would have gained much by their action, and would have enjoyed +whatever of glory the European world might have been disposed to accord +to the allies of American pirates. + +The Royal Proclamation of May 13th, in which the neutrality of England +is peremptorily laid down, and all British subjects are forbidden to +take any part in the war "between the Government of the United States of +America and certain States calling themselves the Confederate States of +America," is a paper in many respects most offensive to the people of +this country, though probably it was better in its intention than it +is in its execution. That part of it which most concerns us is the +recognition of "any blockade lawfully and actually established by or on +behalf of either of the said contending parties." It is important to us +that the British Government has admitted our right to blockade the ports +of the rebels, provided we shall do so in force; and though Lord Derby +has exhibited his ignorance of our naval power by saying that we cannot +enforce the blockade we have declared and instituted, we shall show to +the world, before the next cotton-crop shall be ready for exportation, +that we are fully up to the work that is demanded of us, by having at +least one hundred vessels, strongly armed and well manned, employed in +watching every part of the Southern coast to which any foreign ship +would think of going with a cargo or for the purpose of receiving one. +The naval strength of the Union is as capable of vast and effective +development as its military strength; and there is no reason why we +should not have afloat, and ready for action, by the beginning of +autumn, fleets sufficient to close up the Confederate ports as +thoroughly as the Allies closed those of Russia in 1854-6, and the +advanced guard of other fleets to be made ready to contend with the +forces that insolent foreign nations may send into the waters of America +for the purpose of fighting the battles of the slaveholders. + +With the single exception of the admission of the right of blockade, the +Royal Proclamation is unfriendly to the United States. It admits the +right of the Confederacy's Government to issue letters of marque, from +which it follows that American ships captured by cruisers of the rebels +could be taken into English ports, and there sold, after having been +condemned by prize courts sitting at any one of the places belonging +to the Confederacy. This is no light aid to the pirates; for there are +English ports on every sea, and on almost every one of the ocean's +tributaries. Vessels belonging to America, and captured by the +Confederacy's privateers in the Mediterranean, could be taken into +Gibraltar, into Valetta, and into Corfu, all of which are English ports. +Those captured in the Mexican Gulf and the Caribbean could be sent into +any one of the many ports that belong to England in the West Indies. +If captured in the North Atlantic, or the Baltic, or any other of the +waters of Northern Europe, they could be sent into the ports of England, +Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. In the South Atlantic are St. Helena and +Cape Town, which would afford shelter to Mr. Davis's privateers and +their prizes. In the East Indies British ports are numerous, from Aden +to the last places wrested from the Chinese, and they would be all open +to the enterprise of the Confederacy's cruisers. In the Pacific are +the English harbors on the Northwest Coast; and in Australia there are +British ports that ought, considering their origin, to be particularly +friendly to men who should enter the navy of the Secessionists. England +has in advance provided places for the transaction of all the business +that shall be necessary to render privateering profitable to the +"lawless brood" of the whole world. Into all of her thousand seaports +could the lucky Confederates go, and dispose of their captures, just as +the old Buccaneers used to sell their prizes in the ports of the English +colonies. Nor could all the efforts of all the navies of the world +prevent privateers from preying upon our commerce, as they are to be +commissioned in foreign countries, and will sail from the ports of those +countries. The East Indian seas, the Levant, and the Caribbean are the +old homes and haunts of pirates; and under the encouragement which +England is disposed to afford to piracy, for the especial benefit +of Slavery, the buccaneering business could not fail to flourish +exceedingly. True, our Government would not allow privateers to be +fitted out in our ports, during the Russian War, to prey upon the +commerce of France and England; but what of that? One good turn does +_not_ deserve another, according to the public morality of nations so +orderly and pious as are England and France. + +According to the Royal Proclamation, the blockade of any one of the +Northern ports by one of the ships of the Secessionists would be as +lawful an act as the blockade of Charleston by a dozen of the Union's +cruisers; and England allows that a privateer from Pensacola could seize +an English ship that should be engaged in bringing arras to New York or +Philadelphia. Thus are the two "parties" to the war placed on the same +footing by the decision of the English Government, though the one party +is a nation having treaties with England, and engaged in maintaining the +cause of order, and the other is only a band of conspirators, who have +established their power through the institution of a system of terror, +much after the fashion of Monsieur Robespierre and his associates, whose +conduct was so offensive to all Britons seven-and-sixty years ago. But +Montgomery is much farther from England than Paris, and the French had +no cotton to tempt the British statesmen of 1793-4 to strike an account +between manufacturing and morality. Distance and time appear to have +united their powers to make things appear fair in the eyes of Russell +that inexpressibly horrible to those of "the monster Pitt." + +The Royal Proclamation forbids Englishmen affording the Union assistance +in any way. No British gunmaker can sell us a weapon, no English +merchant can use one of his ships to send us the cannon and rifles we +have purchased in his country, and no English subject of any degree can +lawfully carry a despatch for our Government. Never was there--a +more forbidding state-paper put forth; and the arid language of the +Proclamation is rendered doubly disagreeable by the purpose for which +it is employed. We are placed by its terms on the level of the men of +Montgomery, who must be vastly pleased to see that they are held in as +much esteem in England as are the constitutional authorities of the +United States. If we were to seek for a contrast to this extraordinary +document, we should find it in the proclamation put forth by our own +Government at the time of the "Canadian Rebellion," and in which it was +_not_ sought to convey the impression that we had the right to regard +rebels and loyalists as men entitled to the same treatment at our hands. +It is a source of pride to Americans, that nothing in their own history +can be quoted in justification of the cold-blooded conduct of the +British Government. + +It has been sought to defend the action of England by referring to +precedents. We are reminded by Lord John Russell of the acknowledgment +of the Greeks as belligerents by England; and others have pointed to her +acknowledgment of the Belgians, and of those Spanish--Americans who had +revolted against the rule of Old Spain. We cannot go into an extended +examination of these precedents, for the purpose of showing that they do +not apply to the present case; but we may say, and an examination into +the facts will be found to justify our assertion, that England was in +no such hurry to acknowledge the Greeks, the Belgians, and the +Spanish-Americans as she has been to acknowledge the Secessionists. +Years elapsed after the beginning of the struggle in Greece before the +English Government professed to regard the parties to that memorable +conflict even with indifference. The British historian of the Greek +Revolution, writing of the year 1821, says,--"Among the European +Governments, England was probably, next to Austria, the one most hostile +to Greece at that period, when her foreign policy was guided by a spirit +akin to that of Metternich; the hired organs of Ministry were loud in +defence of Islam, and gall dropped from their pens on the Christian +cause." And when, some years later, England did profess neutrality +between the "parties" to the war, it was less to prevent the Greeks +from falling into the hands of the Turks than to prevent the Turks from +falling into the hands of the Russians. Another object she had in view +was the suppression of that horrible piracy which then raged in the +Hellenic seas. She was then as anxious to suppress piracy because it was +injurious to her commerce, as, apparently, she is now anxious to promote +it because its existence would be injurious to our commerce. The famous +Treaty of London, made in 1827, the parties to which were Russia, +France, and England, was justified on the ground of "the necessity of +putting an end to the sanguinary contest which, by delivering up the +Greek provinces and the isles of the Archipelago to the disorders +of anarchy, produces daily fresh impediments to the commerce of the +European states, and gives occasion to piracies which not only expose +the subjects of the contracting powers to considerable losses, but +render necessary burdensome measures of suppression and protection." +In the autumn of the same year, an Order in Council decreed that "the +British ships in the Mediterranean should seize every vessel they saw +under the Greek flag, or armed and fitted out at a Greek port, except +such as were under the immediate orders of the Greek Government." The +object of this strong measure was the suppression of piracy. Thus +England had to interfere to put down the Greek pirates; and if she means +to insist upon there being any resemblance between the case of the +Greeks and that of the Secessionists, (President Lincoln to appear as +the Grand Turk, or Sultan Mahmoud II., the destroyer of the Janizaries,) +we should not object, so far as relates to the finale of the piece, +which is very likely, through her most injudicious action, to produce +a large crop of Selims and Abdallahs, by whom any amount of sea-roving +will be done, but as much at Britain's expense as at ours. + +The case of Belgium is not at all to the point, the Dutch being by no +means anxious that the foolish arrangement made at Vienna, by which +Holland and Belgium had been formally united, should be continued, +though the House of Orange was averse to the loss of so much of its +dominions. The disputes that followed the expulsion of the Dutch from +Belgium were about details, and the whole matter was finally settled by +the action of the Great Powers, and England was not then in a condition +to decide it, had it been left for her decision. The makers of the +Kingdom of the Netherlands destroyed their own work, after it had been +found to be a bad job, and had had fifteen years and upward of fair +trial. England had no choice in the matter,--especially as the effect +of determined opposition on her part would have thrown Belgium into the +arms of France, and have brought about a French war, which would have +extended to the whole of Europe, with the revolutionists in every +country for the allies of France. Louis Philippe either would have been +overthrown very speedily after his elevation, or he would have been +enabled to wear his new crown only by placing the old _bonnet rouge_ +above it. + +That England recognized the Spanish-Americans is true; but why did +she recognize them? Because she had to choose between doing that and +allowing the Holy Alliance to enter upon the reconquest of the Spanish +colonies. Mr. Canning declared that he had called a new world into +existence to redress the balance of the old,--and that, if France, as +the tool of the Holy Alliance, should have Spain, it should not be +"Spain--with the Indies." This was in 1823, though it was not until 1826 +that Mr. Canning made use of the language quoted; and so serious was the +matter, that our country was prepared to make common cause with England +in resisting the interference of the Allies and their dependants in the +affairs of Spanish-America. The question was one which did not relate to +English interests alone, but concerned those of the whole world; and it +was not decided with reference to the interests of any one country, +but after it had been ascertained that its decision would closely and +immediately affect the welfare of Christendom. England had to choose +between diplomatic resistance to the Continental Powers and the support +of a policy which she could not adopt without degrading herself. +Naturally she elected to resist, and she did so with success. The +Spanish-American countries, however, were freed from the rule of Spain +long before she recognized them, and Spain had not the means of subduing +them. England, therefore, did not acknowledge them as against Spain, but +as against France, and in opposition to the Holy Alliance, the decrees +of which France was engaged in enforcing at the expense of the Spanish +Constitutionalists, and which process of enforcement the French +Government was prepared to extend to Peru and Mexico, and to the whole +of that part of America which had belonged to the Spanish Bourbons. Mr. +Canning's conduct was statesmanlike, but it was also spiteful; and had +England been in the condition to send sixty thousand men to Spain, +probably the recognition of the independence of Spanish-America would +have been much longer delayed. He had to strike a blow at a mighty +enemy, and he delivered it skilfully at that enemy's only exposed point, +where it told at once, and where it is telling to this day. But his +action affords no precedent to the present rulers of England for the +treatment of our case, for he moved not until after the colonies had +achieved their independence. Now the British Government proclaims its +purpose to acknowledge the Southern Confederacy in less than a month +after the beginning of the attack on Fort Sumter, and in about a week +after it had heard of the fall of that ill-used fortress! Is there not +some difference between the two cases? + +England did not admit the Poles to the honors she has allowed to the +American Secessionists, after their revolt from the Czar, in 1830-31, +though their cause was popular in that country, and they had achieved +such successes over the Russian armies as the Secessionists have not +won over the armies of the Union. Neither did she acknowledge the +Hungarians, in 1849, though they had actually won their independence, +which they would have preserved but for the intervention of Russia. It +was not for her interest that Austria should be weakened. Is it for her +interest that the United States should be weakened? Is it the purpose of +her Government to give our rebels encouragement, step by step, in order +that the American nation may be thrown back to the place it held twenty +years ago? + +The Cottonocracy of England, and those who for reasons of political +interest support them, proceed erroneously, we think, when they assume +that American cotton is the chief necessary of English life, and that +without a full supply of it there must ensue great suffering throughout +the British Empire. That it would be better for England to receive her +cotton without interruption may be admitted, without its following that +she must be ruined if there should be a discontinuance of the American +cotton-trade. Men are so accustomed to think that that which is must +ever continue to be, or all will be lost, that it is not surprising that +British manufacturers should suppose change in this instance to be ruin. +They are quite ready to innovate on the British Constitution, because in +that way they hope to obtain political power, and to injure the landed +aristocracy; but the idea of change in modes of business strikes them +with terror, and hence all their wonted sagacity is now at fault. +Lancashire is to become a Sahara, because President Lincoln, in +accordance with the demands of twenty million Americans, proclaims the +ports of the rebels under blockade, and enforces that blockade with a +fleet quite sufficient to satisfy even Lord John Russell's notions as to +effectiveness. We have never believed, and we do not now believe, that +it is in the power of any part of America thus to control the condition +of England. We would not have it so, if we could, as we are sure that +the power would be abused. If America really possessed the ability to +rule England that her cotton-manufacturers assert she possesses, all +Englishmen should rejoice that events have occurred here that promise to +work out their country's deliverance from so degrading a vassalage. But +it is not so, and England will survive the event of our conflict, no +matter what that event may be. The nation that triumphed over the +Continental System of Napoleon, and which was not injured by our Embargo +Acts of fifty years ago, should be ashamed to lay so much stress upon +the value of our cotton-crop, when it has its choice of the lands of the +tropics from which to draw the raw material it requires. As to France, +it would be most impolitic in her to seek our destruction, unless she +wishes to see the restoration of England's maritime supremacy. The +French navy, great and powerful as it now is, can be regarded only as +the result of a skilful and most costly forcing process, carried on by +Bourbons, Orleanists, Republicans, and Imperialists, during forty-six +years of maritime peace. It could not be maintained against the attacks +of England, which is a naval country by position and interest. We never +could be the rival of France, but we could always be relied upon to +throw our weight on her side in a maritime war; and while our policy +would never allow of our having a very large navy in time of peace, we +have in abundance all the elements of naval power. Nor should England +be indifferent to the aid which we could afford her, were she to be +assailed by the principal nations of Continental Europe. Strike the +American Union out of the list of the nations, or cause it to be +sensibly weakened, or treat it so as to revive in force the old American +hatred of England, and it is possible that the predictions of those who +see in Napoleon III. only the Avenger of Napoleon I. may be justified by +the event. + + * * * * * + + +WASHINGTON AS A CAMP. + + +OUR BARRACKS AT THE CAPITOL. + + +We marched up the hill, and when the dust opened there was our Big Tent +ready pitched. + +It was an enormous tent,--the Sibley pattern modified. A simple soul in +our ranks looked up and said,--"Tent! canvas! I don't see it: that's +marble!" Whereupon a simpler soul informed us,--"Boys, that's the +Capitol." + +And so it was the Capitol,--as glad to see the New York Seventh Regiment +as they to see it. The Capitol was to be our quarters, and I was pleased +to notice that the top of the dome had been left off for ventilation. + +The Seventh had had a wearisome and anxious progress from New York, as I +have chronicled in the June "Atlantic." We had marched from Annapolis, +while "rumors to right of us, rumors to left of us, volleyed and +thundered." We had not expected that the attack upon us would be merely +verbal. The truculent citizens of Maryland notified us that we were to +find every barn a Concord and every hedge a Lexington. Our Southern +brethren at present repudiate their debts; but we fancied they would +keep their warlike promises. At least, everybody thought, "They will +fire over our heads, or bang blank cartridges at us." Every nose was +sniffing for the smell of powder. Vapor instead of valor nobody looked +for. So the march had been on the _qui vive_. We were happy enough that +it was over, and successful. + +Successful, because Mumbo Jumbo was not installed in the White House. It +is safe to call Jeff. Davis Mumbo Jumbo now. But there is no doubt that +the luckless man had visions of himself receiving guests, repudiating +debts, and distributing embassies in Washington, May 1, 1861. And as to +La' Davis, there seems to be documentary evidence that she meant to be +"At Home" in the capital, bringing the first strawberries with her from +Montgomery for her May-day _soirée_. Bah! one does not like to sneer at +people who have their necks in the halter; but one happy result of this +disturbance is that the disturbers have sent themselves to Coventry. The +Lincoln party may be wanting in finish. Finish comes with use. A little +roughness of manner, the genuine simplicity of a true soul like Lincoln, +is attractive. But what man of breeding could ever stand the type +Southern Senator? But let him rest in such peace as he can find! He and +his peers will not soon be seen where we of the New York Seventh were +now entering. + +They gave us the Representatives Chamber for quarters. Without running +the gauntlet of caucus primary and election, every one of us attained +that sacred shrine. + +In we marched, tramp, tramp. Bayonets took the place of buncombe. The +frowzy creatures in ill-made dress-coats, shimmering satin waistcoats, +and hats of the tile model, who lounge, spit, and vociferate there, and +name themselves M.C., were off. Our neat uniforms and bright barrels +showed to great advantage, compared with the usual costumes of the usual +_dramatis personae_ of the scene. + +It was dramatic business, our entrance there. The new Chamber is +gorgeous, but ineffective. Its ceiling is flat, and panelled with +transparencies. Each panel is the coat-of-arms of a State, painted on +glass. I could not see that the impartial sunbeams, tempered by this +skylight, had burned away the insignia of the malecontent States. Nor +had any rampant Secessionist thought to punch any of the seven lost +Pleiads out from that firmament with a long pole. Crimson and gold are +the prevailing hues of the decorations. There is no unity and breadth of +coloring. The desks of the members radiate in double files from a white +marble tribune at the centre of the semicircle. + +In came the new actors on this scene. Our presence here was the +inevitable sequel of past events. We appeared with bayonets and bullets +because of the bosh uttered on this floor; because of the bills--with +treasonable stump-speeches in their bellies--passed here; because of +the cowardice of the poltroons, the imbecility of the dodgers, and the +arrogance of the bullies, who had here cooperated to blind and corrupt +the minds of the people. Talk had made a miserable mess of it. The +_ultima ratio_ was now appealed to. + +Some of our companies were marched up-stairs into the galleries. The +sofas were to be their beds. With their white cross-belts and bright +breastplates, they made a very picturesque body of spectators for +whatever happened in the Hall, and never failed to applaud in the right +or the wrong place at will. + +Most of us were bestowed in the amphitheatre. Each desk received its +man. He was to scribble on it by day, and sleep under it by night. When +the desks were all taken, the companies overflowed into the corners and +into the lobbies. The staff took committee-rooms. The Colonel reigned in +the Speaker's parlor. + +Once in, firstly, we washed. + +Such a wash merits a special paragraph. I compliment the M.C.s, our +hosts, upon their water-privileges. How we welcomed this chief luxury +after our march! And thenceforth how we prized it! For the clean face +is an institution which requires perpetual renovation at Washington. +"Constant vigilance is the price" of neatness. When the sky here is not +travelling earthward in rain, earth is mounting skyward in dust. So much +dirt must have an immoral effect. + +After the wash we showed ourselves to the eyes of Washington, marching +by companies, each to a different hotel, to dinner. This became one of +the ceremonies of our barrack-life. We liked it. The Washingtonians were +amused and encouraged by it. Three times a day, with marked punctuality, +our lines formed and tramped down the hill to scuffle with awkward +squads of waiters for fare more or less tolerable. In these little +marches, we encountered by-and-by the other regiments, and, most +soldierly of all, the Rhode Island men, in blue flannel blouses and +_bersaglière_ hats. But of them hereafter. + +It was a most attractive post of ours at the Capitol. Spring was at its +freshest and fairest. Every day was more exquisite than its forerunner. +We drilled morning, noon, and evening, almost hourly, in the pretty +square east of the building. Old soldiers found that they rattled +through the manual twice as alert as ever before. Recruits became old +soldiers in a trice. And as to awkward squads, men that would have been +the veriest louts and lubbers in the piping times of peace now learned +to toe the mark, to whisk their eyes right and their eyes left, to drop +the butts of their muskets without crushing their corns, and all the +mysteries of flank and file,--and so became full-fledged heroes before +they knew it. + +In the rests between our drills we lay under the young shade on the +sweet young grass, with the odors of snowballs and horse-chestnut blooms +drifting to us with every whiff of breeze, and amused ourselves with +watching the evolutions of our friends of the Massachusetts Eighth, and +other less experienced soldiers, as they appeared upon the field. They, +too, like ourselves, were going through the transformations. These +sturdy fellows were then in a rough enough chrysalis of uniform. That +shed, they would look worthy of themselves. + +But the best of the entertainment was within the Capitol. Some three +thousand or more of us were now quartered there. The Massachusetts +Eighth were under the dome. No fear of want of air for them. The +Massachusetts Sixth were eloquent for their State in the Senate Chamber. +It was singularly fitting, among the many coincidences in the history of +this regiment, that they should be there, tacitly avenging the assault +upon Sumner and the attempts to bully the impregnable Wilson. + +In the recesses, caves, and crypts of the Capitol what other legions +were bestowed I do not know. I daily lost myself, and sometimes when +out of my reckoning was put on the way by sentries of strange corps, a +Reading Light Infantry man, or some other. We all fraternized. There was +a fine enthusiasm among us: not the soldierly rivalry in discipline that +may grow up in future between men of different States acting together, +but the brotherhood of ardent fellows first in the field and earnest in +the cause. + +All our life in the Capitol was most dramatic and sensational. + +Before it was fairly light in the dim interior of the Representatives +Chamber, the _réveilles_ of the different regiments came rattling +through the corridors. Every snorer's trumpet suddenly paused. The +impressive sound of the hushed breathing of a thousand sleepers, marking +off the fleet moments of the night, gave way to a most vociferous +uproar. The boy element is large in the Seventh Regiment. Its slang +dictionary is peculiar and unabridged. As soon as we woke, the pit began +to chaff the galleries, and the galleries the pit. We were allowed noise +nearly _ad libitum_. Our riotous tendencies, if they existed, escaped +by the safety-valve of the larynx. We joked, we shouted, we sang, we +mounted the Speaker's desk and made speeches,--always to the point; for +if any but a wit ventured to give tongue, he was coughed down without +ceremony. Let the M.C.s adopt this plan and silence their dunces. + +With all our jollity we preserved very tolerable decorum. The regiment +is _assez bien composé_. Many of its privates are distinctly gentlemen +of breeding and character. The tone is mainly good, and the _esprit de +corps_ high. If the Colonel should say, "Up, boys, and at 'em!" I know +that the Seventh would do brilliantly in the field. I speak now of its +behavior in-doors. This certainly did it credit. Our thousand did the +Capitol little harm that a corporal's guard of Biddies with mops and +tubs could not repair in a forenoon's campaign. + +Perhaps we should have served our country better by a little Vandalism. +The decorations of the Capitol have a slight flavor of the Southwestern +steamboat saloon. The pictures (now, by the way, carefully covered) +would most of them be the better, if the figures were bayoneted and the +backgrounds sabred out. Both--pictures and decorations--belong to that +bygone epoch of our country when men shaved the moustache, dressed like +parsons, said "Sir," and chewed tobacco,--a transition epoch, now become +an historic blank. + +The home-correspondence of our legion of young heroes was illimitable. +Every one had his little tale of active service to relate. A decimation +of the regiment, more or less, had profited by the tender moment of +departure to pop the question and to receive the dulcet "Yes." These +lucky fellows were of course writing to Dulcinea regularly, three meals +of love a day. Mr. Van Wyck, M.C., and a brace of colleagues were kept +hard at work all day giving franks and saving threepennies to the ardent +scribes. Uncle Sam lost certainly three thousand cents a day in this +manner. + +What crypts and dens, caves and cellars there are under that great +structure! And barrels of flour in every one of them this month of May, +1861. Do civilians eat in this proportion? Or does long standing in the +"Position of a Soldier" (_vide_ "Tactics" for a view of that graceful +_pose_) increase a man's capacity for bread and beef so enormously? + +It was infinitely picturesque in these dim vaults by night. Sentries +were posted at every turn. Their guns gleamed in the gaslight. Sleepers +were lying in their blankets wherever the stones were softest. Then in +the guard-room the guard were waiting their turn. We have not had much +of this scenery in America, and the physiognomy of volunteer military +life is quite distinct from anything one sees in European service. The +People have never had occasion until now to occupy their Palace with +armed men. + + +THE FOLLOWING IS THE OATH. + + +We were to be sworn into the service of the United States the afternoon +of April 26th. All the Seventh, raw men and ripe men, marched out +into the sweet spring sunshine. Every fellow had whitened his belts, +burnished his arms, curled his moustache, and was scowling his manliest +for Uncle Sam's approval. + +We were drawn up by companies in the Capitol Square for mustering in. + +Presently before us appeared a gorgeous officer, in full fig. "Major +McDowell!" somebody whispered, as we presented arms. He is a General, +or perhaps a Field Marshal, now. Promotions come with a hop, skip, and +jump, in these times, when demerit resigns and merit stands ready to +step to the front. + +Major-Colonel-General McDowell, in a soldierly voice, now called the +roll, and we all answered, "Here!" in voices more or less soldierly. He +entertained himself with this ceremony for an hour. The roll over, we +were marched and formed in three sides of a square along the turf. Again +the handsome officer stepped forward, and recited to us the conditions +of our service. "In accordance with a special arrangement, made with the +Governor of New York," says the Major, "you are now mustered into the +service of the United States, to serve for thirty days, unless sooner +discharged"; and continues he, "The oath will now be read to you by the +magistrate." + +Hereupon a gentleman _en mufti_, but wearing a military cap with an +oil-skin cover, was revealed. Until now he had seemed an impassive +supernumerary. But he was biding his time, and--with due respect be it +said--saving his wind, and now in a Stentorian voice he ejaculated,-- + +"_The following is the oath!_" + +_Per se_ this remark was not comic. But there was something in the +dignitary's manner which tickled the regiment. As one man the thousand +smiled, and immediately adopted this new epigram among its private +countersigns. + +But the good-natured smile passed away as we listened to the impressive +oath, following its title. + +We raised our right hands, and, clause by clause, repeated the solemn +obligation, in the name of God, to be faithful soldiers of our country. +It was not quite so comprehensive as the beautiful knightly pledge +administered by King Arthur to his comrades, and transmitted to our time +by Major-General Tennyson of the Parnassus Division. We did not swear, +as they did of yore, to be true lovers as well as loyal soldiers. _Ça va +sans dire_ in 1861,--particularly when you were engaged to your Amanda +the evening before you started, as was the case with many a stalwart +brave and many a mighty man of a corporal or sergeant in our ranks. + +We were thrilled and solemnized by the stately ceremony of the oath. +This again was most dramatic. A grand public recognition of a duty. A +reavowal of the fundamental belief that our system was worthy of the +support, and our Government of the confidence, of all loyal men. And +there was danger in the middle distance of our view into the future, +--danger of attack, or dangerous duty of advance, just enough to keep +any trifler from feeling that his pledge was mere holiday business. + +So, under the cloudless blue sky, we echoed in unison the sentences of +the oath. A little low murmur of rattling arms, shaken with the hearty +utterance, made itself heard in the pauses. Then the band crashed in +magnificently. + +We were now miserable mercenaries, serving for low pay and rough +rations. Read the Southern papers and you will see us described. +"Mudsills,"--that, I believe, is the technical word. By repeating a form +of words after a gentleman in a glazed cap and black raiment, we had +suffered change into base assassins, the offscouring of society, +starving for want of employment, and willing to "imbrue our coarse fists +in fraternal blood" for the sum of eleven dollars a month, besides hard +tack, salt junk, and the hope of a Confederate States bond apiece for +bounty, or free loot in the treasuries of Florida, Mississippi, and +Arkansas, after the war. How carefully from that day we watched the +rise and fall of United States stocks! If they should go low among +the nineties, we felt that our eleven dollars _per mensem_ would be +imperilled. + +We stayed in our palace for a week or so after April 26th, the day of +the oath. That was the most original part of our duty thus far. New York +never had so unanimous a deputation on the floor of the Representatives +Chamber before, and never a more patriotic one. Take care, Gentlemen +Members of Congress! look to your words and your Acts honestly and +wisely in future! don't palter with Liberty again! it is not well that +soldiers should get into the habit of thinking they are always to +unravel the snarls and cut the knots twisted and tied by clumsy or +crafty fingers. The traitor States already need the _main de fer_,--yes, +and without the _gant de velours_. Let us beware, and keep ourselves +worthy of the boon of self-government, man by man! I do not wish to +hear, "Order arms!" and "Charge bayonets!" in the Capitol. But this +present defence of Free Speech and Free Thought ends, let us hope, that +danger forever. + +When we had been ten days in our showy barracks we began to quarrel with +luxury. What had private soldiers to do with the desks of law-givers? +Why should we be allowed to revel longer in the dining-rooms of +Washington hotels, partaking the admirable dainties there? + +The May sunshine, the birds and the breezes of May, invited us to +Camp,--the genuine thing, under canvas. Besides, Uncles Sam and Abe +wanted our room for other company. Washington was filling up fast with +uniforms. It seemed as if all the able-bodied men in the country were +moving, on the first of May, with all their property on their backs, to +agreeable, but dusty lodgings on the Potomac. + +We also made our May move. One afternoon, my company, the Ninth, and the +Engineers, the Tenth, were detailed to follow Captain Vielé, and lay out +a camp on Meridian Hill. + + +CAMP CAMERON. + + +As we had the first choice, we got, on the whole, the best site for a +camp. We occupy the villa and farm of Dr. Stone, two miles due north of +Willard's Hotel. I assume that hotel as a peculiarly American point of +departure, and also because it is the hub of Washington,--the centre of +an eccentric, having the White House at the end of its shorter, and the +Capitol at the end of its longer radius,--moral, so they say, as well +as geometrical. + +Sundry dignitaries, Presidents and what not, have lived here in times +gone by. Whoever chose the site ought to be kindly remembered for his +good taste. The house stands upon the pretty terrace commanding the +plain of Washington. From the upper windows we can see the Potomac +opening southward like a lake, and between us and the water ambitious +Washington stretching itself along and along, like the shackly files of +an army of recruits. + +Oaks love the soil of this terrace. There are some noble ones on the +undulations before the house. It may be permitted even for one who is +supposed to think of nothing but powder and ball to notice one of these +grand trees. Let the ivy-covered stem of the Big Oak of Camp Cameron +take its place in literature! And now enough of scenery. The landscape +will stay, but the troops will not. There are trees and slopes of +green-sward elsewhere, and shrubbery begins to blossom in these bright +days of May before a thousand pretty homes. The tents and the tent-life +are more interesting for the moment than objects which cannot decamp. + +The old villa serves us for head-quarters. It is a respectable place, +not without its pretensions. Four granite pillars, as true grit as if +the two Presidents Adams had lugged them on their shoulders all the way +from Quincy, Mass., make a carriage-porch. Here is the Colonel in the +big west parlor, the Quartermaster and Commissary in the rooms with +sliding-doors on the east, the Hospital upstairs, and so on. Other +rooms, numerous as the cells in a monastery, serve as quarters for the +Engineer Company. These dens are not monastic in aspect. The house is, +of course, a Certosa, so far as the gentler sex are concerned; but no +anchorites dwell here at present. If the Seventh disdained everything +but soldiers' fare,--which it does not,--common civility would require +that it should do violence to its disinclination for comfort and luxury, +and consume the stores sent down by ardent patriots in New York. The +cellars of the villa overflow with edibles, and in the greenhouse is a +most appetizing array of barrels, boxes, cans, and bottles, shipped here +that our Sybarites might not sigh for the flesh-pots of home. Such trash +may do very well to amuse the palate in these times of half-peace, +half-hostility; but when + + "war, which for a space does fail, + Shall doubly thundering swell the gale," + +then every soldier should drop gracefully to the simple ration, and +cease to dabble with frying-pans. Cooks to their aprons, and soldiers to +their guns! + +Our tents are pitched on a level clover-field sloping to the front +for our parade-ground. We use the old wall tent without a fly. It is +necessary to live in one of these awhile to know the vast superiority of +the Sibley pattern. Sibley's tent is a wrinkle taken from savage life. +It is the Sioux buffalo-skin, lodge, or _Tepee_, improved,--a cone +truncated at the top and fitted with a movable apex for ventilation. A +single tent-pole, supported upon a hinged tripod of iron, sustains the +structure. It is compacter, more commodious, healthier, and handsomer +than the ancient models. None other should be used in permanent +encampments. For marching troops, the French _Tente d'abri_ is a capital +shelter. + +Still our fellows manage to be at home as they are. Some of our +model tents are types of the best style of temporary cottages. Young +housekeepers of limited incomes would do well to visit and take heed. A +whole elysium of household comfort can be had out of a teapot,--tin; a +brace of cups,--tin; a brace of plates,--tin; and a frying-pan. + +In these days of war everybody can see a camp. Every one who stays at +home has a brother or a son or a lover quartered in one of the myriad +tents that have blossomed with the daffodil-season all over our green +fields of the North. I need not, then, describe our encampment in +detail,--its guard-tent in advance,--its guns in battery,--its +flagstaff,--its companies quartered in streets with droll and fanciful +names,--its officers' tents in the rear, at right angles to the lines of +company-tents,--its kitchens, armed with Captain Vielé's capital army +cooking-stoves,--its big marquees, "The White House" and "Fort Pickens," +for the lodging and messing of the new artillery company,--its barbers' +shops,--its offices. The same, more or less well arranged, can be seen +in all the rendezvous where the armies are now assembling. Instead of +such description, then, let me give the log of a single day at our camp. + + +JOURNAL OF A DAY AT CAMP CAMERON, BY PRIVATE W., COMPANY I. + + +BOOM! + +I would rather not believe it; but it is--yes, it is--the morning gun, +uttering its surly "Hullo!" to sunrise. + +Yes,--and, to confirm my suspicions, here rattle in the drums and pipe +in the fifes, wooing us to get up, _get up_, with music too peremptory +to be harmonious. + +I rise up _sur mon séant_ and glance about me. I, Private W., chance, by +reason of sundry chances, to be a member of a company recently largely +recruited and bestowed all together in a big marquee. As I lift myself +up, I see others lift themselves up on those straw bags we kindly call +our mattresses. The tallest man of the regiment, Sergeant K., is on one +side of me. On the other side I am separated from two of the fattest men +of the regiment by Sergeant M., another excellent fellow, prime cook and +prime forager. + +We are all presently on our pins,--K. on those lengthy continuations of +his, and the two stout gentlemen on their stout supporters. The deep +sleepers are pulled up from those abysses of slumber where they had been +choking, gurgling, strangling, death-rattling all night. There is for a +moment a sound of legs rushing into pantaloons and arms plunging into +jackets. + +Then, as the drums and fifes whine and clatter their last notes, at the +flap of our tent appears our orderly, and fierce in the morning sunshine +gleams his moustache,--one month's growth this blessed day. "Fall in, +for roll-call!" he cries, in a ringing voice. The orderly can speak +sharp, if need be. + +We obey. Not "Walk in!" "March in!" "Stand in!" is the order; but "Fall +in!" as sleepy men must. Then the orderly calls off our hundred. There +are several boyish voices which reply, several comic voices, a few +mean voices, and some so earnest and manly and alert that one says to +himself, "Those are the men for me, when work is to be done!" I read the +character of my comrades every morning in each fellow's monosyllable +"Here!" + +When the orderly is satisfied that not one of us has run away and +accepted a Colonelcy from the Confederate States since last roll-call, +he notifies those unfortunates who are to be on guard for the next +twenty-four hours of the honor and responsibility placed upon their +shoulders. Next he tells us what are to be the drills of the day. Then, +"Right face! Dismissed! Break ranks! March!" + +With ardor we instantly seize tin basins, soap, and towels, and invade a +lovely oak-grove at the rear and left of our camp. Here is a delicious +spring into which we have fitted a pump. The sylvan scene becomes +peopled with "National Guards Washing,"--a scene meriting the notice of +Art as much as any "Diana and her Nymphs." But we have no Poussin +to paint us in the dewy sunlit grove. Few of us, indeed, know how +picturesque we are at all times and seasons. + +After this _beau idéal_ of a morning toilet comes the ante-prandial +drill. Lieutenant W. arrives, and gives us a little appetizing exercise +in "Carry arms!" "Support arms!" "By the right flank, march!" "Double +quick!" + +Breakfast follows. My company messes somewhat helter-skelter in a big +tent. We have very tolerable rations. Sometimes luxuries appear of +potted meats and hermetical vegetables, sent us by the fond New +Yorkers. Each little knot of fellows, too, cooks something savory. Our +table-furniture is not elegant, our plates are tin, there is no silver +in our forks; but _à la guerre, comme à la guerre_. Let the scrubs +growl! Lucky fellows, if they suffer no worse hardships than this! + +By-and-by, after breakfast, come company-drills, bayonet-practice, +battalion-drills, and the heavy work of the day. Our handsome Colonel, +on a nice black nag, manoeuvres his thousand men of the line-companies +on the parade for two or three hours. Two thousand legs step off +accurately together. Two thousand pipe-clayed cross-belts--whitened with +infinite pains and waste of time, and offering a most inviting mark to +a foe--restrain the beating bosoms of a thousand braves, as they--the +braves, not the belts--go through the most intricate evolutions +unerringly. Watching these battalion movements, Private W., perhaps, +goes off and inscribes in his journal,--"Any clever, prompt man, with a +mechanical turn, an eye for distance, a notion of time, and a voice +of command, can be a tactician. It is pure pedantry to claim that the +manoeuvring of troops is difficult: it is not difficult, if the troops +are quick and steady. But to be a general, with patience and purpose and +initiative,--ah!" thinks Private W., "for that you must have the man of +genius; and already in this war he begins to appear out of Massachusetts +and elsewhere." + +Private W. avows without fear that about noon, at Camp Cameron, he takes +a hearty dinner, and with satisfaction. Private W. has had his feasts +in cot and chateau in Old World and New. It is the conviction of said +private that nowhere and no-when has he expected his ration with more +interest, and remembered it with more affection, than here. + +In the middle hours of the day it is in order to get a pass to go to +Washington, or to visit some of the camps, which now, in the middle +of May, begin to form a cordon around the city. Some of these I may +criticize before the end of this paper. Our capital seems arranged by +Nature to be protected by fortified camps on the circuit of its hills. +It may be made almost a Verona, if need be. Our brother regiments have +posts nearly as charming as our own in these fair groves and on these +fair slopes on either side of us. + +In the afternoon, comes target-practice, skirmishing-drill, more +company- or recruit-drill, and, at half-past five, our evening parade. +Let me not forget tent-inspection, at four, by the officer of the day, +when our band plays deliciously. + +At evening parade all Washington appears. A regiment of ladies, +rather indisposed to beauty, observe us. Sometimes the Dons +arrive,--Secretaries of State, of War, of Navy,--or military Dons, +bestriding prancing steeds, but bestriding them as if "'twas _not_ their +habit often of an afternoon." All which,--the bad teeth, pallid skins, +and rustic toilets of the fair, and the very moderate horsemanship of +the brave,--privates, standing at ease in the ranks, take note of, not +cynically, but as men of the world. + +Wondrous gymnasts are some of the Seventh, and after evening parade they +often give exhibitions of their prowess to circles of admirers. Muscle +has not gone out, nor nerve, nor activity, if these athletes are to be +taken as the types or even as the leaders of the young city-bred men of +our time. All the feats of strength and grace of the gymnasiums are to +be seen here, and show to double advantage in the open air. + +Then comes sweet evening. The moon rises. It seems always full moon +at Camp Cameron. Every tent becomes a little illuminated pyramid. +Cooking-fires burn bright along the alleys. The boys lark, sing, shout, +do all those merry things that make the entertainment of volunteer +service. The gentle moon looks on, mild and amused, the fairest lady of +all that visit us. + +At last, when the songs have been sung and the hundred rumors of the day +discussed, at ten the intrusive drums and scolding fifes get together +and stir up a concert, always premature, called tattoo. The Seventh +Regiment begins to peel for bed: at all events, Private W. does; for +said W. takes, when he can, precious good care of his cuticle, and never +yields to the lazy and unwholesome habit of soldiers,--sleeping in the +clothes. At taps--half-past ten--out go the lights. If they do not, +presently comes the sentry's peremptory command to put them out. Then, +and until the dawn of another day, a cordon of snorers inside of a +cordon of sentries surrounds our national capital. The outer cordon +sounds its "All's well"; and the inner cordon, slumbering, echoes it. + +And that is the history of any day at Camp Cameron. It is monotonous, it +is not monotonous, it is laborious, it is lazy, it is a bore, it is a +lark, it is half war, half peace, and totally attractive, and not to be +dispensed with from one's experience in the nineteenth century. + + +OUR ADVANCE INTO VIRGINIA. + + +Meantime the weeks went on. May 23d arrived. Lovely creatures with their +taper fingers had been brewing a flag for us. Shall I say that its red +stripes were celestial rosy as their cheeks, its white stripes virgin +white as their brows, its blue field cerulean as their eyes, and its +stars scintillating as the beams of the said peepers? Shall I say this? +If I were a poet, like Jeff. Davis and each and every editor of each +and every newspaper in our misbehaving States, I might say it. And +involuntarily I have said it. + +So the young ladies of New York--including, I hope, her who made my +sandwiches for the march hither--had been making us a flag, as they +have made us havelocks, pots of jelly, bundles of lint, flannel +dressing-gowns, embroidered slippers for a rainy day in camp, and other +necessaries of the soldier's life. + +May 23d was the day we were to get this sweet symbol of good-will. At +evening parade appeared General Thomas, as the agent of the ladies, the +donors, with a neat speech on a clean sheet of paper. He read it with +feeling; and Private W., who has his sentimental moments, avows that he +was touched by the General's earnest manner and patriotic words. Our +Colonel responded with his neat speech, very _apropos_. The regiment +then made its neat speech, nine cheers and a roar of tigers,--very brief +and pointed. + +There had been a note of preparation in General Thomas's remarks,--a +"_Virginia, cave canem!_" And before parade was dismissed, we saw our +officers holding parley with the Colonel. + +Something in the wind! As I was strolling off to see the sunset and the +ladies on parade, I began to hear great irrepressible cheers bursting +from the streets of the different companies. + +"Orders to be ready to march at a moment's notice!"--so I learned +presently from dozens of overjoyed fellows. "Harper's Ferry!" says one. +"Alexandria!" shouts a second. "Richmond!" only Richmond will content +a third. And some could hardly be satisfied short of the hope of a +breakfast in Montgomery. + +What a happy thousand were the line-companies! How their suppressed +ardors stirred! No want of fight in these lads! They may be rather +luxurious in their habits, for camp-life. They may be a little impatient +of restraint. They may have--as the type regiment of militia--the type +faults of militia on service. But a desire to dodge a fight is not one +of these faults. + +Every man in camp was merry, except two hundred who were grim. These +were the two artillery companies, ordered to remain in guard of our +camp. They swore as if Camp Cameron were Flanders. + +I by rights belonged with these malecontent and objurgating gentlemen; +but a chronicler has privileges, and I got leave to count myself into +the Eighth Company, my old friend Captain Shumway's. We were to move, +about midnight, in light marching order, with one day's rations. + +It has been always full moon at our camp. This night was full moon at +its fullest,--a night more perfect than all perfection, mild, dewy, +refulgent. At one o'clock the drum beat; we fell into ranks, and marched +quietly off through the shadowy trees of the lane, into the highway. + + +ACROSS THE LONG BRIDGE. + + +I have heretofore been proud of my individuality, and resisted, so +far as one may, all the world's attempts to merge me in the mass. +_In pluribus unum_ has been my motto. But whenever I march with the +regiment, my pride is that I lose my individuality, that I am merged, +that I become a part of a machine, a mere walking gentleman, a No. 1 +or a No. 2, front rank or rear rank, file-leader or file-closer. The +machine is so steady and so mighty, it moves with such musical cadence +and such brilliant show, that I enjoy it entirely as the _unum_ and lose +myself gladly as a _pluribus_. + +Night increases this fascination. The outer world is vague in the +moonlight. Objects out of our ranks are lost. I see only glimmering +steel and glittering buttons and the light-stepping forms of my +comrades. Our array and our step connect us. We move as one man. A +man made up of a thousand members and each member a man is a grand +creature,--particularly when you consider that he is self-made. And the +object of this self-made giant, men-man, is to destroy another like +himself, or the separate pigmy members of another such giant. We have +failed to put ourselves--heads, arms, legs, and wills--together as a +unit for any purpose so thoroughly as to snuff out a similar unit. Up to +1861, it seems that the business of war compacts men best. + +Well, the Seventh, a compact projectile, was now flinging itself along +the road to Washington. Just a month ago, "in such a night as this," +we made our first promenade through the enemy's country. The moon of +Annapolis,--why should we not have our ominous moon, as those other +fellows had their sun of Austerlitz?--the moon of Annapolis shone over +us. No epithets are too fine or too complimentary for such a luminary, +and there was no dust under her rays. + +So we pegged along to Washington and across Washington,--which at that +point consists of Willard's Hotel, few other buildings being in sight. A +hag in a nightcap reviewed us from an upper window as we tramped by. + +Opposite that bald block, the Washington Monument, and opposite what was +of more importance to us, a drove of beeves putting beef on their bones +in the seedy grounds of the Smithsonian Institution, we were halted +while the New Jersey brigade--some three thousand of them--trudged by, +receiving the complimentary fire of our line as they passed. New Jersey +is not so far from New York but that the dialects of the two can +understand each other. Their respective slangs, though peculiar, are of +the same genus. By the end of this war, I trust that these distinctions +of locality will be quite annulled. + +We began to feel like an army as these thousands thronged by us. This +was evidently a movement in force. We rested an hour or more by the +road. Mounted officers galloping along down the lines kept up the +excitement. + +At last we had the word to fall in again and march. It is part of the +simple perfection of the machine, a regiment, that, though it drops to +pieces for a rest, it comes together instantly for a start, and nobody +is confused or delayed. We moved half a mile farther, and presently a +broad pathway of reflected moonlight shone up at us from the Potomac. + +No orders, at this, came from the Colonel, "Attention, battalion! Be +sentimental!" Perhaps privates have no right to perceive the beautiful. +But the sections in my neighborhood murmured admiration. The utter +serenity of the night was most impressive. Cool and quiet and tender the +moon shone upon our ranks. She does not change her visage, whether it be +lovers or burglars or soldiers who use her as a lantern to their feet. + +The Long Bridge thus far has been merely a shabby causeway with +waterways and draws. Shabby,--let me here pause to say that in Virginia +shabbiness is the grand universal law, and neatness the spasmodic +exception, attained in rare spots, an _aeon_ beyond their Old Dominion +age. + +The Long Bridge has thus far been a totally unhistoric and prosaic +bridge. Roads and bridges are making themselves of importance and +shining up into sudden renown in these times. The Long Bridge has done +nothing hitherto except carry passengers on its back across the Potomac. +Hucksters, planters, dry-goods drummers, Members of Congress, _et ea +genera omnia_, have here gone and come on their several mercenary +errands, and, as it now appears, some sour little imp--the very reverse +of a "sweet little cherub"--took toll of every man as he passed,--a +heavy toll, namely, every man's whole store of Patriotism and Loyalty. +Every man--so it seems--who passed the Long Bridge was stripped of his +last dollar of _Amor Patriae_, and came to Washington, or went home, +with a waistcoat-pocket full of bogus in change. It was our business now +to open the bridge and see it clear, and leave sentries along to keep it +permanently free for Freedom. + +There is a mile of this Long Bridge. We seemed to occupy the whole +length of it, with our files opened to diffuse the weight of our column. +We were not now the tired and sleepy squad which just a moon ago had +trudged along the railroad to the Annapolis Junction, looking up a +Capital and a Government, perhaps lost. + +By the time we touched ground across the bridge, dawn was breaking,--a +good omen for poor old sleepy Virginia. The moon, as bright and handsome +as a new twenty-dollar piece, carried herself straight before us,--a +splendid oriflamme. + +Lucky is the private who marches with the van! It may be the post of +more danger, but it is also the post of less dust. My throat, therefore, +and my eyes and beard, wore the less Southern soil when we halted half a +mile beyond the bridge, and let sunrise overtake us. + +Nothing men can do--except picnics, with ladies in straw flats with +feathers--is so picturesque as soldiering. As soon as the Seventh halt +anywhere, or move anywhere, or camp anywhere, they resolve themselves +into a grand _tableau_. + +Their own ranks should supply their own Horace Vernet. Our groups +were never more entertaining than at this halt by the roadside on the +Alexandria road. Stacks of guns make a capital framework for drapery, +and red blankets dot in the lights most artistically. The fellows lined +the road with their gay array, asleep, on the rampage, on the lounge, +and nibbling at their rations. + +By-and-by, when my brain had taken in as much of the picturesque as it +could stand, it suffered the brief congestion known as a nap. I was +suddenly awaked by the rattle of a horse's hoofs. Before I had rubbed +my eyes the rider was gone. His sharp tidings had stayed behind him. +Ellsworth was dead,--so he said hurriedly, and rode on. Poor Ellsworth! +a fellow of genius and initiative! He had still so much of the boy in +him, that he rattled forward boyishly, and so died. _Si monumentum +requiris_, look at his regiment. It was a brilliant stroke to levy it; +and if it does worthily, its young Colonel will not have lived in vain. + +As the morning hours passed, we learned that we were the rear-guard of +the left wing of the army advancing into Virginia. The Seventh, as the +best organized body, acted as reserve to this force. It didn't wish +to be in the rear; but such is the penalty of being reliable for an +emergency. Fellow-soldier, be a scalawag, be a bashi-bazouk, be a +Billy-Wilsoneer, if you wish to see the fun in the van! + +When the road grew too hot for us, on account of the fire of sunshine +in our rear, we jumped over the fence into the Race-Course, a big field +beside us, and there became squatter sovereigns all day. I shall be +a bore, if I say again what a pretty figure we cut in this military +picnic, with two long lines of blankets draped on bayonets for parasols. + +The New Jersey brigade were meanwhile doing workie work on the ridge +just beyond us. The road and railroad to Alexandria follow the general +course of the river southward along the level. This ridge to be +fortified is at the point where the highway bends from west to south. +The works were intended to serve as an advanced _tête du pont_,--a +bridge-head, with a very long neck connecting it with the bridge. That +fine old Fabius, General Scott, had no idea of flinging an army out +broadcast into Virginia, and, in the insupposable case that it turned +tail, leaving it no defended passage to run away by. + +This was my first view of a field-work in construction,--also, my first +hand as a laborer at a field-work. I knew glacis and counterscarp on +paper; also, on paper, superior slope, banquette, and the other dirty +parts of a redoubt. Here they were, not on paper. A slight wooden +scaffolding determined the shape of the simple work; and when I arrived, +a thousand Jerseymen were working, not at all like Jerseymen,--with +picks, spades, and shovels, cutting into Virginia, digging into +Virginia, shovelling up Virginia, for Virginia's protection against +pseudo-Virginians. + +I swarmed in for a little while with our Paymaster, picked a little, +spaded a little, shovelled a little, took a hand to my great +satisfaction at earth-works, and for my efforts I venture to suggest +that Jersey City owes me its freedom in a box, and Jersey State a basket +of its finest Clicquot. + +Is my gentle reader tired of the short marches and frequent halts of +the Seventh? Remember, gentle reader, that you must be schooled by such +alphabetical exercises to spell bigger words--skirmish, battle, defeat, +rout, massacre--by-and-by. + +Well,--to be Xenophontic,--from the Race-Course that evening we marched +one stadium, one parasang, to a cedar-grove up the road. In the grove +is a spring worthy to be called a fountain, and what I determined by +infallible indications to be a _lager-bier_ saloon. Saloon no more! War +is no respecter of localities. Be it Arlington House, the seedy palace +of a Virginia Don,--be it the humbler, but seedy, pavilion where the +tired Teuton washes the dust of Washington away from his tonsils,--each +must surrender to the bold soldier-boy. Exit Champagne and its goblet; +exit _lager_ and its mug; enter whiskey-and-water in a tin pot. Such are +the horrors of civil war! + +And now I must cut short my story, for graver matters press. As to +the residence of the Seventh in the cedar-grove for two days and two +nights,--how they endured the hardship of a bivouac on soft earth and +the starvation of coffee _sans_ milk,--how they digged manfully in the +trenches by gangs all these two laborious days,--with what supreme +artistic finish their work was achieved,--how they chopped off their +corns with axes, as they cleared the brushwood from the glacis,--how +they blistered their hands,--how they chafed that they were not +lunging with battailous steel at the breasts of the minions of the +oligarchs,--how Washington, seeing the smoke of burning rubbish, and +hearing dropping shots of target-practice, or of novices with the musket +shooting each other by accident,--how Washington, alarmed, imagined a +battle, and went into panic accordingly,--all this, is it not written +in the daily papers? + +On the evening of the 26th, the Seventh travelled back to Camp Cameron +in a smart shower. Its service was over. Its month was expired. The +troops ordered to relieve it had arrived. It had given the other +volunteers the benefit of a month's education at its drills and parades. +It had enriched poor Washington to the tune of fifty thousand dollars. +Ah, Washington! that we, under Providence and after General Butler, +saved from the heel of Secession! Ah, Washington, why did you charge us +so much for our milk and butter and strawberries? The Seventh, then, +after a month of delightful duty, was to be mustered out of service, and +take new measures, if it would, to have a longer and a larger share in +the war. + + +ARLINGTON HEIGHTS. + + +I took advantage of the day of rest after our return to have a gallop +about the outposts. Arlington Heights had been the spot whence the +alarmists threatened us daily with big thunder and bursting bombs. I was +curious to see the region that had had Washington under its thumb. + +So Private W., tired of his foot-soldiering, got a quadruped under him, +and felt like a cavalier again. The horse took me along the tow-path of +the Cumberland Canal, as far as the redoubts where we had worked our +task. Then I turned up the hill, took a look at the camp of the New York +Twenty-Fifth at the left, and rode along for Arlington House. + +Grand name! and the domain is really quite grand, but ill-kept. Fine +oaks make beauty without asking favors. Fine oaks and a fair view make +all the beauty of Arlington. It seems that this old establishment, like +many another old Virginian, had claimed its respectability for its +antiquity, and failed to keep up to the level of the time. The road +winds along through the trees, climbing to fairer and fairer reaches of +view over the plain of Washington. I had not fancied that there was any +such lovely site near the capital. But we have not yet appreciated what +Nature has done for us there. When civilization once makes up its mind +to colonize Washington, all this amphitheatre of hills will blossom with +structures of the sublimest gingerbread. + +Arlington House is the antipodes of gingerbread, except that it is +yellow, and disposed to crumble. It has a pompous propylon of enormous +stuccoed columns. Any house smaller than Blenheim would tail on +insignificantly after such a frontispiece. The interior has a certain +careless, romantic, decayed-gentleman effect, wholly Virginian. It was +enlivened by the uniforms of staff-officers just now, and as they rode +through the trees of the approach and by the tents of the New York +Eighth, encamped in the grove to the rear, the _tableau_ was brilliantly +warlike. Here, by the way, let me pause to ask, as a horseman, though a +foot-soldier, why generals and other gorgeous fellows make such guys of +their horses with trappings. If the horse is a screw, cover him thick +with saddle-cloths, girths, cruppers, breast-bands, and as much brass +and tinsel as your pay will enable you to buy; but if not a screw, let +his fair proportions be seen as much as may be, and don't bother a lover +of good horseflesh to eliminate so much uniform before he can see what +is beneath. + +From Arlington I rode to the other encampments,--the Sixty-Ninth, Fifth, +and Twenty-Eighth, all of New York,--and heard their several stories +of alarms and adventures. This completed the circuit of the new +fortification of the Great Camp. Washington was now a fortress. The +capital was out of danger, and therefore of no further interest to +anybody. The time had come for myself and my regiment to leave it by +different ways. + + +"PARTANT POUR LA SYRIE." + + +I should have been glad to stay and see my comrades through to their +departure; but there was a Massachusetts man down at Fortress Monroe, +Butler by name,--has any one heard of him?--and to this gentleman it +chanced that I was to report myself. So I packed my knapsack, got my +furlough, shook hands with my fellows, said good-bye to Camp Cameron, +and was off, two days after our month's service was done. + + +FAREWELL TO THE SEVENTH. + + +Under Providence, Washington owes its safety, 1st, To General Butler, +whose genius devised the circumvention of Baltimore and its rascal rout, +and whose utter bravery executed the plan;--he is the Grand Yankee of +this little period of the war. 2d, To the other Most Worshipful Grand +Yankees of the Massachusetts regiment who followed their leader, as he +knew they would, discovered a forgotten colony called Annapolis, and +dashed in there, asking no questions. 3d, And while I gladly yield the +first places to this General and his men, I put the Seventh in, as +last, but not least, in saving the capital. Character always tells. The +Seventh, by good, hard, faithful work at drill, had established its fame +as the most thorough militia regiment in existence. Its military and +moral character were excellent. The mere name of the regiment carried +weight. It took the field as if the field were a ball-room. There were +myriads eager to march; but they had not made ready beforehand. Yes, +the Seventh had its important share in the rescue. Without our support, +whether our leaders tendered it eagerly or hesitatingly, General +Butler's position at Annapolis would have been critical, and his forced +march to the capital a forlorn hope,--heroic, but desperate. + +So, honor to whom honor is due. + +Here I must cut short my story. So good-bye to the Seventh, and thanks +for the fascinating month I have passed in their society. In this pause +of the war our camp-life has been to me as brilliant as a permanent +picnic. + +Good-bye to Company I, and all the fine fellows, rough and smooth, cool +old hands and recruits verdant but ardent! Good-bye to our Lieutenants, +to whom I owe much kindness! Good-bye, the Orderly, so peremptory on +parade, so indulgent off! Good-bye, everybody! + +And so in haste I close. + + + + +BETWEEN SPRING AND SUMMER. + +(A BIRTHDAY POEM, WITH ROSES.) + + + To her whose birth and being + Touch summer out of spring, + These roses, reaching forward + From May to June, I bring. + + To her whose fragrant friendship + Sweetens the life I live, + These flowers, Love's message hinting + With perfumed breath, I give. + + The violet and the lily + Shall stand for these and those; + But give her roses only + Whose soul suggests the rose,-- + + Whose Life's idea ranges + Through all of sweet and bright, + A vernal flow of feeling, + A summer day of light. + + I bless the child whose coming + Sheds grace around us, where + Her voice falls soft as music, + Her step drops light as air: + + Fair grace, to good related + In her, sweet sisters twin; + As in this House of Roses + The fruits and flowers are kin. + + * * * * * + + +ELLSWORTH. + + +The beginnings of great periods have often been marked and made +memorable by striking events. Out of the cloud that hangs around the +vague inceptions of revolutions, a startling incident will sometimes +flash like lightning, to show that the warring elements have begun their +work. The scenes that attended the birth of American nationality formed +a not inaccurate type of those that have opened the crusade for its +perpetuation. The consolidation of public sentiment which followed the +magnificent defeat at Bunker's Hill, in which the spirit of indignant +resistance was tempered by the pathetic interest surrounding the fate +of Warren, was but a foreshadowing of the instant rally to arms which +followed the fall of the beleaguered fort in Charleston harbor, and of +the intensity of tragic pathos which has been added to the stern purpose +of avenging justice by the murder of Colonel Ellsworth. + +Ephraim Elmer Ellsworth was born in the little village of +Mechanicsville, on the left bank of the Hudson, on the 23d day of April, +1837. When he was very young, his father, through no fault of his own, +lost irretrievably his entire fortune, in the tornado of financial ruin +that in those years swept from the sea to the mountains. From this +disaster he never recovered. Misfortune seems to have followed him +through life, with the insatiable pertinacity of the Nemesis of a Greek +tragedy. And now in his old age, when for a moment there seemed to shine +upon his path the sunshine that promised better days, he finds that +suddenly withdrawn, and stands desolate, "stabbed through the heart's +affections, to the heart." His younger son died some years ago, of +small-pox, in Chicago, and the murder at Alexandria leaves him with his +sorrowing wife, lonely, amid the sympathy of the world. + +The days of Elmer's childhood and early youth--were passed at Troy +and in the city of New York, in pursuits various, but energetic and +laborious. There is little of interest in the story of these years. He +was a proud, affectionate, sensitive, and generous boy, hampered by +circumstance, but conscious of great capabilities,--not morbidly +addicted to day-dreaming, but always working heartily for something +beyond. He was still very young--when he went to Chicago, and associated +himself in business with Mr. Devereux of Massachusetts.[A] They managed +for a little while, with much success, an agency for securing patents to +inventors. Through the treachery of one in whom they had reposed great +confidence they suffered severe losses which obliged them to close +their business, and Devereux went back to the East. The next year of +Ellsworth's life was a miracle of endurance and uncomplaining fortitude. +He read law with great assiduity, and supported himself by copying, +in the hours that should have been devoted to recreation. He had no +pastimes and very few friends. Not a soul beside himself and the baker +who gave him his daily loaf knew how he was living. During all that +time, he never slept in a bed, never ate with friends at a social board. +So acute was his sense of honor, so delicate his ideas of propriety, +that, although himself the most generous of men, he never would accept +from acquaintances the slightest favors or courtesies which he was +unable to return. He told me once of a severe struggle between +inclination and a sense of honor. At a period of extreme hunger, he +met a friend in the street who was just starting from the city. He +accompanied his friend into a restaurant, wishing to converse with him, +but declined taking any refreshment. He represented the savory fragrance +of his friend's dinner as almost maddening to his famished senses, +while he sat there pleasantly chatting, and deprecating his friend's +entreaties to join him in his repast, on the plea that he had just +dined. + +[Footnote A: Arthur F. Devereux, Esq., now in command of the Salem +Zouave Corps, Eighth Massachusetts Regiment, distinguished for the +gallant part borne by it in opening the route to Washington through +Annapolis, and in the rescue of the frigate Constitution, "Old +Ironsides," from the hands of the rebels.] + +What would have killed an ordinary man did not injure Ellsworth. His +iron frame seemed incapable of dissolution or waste. Circumstance had no +power to conquer his spirit. His hearty good-humor never gave way. His +sense of honor, which was sometimes even fantastic in its delicacy, +freed him from the very temptation to wrong. He knew there was a better +time coming for him. Conscious of great mental and bodily strength, with +that bright outlook that industry and honor always give a man, he was +perfectly secure of ultimate success. His plans mingled in a singular +manner the bright enthusiasm of the youthful dreamer and the eminent +practicality of the man of affairs. At one time, his mind was fixed +on Mexico,--not with the licentious dreams that excited the ragged +_Condottieri_ who followed the fated footsteps of the "gray-eyed man of +Destiny," in the wild hope of plunder and power,--nor with the vague +reverie in which fanatical theorists construct impossible Utopias on +the absurd framework of Icarias or Phalansteries. His clear, bold, and +thoroughly executive mind planned a magnificent scheme of commercial +enterprise, which, having its centre of operations at Guaymas, should +ramify through the golden wastes that stretch in silence and solitude +along the tortuous banks of the Rio San José. This was to be the +beginning and the ostensible end of the enterprise. Then he dreamed of +the influence of American arts and American energy penetrating into the +twilight of that decaying nationality, and saw the natural course of +events leading on, first, Emigration, then Protection, and at last +Annexation. Yet there was no thought of conquest or rapine. The idea was +essentially American and Northern. He never wholly lost that dream. +One day last winter, when some one was discussing the propriety of an +amputation of the States that seemed thoroughly diseased, Ellsworth +swept his hand energetically over the map of Mexico that hung upon the +wall, and exclaimed,--"_There_ is an unanswerable argument against the +recognition of the Southern Confederacy." + +But the central idea of Ellsworth's short life was the thorough +reorganization of the militia of the United States. He had studied with +great success the theory of national defence, and, from his observation +of the condition of the militia of the several States, he was convinced +that there was much of well-directed effort yet lacking to its entire +efficiency. In fact, as he expressed it, a well-disciplined body of five +thousand troops could land anywhere on our coast and ravage two or three +States before an adequate force could get into the field to oppose them. +To reform this defective organization, he resolved to devote whatever +of talent or energy was his. This was very large undertaking for a boy, +whose majority and moustache were still of the substance of things hoped +for. But nothing that he could propose to himself ever seemed absurd. He +attacked his work with his usual promptness and decision. + +The conception of a great idea is no proof of a great mind; a man's +calibre is shown by the way in which he attempts to realize his idea. A +great design planted in a little mind frequently bursts it, and nothing +is more pitiable than the spectacle of a man staggering into insanity +under a thought too large for him. Ellsworth chose to begin his work +simply and practically. He did not write a memorial to the President, to +be sent to the Secretary of War, to be referred to the Chief Clerk, to +be handed over to File-Clerk No. 99, to be glanced at and quietly thrust +into a pigeon-hole labelled "Crazy and trashy." He did not haunt the +anteroom of Congressman Somebody, who would promise to bring his plan +before the House, and then, bowing him out, give general orders to his +footman, "Not at home, hereafter, to that man." He did not float, as +some theorists do, ghastly and seedy, around the _Adyta_ of popular +editors, begging for space and countenance. He wisely determined to +keep his theories to himself until he could illustrate them by living +examples. He first put himself in thorough training. He practised the +manual of arms in his own room, until his dexterous precision was +something akin to the sleight of a juggler. He investigated the theory +of every movement in an anatomical view, and made several most valuable +improvements on Hardee. He rearranged the manual so that every movement +formed the logical groundwork of the succeeding one. He studied the +science of fence, so that he could hold a rapier with De Villiers, the +most dashing of the Algerine swordsmen. He always had a hand as true as +steel, and an eye like a gerfalcon. He used to amuse himself by shooting +ventilation-holes through his window-panes. Standing ten paces from the +window, he could fire the seven shots from his revolver and not shiver +the glass beyond the circumference of a half-dollar. + +I have seen a photograph of his arm taken at this time. The knotted coil +of thews and sinews looks like the magnificent exaggerations of antique +sculpture. + +His person was strikingly prepossessing. His form, though +slight,--exactly the Napoleonic size,--was very compact and commanding; +the head statuesquely poised, and crowned with a luxuriance of curling +black hair; a hazel eye, bright, though serene, the eye of a gentleman +as well as a soldier; a nose such as you see on Roman medals; a light +moustache just shading the lips, that were continually curving into +the sunniest smiles. His voice, deep and musical, instantly attracted +attention; and his address, though not without soldierly brusqueness, +was sincere and courteous. There was one thing his backwoods detractors +could never forgive: he always dressed well; and sometimes wore the +military insignia presented to him by different organizations. One of +these, a gold circle, inscribed with the legend, NON NOBIS, SED PRO +PATRIA, was driven into his heart by the slug of the Virginian assassin. + +He had great tact and executive talent, was a good mathematician, +possessed a fine artistic eye, sketched well and rapidly, and in short +bore a deft and skilful hand in all gentlemanly exercise. + +No one ever possessed greater power of enforcing the respect and +fastening the affections of men. Strangers soon recognized and +acknowledged this power; while to his friends he always seemed like a +Paladin or Cavalier of the dead days of romance and beauty. He was so +generous and loyal, so stainless and brave, that Bayard himself would +have been proud of him. The grand bead-roll of the virtues of the Flower +of Kings contains the principles that guided his life; he used to read +with exquisite appreciation these lines:-- + + "To reverence the King as if he were + Their conscience, and their conscience as + their King,-- + To break the heathen and uphold the + Christ,-- + To ride abroad redressing human wrongs,-- + To speak no slander, no, nor listen to it,-- + To lead sweet lives in purest chastity,-- + To love one maiden only, cleave to her, + And worship her by years of noble deeds, + Until they won her"; + +and the rest,-- + + "high thoughts, and amiable words, + And courtliness, and the desire of fame, + And love of truth, and all that makes a man." + +Such, in person and character, was Ellsworth, when he organized, on the +4th day of May, 1859, the United States Zouave Cadets of Chicago. + +This company was the machine upon which he was to experiment. +Disregarding all extant works upon tactics, he drew up a simpler system +for the use of his men. Throwing aside the old ideas of soldierly +bearing, he taught them to use vigor, promptness, and ease. Discarding +the stiff buckram strut of martial tradition, he educated them to move +with the loafing _insouciance_ of the Indian, or the graceful ease of +the panther. He tore off their choking collars and binding coats, and +invented a uniform which, though too flashy and conspicuous for actual +service, was very bright and dashing for holiday occasions, and left the +wearer perfectly free to fight, strike, kick, jump, or run. + +He drilled these young men for about a year at short intervals. His +discipline was very severe and rigid. Added to the punctilio of the +martinet was the rigor of the moralist. The slightest exhibition of +intemperance or licentiousness was punished by instant degradation and +expulsion. He struck from the rolls at one time twelve of his best men +for breaking the rule of total abstinence. His moral power over them was +perfect and absolute. I believe anyone of them would have died for him. + +In two or three principal towns of Illinois and Wisconsin he drilled +other companies: in Springfield, where he made the friends who best +appreciated what was best in him; and in Rockford, where he formed an +attachment which imparted a coloring of tender romance to all the days +of his busy life that remained. This tragedy would not have been perfect +without the plaintive minor strain of Love in Death. + +His company took the Premium Colors at the United States Agricultural +Pair, and Ellsworth thought it was time to show to the people some fruit +of his drill. They issued their soldierly _défi_ and started on their +_Marche de Triomphe_. It is useless to recall to those who read +newspapers the clustering glories of that bloodless campaign. Hardly had +they left the suburbs of Chicago when the murmur of applause began. New +York, secure in the championship of half a century, listened with quiet +metropolitan scorn to the noise of the shouting provinces; but when the +crimson phantasms marched out of the Park, on the evening of the 15th of +July, New York, with metropolitan magnanimity, confessed herself utterly +vanquished by the good thing that had come out of Nazareth. There was no +resisting the Zouaves. As the erring Knight of the Round Table said,-- + + "men went down before his spear at a touch, + But knowing he was Lancelot; his great name conquered." + +There were one or two Southern companies that issued insulting +defiances, but, after a little expenditure of epistolary valor, +prudently, though ingloriously, stayed afar,--as is usual in New +Gascony. With these exceptions, the heart of the nation went warmly out +to these young men. Their endurance, their discipline, their alertness, +their _élan_, surprised the sleepy drill-masters out of their propriety, +and waked up the people to intense and cordial admiration. Chicago +welcomed them home proudly, covered with tan and dust and glory. + +Ellsworth found himself for his brief hour the most talked-of man in +the country. His pictures sold like wildfire in every city of the land. +School-girls dreamed over the graceful wave of his curls, and shop-boys +tried to reproduce the _Grand Seigneur_ air of his attitude. Zouave +corps, brilliant in crimson and gold, sprang up, phosphorescently, in +his wake, making bright the track of his journey. The leading journals +spoke editorially of him, and the comic papers caricatured his drill. + +So one thing was accomplished. He had gained a name that would entitle +him hereafter to respectful attention, and had demonstrated the +efficiency of his system of drill. The public did not, of course, +comprehend the resistless moral power which he exercised,--imperiously +moulding every mind as he willed,--inspiring every soul with his own +unresting energy. But the public recognized success, and that for the +present was enough. + +He quietly formed a regiment in the upper counties of Illinois, and made +his best men the officers of it. He tendered its services to Governor +Yates immediately on his inauguration, "for any service consistent with +honor." This was the first positive tender made of an organized force in +defence of the Constitution. He seemed to recognize more clearly than +others the certainty of the coming struggle. It was the soldierly +instinct that heard "the battle afar off, the thunder of the captains, +and the shouting." + +Still intent upon the great plan of militia reform, he came to +Springfield. He hoped, in case of the success of Mr. Lincoln in the +canvass then pending, to be able to establish in the War Department a +Bureau of Militia, which would prove a most valuable auxiliary to his +work. His ideas were never vague or indefinite. Means always presented +themselves to him, when he contemplated ends. The following were the +duties of the proposed bureau, which may serve as a guide to some future +reformer: I copy from his own exquisitely neat and clear memorandum, +which lies before me:-- + +"First. The gradual concentration of all business pertaining to the +militia now conducted by the several bureaus of this Department. + +"Second. The collection and systematizing of accurate information of the +number, arm, and condition of the militia of all classes of the several +States, and the compilation of yearly reports of the same for the +information of this Department. + +"Third. The compilation of a report of the actual condition of the +militia and the working of the present systems of the General Government +and the various States. + +"Fourth. The publication and distribution of such information as is +important to the militia, and the conduct of all correspondence relating +to militia affairs. + +"Fifth. The compilation of a system of instruction for light troops for +distribution to the several States, including everything pertaining to +the instruction of the militia in the school of the soldier,--company +and battalion, skirmishing, bayonet, and gymnastic drill, adapted for +self-instruction. + +"Sixth. The arrangement of a system of organization, with a view to the +establishment of a uniform system of drill, discipline, equipment, and +dress, throughout the United States." + +His plan for this purpose was very complete and symmetrical. Though +enthusiastic, he was never dreamy. His idea always went forth fully +armed and equipped. + +Nominally, he was a student of law in the office of Lincoln and Herndon, +but in effect he passed his time in completing his plans of militia +reform. He made in October many stirring and earnest speeches for the +Republican candidates. He was very popular among the country people. +His voice was magnificent in melody and volume, his command of language +wonderful in view of the deficiencies of his early education, his humor +inexhaustible and hearty, and his manner deliberate and impressive, +reminding his audiences in Central Illinois of the earliest and best +days of Senator Douglas. + +When the Legislature met, he prepared an elaborate military bill, the +adoption of which would have placed the State in an enviable attitude +of defence. The stupid jealousy of colonels and majors who had won +bloodless glory, on both sides, in the Mormon War, and the malignant +prejudice instigated by the covert treason that lurked in Southern +Illinois, succeeded in staving off the passage of the bill, until it was +lost by the expiration of the term. Many of these men are now in the +ranks, shouting the name of Ellsworth as a battle-cry. + +He came to Washington in the escort of the President elect. Hitherto he +had been utterly independent of external aid. The time was come when he +must wait for the cooperation of others, for the accomplishment of his +life's great purpose. He wished a position in the War Department, which +would give him an opportunity for the establishment of the Militia +Bureau. He was a strange anomaly at the capital. He did not care for +money or luxury. Though sensitive in regard to his reputation, for the +honor of his work, his motto always was that of the sage Merlin,--"I +follow use, not fame." An office-seeker of this kind was an eccentric +and suspicious personage. The hungry thousands that crowded and pushed +at Willard's thought him one of them, only deeper and slier. The +simplicity and directness of his character, his quick sympathy and +thoughtless generosity, and his delicate sense of honor unfitted him for +such a scramble as that which degrades the quadrennial rotations of our +Departments. He withdrew from the contest for the position he desired, +and the President, who loved him like a younger brother, made him a +lieutenant in the army, intending to detail him for special service. + +The jealousy of the staff-officers of the regular army, who always +discover in any effective scheme of militia reform the overthrow of +their power, and who saw in the young Zouave the promise of brilliant +and successful innovation, was productive of very serious annoyance +and impediment to Ellsworth. In the midst of this, he fell sick at +Willard's. While he lay there, the news from the South began to show +that the rebels were determined upon war, and the rumors on the street +said that a wholesome North-westerly breeze was blowing from the +Executive Mansion. These indications were more salutary to Ellsworth +than any medicine. We were talking one night of coming probabilities, +and I spoke of the doubt so widely existing as to the loyalty of the +people. He rejoined, earnestly,--"I can only speak for myself. You know +I have a great work to do, to which my life is pledged; I am the only +earthly stay of my parents; there is a young woman whose happiness I +regard as dearer than my own: yet I could ask no better death than to +fall next week before Sumter. I am not better than other men. You will +find that patriotism is not dead, even if it sleeps." + +Sumter fell, and the sleeping awoke. The spirit of Ellsworth, cramped by +a few weeks' intercourse with politicians, sprang up full-statured +in the Northern gale. He cut at once the meshes of red tape that had +hampered and held him, threw up his commission, and started for New York +without orders, without assistance, without authority, but with the +consciousness that the President would sustain him. The rest the world +knows. I will be brief in recalling it. + +In an incredibly short space of time he enlisted and organized a +regiment, eleven hundred strong, of the best fighting material that ever +went to war. He divided it, according to an idea of his own, into +groups of four comrades each, for the campaign. He exercised a personal +supervision over the most important and the most trivial minutiae of the +regimental business. The quick sympathy of the public still followed +him. He became the idol of the Bowery and the pet of the Avenue. Yet not +one instant did he waste in recreation or lionizing. Indulgent to all +others, he was merciless to himself. He worked day and night, like an +incarnation of Energy. When he arrived with his men in Washington, he +was thin, hoarse, flushed, but entirely contented and happy, because +busy and useful. + +Of the bright enthusiasm and the quenchless industry of the next few +weeks what need to speak? Every day, by his unceasing toil and care, by +his vigor, alertness, activity, by his generosity, and by his relentless +rigor when duty commanded, he grew into the hearts of his robust and +manly followers, until every man in the regiment feared him as a Colonel +should be feared, and loved him as a brother should be loved. + +On the night of the twenty-third of May, he called his men together, +and made a brief, stirring speech to them, announcing their orders to +advance on Alexandria. "Now, boys, go to bed, and wake up at two o'clock +for a sail and a skirmish." When the camp was silent, he began to work. +He wrote many hours, arranging the business of the regiment. He finished +his labor as the midnight stars were crossing the zenith. As he sat in +his tent by the shore, it seems as if the mystical gales from the near +eternity must have breathed for a moment over his soul, freighted with +the odor of amaranths and asphodels. For he wrote two strange letters: +one to her who mourns him faithful in death; one to his parents. There +is nothing braver or more pathetic. With the prophetic instinct of love, +he assumed the office of consoler for the stroke that impended. + +In the dewy light of the early dawn he occupied the first rebel town. +With his own hand he tore down the first rebel flag. He added to the +glories of that morning the seal of his blood. + +The poor wretch who stumbled upon an immortality of infamy by murdering +him died at the same instant. The two stand in the light of that +event--clearly revealed--types of the two systems in conflict to-day: +the one, brave, refined, courtly, generous, tender, and true; the other, +not lacking in brute courage, reckless, besotted, ignorant, and cruel. + +Let the two systems, Freedom and Slavery, stand thus typified forever, +in the red light of that dawn, as on a Mount of Transfiguration. I +believe that may solve the dark mystery why Ellsworth died. + + + + +REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES. + + +_Chambers's Encyclopaedia: A Dictionary of Universal Knowledge for +the People; on the Basis of the Latest Edition of the German +Conversations-Lexicon_. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott & Co. Vols. I. and +II. + +An Encyclopaedia is both a luxury and a necessity. Few readers now +collect a library, however scant, without including one of some sort. +Many of them, even in the absence of all other books, of themselves +constitute a complete library. The Britannica, Edinburgh, Metropolitana, +English, Penny, London, Oxford, and that of Kees, are most elaborate +works, extending respectively to about a score of heavy volumes, +averaging eight or nine hundred pages each. Such publications must +necessarily be expensive. They are, moreover, to be regarded rather as a +collection of exhaustive treatises,--great prominence being given to +the physical and mathematical sciences, and to general history. For +instance, in the Britannica, the publication of the eighth edition +of which is just completed, the length of some of the articles is as +follows: Astronomy, 155 quarto pages; Chemistry, 88; Electricity, 104; +Hydrodynamics, 119; Optics, 176; Mammalia, 120; Ichthyology, 151; +Entomology, 265; Britain, 300; England, 136; France, 284. Each one of +these papers is equal to a large octavo volume; some of them would +occupy several volumes; and the entire work, containing a collection of +such articles, can be regarded in no other light than as an attempted +exhibition of the sum of human knowledge, commending itself, of course, +to professional and highly educated minds, but far transcending, in +extent and costliness, the requirements and the means of the great class +of general readers. For the wants of this latter class a different sort +of work is desirable, which shall be cheaper in price, less exhaustive +in its method, and more diversified in its range. In these particulars +the Germans seem to have hit upon the happy medium in their famous +"Conversations-Lexicon," which has passed through a great many editions, +and been translated into the principal languages of Europe. This is +taken as the type, and in some respects as the basis, of the present +publication,--there being engrafted upon it new contributions from +leading authors of this and other countries, together with such +extensive improvements, revisals, rewritings, additions, and +modifications throughout, as to constitute a substantially new work, +exhibiting in combination the results of the best labors of the German, +English, and American mind. In the departments of statistics, geography, +history, and science, the articles are all within readable limits, +accurate, and up to the times; while in the biographical and literary +articles there is a freshness and originality of criticism, and a +vivacity of style, seldom met with in this class of publications. + +The peculiar merit of this Encyclopaedia is its convenient adaptedness +to popular use. The subjects treated of are broken up and distributed +alphabetically under their proper heads, so as to facilitate reference. +We are thus furnished with a dictionary of facts and events, where we +may readily find whatever properly appertains to any particular point, +without being compelled to explore an entire treatise. This, by the +way, makes it a sort of hand-book even for those who possess the more +voluminous works. As a necessary result of such a method of treatment, +it will be found, upon an actual count and comparison, to contain more +separate titles than any other Encyclopaedia ever published. Although +the articles are generally brief, it must not be supposed that they are +meagre, for they will be found to present a clear and comprehensive view +of the existing information upon the particular topic, with a mastery +which arises only from familiarity. Montesquieu said that Tacitus +abridged all because he knew all; and no reader can peruse a number of +this Encyclopaedia without being convinced that the success in preparing +the perspicuous abridgments it contains is due to thorough knowledge. +Its excellence is not confined, however, to the letter-press; for we are +furnished with a series of colored maps, embodying the results of +the most recent explorations, and also with a profusion of admirable +woodcuts, illustrating the subject wherever pictorial exposition may aid +the verbal. It will be recollected that no other Encyclopaedia published +in this country has the advantage of illustrations. + +The character of Messrs. William and Robert Chambers of itself gives +ample assurance that the work is prepared and executed in a superior +manner; but when we superadd to this the fact that they have spared no +labor or expense, but have devoted to it all the resources of their +experience, enterprise, and skill, in order to make the work, in all its +departments, their crowning contribution to the cause of knowledge, we +are the more ready to believe that it actually is all that it claims to +be. The American edition by J.B. Lippincott & Co., of Philadelphia, +is published in numbers simultaneously with the Edinburgh and London +edition, and in an unexceptionable style of typography. Its low price +brings it within the reach of almost every reader. Indeed, when we +consider the size of the volumes, the number of illustrations and maps, +the mechanical execution, and the compensation to the writers, we are +at a loss to conceive how it can be profitably furnished at so cheap a +rate. + + +_The Recreations of a Country Parson_. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 12mo. + +The essays of which this volume is made up were originally contributed +to "Fraser's Magazine." The "Recreations" they record are therefore +those of an English, and not an American "Parson"; but there is nothing +in them which a parson of any church or denomination would feel inclined +to repudiate, on the score either of their fineness of mental perception +or healthiness of moral sense. The author tells us, that, in writing +these essays, he has not been rapt away into heroic times and distant +scenes, but has written of daily work and worry amid daily work and +worry: and herein lies the charm of his discourses. He has one of those +sensible, elastic, cheerful natures whose ideal qualities are not +perverted by fretfulness and discontent. That most wicked of Byronisms, +which consists in depreciating the duties of common life in order to +exalt the claims of a kind of spiritualized sensuality and poetic +self-importance, he instinctively avoids. The thirteen shrewd, +suggestive, and practical essays which compose the present volume are +transcripts of his own experience and meditations, and teem with facts +and observations such as might be expected from the clear insight of a +man who has mingled with his fellow-men, and who is curiously critical +of the non-romantic phenomena of their daily life. The essays on the Art +of Putting Things, on Petty Malignity and Petty Trickery, on Tidiness, +on Nervous Fears, on Hurry and Leisure, on Work and Play, on Dulness, +and on Growing Old, are full of fresh and delicate perceptions of the +ordinary facts of human experience. His best and brightest remarks +surprise us with the unexpectedness of homely common sense, as flashed +on a world of organized illusions. The entire absence of rhetoric in the +author's mode of "putting things" adds to its effectiveness. He attempts +to reveal the common,--one of the rarest of revelations; and shows what +heroic qualities are needed to overcome the superficial circumstances +of our life, and transmute them into occasions for that humble, obscure +heroism which God alone apprehends and rewards. The freedom of the +writer from all the stereotyped phraseology of sanctity in doing this +work, and his innocent sympathy with everything cheerful, pleasurable, +and lovable in Nature and human nature, only add to the power of his +teachings. These "Recreations" of the "Parson" will, to the generality +of readers, produce more beneficent results than could have been +produced, had he given us his most carefully prepared sermons,--for they +connect religion with life. Nobody can read the volume without feeling +the moral and religious purpose which underlies its graceful and genial +exhibition of human character and manners. The common objection to +clergymen is, that they are ignorant of the world. No sagacious reader +of the present book can doubt that this parson, at least, is an +exception to the general rule; for he palpably knows more of the world +than most men who have made it a special study. + + + + +RECENT AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS + +RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS OF THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + + +Afloat and Ashore. By J. Fenimore Cooper. Illustrated by Darley. New +York. W.A. Townsend & Co. 12mo. pp. 549. $1.50. + +Silas Marner, the Weaver of Raveloe. By the Author of "Adam Bede." New +York. Harper & Brothers. 12mo. pp. 265. 75 cts. + +The Works of Francis Bacon, Baron of Verulam. Collected and edited by +James Spedding, M.A., Robert Leslie Ellis, M.A., and Douglas Denon +Heath. Volume I. Boston. Brown & Taggard. 12mo. pp. 539. $1.50. + +History of Latin Christianity, including that of the Popes to the +Pontificate of Nicolas V. By Henry Hart Milman, D.D., Dean of St. +Paul's. Volume VIII. New York. Sheldon & Co. 12mo. pp. 561. $1.50. + +Chambers's Encyclopedia: A Dictionary of Universal Knowledge for +the People, on the Basis of the Latest Edition of the German +Conversations--Lexicon. Illustrated. Parts XXIX., XXX. Philadelphia. +J.B. Lippincott & Co. 8vo. paper, pp. 55, 65. 15 cts. each. + +The New American Cyclopedia: A Popular Dictionary of General Knowledge. +Edited by George Ripley and Charles A. Dana. Vol. XII. New York. D. +Appleton & Co. 8vo. pp. 788. $3.00. + +The Life of George Washington. By Washington Irving. In Five Volumes. +Vol. V. Illustrated. New York. G.P. Putnam & Co. 12mo. pp. 434. $1.50. + +The Crayon Miscellany. By Washington Irving. New Illustrated Edition. +Complete in One Volume. New York. G.P. Putnam. 12mo. pp. 379. $1.50. + +Another Letter to a Young Physician; to which are appended some other +Medical Papers. By James Jackson, II. D. Boston. Ticknor and Fields. +13mo. pp. 179. 80 cts. + +The Partisan Leader: A Key to the Disunion Conspiracy. By Beverly +Tucker, of Virginia. Secretly published in Washington in the Year 1836, +but afterwards suppressed. New York. Rudd & Carleton. 18mo. paper, pp. +l95. 50 cts. + +Exercises at the Consecration of the Flag of the Union, by the Old South +Society in Boston, May 1st. 1861. Boston. Alfred Mudge & Son. 8vo. +paper, pp. 16. 20 cts. + +The Life and Military and Civic Services of Lieutenant-General Winfield +Scott. Complete up to the Present Period. By 0.J. Victor. New York. +Beadle & Co. 18mo. pp. 118. 25 cts. + +The Zouave Drill. Being a Complete Manual of Arms for the Use of the +Rifled Musket; containing also the Complete Manual of the Sword and +Sabre. By Colonel E.E. Ellsworth. With a Biography of his Life. +Philadelphia. T.E. Peterson & Brothers. 16mo. paper, pp. 62. 25 cts. + +The Soldier's Guide. A Complete Manual and Drill-Book for the Use +of Volunteers and Militia. Revised, corrected, and adapted to the +Discipline of the Soldier of the Present Day. By an Officer in the +United States Army. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & Brothers. 16mo. pp. +63. paper, 25 cts. boards, 40 cts. + +The Soldier's Companion, for the Use of all Officers, Volunteers, and +Militia in the United States, in the Camp, Field, or on the March. +Compiled from the Latest Authorities. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & +Brothers. 16mo. paper, pp. 77. 25 cts. + +The Volunteer's Text-Book. Containing the whole of "The Soldier's +Guide," as well as all of "The Soldier's Companion," with Valuable +Information for the Use of Officers of all Grades, compiled from the +Latest Authorities, issued under Orders of Simon Cameron, Secretary of +War, and Lieutenant-General Winfield Scott. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson +& Brothers. 16mo. paper, pp. 154. 50 cts. + +United States Infantry Tactics, for the Instruction, Exercise, and +Manoeuvres of the United States Infantry, including Infantry of the +Line, Light Infantry, and Riflemen. Prepared under the Direction of the +War Department, and authorized and adopted by the Secretary of War, May +1,1861. Philadelphia. J.B. Lippincott & Co. 32mo. pp. 450. $1.25. + +A Manual of Military Surgery; or, Hints on the Emergencies of Field, +Camp, and Hospital Practice. Illustrated with Woodcuts. By S.D. +Gross, M.D., Professor of Surgery in the Jefferson Medical College of +Philadelphia. Philadelphia. J.B. Lippincott & Co. 24mo. pp. 186. 50 cts. + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 11154 *** diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6ea2f9b --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #11154 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/11154) diff --git a/old/11154-8.txt b/old/11154-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f481c2b --- /dev/null +++ b/old/11154-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8794 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 45, July, +1861, by Various + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 45, July, 1861 + +Author: Various + +Release Date: February 18, 2004 [eBook #11154] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY, VOLUME 8, ISSUE +45, JULY, 1861*** + + +E-text prepared by Joshua Hutchinson, Tonya Allen, and Project Gutenberg +Distributed Proofreaders + + + +THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + +A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS. + +VOL. VIII.--JULY, 1861.--NO. XLV. + + + + + + + + OUR ORDERS. + + Weave no more silks, ye Lyons looms, + To deck our girls for gay delights! + The crimson flower of battle blooms, + And solemn marches fill the nights. + + Weave but the flag whose bars to-day + Drooped heavy o'er our early dead, + And homely garments, coarse and gray, + For orphans that must earn their bread! + + Keep back your tunes, ye viols sweet, + That pour delight from other lands! + Rouse there the dancer's restless feet,-- + The trumpet leads our warrior bands. + + And ye that wage the war of words + With mystic fame and subtle power, + Go, chatter to the idle birds, + Or teach the lesson of the hour! + + Ye Sibyl Arts, in one stern knot + Be all your offices combined! + Stand close, while Courage draws the lot, + The destiny of humankind! + + And if that destiny could fail, + The sun should darken in the sky, + The eternal bloom of Nature pale, + And God, and Truth, and Freedom die! + + + + +AGNES OF SORRENTO. + + +CHAPTER VII. + +THE DAY AT THE CONVENT. + + +The Mother Theresa sat in a sort of withdrawing-room, the roof of which +rose in arches, starred with blue and gold like that of the cloister, +and the sides were frescoed with scenes from the life of the Virgin. +Over every door, and in convenient places between the paintings, tests +of Holy Writ were illuminated in blue and scarlet and gold, with a +richness and fancifulness of outline, as if every sacred letter had +blossomed into a mystical flower. The Abbess herself, with two of her +nuns, was busily embroidering a new altar-cloth, with a lavish profusion +of adornment; and, from time to time, their voices rose in the musical +tones of an ancient Latin hymn. The words were full of that quaint +and mystical pietism with which the fashion of the times clothed the +expression of devotional feeling:-- + + "Jesu, corona virginum, + Quem mater illa concepit, + Quae sola virgo parturit, + Haec vota clemens accipe. + + "Qui pascis inter lilia + Septus choreis virginum, + Sponsus decoris gloria + Sponsisque reddens praemia. + + "Quocunque pergis, virgines + Sequuntur atque laudibus + Post te canentes cursitant + Hymnosque dulces personant[A]." + +[Footnote A: + + "Jesus, crown of virgin spirits, + Whom a virgin mother bore, + Graciously accept our praises + While thy footsteps we adore. + + "Thee among the lilies feeding + Choirs of virgins walk beside, + Bridegroom crowned with glorious beauty + Giving beauty to thy bride. + + "Where thou goest still they follow + Singing, singing as they move, + All those souls forever virgin + Wedded only to thy love."] + +This little canticle was, in truth, very different from the hymns +to Venus which used to resound in the temple which the convent had +displaced. The voices which sang were of a deep, plaintive contralto, +much resembling the richness of a tenor, and us they moved in modulated +waves of chanting sound the effect was soothing and dreamy. Agnes +stopped at the door to listen. + +"Stop, dear Jocunda," she said to the old woman, who was about to push +her way abruptly into the room, "wait till it is over." + +Jocunda, who was quite matter-of-fact in her ideas of religion, made a +little movement of impatience, but was recalled to herself by observing +the devout absorption with which Agnes, with clasped hands and downcast +head, was mentally joining in the hymn with a solemn brightness in her +young face. + +"If she hasn't got a vocation, nobody ever had one," said Jocunda, +mentally. "Deary me, I wish I had more of one myself!" + +When the strain died away, and was succeeded by a conversation on the +respective merits of two kinds of gold embroidering-thread, Agnes and +Jocunda entered the apartment. Agnes went forward and kissed the hand of +the Mother reverentially. + +Sister Theresa we have before described as tall, pale, and sad-eyed,--a +moonlight style of person, wanting in all those elements of warm color +and physical solidity which give the impression of a real vital human +existence. The strongest affection she had ever known had been that +which had been excited by the childish beauty and graces of Agnes, and +she folded her in her arms and kissed her forehead with a warmth that +had in it the semblance of maternity. + +"Grandmamma has given me a day to spend with you, dear mother," said +Agnes. + +"Welcome, dear little child!" said Mother Theresa. "Your spiritual home +always stands open to you." + +"I have something to speak to you of in particular, my mother," said +Agnes, blushing deeply. + +"Indeed!" said the Mother Theresa, a slight movement of curiosity +arising in her mind as she signed to the two nuns to leave the +apartment. + +"My mother," said Agnes, "yesterday evening, as grandmamma and I were +sitting at the gate, selling oranges, a young cavalier came up and +bought oranges of me, and he kissed my forehead and asked me to pray for +him, and gave me this ring for the shrine of Saint Agnes." + +"Kissed your forehead!" said Jocunda, "here's a pretty go! it isn't like +you, Agnes, to let him." + +"He did it before I knew," said Agnes. "Grandmamma reproved him, and +then he seemed to repent, and gave this ring for the shrine of Saint +Agnes." + +"And a pretty one it is, too," said Jocunda. "We haven't a prettier in +all our treasury. Not even the great emerald the Queen gave is better in +its way than this." + +"And he asked you to pray for him?" said Mother Theresa. + +"Yes, mother dear; he looked right into my eyes and made me look into +his, and made me promise;--and I knew that holy virgins never refused +their prayers to any one that asked, and so I followed their example." + +"I'll warrant me he was only mocking at you for a poor little fool," +said Jocunda; "the gallants of our day don't believe much in prayers." + +"Perhaps so, Jocunda," said Agnes, gravely; "but if that be the case, he +needs prayers all the more." + +"Yes," said Mother Theresa. "Remember the story of the blessed Saint +Dorothea,--how a wicked young nobleman mocked at her, when she was going +to execution, and said, 'Dorothea, Dorothea, I will believe, when you +shall send me down some of the fruits and flowers of Paradise'; and she, +full of faith, said, 'To-day I will send them'; and, wonderful to tell, +that very day, at evening, an angel came to the young man with a basket +of citrons and roses, and said, 'Dorothea sends thee these, wherefore +believe.' See what grace a pure maiden can bring to a thoughtless young +man,--for this young man was converted and became a champion of the +faith." + +"That was in the old times," said Jocunda, skeptically. "I don't believe +setting the lamb to pray for the wolf will do much in our day. Prithee, +child, what manner of man was this gallant?" + +"He was beautiful as an angel," said Agnes, "only it was not a good +beauty. He looked proud and sad, both,--like one who is not at ease in +his heart. Indeed, I feel very sorry for him; his eyes made a kind of +trouble in my mind, that reminds me to pray for him often." + +"And I will join my prayers to yours, dear daughter," said the Mother +Theresa; "I long to have you with us, that we may pray together every +day;--say, do you think your grandmamma will spare you to us wholly +before long?" + +"Grandmamma will not hear of it yet," said Agnes; "and she loves me so, +it would break her heart, if I should leave her, and she could not be +happy here;--but, mother, you have told me we could carry an altar +always in our hearts, and adore in secret. When it is God's will I +should come to you, He will incline her heart." + +"Between you and me, little one," said Jocunda, "I think there will soon +be a third person who will have something to say in the case." + +"Whom do you mean?" said Agnes. + +"A husband," said Jocunda; "I suppose your grandmother has one picked +out for you. You are neither humpbacked nor cross-eyed, that you +shouldn't have one as well as other girls." + +"I don't want one, Jocunda; and I have promised to Saint Agnes to come +here, if she will only get grandmother to consent." + +"Bless you, my daughter!" said Mother Theresa; "only persevere and the +way will be opened." + +"Well, well," said Jocunda, "we'll see. Come, little one, if you +wouldn't have your flowers wilt, we must go back and look after them." + +Reverently kissing the hand of the Abbess, Agnes withdrew with her old +friend, and crossed again to the garden to attend to her flowers. + +"Well now, childie," said Jocunda, "you can sit here and weave your +garlands, while I go and look after the conserves of raisins and citrons +that Sister Cattarina is making. She is stupid at anything but her +prayers, is Cattarina. Our Lady be gracious to me! I think I got my +vocation from Saint Martha, and if it wasn't for me, I don't know what +would become of things in the Convent. Why, since I came here, our +conserves, done up in fig-leaf packages, have had quite a run at Court, +and our gracious Queen herself was good enough to send an order for a +hundred of them last week. I could have laughed to see how puzzled the +Mother Theresa looked;--much she knows about conserves! I suppose she +thinks Gabriel brings them straight down from Paradise, done up in +leaves of the tree of life. Old Jocunda knows what goes to their making +up; she's good for something, if she is old and twisted; many a scrubby +old olive bears fat berries," said the old portress, chuckling. + +"Oh, dear Jocunda," said Agnes, "why must you go this minute? I want to +talk with you about so many things!" + +"Bless the sweet child! it does want its old Jocunda, does it?" said the +old woman, in the tone with which one caresses a baby. "Well, well, it +should, then! Just wait a minute, till I go and see that our holy Saint +Cattarina hasn't fallen a-praying over the conserving-pan. I'll be back +in a moment." + +So saying, she hobbled off briskly, and Agnes, sitting down on the +fragment sculptured with dancing nymphs, began abstractedly pulling her +flowers towards her, shaking from them the dew of the fountain. + +Unconsciously to herself, as she sat there, her head drooped into the +attitude of the marble nymph, and her sweet features assumed the same +expression of plaintive and dreamy thoughtfulness; her heavy dark lashes +lay on her pure waxen cheeks like the dark fringe of some tropical +flower. Her form, in its drooping outlines, scarcely yet showed the full +development of womanhood, which after-years might unfold into the ripe +fulness of her countrywomen. Her whole attitude and manner were those of +an exquisitively sensitive and highly organized being, just struggling +into the life of some mysterious new inner birth,--into the sense of +powers of feeling and being hitherto unknown even to herself. + +"Ah," she softly sighed to herself, "how little I am! how little I can +do! Could I convert one soul! Ah, holy Dorothea, send down the roses of +heaven into his soul, that he also may believe!" + +"Well, my little beauty, you have not finished even one garland," said +the voice of old Jocunda, bustling up behind her. "Praise to Saint +Martha, the conserves are doing well, and so I catch a minute for my +little heart." + +So saying, she sat down with her spindle and flax by Agnes, for an +afternoon gossip. + +"Dear Jocunda, I have heard you tell stories about spirits that haunt +lonesome places. Did you ever hear about any in the gorge?" + +"Why, bless the child, yes,--spirits are always pacing up and down in +lonely places. Father Anselmo told me that; and he had seen a priest +once that had seen that in the Holy Scriptures themselves,--so it must +be true." + +"Well, did you ever hear of their making the most beautiful music?" + +"Haven't I?" said Jocunda,--"to be sure I have,--singing enough to draw +the very heart out of your body,--it's an old trick they have. Why, I +want to know if you never heard about the King of Amalfi's son coming +home from fighting for the Holy Sepulchre? Why, there's rocks not far +out from this very town where the Sirens live; and if the King's son +hadn't had a holy bishop on board, who slept every night with a piece of +the true cross under his pillow, the green ladies would have sung him +straight into perdition. They are very fair-spoken at first, and sing so +that a man gets perfectly drunk with their music, and longs to fly to +them; but they suck him down at last under water, and strangle him, and +that's the end of him." + +"You never told me about this before, Jocunda." + +"Haven't I, child? Well, I will now. You see, this good bishop, he +dreamed three times that they would sail past those rocks, and he was +told to give all the sailors holy wax from an altar-candle to stop their +ears, so that they shouldn't hear the music. Well, the King's son said +he wanted to hear the music, so he wouldn't have his ears stopped; but +he told 'em to tie him to the mast, so that he could hear it, but not to +mind a word he said, if he begged 'em ever so hard to untie him. + +"Well, you see they did it; and the old bishop, he had his ears sealed +up tight, and so did all the men; but the young man stood tied to the +mast, and when they sailed past he was like a demented creature. He +called out that it was his lady who was singing, and he wanted to go to +her,--and his mother, who they all knew was a blessed saint in paradise +years before; and he commanded them to untie him, and pulled and +strained on his cords to get free; but they only tied him the tighter, +and so they got him past,--for, thanks to the holy wax, the sailors +never heard a word, and so they kept their senses. So they all got safe +home; but the young prince was so sick and pining that he had to be +exorcised and prayed for seven times seven days before they could get +the music out of his head." + +"Why," said Agnes, "do those Sirens sing there yet?" + +"Well, that was a hundred years ago. They say the old bishop, he prayed +'em down; for he went out a little after on purpose, and gave 'em a +precious lot of holy water; most likely he got 'em pretty well under, +though my husband's brother says he's heard 'em singing in a small way, +like frogs in spring-time; but he gave 'em a pretty wide berth. You see, +these spirits are what's left of old heathen times, when, Lord bless us! +the earth was just as full of 'em as a bit of old cheese is of mites. +Now a Christian body, if they take reasonable care, can walk quit of +'em; and if they have any haunts in lonesome and doleful places, if one +puts up a cross or a shrine, they know they have to go." + +"I am thinking," said Agnes, "it would be a blessed work to put up some +shrines to Saint Agnes and our good Lord in the gorge, and I'll promise +to keep the lamps burning and the flowers in order." + +"Bless the child!" said Jocunda, "that is a pious and Christian +thought." + +"I have an uncle in Florence who is a father in the holy convent of San +Marco, who paints and works in stone,--not for money, but for the glory +of God; and when he comes this way I will speak to him about it," said +Agnes. "About this time in the spring he always visits us." + +"That's mighty well thought of," said Jocunda. "And now, tell me, little +lamb, have you any idea who this grand cavalier may be that gave you the +ring?" + +"No," said Agnes, pausing a moment over the garland of flowers she was +weaving,--"only Giulietta told me that he was brother to the King. +Giulietta said everybody knew him." + +"I'm not so sure of that," said Jocunda. "Giulietta always thinks she +knows more than she does." + +"Whatever he may be, his worldly state is nothing to me," said Agnes. "I +know him only in my prayers." + +"Ay, ay," muttered the old woman to herself, looking obliquely out of +the corner of her eye at the girl, who was busily sorting her flowers; +"perhaps he will be seeking some other acquaintance." + +"You haven't seen him since?" said Jocunda. + +"Seen him? Why, dear Jocunda, it was only last evening"-- + +"True enough. Well, child, don't think too much of him. Men are dreadful +creatures,--in these times especially; they snap up a pretty girl as a +fox does a chicken, and no questions asked." + +"I don't think he looked wicked, Jocunda; he had a proud, sorrowful +look. I don't know what could make a rich, handsome young man sorrowful; +but I feel in my heart that he is not happy. Mother Theresa says that +those who can do nothing but pray may convert princes without knowing +it." + +"May be it is so," said Jocunda, in the same tone in which thrifty +professors of religion often assent to the same sort of truths in our +days. "I've seen a good deal of that sort of cattle in my day; and one +would think, by their actions, that praying souls must be scarce where +they came from." + +Agnes abstractedly stooped and began plucking handfuls of lycopodium, +which was growing green and feathery on one side of the marble frieze on +which she was sitting; in so doing, a fragment of white marble, which +had been overgrown in the luxuriant green, appeared to view. It was +that frequent object in the Italian soil,--a portion of an old Roman +tombstone. Agnes bent over, intent on the mystic "_Dis Manibus_" in old +Roman letters. + +"Lord bless the child! I've seen thousands of them," said Jocunda; "it's +some old heathen's grave, that's been in hell these hundred years." + +"In hell?" said Agnes, with a distressful accent. + +"Of course," said Jocunda. "Where should they be? Serves 'em right, too; +they were a vile old set." + +"Oh, Jocunda, it's dreadful to think of, that they should have been in +hell all this time." + +"And no nearer the end than when they began," said Jocunda. + +Agnes gave a shivering sigh, and, looking up into the golden sky that +was pouring such floods of splendor through the orange-trees and +jasmines, thought, How could it be that the world could possibly be +going on so sweet and fair over such an abyss? + +"Oh, Jocunda!" she said, "it does seem _too_ dreadful to believe! How +could they help being heathen,--being born so,--and never hearing of the +true Church?" + +"Sure enough," said Jocunda, spinning away energetically, "but that's no +business of mine; my business is to save _my_ soul, and that's what I +came here for. The dear saints know I found it dull enough at first, for +I'd been used to jaunting round with my old man and the boys; but what +with marketing and preserving, and one thing and another, I get on +better now, praise to Saint Agnes!" + +The large, dark eyes of Agnes were fixed abstractedly on the old woman +as she spoke, slowly dilating, with a sad, mysterious expression, which +sometimes came over them. + +"Ah! how can the saints themselves be happy?" she said. "One might be +willing to wear sackcloth and sleep on the ground, one might suffer ever +so many years and years, if only one might save some of them." + +"Well, it does seem hard," said Jocunda; "but what's the use of thinking +of it? Old Father Anselmo told us in one of his sermons that the Lord +wills that his saints should come to rejoice in the punishment of all +heathens and heretics; and he told us about a great saint once, who took +it into his head to be distressed because one of the old heathen whose +books he was fond of reading had gone to hell,--and he fasted and +prayed, and wouldn't take no for an answer, till he got him out." + +"He did, then?" said Agnes, clasping her hands in an ecstasy. + +"Yes; but the good Lord told him never to try it again,--and He struck +him dumb, as a kind of hint, you know. Why, Father Anselmo said that +even getting souls out of purgatory was no easy matter. He told us of +one holy nun who spent nine years fasting and praying for the soul of +her prince, who was killed in a duel, and then she saw in a vision +that he was only raised the least little bit out of the fire,--and she +offered up her life as a sacrifice to the Lord to deliver him, but, +after all, when she died he wasn't quite delivered. Such things made me +think that a poor old sinner like me would never get out at all, if I +didn't set about it in earnest,--though it a'n't all nuns that save +their souls either. I remember in Pisa I saw a great picture of the +Judgment-Day in the Campo Santo, and there were lots of abbesses, and +nuns, and monks, and bishops too, that the devils were clearing off into +the fire." + +"Oh, Jocunda, how dreadful that fire must be!" + +"Yes," said Jocunda. "Father Anselmo said hell-fire wasn't like any kind +of fire we have here,--made to warm us and cook our food,--but a kind +made especially to torment body and soul, and not made for anything +else. I remember a story he told us about that. You see, there was an +old duchess that lived in a grand old castle,--and a proud, wicked old +thing enough; and her son brought home a handsome young bride to the +castle, and the old duchess was jealous of her,--'cause, you see, she +hated to give up her place in the house, and the old family-jewels, and +all the splendid things,--and so one time, when the poor young thing was +all dressed up in a set of the old family-lace, what does the old hag do +but set fire to it!" + +"How horrible!" said Agnes. + +"Yes; and when the young thing ran screaming in her agony, the old hag +stopped her and tore off a pearl rosary that she was wearing, for fear +it should be spoiled by the fire." + +"Holy Mother! can such things be possible?" said Agnes. + +"Well, you see, she got her pay for it. That rosary was of famous old +pearls that had been in the family a hundred years; but from that moment +the good Lord struck it with a curse, and filled it white-hot with +hell-fire, so that, if anybody held it a few minutes in their hand, it +would burn to the bone. The old sinner made believe that she was in +great affliction for the death of her daughter-in-law, and that it was +all an accident, and the poor young man went raving mad,--but that awful +rosary the old hag couldn't get rid of. She couldn't give it away,--she +couldn't sell it,--but back it would come every night, and lie right +over her heart, all white-hot with the fire that burned in it. She gave +it to a convent, and she sold it to a merchant, but back it came; and +she locked it up in the heaviest chests, and she buried it down in the +lowest vaults, but it always came back in the night, till she was worn +to a skeleton; and at last the old thing died without confession or +sacrament, and went where she belonged. She was found lying dead in her +bed one morning, and the rosary was gone; but when they came to lay her +out, they found the marks of it burned to the bone into her breast. +Father Anselmo used to tell us this, to show us a little what hell-fire +was like." + +"Oh, please, Jocunda, don't let us talk about it any more," said Agnes. + +Old Jocunda, with her tough, vigorous organization and unceremonious +habits of expression, could not conceive the exquisite pain with which +this whole conversation had vibrated on the sensitive being at her right +hand,--that what merely awoke her hard-corded nerves to a dull vibration +of not unpleasant excitement was shivering and tearing the tenderer +chords of poor little Psyche beside her. + +Ages before, beneath those very skies that smiled so sweetly over +her,--amid the bloom of lemon and citron, and the perfume of jasmine and +rose, the gentlest of old Italian souls had dreamed and wondered what +might be the unknown future of the dead, and, learning his lesson from +the glorious skies and gorgeous shores which witnessed how magnificent a +Being had given existence to man, had recorded his hopes of man's future +in the words--_Aut beatus, aut nihil_; but, singular to tell, the +religion which brought with it all human tenderness and pities,--the +hospital for the sick, the refuge for the orphan, the enfranchisement +of the slave,--this religion brought also the news of the eternal, +hopeless, living torture of the great majority of mankind, past and +present. Tender spirits, like those of Dante, carried this awful mystery +as a secret and unexplained anguish; saints wrestled with God and +wept over it; but still the awful fact remained, spite of Church and +sacrament, that the gospel was in effect, to the majority of the human +race, not the glad tidings of salvation, but the sentence of immitigable +doom. + +The present traveller in Italy sees with disgust the dim and faded +frescoes in which this doom is portrayed in all its varied refinements +of torture; and the vivid Italian mind ran riot in these lurid fields, +and every monk who wanted to move his audience was in his small way a +Dante. The poet and the artist give only the highest form of the ideas +of their day, and he who cannot read the "Inferno" with firm nerves may +ask what the same representations were likely to have been in the grasp +of coarse and common minds. + +The first teachers of Christianity in Italy read the Gospels by the +light of those fiendish fires which consumed their fellows. Daily made +familiar with the scorching, the searing, the racking, the devilish +ingenuities of torture, they transferred them to the future hell of the +torturers. The sentiment within us which asserts eternal justice and +retribution was stimulated to a kind of madness by that first baptism of +fire and blood, and expanded the simple and grave warnings of the gospel +into a lurid poetry of physical torture. Hence, while Christianity +brought multiplied forms of mercy into the world, it failed for many +centuries to humanize the savage forms of justice; and rack and wheel, +fire and fagot were the modes by which human justice aspired to a +faint imitation of what divine justice was supposed to extend through +eternity. + +But it is remarkable always to observe the power of individual minds +to draw out of the popular religious ideas of their country only those +elements which suit themselves, and to drop others from their thought. +As a bee can extract pure honey from the blossoms of some plants whose +leaves are poisonous, so some souls can nourish themselves only with the +holier and more ethereal parts of popular belief. + +Agnes had hitherto dwelt only on the cheering and the joyous features of +her faith; her mind loved to muse on the legends of saints and angels +and the glories of paradise, which, with a secret buoyancy, she hoped to +be the lot of every one she saw. The mind of the Mother Theresa was of +the same elevated cast, and the terrors on which Jocunda dwelt with such +homely force of language seldom made a part of her instructions. + +Agnes tried to dismiss these gloomy images from her mind, and, after +arranging her garlands, went to decorate the shrine and altar,--a +cheerful labor of love, in which she delighted. + +To the mind of the really spiritual Christian of those ages the air of +this lower world was not as it is to us, in spite of our nominal faith +in the Bible, a blank, empty space from which all spiritual sympathy +and life have fled, but, like the atmosphere with which Raphael has +surrounded the Sistine Madonna, it was full of sympathizing faces, a +great "cloud of witnesses." The holy dead were not gone from earth; +the Church visible and invisible were in close, loving, and constant +sympathy,--still loving, praying, and watching together, though with a +veil between. + +It was at first with no idolatrous intention that the prayers of the +holy dead were invoked in acts of worship. Their prayers were asked +simply because they were felt to be as really present with their former +friends and as truly sympathetic as if no veil of silence had fallen +between. In time this simple belief had its intemperate and idolatrous +exaggerations,--the Italian soil always seeming to have a fiery +and volcanic forcing power, by which religious ideas overblossomed +themselves, and grew wild and ragged with too much enthusiasm; and, as +so often happens with friends on earth, these too much loved and revered +invisible friends became eclipsing screens instead of transmitting +mediums of God's light to the soul. + +Yet we can see in the hymns of Savonarola, who perfectly represented the +attitude of the highest Christian of those times, how perfect might +be the love and veneration for departed saints without lapsing into +idolatry, and with what an atmosphere of warmth and glory the true +belief of the unity of the Church, visible and invisible, could inspire +an elevated soul amid the discouragements of an unbelieving and +gainsaying world. + +Our little Agnes, therefore, when she had spread all her garlands out, +seemed really to feel as if the girlish figure that smiled in sacred +white from the altar-piece was a dear friend who smiled upon her, and +was watching to lead her up the path to heaven. + +Pleasantly passed the hours of that day to the girl, and when at evening +old Elsie called for her, she wondered that the day had gone so fast. + +Old Elsie returned with no inconsiderable triumph from her stand. The +cavalier had been several times during the day past her stall, and once, +stopping in a careless way to buy fruit, commented on the absence of +her young charge. This gave Elsie the highest possible idea of her own +sagacity and shrewdness, and of the promptitude with which she had taken +her measures, so that she was in as good spirits as people commonly are +who think they have performed some stroke of generalship. + +As the old woman and young girl emerged from the dark-vaulted passage +that led them down through the rocks on which the convent stood to the +sea at its base, the light of a most glorious sunset burst upon them, in +all those strange and magical mysteries of light which any one who has +walked that beach of Sorrento at evening will never forget. + +Agnes ran along the shore, and amused herself with picking up little +morsels of red and black coral, and those fragments of mosaic pavements, +blue, red, and green, which the sea is never tired of casting up from +the thousands of ancient temples and palaces which have gone to wreck +all around these shores. + +As she was busy doing this, she suddenly heard the voice of Giulietta +behind her. + +"So ho, Agnes! where have you been all day?" + +"At the Convent," said Agnes, raising herself from her work, and smiling +at Giulietta, in her frank, open way. + +"Oh, then you really did take the ring to Saint Agnes?" + +"To be sure I did," said Agnes. + +"Simple child!" said Giulietta, laughing; "that wasn't what he meant you +to do with it. He meant it for you,--only your grandmother was by. You +never will have any lovers, if she keeps you so tight." + +"I can do without," said Agnes. + +"I could tell you something about this one," said Giulietta. + +"You did tell me something yesterday," said Agnes. + +"But I could tell you some more. I know he wants to see you again." + +"What for?" said Agnes. + +"Simpleton, he's in love with you. You never had a lover;--it's time you +had." + +"I don't want one, Giulietta. I hope I never shall see him again." + +"Oh, nonsense, Agnes! Why, what a girl you are! Why, before I was as old +as you I had half-a-dozen lovers." + +"Agnes," said the sharp voice of Elsie, coming up from behind, "don't +run on ahead of me again;--and you, Mistress Baggage, let my child +alone." + +"Who's touching your child?" said Giulietta, scornfully. "Can't a body +say a civil word to her?" + +"I know what you would be after," said Elsie,--"filling her head with +talk of all the wild, loose gallants; but she is for no such market, I +promise you! Come, Agnes." + +So saying, old Elsie drew Agnes rapidly along with her, leaving +Giulietta rolling her great black eyes after them with an air of +infinite contempt. + +"The old kite!" she said; "I declare he shall get speech of the little +dove, if only to spite her. Let her try her best, and see if we don't +get round her before she knows it. Pietro says his master is certainly +wild after her, and I have promised to help him." + +Meanwhile, just as old Elsie and Agnes were turning into the +orange-orchard which led into the Gorge of Sorrento, they met the +cavalier of the evening before. + +He stopped, and, removing his cap, saluted them with as much deference +as if they had been princesses. Old Elsie frowned, and Agnes blushed +deeply;--both hurried forward. Looking back, the old woman saw that he +was walking slowly behind them, evidently watching them closely, yet not +in a way sufficiently obtrusive to warrant an open rebuff. + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +THE CAVALIER. + + +Nothing can be more striking, in common Italian life, than the contrast +between out-doors and in-doors. Without, all is fragrant and radiant; +within, mouldy, dark, and damp. Except in the well-kept palaces of the +great, houses in Italy are more like dens than habitations, and a sight +of them is a sufficient reason to the mind of any inquirer, why their +vivacious and handsome inhabitants spend their life principally in the +open air. Nothing could be more perfectly paradisiacal than this evening +at Sorrento. The sun had sunk, but left the air full of diffused +radiance, which trembled and vibrated over the thousand many-colored +waves of the sea. The moon was riding in a broad zone of purple, low +in the horizon, her silver forehead somewhat flushed in the general +rosiness that seemed to penetrate and suffuse every object. The +fishermen, who were drawing in their nets, gayly singing, seemed to +be floating on a violet-and-gold-colored flooring that broke into a +thousand gems at every dash of the oar or motion of the boat. The old +stone statue of Saint Antonio looked down in the rosy air, itself tinged +and brightened by the magical colors which floated round it. And the +girls and men of Sorrento gathered in gossiping knots on the old Roman +bridge that spanned the gorge, looked idly down into its dusky shadows, +talking the while, and playing the time-honored game of flirtation which +has gone on in all climes and languages since man and woman began. + +Conspicuous among them all was Giulietta, her blue-black hair recently +braided and polished to a glossy radiance, and all her costume arranged +to show her comely proportions to the best advantage,--her great pearl +ear-rings shaking as she tossed her head, and showing the flash of +the emerald in the middle of them. An Italian peasant-woman may trust +Providence for her gown, but ear-rings she attends to herself,--for what +is life without them? The great pearl ear-rings of the Sorrento women +are accumulated, pearl by pearl, as the price of years of labor. +Giulietta, however, had come into the world, so to speak, with a gold +spoon in her mouth,--since her grandmother, a thriving, stirring, +energetic body, had got together a pair of ear-rings of unmatched size, +which had descended as heirlooms to her, leaving her nothing to do but +display them, which she did with the freest good-will. At present she +was busily occupied in coquetting with a tall and jauntily-dressed +fellow, wearing a plumed hat and a red sash, who seemed to be mesmerized +by the power of her charms, his large dark eyes following every +movement, as she now talked with him gayly and freely, and now pretended +errands to this and that and the other person on the bridge, stationing +herself here and there, that she might have the pleasure of seeing +herself followed. + +"Giulietta," at last said the young man, earnestly, when he found her +accidentally standing alone by the parapet, "I must be going to-morrow." + +"Well, what is that to me?" said Giulietta, looking wickedly from under +her eyelashes. + +"Cruel girl! you know"---- + +"Nonsense, Pietro! I don't know anything about you"; but as Giulietta +said this, her great, soft, dark eyes looked out furtively, and said +just the contrary. + +"You will go with me?" + +"Did I ever hear anything like it? One can't be civil to a fellow but he +asks her to go to the world's end. Pray, how far is it to your dreadful +old den?" + +"Only two days' journey, Giulietta." + +"Two days!" + +"Yes, my life; and you shall ride." + +"Thank you, Sir,--I wasn't thinking of walking. But seriously, Pietro, I +am afraid it's no place for an honest girl to be in." + +"There are lots of honest women there,--all our men have wives; and our +captain has put his eye on one, too, or I'm mistaken." + +"What! little Agnes?" said Giulietta. "He will be bright that gets her. +That old dragon of a grandmother is as tight to her as her skin." + +"Our captain is used to helping himself," said Pietro. "We might carry +them both off some night, and no one the wiser; but he seems to want to +win the girl to come to him of her own accord. At any rate, we are to +be sent back to the mountains while he lingers a day or two more round +here." + +"I declare, Pietro, I think you all little better than Turks or +heathens, to talk in that way about carrying off women; and what if one +should be sick and die among you? What is to become of one's soul, I +wonder?" + +"Pshaw! don't we have priests? Why, Giulietta, we are all very pious, +and never think of going out without saying our prayers. The Madonna is +a kind Mother, and will wink very hard on the sins of such good sons as +we are. There isn't a place in all Italy where she is kept better in +candles, and in rings and bracelets, and everything a woman could want. +We never come home without bringing her something; and then we have lots +left to dress all our women like princesses; and they have nothing to do +from morning till night but play the lady. Come now?" + +At the moment this conversation was going on in the balmy, seductive +evening air at the bridge, another was transpiring in the Albergo della +Torre, one of those dark, musty dens of which we have been speaking. +In a damp, dirty chamber, whose brick floor seemed to have been +unsuspicious of even the existence of brooms for centuries, was sitting +the cavalier whom we have so often named in connection with Agnes. His +easy, high-bred air, his graceful, flexible form and handsome face +formed a singular contrast to the dark and mouldy apartment, at whose +single unglazed window he was sitting. The sight of this splendid man +gave an impression of strangeness, in the general bareness, much as if +some marvellous jewel had been unaccountably found lying on that dusty +brick floor. + +He sat deep in thought, with his elbow resting on a rickety table, his +large, piercing, dark eyes seeming intently to study the pavement. + +The door opened, and a gray-headed old man entered, who approached him +respectfully. + +"Well, Paolo?" said the cavalier, suddenly starting. + +"My Lord, the men are all going back to-night." + +"Let them go, then," said the cavalier, with an impatient movement. "I +can follow in a day or two." + +"Ah, my Lord, if I might make so bold, why should you expose your person +by staying longer? You may be recognized and"---- + +"No danger," said the other, hastily. + +"My Lord, you must forgive me, but I promised my dear lady, your mother, +on her death-bed"---- + +"To be a constant plague to me," said the cavalier, with a vexed smile +and an impatient movement; "but speak on, Paolo,--for when you once get +anything on your mind, one may as well hear it first as last." + +"Well, then, my Lord, this girl,--I have made inquiries, and every one +reports her most modest and pious,--the only grandchild of a poor old +woman. Is it worthy of a great lord of an ancient house to bring her to +shame?" + +"Who thinks of bringing her to shame? 'Lord of an ancient house'!" +added the cavalier, laughing bitterly,--"a landless beggar, cast out of +everything,--titles, estates, all! Am I, then, fallen so low that my +wooing would disgrace a peasant-girl?" + +"My Lord, you cannot mean to woo a peasant-girl in any other way than +one that would disgrace her,--one of the House of Sarelli, that goes +back to the days of the old Roman Empire!" + +"And what of the 'House of Sarelli that goes back to the days of the old +Roman Empire'? It is lying like weeds' roots uppermost in the burning +sun. What is left to me but the mountains and my sword? No, I tell +you, Paolo, Agostino Sarelli, cavalier of fortune, is not thinking of +bringing disgrace on a pious and modest maiden, unless it would disgrace +her to be his wife." + +"Now may the saints above help us! Why, my Lord, our house in days past +has been allied to royal blood. I could tell you how Joachim VI."-- + +"Come, come, my good Paolo, spare me one of your chapters of genealogy. +The fact is, my old boy, the world is all topsy-turvy, and the bottom is +the top, and it isn't much matter what comes next. Here are shoals +of noble families uprooted and lying round like those aloes that the +gardener used to throw over the wall in spring-time; and there is that +great boar of a Caesar Borgia turned in to batten and riot over our +pleasant places." + +"Oh, my Lord," said the old serving-man, with a distressful movement, +"we have fallen on evil times, to be sure, and they say his Holiness has +excommunicated us. Anselmo heard that in Naples yesterday." + +"Excommunicated!" said the young man,--every feature of his fine face, +and every nerve of his graceful form seeming to quiver with the effort +to express supreme contempt. "Excommunicated! I should _hope_ so! One +would hope through Our Lady's grace to act so that Alexander, and his +adulterous, incestuous, filthy, false-swearing, perjured, murderous +crew, _would_ excommunicate us! In these times, one's only hope of +paradise lies in being excommunicated." + +"Oh, my dear master," said the old man, falling on his knees, "what is +to become of us? That I should live to hear you talk like an infidel and +unbeliever!" + +"Why, hear you, poor old fool! Did you never hear in Dante of the Popes +that are burning in hell? Wasn't Dante a Christian, I beg to know?" + +"Oh, my Lord, my Lord! a religion got out of poetry, books, and romances +won't do to die by. We have no business with the affairs of the Head of +the Church,--it's the Lord's appointment. We have only to shut our eyes +and obey. It may all do well enough to talk so when you are young and +fresh; but when sickness and death come, then we _must_ have religion,-- +and if we have gone out of the only true Roman Catholic Apostolic +Church, what becomes of our souls? Ah, I misdoubted about your taking so +much to poetry, though my poor mistress was so proud of it; but these +poets are all heretics, my Lord,--that's my firm belief. But, my Lord, +if you do go to hell, I'm going there with you; I'm sure I never could +show my face among the saints, and you not there." + +"Well, come, then, my poor Paolo," said the cavalier, stretching out his +hand to his serving-man, "don't take it to heart so. Many a better man +than I has been excommunicated and cursed from toe to crown, and been +never a whit the worse for it. There's Jerome Savonarola there in +Florence--a most holy man, they say, who has had revelations straight +from heaven--has been excommunicated; but he preaches and gives the +sacraments all the same, and nobody minds it." + +"Well, it's all a maze to me," said the old serving-man, shaking his +white head. "I can't see into it, I don't dare to open my eyes for fear +I should get to be a heretic; it seems to me that everything is getting +mixed up together. But one must hold on to one's religion; because, +after we have lost everything in this world, it would be too bad to burn +in hell forever at the end of that." + +"Why, Paolo, I am a good Christian. I believe, with all my heart, in the +Christian religion, like the fellow in Boccaccio,--because I think it +must be from God, or else the Popes and Cardinals would have had it out +of the world long ago. Nothing but the Lord Himself could have kept it +against them." + +"There you are, my dear master, with your romances! Well, well, well! I +don't know how it'll end. I say my prayers, and try not to inquire into +what's too high for me. But now, dear master, will you stay lingering +after this girl till some of our enemies hear where you are and pounce +down upon us? Besides, the troop are never so well affected when you are +away; there are quarrels and divisions." + +"Well, well," said the cavalier, with an impatient movement,--"one day +longer. I must get a chance to speak with her once more. I _must_ see +her." + + * * * * * + + +SUN-PAINTING AND SUN-SCULPTURE; + +WITH A STEREOSCOPIC TRIP ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. + + +There is one old fable which Lord Bacon, in his "Wisdom of the +Ancients," has not interpreted. This is the flaying of Marsyas by +Apollo. Everybody remembers the accepted version of it, namely,--that +the young shepherd found Minerva's flute, and was rash enough to enter +into a musical contest with the God of Music. He was vanquished, of +course,--and the story is, that the victor fastened him to a tree and +flayed him alive. + +But the God of Song was also the God of Light, and a moment's reflection +reveals the true significance of this seemingly barbarous story. Apollo +was pleased with his young rival, fixed him in position against an iron +rest, (the _tree_ of the fable,) and took a _photograph_, a sun-picture, +of him. This thin film or _skin_ of light and shade was absurdly +interpreted as being the _cutis_, or untanned leather integument of the +young shepherd. The human discovery of the art of photography enables us +to rectify the error and restore that important article of clothing to +the youth, as well as to vindicate the character of Apollo. There is +one spot less upon the sun since the theft from heaven of Prometheus +Daguerre and his fellow-adventurers has enabled us to understand the +ancient legend. + +We are now flaying our friends and submitting to be flayed ourselves, +every few years or months or days, by the aid of the trenchant sunbeam +which performed the process for Marsyas. All the world has to submit to +it,--kings and queens with the rest. The monuments of Art and the face +of Nature herself are treated in the same way. We lift an impalpable +scale from the surface of the Pyramids. We slip off from the dome of St. +Peter's that other imponderable dome which fitted it so closely that it +betrays every scratch on the original. We skim off a thin, dry cuticle +from the rapids of Niagara, and lay it on our unmoistened paper without +breaking a bubble or losing a speck of foam. We steal a landscape from +its lawful owners, and defy the charge of dishonesty. We skin the flints +by the wayside, and nobody accuses us of meanness. + +These miracles are being worked all around us so easily and so cheaply +that most people have ceased to think of them as marvels. There is a +photographer established in every considerable village,--nay, one may +not unfrequently see a photographic _ambulance_ standing at the wayside +upon some vacant lot where it can squat unchallenged in the midst of +burdock and plantain and apple-Peru, or making a long halt in the middle +of a common by special permission of the "Selectmen." + +We must not forget the inestimable preciousness of the new Promethean +gifts because they have become familiar. Think first of the privilege we +all possess now of preserving the lineaments and looks of those dear to +us. + + "Blest be the art which can immortalize," + +said Cowper. But remember how few painted portraits really give their +subjects. Recollect those wandering Thugs of Art whose murderous doings +with the brush used frequently to involve whole families; who passed +from one country tavern to another, eating and painting their +way,--feeding a week upon the landlord, another week upon the landlady, +and two or three days apiece upon the children; as the walls of those +hospitable edifices too frequently testify even to the present day. Then +see what faithful memorials of those whom we love and would remember are +put into our hands by the new art, with the most trifling expenditure of +time and money. + +This new art is old enough already to have given us the portraits of +infants who are now growing into adolescence. By-and-by it will show +every aspect of life in the same individual, from the earliest week to +the last year of senility. We are beginning to see what it will reveal. +Children grow into beauty and out of it. The first line in the forehead, +the first streak in the hair are chronicled without malice, but without +extenuation. The footprints of thought, of passion, of purpose are all +treasured in these fossilized shadows. Family-traits show themselves in +early infancy, die out, and reappear. Flitting moods which have escaped +one pencil of sunbeams are caught by another. Each new picture gives us +a new aspect of our friend; we find he had not one face, but many. + +It is hardly too much to say, that those whom we love no longer leave us +in dying, as they did of old. They remain with us just as they appeared +in life; they look down upon us from our walls; they lie upon our +tables; they rest upon our bosoms; nay, if we will, we may wear their +portraits, like signet-rings, upon our fingers. Our own eyes lose the +images pictured on them. Parents sometimes forget the faces of their own +children in a separation of a year or two. But the unfading artificial +retina which has looked upon them retains their impress, and a fresh +sunbeam lays this on the living nerve as if it were radiated from the +breathing shape. How these shadows last, and how their originals fade +away! + +What is true of the faces of our friends is still more true of the +places we have seen and loved. No picture produces an impression on the +imagination to compare with a photographic transcript of the home of our +childhood, or any scene with which we have been long familiar. The very +point which the artist omits, in his effort to produce general effect, +may be exactly the one that individualizes the place most strongly to +our memory. There, for instance, is a photographic view of our own +birthplace, and with it of a part of our good old neighbor's dwelling. +An artist would hardly have noticed a slender, dry, leafless stalk which +traces a faint line, as you may see, along the front of our neighbor's +house next the corner. That would be nothing to him,--but to us it marks +the stem of the _honeysuckle-vine_, which we remember, with its pink +and white heavy-scented blossoms, as long as we remember the stars in +heaven. + +To this charm of fidelity in the minutest details the stereoscope adds +its astonishing illusion of solidity, and thus completes the effect +which so entrances the imagination. Perhaps there is also some +half-magnetic effect in the fixing of the eyes on the twin +pictures,--something like Mr. Braid's _hypnotism_, of which many of our +readers have doubtless heard. At least the shutting out of surrounding +objects, and the concentration of the whole attention, which is a +consequence of this, produce a dream-like exaltation of the faculties, a +kind of clairvoyance, in which we seem to leave the body behind us +and sail away into one strange scene after another, like disembodied +spirits. + +"Ah, yes," some unimaginative reader may say; "but there is no color and +no motion in these pictures you think so life-like; and at best they are +but petty miniatures of the objects we see in Nature." + +But color is, after all, a very secondary quality as compared with form. +We like a good crayon portrait better for the most part in black and +white than in tints of pink and blue and brown. Mr. Gibson has never +succeeded in making the world like his flesh-colored statues. The color +of a landscape varies perpetually, with the season, with the hour of the +day, with the weather, and as seen by sunlight or moonlight; yet our +home stirs us with its old associations, seen in any and every light. + +As to motion, though of course it is not present in stereoscopic +pictures, except in those toy-contrivances which have been lately +introduced, yet it is wonderful to see how nearly the effect of motion +is produced by the slight difference of light on the water or on the +leaves of trees as seen by the two eyes in the double-picture. + +And lastly with respect to size, the illusion is on the part of those +who suppose that the eye, unaided, ever sees anything but miniatures +of objects. Here is a new experiment to convince those who have not +reflected on the subject that the stereoscope shows us objects of their +natural size. + +We had a stereoscopic view taken by Mr. Soule out of our parlor-window, +overlooking the town of Cambridge, with the river and the bridge in the +foreground. Now, placing this view in the stereoscope, and looking with +the left eye at the right stereographic picture, while the right eye +looked at the natural landscape, through the window where the view was +taken, it was not difficult so to adjust the photographic and real views +that one overlapped the other, and then it was shown that the two almost +exactly coincided in all their dimensions. + +Another point in which the stereograph differs from every other +delineation is in the character of its evidence. A simple photographic +picture may be tampered with. A lady's portrait has been known to come +out of the finishing-artist's room ten years younger than when it left +the camera. But try to mend a stereograph and you will soon find the +difference. Your marks and patches float above the picture and never +identify themselves with it. We had occasion to put a little cross on +the pavement of a double photograph of Canterbury Cathedral,--copying +another stereoscopic picture where it was thus marked. By careful +management the two crosses were made perfectly to coincide in the field +of vision, but the image seemed suspended above the pavement, and did +not absolutely designate any one stone, as it would have done, if it +had been a part of the original picture. The impossibility of the +stereograph's perjuring itself is a curious illustration of the law of +evidence. "At the mouth of _two witnesses_, or of three, shall he that +is worthy of death be put to death; but at the mouth of one he shall not +be put to death." No woman may be declared youthful on the strength of a +single photograph; but if the stereoscopic twins say she is young, let +her be so acknowledged in the high court of chancery of the God of Love. + +Some two or three years since, we called the attention of the readers +of this magazine to the subject of the stereoscope and the stereograph. +Some of our expressions may have seemed extravagant, as if heated by the +interest which a curious novelty might not unnaturally excite. We have +not lost any of the enthusiasm and delight which that article must have +betrayed. After looking over perhaps a hundred thousand stereographs +and making a collection of about a thousand, we should feel the same +excitement on receiving a new lot to look over and select from as +in those early days of our experience. To make sure that this early +interest has not cooled, let us put on record one or two convictions of +the present moment. + +First, as to the wonderful nature of the invention. If a strange planet +should happen to come within hail, and one of its philosophers were to +ask us, as it passed, to hand him the most remarkable material product +of human skill, we should offer him, without a moment's hesitation, a +stereoscope containing an _instantaneous_ double-view of some great +thoroughfare,--one of Mr. Anthony's views of Broadway, (No. 203,) for +instance. + +Secondly, of all artificial contrivances for the gratification of human +taste, we seriously question whether any offers so much, on the whole, +to the enjoyment of the civilized races as the self-picturing of Art +and Nature,--with three exceptions: namely, dress, the most universal, +architecture, the most imposing, and music, the most exciting, of +factitious sources of pleasure. + +No matter whether this be an extravagance or an over-statement; none +can dispute that we have a new and wonderful source of pleasure in +the sun-picture, and especially in the solid sun-_sculptures_ of the +stereograph. Yet there is a strange indifference to it, even up to the +present moment, among many persons of cultivation and taste. They do not +seem to have waked up to the significance of the miracle which the Lord +of Light is working for them. The cream of the visible creation has been +skimmed off; and the sights which men risk their lives and spend their +money and endure sea-sickness to behold,--the views of Nature and Art +which make exiles of entire families for the sake of a look at them, +and render "bronchitis" and dyspepsia, followed by leave of absence, +endurable dispensations to so many worthy shepherds,--these sights, +gathered from Alps, temples, palaces, pyramids, are offered you for +a trifle, to carry home with you, that you may look at them at your +leisure, by your fireside, with perpetual fair weather, when you are in +the mood, without catching cold, without following a _valet-de-place_, +in any order of succession,--from a glacier to Vesuvius, from Niagara +to Memphis,--as long as you like, and breaking off as suddenly as you +like;--and you, native of this incomparably dull planet, have hardly +troubled yourself to look at this divine gift, which, if an angel had +brought it from some sphere nearer to the central throne, would have +been thought worthy of the celestial messenger to whom it was intrusted! + +It seemed to us that it might possibly awaken an interest in some of our +readers, if we should carry them with us through a brief stereographic +trip,--describing, not from places, but from the photographic pictures +of them which we have in our own collection. Again, those who have +collections may like to compare their own opinions of particular +pictures mentioned with those here expressed, and those who are buying +stereographs may be glad of some guidance in choosing. + +But the reader must remember that this trip gives him only a glimpse of +a few scenes selected out of our gallery of a thousand. To visit them +all, as tourists visit the realities, and report what we saw, with the +usual explanations and historical illustrations, would make a formidable +book of travels. + +Before we set out, we must know something of the sights of our own +country. At least we must see Niagara. The great fall shows infinitely +best on glass. Thomson's "Point View, 28," would be a perfect picture of +the Falls in summer, if a lady in the foreground had not moved her shawl +while the pictures were taking, or in the interval between taking the +two. His winter view, "Terrapin Tower, 37," is perfection itself. Both +he and Evans have taken fine views of the rapids, _instantaneous_, +catching the spray as it leaped and the clouds overhead. Of Blondin on +his rope there are numerous views; standing on one foot, on his head, +carrying a man on his back, and one frightful picture, where he hangs by +one leg, head downward, over the abyss. The best we have seen is Evans's +No. 5, a front view, where every muscle stands out in perfect relief, +and the symmetry of the most unimpressible of mortals is finely shown. +It literally makes the head swim to fix the eyes on some of these +pictures. It is a relief to get away from such fearful sights and look +up at the Old Man of the Mountain. There stands the face, without any +humanizing help from the hand of an artist. Mr. Bierstadt has given it +to us very well. Rather an imbecile old gentleman, one would say, +with his mouth open; a face such as one may see hanging about +railway-stations, and, what is curious, a New-England style of +countenance. Let us flit again, and just take a look at the level sheets +of water and broken falls of Trenton,--at the oblong, almost squared +arch of the Natural Bridge,--at the ruins of the Pemberton Mills, still +smoking,--and so come to Mr. Barnum's "Historical Series." Clark's +Island, with the great rock by which the Pilgrims "rested, according to +the commandment," on the first Sunday, or Sabbath, as they loved to call +it, which they passed in the harbor of Plymouth, is the most interesting +of them all to us. But here are many scenes of historical interest +connected with the great names and events of our past. The Washington +Elm, at Cambridge, (through the branches of which we saw the first +sunset we ever looked upon, from this planet, at least,) is here in all +its magnificent drapery of hanging foliage. Mr. Soule has given another +beautiful view of it, when stripped of its leaves, equally remarkable +for the delicacy of its pendent, hair-like spray. + +We should keep the reader half an hour looking through this series, +if we did not tear ourselves abruptly away from it. We are bound for +Europe, and are to leave _via_ New York immediately. + +Here we are in the main street of the great city. This is Mr. Anthony's +miraculous instantaneous view in Broadway, (No. 203,) before referred +to. It is the Oriental story of the petrified city made real to our +eyes. The character of it is, perhaps, best shown by the use we make of +it in our lectures, to illustrate the physiology of walking. Every foot +is caught in its movement with such suddenness that it shows as clearly +as if quite still. We are surprised to see, in one figure, how long the +stride is,--in another, how much the knee is bent,--in a third, how +curiously the heel strikes the ground before the rest of the foot,--in +all, how singularly the body is accommodated to the action of walking. +The facts which the brothers Weber, laborious German experimenters and +observers, had carefully worked out on the bony frame, are illustrated +by the various individuals comprising this moving throng. But what a +wonder it is, this snatch at the central life of a mighty city as it +rushed by in all its multitudinous complexity of movement! Hundreds of +objects in this picture could be identified in a court of law by their +owners. There stands Car No. 33 of the Astor House and Twenty-Seventh +Street Fourth Avenue line. The old woman would miss an apple from that +pile which you see glistening on her stand. The young man whose back is +to us could swear to the pattern of his shawl. The gentleman between two +others will no doubt remember that he had a headache the next morning, +after this walk he is taking. Notice the caution with which the man +driving the dapple-gray horse in a cart loaded with barrels holds his +reins,--wide apart, one in each hand. See the shop-boys with their +bundles, the young fellow with a lighted cigar in his hand, as you see +by the way he keeps it off from his body, the _gamin_ stooping to +pick up something in the midst of the moving omnibuses, the stout +philosophical carman sitting on his cart-tail, Newman Noggs by the +lamp-post at the corner. Nay, look into Car No. 33 and you may see the +passengers;--is that a young woman's face turned toward you looking +out of the window? See how the faithful sun-print advertises the rival +establishment of "Meade Brothers, Ambrotypes and Photographs." What a +fearfully suggestive picture! It is a leaf torn from the book of God's +recording angel. What if the sky is one great concave mirror, which +reflects the picture of all our doings, and photographs every act on +which it looks upon dead and living surfaces, so that to celestial eyes +the stones on which we tread are written with our deeds, and the leaves +of the forest are but undeveloped negatives where our summers stand +self-recorded for transfer into the imperishable record? And what a +metaphysical puzzle have we here in this simple-looking paradox! Is +motion but a succession of rests? All is still in this picture of +universal movement. Take ten thousand instantaneous photographs of the +great thoroughfare in a day; every one of them will be as still as the +_tableau_ in the "Enchanted Beauty." Yet the hurried day's life of +Broadway will have been made up of just such stillnesses. Motion is as +rigid as marble, if you only take a wink's worth of it at a time. + +We are all ready to embark now. Here is the harbor; and there lies the +Great Eastern at anchor,--the biggest island that ever got adrift. +Stay one moment,--they will ask us about secession and the revolted +States,--it may be as well to take a look at Charleston, for an instant, +before we go. + +These three stereographs were sent us by a lady now residing in +Charleston. The Battery, the famous promenade of the Charlestonians, +since armed with twenty-four-pounders facing Fort Sumter; the interior +of Fort Moultrie, with the guns spiked by Major Anderson; and a more +extensive view of the same interior, with the flag of the seven stars, +(corresponding to the seven deadly sins,)--the free end of it tied to +a gun-carriage, as if to prevent the winds of the angry heaven from +rending it to tatters. In the distance, to the right, Fort Sumter, +looking remote and inaccessible,--the terrible rattle which our foolish +little spoiled sister Caroline has insisted on getting into her +rash hand. How ghostly, yet how real, it looms up out of the dim +atmosphere,--the guns looking over the wall and out through the +embrasures,--meant for a foreign foe,--this very day (April 13th) turned +in self-defence against the children of those who once fought for +liberty at Fort Moultrie! It is a sad thought that there are truths +which can be got out of life only by the _destructive analysis_ of war. +Statesmen deal in _proximate principles_,--unstable compounds; but war +reduces facts to their simple elements in its red-hot crucible, with its +black flux of carbon and sulphur and nitre. Let us turn our back on this +miserable, even though inevitable, fraternal strife, and, closing our +eyes for an instant, open them in London. + +Here we are at the foot of Charing Cross. You remember, of course, how +this fine equestrian statue of Charles I. was condemned to be sold and +broken up by the Parliament, but was buried and saved by the brazier who +purchased it, and so reappeared after the Restoration. To the left, the +familiar words "Morley's Hotel" designate an edifice about half windows, +where the plebeian traveller may sit and contemplate Northumberland +House opposite, and the straight-tailed lion of the Percys surmounting +the lofty battlement which crowns its broad _façade_. We could describe +and criticize the statue as well as if we stood under it, but other +travellers have done that. Where are all the people that ought to be +seen here? Hardly more than three or four figures are to be made out; +the rest were moving, and left no images in this slow, old-fashioned +picture,--how unlike the miraculous "instantaneous" Broadway of Mr. +Anthony we were looking at a little while ago! But there, on one side, +an omnibus has stopped long enough to be caught by the sunbeams. There +is a mark on it. Try it with a magnifier. + + Charing + + Strand + 633. + +Here are the towers of Westminster Abbey. A dead failure, as we well +remember them,--miserable modern excrescences, which shame the noble +edifice. We will hasten on, and perhaps by-and-by come back and enter +the cathedral. + +How natural Temple Bar looks, with the loaded coach and the cab going +through the central arch, and the blur of the hurrying throng darkening +the small lateral ones! A fine old structure,--always reminds a +Bostonian of the old arch over which the mysterious _Boston Library_ was +said still to linger out its existence late into the present century. +But where are the spikes on which the rebels' heads used to grin until +their jaws fell off? They must have been ranged along that ledge which +forms the chord of the arch surmounting the triple-gated structure. To +the left a woman is spreading an awning before a shop;--a man would do +it for her here. Ghost of a boy with bundle,--seen with right eye only. +Other ghosts of passers or loiterers,--one of a pretty woman, as we +fancy at least, by the way she turns her face to us. To the right, +fragments of signs, as follow: + + 22 + PAT + + CO + BR + PR + +What can this be but 229, _Patent Combs and Brushes_, PROUT? At any +rate, we were looking after Front's good old establishment, (229, +Strand,) which we remembered was close to Temple Bar, when we discovered +these fragments, the rest being cut off by the limits of the picture. + +London Bridge! Less imposing than Waterloo Bridge, but a massive pile of +masonry, which looks as if its rounded piers would defy the Thames as +long as those of the Bridge of Sant' Angelo have stemmed the Tiber. +Figures indistinct or invisible, as usual, in the foreground, but +farther on a mingled procession of coaches, cabs, carts, and people. +See the groups in the recesses over the piers. The parapet is +breast-high;--a woman can climb over it, and drop or leap into the dark +stream lying in deep shadow under the arches. Women take this leap +often. The angels hear them like the splash of drops of blood out of the +heart of our humanity. In the distance, wharves, storehouses, stately +edifices, steeples, and rising proudly above them, "like a tall bully," +London Monument. + +Here we are, close to the Monument. Tall, square base, with reliefs, +fluted columns, queer top;--looks like an inverted wineglass with a +shaving-brush standing up on it: representative of flame, probably. +Below this the square _cage_ in which people who have climbed the stairs +are standing; seems to be ten or twelve feet high, and is barred or +wired over. Women used to jump off from the Monument as well as from +London Bridge, before they made the cage safe in this way. + +"Holloa!" said a man standing in the square one day, to his +companion,--"there's the flag coming down from the Monument!" + +"It's no flag," said the other, "it's a woman!" + +Sure enough, and so it was. + +Nobody can mistake the four pepper-boxes, with the four weathercocks on +them, surmounting the corners of a great square castle, a little way +from the river's edge. That is the Tower of London. We see it behind the +masts of sailing-vessels and the chimneys of steamers, gray and misty in +the distance. Let us come nearer to it. Four square towers, crowned by +four Oriental-looking domes, not unlike the lower half of an inverted +balloon: these towers at the angles of a square building with buttressed +and battlemented walls, with two ranges of round-arched windows on the +side towards us. But connected with this building are other towers, +round, square, octagon, walls with embrasures, moats, loop-holes, +turrets, parapets,--looking as if the beef-eaters really meant to hold +out, if a new army of Boulogne should cross over some fine morning. We +can't stop to go in and see the lions this morning, for we have come in +sight of a great dome, and we cannot take our eyes away from it. + +That is St. Paul's, the Boston State-House of London. There is a +resemblance in effect, but there is a difference in dimensions,--to the +disadvantage of the native edifice, as the reader may see in the plate +prefixed to Dr. Bigelow's "Technology." The dome itself looks light +and airy compared to St. Peter's or the Duomo of Florence, not only +absolutely, but comparatively. The colonnade on which it rests divides +the honors with it. It does not brood over the city, as those two others +over their subject towns. Michel Angelo's forehead repeats itself in the +dome of St. Peter's. Sir Christopher had doubtless a less ample frontal +development; indeed, the towers he added to Westminster Abbey would +almost lead us to doubt if he had not a vacancy somewhere in his brain. +But the dome of the London "State-House" is very graceful,--so light +that it looks as if Its lineage had been crossed by a spire. Wait until +we have gilded the dome of our Boston St. Paul's before drawing any +comparisons. + +We have seen the outside of London. What do we care for the Crescent, +and the Horseguards, and Nelson's Monument, and the statue of Achilles, +and the new Houses of Parliament? The Abbey, the Tower, the Bridge, +Temple Bar, the Monument, St. Paul's: these make up the great features +of the London we dream about. Let us go into the Abbey for a few +moments. The "dim religious light" is pretty good, after all. We can +read every letter on that mural tablet to the memory of "the most +illustrious and most benevolent John Paul Howard, Earl of Stafford," +"a Lover of his Country, A _Relation to Relations_" (what a eulogy and +satire in that expression!) and in many ways virtuous and honorable, as +"The Countess Dowager, in Testimony of her great Affection and Respect +to her Lord's Memory," has commemorated on his monument. We can see all +the folds of the Duchess of Suffolk's dress, and the meshes of the net +that confines her hair, as she lies in marble effigy on her sculptured +sarcophagus. It looks old to our eyes,--for she was the mother of Lady +Jane Grey, and died three hundred years ago,--but see those two little +stone heads lying on their stone pillow, just beyond the marble Duchess. +They are children of Edward III.,--the Black Prince's baby-brothers. +They died five hundred years ago,--but what are centuries in Westminster +Abbey? Under this pillared canopy, her head raised on two stone +cushions, her fair, still features bordered with the spreading cap +we know so well in her portraits, lies Mary of Scotland. These fresh +monuments, protected from the wear of the elements, seem to make twenty +generations our contemporaries. Look at this husband warding off the +dart which the grim, draped skeleton is aiming at the breast of his +fainting wife. Most famous, perhaps, of all the statues in the Abbey is +this of Joseph Gascoigne Nightingale and his Lady, by Roubilliac. You +need not cross the ocean to see it. It is here, literally to every +dimple in the back of the falling hand, and every crinkle of the +vermiculated stone-work. What a curious pleasure it is to puzzle out the +inscriptions on the monuments in the background!--for the beauty of your +photograph is, that you may work out minute derails with the microscope, +just as you can with the telescope in a distant landscape in Nature. +There is a lady, for instance, leaning upon an urn,--suggestive, a +little, of Morgiana and the forty thieves. Above is a medallion of one +wearing a full periwig. Now for a half-inch lens to make out the specks +that seem to be letters. "Erected to the Memory of William Pulteney, +Earl of Bath, by his Brother"--That will do,--the inscription operates +as a cold bath to enthusiasm. But here is our own personal namesake, +the once famous Rear Admiral of the White, whose biography we can find +nowhere except in the "Gentleman's Magazine," where he divides the glory +of the capture of Quebec with General Wolfe. A handsome young man with +hyacinthine locks, his arms bare and one hand resting on a cannon. We +remember thinking our namesake's statue one of the most graceful in the +Abbey, and have always fallen back on the memory of that and of Dryden's +Achates of the "Annus Mirabilis," as trophies of the family. + +Enough of these marbles; there is no end to them; the walls and floor of +the great, many-arched, thousand-pillared, sky-lifted cavern are crusted +all over with them, like stalactites and stalagmites. The vast temple is +alive with the images of the dead. Kings and queens, nobles, statesmen, +soldiers, admirals, the great men whose deeds we all know, the great +writers whose words are in all our memories, the brave and the beautiful +whose fame has shrunk into their epitaphs, are all around us. What is +the cry for alms that meets us at the door of the church to the mute +petition of these marble beggars, who ask to warm their cold memories +for a moment in our living hearts? Look up at the mighty arches +overhead, borne up on tall clustered columns,--as if that avenue of +Royal Palms we remember in the West India Islands (photograph) had been +spirited over seas and turned into stone. Make your obeisance to the +august shape of Sir Isaac Newton, reclining like a weary swain in the +niche at the side of the gorgeous screen. Pass through Henry VII.'s +Chapel, a temple cut like a cameo. Look at the shining oaken stalls of +the knights. See the banners overhead. There is no such speaking record +of the lapse of time as these banners,--there is one of them beginning +to drop to pieces; the long day of a century has decay for its +dial-shadow. + +We have had a glimpse of London,--let us make an excursion to +Stratford-on-Avon. + +Here you see the Shakspeare House as it was,--wedged in between, and +joined to, the "Swan and Maidenhead" Tavern and a mean and dilapidated +brick building, not much worse than itself, however. The first +improvement (as you see in No. 2) was to pull down this brick building. +The next (as you see in No. 3)--was to take away the sign and the +bay-window of the "Swan and Maidenhead" and raise two gables out of its +roof, so as to restore something like its ancient aspect. Then a rustic +fence was put up and the outside arrangements were completed. The +cracked and faded sign projects as we remember it of old. In No. 1 you +may read "THE IMMORTAL SHAKES_peare ... Born in This House_" about as +well as if you had been at the trouble and expense of going there. + +But here is the back of the house. Did little Will use to look out at +this window with the bull's-eye panes? Did he use to drink from this old +pump, or the well in which it stands? Did his shoulders rub against this +angle of the old house, built with rounded bricks? It a strange picture, +and sets us dreaming. Let us go in and up-stairs. In this room he was +born. They say so, and we will believe it. Rough walls, rudely boarded +floor, wide window with small panes, small bust of him between two +cactuses in bloom on window-seat. An old table covered with prints and +stereographs, a framed picture, and under it a notice "Copies of this +Portrait" ... the rest, in fine print, can only be conjectured. + +Here is the Church of the Holy Trinity, in which he lies buried. The +trees are bare that surround it; see the rooks' nests in their tops. +The Avon is hard by, dammed just here, with flood-gates, like a canal. +Change the season, if you like,--here are the trees in leaf, and in +their shadow the tombs and graves of the mute, inglorious citizens of +Stratford. + +Ah, how natural this interior, with its great stained window, its mural +monuments, and its slab in the pavement with the awful inscription! That +we cannot see here, but there is the tablet with the bust we know so +well. But this, after all, is Christ's temple, not Shakspeare's. Here +are the worshippers' seats,--mark how the polished wood glistens,--there +is the altar, and there the open prayer-book,--you can almost read the +service from it. Of the many striking things that Henry Ward Beecher +has said, nothing, perhaps, is more impressive than his account of his +partaking of the communion at that altar in the church where Shakspeare +rests. A memory more divine than his overshadowed the place, and he +thought of Shakspeare, "as he thought of ten thousand things, without +the least disturbance of his devotion," though he was kneeling directly +over the poet's dust. + +If you will stroll over to Shottery now with me, we can see the Ann +Hathaway cottage from four different points, which will leave nothing +outside of it to be seen. Better to look at than to live in. A fearful +old place, full of small vertebrates that squeak and smaller articulates +that bite, if its outward promise can be trusted. A thick thatch covers +it like a coarse-haired hide. It is patched together with bricks and +timber, and partly crusted with scaling plaster. One window has the +diamond panes framed in lead, such as we remember seeing of old in one +or two ancient dwellings in the town of Cambridge, hard by. In this view +a young man is sitting, pensive, on the steps which Master William, too +ardent lover, used to climb with hot haste and descend with lingering +delay. Young men die, but youth lives. Life goes on in the cottage just +as it used to three hundred years ago. On the rail before the door sits +the puss of the household, of the fiftieth generation, perhaps, from +that "harmless, necessary cat" which purred round the poet's legs as he +sat talking love with Ann Hathaway. At the foot of the steps is a huge +basin, and over the rail hangs--a dishcloth, drying. In these homely +accidents of the very instant, that cut across our romantic ideals with +the sharp edge of reality, lies one of the ineffable charms of the +sun-picture. It is a little thing that gives life to a scene or a face; +portraits are never absolutely alive, because they do not _wink_. + +Come, we are full of Shakspeare; let us go up among the hills and see +where another poet lived and lies. Here is Rydal Mount, the home of +Wordsworth. Two-storied, ivy-clad, hedge-girdled, dropped into a crease +among the hills that look down dimly from above, as if they were hunting +after it as ancient dames hunt after a dropped thimble. In these walks +he used to go "booing about," as his rustic neighbor had it,--reciting +his own verses. Here is his grave in Grasmere. A plain slab, with +nothing but his name. Next him lies Dora, his daughter, beneath a taller +stone bordered with a tracery of ivy, and bearing in relief a lamb and +a cross. Her husband lies next in the range. The three graves have just +been shorn of their tall grass,--in this other view you may see them +half-hidden by it. A few flowering stems have escaped the scythe in the +first picture, and nestle close against the poet's headstone. Hard by +sleeps poor Hartley Coleridge, with a slab of freestone graven with a +cross and a crown of thorns, and the legend, "By thy Cross and Passion, +Good Lord, deliver us."[A] All around are the graves of those whose +names the world has not known. This view, (302,) from above Rydal Mount, +is so Claude-like, especially in its trees, that one wants the solemn +testimony of the double-picture to believe it an actual transcript of +Nature. Of the other English landscapes we have seen, one of the most +pleasing on the whole is that marked 43,--Sweden Bridge, near Ambleside. +But do not fail to notice St. Mary's Church (101) in the same +mountain-village. It grows out of the ground like a crystal, with +spur-like gables budding out all the way up its spire, as if they were +ready to flower into pinnacles, like such as have sprung up all over the +marble multiflora of Milan. + +[Footnote A: Miss Martineau, who went to his funeral, and may be +supposed to describe after a visit to the churchyard, gives the +inscription incorrectly. See Atlantic Monthly for May, 1861, p. 552. +Tourists cannot be trusted; stereographs can.] + +And as we have been looking at a steeple, let us flit away for a moment +and pay our reverence at the foot of the tallest spire in England,--that +of Salisbury Cathedral. Here we see it from below, looking up,--one of +the most striking pictures ever taken. Look well at it; Chichester has +just fallen, and this is a good deal like it,--some have thought raised +by the same builder. It has bent somewhat (as you may see in these other +views) from the perpendicular; and though it has been strengthened with +clamps and framework, it must crash some day or other, for there has +been a great giant tugging at it day and night for five hundred years, +and it will at last shut up into itself or topple over with a sound and +thrill that will make the dead knights and bishops shake on their stone +couches, and be remembered all their days by year-old children. This is +the first cathedral we ever saw, and none ever so impressed us since. +Vast, simple, awful in dimensions and height, just beginning to grow +tall at the point where our proudest steeples taper out, it fills the +whole soul, pervades the vast landscape over which it reigns, and, like +Niagara and the Alps, abolishes that five- or six-foot personality in +the beholder which is fostered by keeping company with the little life +of the day in its little dwellings. In the Alps your voice is as the +piping of a cricket. Under the sheet of Niagara the beating of your +heart seems to trivial a movement to take reckoning of. In the +buttressed hollow of one of these palaeozoic cathedrals you are ashamed +of your ribs, and blush for the exiguous pillars of bone on which your +breathing structure reposes. Before we leave Salisbury, let us look for +a moment into its cloisters. A green court-yard, with a covered gallery +on its level, opening upon it through a series of Gothic arches. You may +learn more, young American, of the difference between your civilization +and that of the Old World by one look at this than from an average +lyceum-lecture an hour long. Seventy years of life means a great deal to +you; how little, comparatively, to the dweller in these cloisters! You +will have seen a city grow up about you, perhaps; your whole world will +have been changed half a dozen times over. What change for him? The +cloisters are just as when he entered them,--just as they were a hundred +years ago,--just as they will be a hundred years hence. + +These old cathedrals are beyond all comparison what are best worth +seeing, of a man's handiwork, in Europe. How great the delight to be +able to bring them, bodily, as it were, to our own firesides! A hundred +thousand pilgrims a year used to visit Canterbury. Now Canterbury visits +us. See that small white mark on the pavement. That marks the place +where the slice of Thomas à Becket's skull fell when Reginald Fitz Urse +struck it off with a "Ha!" that seems to echo yet through the vaulted +arches. And see the broad stains, worn by the pilgrims' knees as they +climbed to the martyr's shrine. For four hundred years this stream of +worshippers was wearing itself into these stones. But there was the +place where they knelt before the altar called "Beckets's Crown." +No! the story that those deep hollows in the marble were made by the +pilgrims' knees is too much to believe,--but there are the hollows, and +that is the story. + +And now, if you would see a perfect gem of the art of photography, and +at the same time an unquestioned monument of antiquity which no person +can behold without interest, look upon this,--the monument of the Black +Prince. There is hardly a better piece of work to be found. His marble +effigy lies within a railing, with a sounding board. Above this, on a +beam stretched between two pillars, hang the arms he wore at the Battle +of Poitiers,--the tabard, the shield, the helmet, the gauntlets, and +the sheath that held his sword, which weapon it is said that Cromwell +carried off. The outside casing of the shield has broken away, as you +observe, but the lions or lizards, or whatever they were meant for, and +the flower-de-laces or plumes may still be seen. The metallic scales, if +such they were, have partially fallen from the tabard, or frock, and the +leather shows bare in parts of it. + +Here, hard by, is the sarcophagus of Henry IV. and his queen, also +inclosed with a railing like the other. It was opened about thirty years +ago, in presence of the dean of the cathedral. There was a doubt, so +it was said, as to the monarch's body having been really buried there. +Curiosity had nothing to do with it, it is to be presumed. Every +over-ground sarcophagus is opened sooner or later, as a matter of +course. It was hard work to get it open; it had to be sawed. They found +a quantity of hay,--fresh herbage, perhaps, when it was laid upon the +royal body four hundred years ago,--and a cross of twigs. A silken mask +was on the face. They raised it and saw his red beard, his features +well preserved, a gap in the front-teeth, which there was probably no +court-dentist to supply,--the same the citizens looked on four centuries +ago + + "In London streets that coronation-day, + When Bolingbroke rode on roan Barbary"; + +then they covered it up to take another nap of a few centuries, +until another dean has an historical doubt,--at last, perhaps, to be +transported by some future Australian Barnum to the Sidney Museum and +exhibited as the mummy of one of English Pharaohs. Look, too, at the +"Warriors' Chapel," in the same cathedral. It is a very beautiful +stereograph, and may be studied for a long time, for it is full of the +most curious monuments. + +Before leaving these English churches and monuments, let us enter, if +but for a moment, the famous Beauchamp Chapel at Warwick. The finest +of the views (323, 324) recalls that of the Black Prince's tomb, as a +triumph of photography. Thus, while the whole effect of the picture is +brilliant and harmonious, we shall find, on taking a lens, that we can +count every individual bead in the chaplet of the monk who is one of the +more conspicuous reliefs on the sarcophagus. The figure of this monk +itself is about half an inch in height, and its face may be completely +hidden by the head of a pin. The whole chapel is a marvel of workmanship +and beauty. The monument of Richard Beauchamp in the centre, with the +frame of brass over the recumbent figure, intended to support the +drapery thrown upon it to protect the statue,--with the mailed shape of +the warrior, his feet in long-pointed shoes resting against the muzzled +bear and the griffin, his hands raised, but not joined,--this monument, +with the tomb of Dudley, Earl of Leicester,--Elizabeth's Leicester, +--and that of the other Dudley, Earl of Warwick,--all enchased in these +sculptured walls and illuminated through that pictured window, where we +can dimly see the outlines of saints and holy maidens,--form a group of +monumental jewels such as only Henry VII.'s Chapel can equal. For these +two pictures (323 and 324) let the poor student pawn his outside-coat, +if he cannot have them otherwise. + +Of abbeys and castles there is no end, ago No. 4, Tintern Abbey, is the +finest, on the whole, we have ever seen. No. 2 is also very perfect and +interesting. In both, the masses of ivy that clothe the ruins are given +with wonderful truth and effect. Some of these views have the advantage +of being very well colored. Warwick Castle (81) is one of the best and +most the interesting of the series of castles; Caernarvon is another +still more striking. + +We may as well break off here as anywhere, so far as England is +concerned. England is one great burial-ground to an American. As islands +are built up out of the shields of insects, so her soil is made the land +of Burns, and see what one man can do to idealize and glorify the common +life about him! Here is a poor "ten-footer", as we should call it, the +cottage William "Burness" built with his own hands, where he carried his +young bride Agnes, and where the boy Robert, his first-born, was given +to the light and air which he made brighter and freer for mankind. Sit +still and do not speak,--but see that your eyes do not grow dim as these +pictures pass before them: The old hawthorn under which Burns sat with +Highland Mary,--a venerable duenna-like tree, with thin arms and sharp +elbows, and scanty _chevelure_ of leaves; the Auld Brig o' Doon (No. +4),--a daring arch that leaps the sweet stream at a bound, more than +half clad in a mantle of ivy, which has crept with its larva-like +feet beyond the key-stone; the Twa Brigs of Ayr, with the beautiful +reflections in the stream that shines under their eyebrow-arches; and +poor little Alloway Kirk, with its fallen roof and high gables. Lift +your hand to your eyes and draw a long breath,--for what words would +come so near to us as these pictured, nay, real, memories of the dead +poet who made a nation of a province, and the hearts of mankind its +tributaries? + +And so we pass to many-towered and turreted and pinnacled Abbotsford, +and to large-windowed Melrose, and to peaceful Dryburgh, where, under a +plain bevelled slab, lies the great Romancer whom Scotland holds only +second in her affections to her great poet. Here in the foreground of +the Melrose Abbey view (436) is a gravestone which looks as if it might +be deciphered with a lens. Let us draw out this inscription from the +black archives of oblivion. Here it is: + + In Memory of + Francis Cornel, late + Labourer in Greenwell, + Who died 11th July, 1827, + aged 89 years. Also + Margaret Betty, his + Spouse, who died 2'd Dec'r, + 1831, aged 89 years. + +This is one charm, as we have said over and over, of the truth-telling +photograph. We who write in great magazines of course float off from the +wreck of our century, on our life-preserving articles, to immortality. +What a delight it is to snatch at the unknown head that shows for an +instant through the wave, and drag it out to personal recognition and +a share in our own sempiternal buoyancy! Go and be photographed on the +edge of Niagara, O unknown aspirant for human remembrance! Do not throw +yourself, O traveller, into Etna, like Empedocles, but be taken by the +camera standing on the edge of the crater! Who is that lady in the +carriage at the door of Burns's cottage? Who is that gentleman in the +shiny hat on the sidewalk in front of the Shakspeare house? Who are +those two fair youths lying dead on a heap of dead at the trench's side +in the cemetery of Melegnano, in that ghastly glass stereograph in our +friend Dr. Bigelow's collection? Some Austrian mother has perhaps seen +her boy's features in one of those still faces. All these seemingly +accidental figures are not like the shapes put in by artists to fill the +blanks in their landscapes, but real breathing persons, or forms that +have but lately been breathing, not found there by chance, but brought +there with a purpose, fulfilling some real human errand, or at least, as +in the last-mentioned picture, waiting to be buried. + +Before quitting the British Islands, it would be pleasant to wander +through the beautiful Vale of Avoca in Ireland, and to look on those +many exquisite landscapes and old ruins and crosses which have been so +admirably rendered in the stereograph. There is the Giant's Causeway, +too,--not in our own collection, but which our friend Mr. Waterston +has transplanted with all its basaltic columns to his Museum of Art in +Chester Square. Those we cannot stop to look at now, nor these many +objects of historical or poetical interest which lie before us on our +own table. Such are the pictures of Croyland Abbey, where they kept that +jolly drinking-horn of "Witlaf, King of the Saxons", which Longfellow +has made famous; Bedd-Gelert, the grave of the faithful hound +immortalized by--nay, who has immortalized--William Spencer; the stone +that marks the spot where William Rufus fell by Tyrrel's shaft; the +Lion's Head in Dove Dale, fit to be compared with our own Old Man of the +Mountain; the "Bowder Stone," or the great boulder of Borrowdale; and +many others over which we love to dream at idle moments. + +When we began these notes of travel, we meant to take our +fellow-voyagers over the continent of Europe, and perhaps to all the +quarters of the globe. We should make a book, instead of an article, if +we attempted it. Let us, instead of this, devote the remaining space to +an enumeration of a few of the most interesting pictures we have met +with, many of which may be easily obtained by those who will take the +trouble we have taken to find them. + +Views of Paris are everywhere to be had, good and cheap. The finest +illuminated or transparent paper view we have ever seen is one of the +Imperial Throne. There is another illuminated view, the Palace of the +Senate, remarkable for the beauty with which it gives the frescoes on +the cupola. We have a most interesting stereograph of the Amphitheatre +of Nismes, with a _bull-fight_ going on in its arena at the time when +the picture was taken. The contrast of the vast Roman structure, with +its massive arched masonry, and the scattered assembly, which seems +almost lost in the spaces once filled by the crowd of spectators who +thronged to the gladiatorial shows, is one of the most striking we have +ever seen. At Quimperlé is a house so like the curious old building +lately removed from Dock Square in Boston, that it is commonly taken for +it at the first view. The Roman tombs at Arles and the quaint streets at +Troyes are the only other French pictures we shall speak of, apart from +the cathedrals to be mentioned. + +Of the views in Switzerland, it may be said that the Glaciers are +perfect, in the glass pictures, at least. Waterfalls are commonly poor: +the water glares and looks like cotton-wool. Staubbach, with the Vale +of Lauterbrunnen, is an exquisite exception. Here are a few signal +specimens of Art. No. 4018, Seelisberg,--unsurpassed by any glass +stereograph we have ever seen, in all the qualities that make a +faultless picture. No. 4119, Mont Blanc from Sta. Rosa,--the finest +view of the mountain for general effect we have met with. No. 4100, +Suspension-Bridge of Fribourg,--very fine, but makes one giddy to look +at it. Three different views of Goldau, where the villages lie buried +under these vast masses of rock, recall the terrible catastrophe of +1806, as if it had happened but yesterday. + +Almost everything from Italy is interesting. The ruins of Rome, the +statues of the Vatican, the great churches, all pass before us but in +a flash, as we are expressed by them on our ideal locomotive. Observe: +next to snow and ice, stone is best rendered in the stereograph. Statues +are given absolutely well, except where there is much foreshortening to +be done, as in this of the Torso, where you see the thigh is unnaturally +lengthened. See the mark on the Dying Gladiator's nose. That is where +Michel Angelo mended it. There is Hawthorne's Marble Faun, (the one +called of Praxiteles,) the Laocoön, the Apollo Belvedere, the Young +Athlete with the Strigil, the Forum, the Cloaca Maxima, the Palace of +the Caesars, the bronze Marcus Aurelius,--those wonders all the world +flocks to see,--the God of Light has multiplied them all for you, and +you have only to give a paltry fee to his servant to own in fee-simple +the best sights that earth has to show. + +But look in at Pisa one moment, not for the Leaning Tower and the other +familiar objects, but for the interior of the Campo Santo, with its +holy earth, its innumerable monuments, and the fading frescoes on its +walls,--see! there are the Three Kings of Andrea Orgagna. And there hang +the broken chains that once, centuries ago, crossed the Arno,--standing +off from the wall, so that it seems as if they might clank, if you +jarred the stereoscope. Tread with us the streets of Pompeii for a +moment: there are the ruts made by the chariots of eighteen hundred +years ago,--it is the same thing as stooping down and looking at the +pavement itself. And here is the amphitheatre out of which the Pompeians +trooped when the ashes began to fall round them from Vesuvius. Behold +the famous gates of the Baptistery at Florence,--but do not overlook the +exquisite iron gates of the railing outside; think of them as you enter +our own Common in Boston from West Street, through those portals which +are fit for the gates of--not paradise. Look at this sugar-temple,--no, +it is of marble, and is the monument of one of the Scalas at Verona. +What a place for ghosts that vast _palazzo_ behind it! Shall we stand in +Venice on the Bridge of Sighs, and then take this stereoscopic gondola +and go through it from St. Mark's to the Arsenal? Not now. We will only +look at the Cathedral,--all the pictures under the arches show in our +glass stereograph,--at the Bronze Horses, the Campanile, the Rialto, +and that glorious old statue of Bartholomew Colleoni,--the very image of +what a partisan leader should be, the broad-shouldered, slender-waisted, +stern-featured old soldier who used to leap into his saddle in full +armor, and whose men would never follow another leader when he died. +Well, but there have been soldiers in Italy since his day. Here are +the encampments of Napoleon's army in the recent campaign. This is the +battle-field of Magenta with its trampled grass and splintered trees, +and the fragments of soldiers' accoutrements lying about. + +And here (leaving our own collection for our friend's before-mentioned) +here is the great trench in the cemetery of Melegnano, and the heap of +dead lying unburied at its edge. Look away, young maiden and tender +child, for this is what war leaves after it. Flung together, like sacks +of grain, some terribly mutilated, some without mark of injury, all +or almost all with a still, calm look on their faces. The two youths, +before referred to, lie in the foreground, so simple-looking, so like +boys who had been overworked and were lying down to sleep, that one can +hardly see the picture for the tears these two fair striplings bring +into the eyes. + +The Pope must bless us before we leave Italy. See, there he stands on +the balcony of St. Peter's, and a vast crowd before him with uncovered +heads as he stretches his arms and pronounces his benediction. + +Before entering Spain we must look at the Circus of Gavarni, a +natural amphitheatre in the Pyrenees. It is the most picturesque of +stereographs, and one of the best. As for the Alhambra, we can show that +in every aspect; and if you do not vote the lions in the court of the +same a set of mechanical h----gs and nursery bugaboos, we have no skill +in entomology. But the Giralda, at Seville, is really a grand tower, +worth looking at. The Seville Boston-folks consider it the linchpin, +at least, of this rolling universe. And what a fountain this is in the +Infanta's garden! what shameful beasts, swine and others, lying about on +their stomachs! the whole surmounted by an unclad gentleman squeezing +another into the convulsions of a galvanized frog! Queer tastes they +have in the Old World. At the Fountain of the Ogre in Berne, the giant, +or large-mouthed private person, upon the top of the column, is eating a +little infant as one eats a radish, and has plenty more,--a whole bunch +of such,--in his hand, or about him. + +A voyage down the Rhine shows us nothing better than St. Goar, (No. +2257,) every house on each bank clean and clear as a crystal. The +Heidelberg views are admirable;--you see a slight streak in the +background of this one: we remember seeing just such a streak from the +castle itself, and being told that it was the Rhine, just visible, afar +off. The man with the geese in the goose-market at Nuremberg gives +stone, iron, and bronze, each in perfection. + +So we come to quaint Holland, where we see windmills, _ponts-levis_, +canals, galiots, houses with gable-ends to the streets and little +mirrors outside the windows, slanted so as to show the frows inside what +is going on. + +We must give up the cathedrals, after all: Santa Maria del Fiore, with +Brunelleschi's dome, which Michel Angelo wouldn't copy and couldn't +beat; Milan, aflame with statues, like a thousand-tapered candelabrum; +Tours, with its embroidered portal, so like the lace of an archbishop's +robe; even Notre Dame of Paris, with its new spire; Rouen, Amiens, +Chartres,--we must give them all up. + +Here we are at Athens, looking at the buttressed Acropolis and the +ruined temples,--the Doric Parthenon, the Ionic Erechtheum, the +Corinthian temple of Jupiter, and the beautiful Caryatides. But see +those steps cut in the natural rock. Up those steps walked the Apostle +Paul, and from that summit, Mars Hill, the Areopagus, he began his noble +address, "Ye men of Athens!" + +The Great Pyramid and the Sphinx! Herodotus saw them a little fresher, +but of unknown antiquity,--far more unknown to him than to us. The +Colossi of the Plain! Mighty monuments of an ancient and proud +civilization standing alone in a desert now. + + My name is Osymandyas, King of Kings; + Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair! + +But nothing equals these vast serene faces of the Pharaohs on the +great rock-temple of Abou Simbel (Ipsambul) (No. 1, F. 307). It Is the +sublimest of stereographs, as the temple of Kardasay, this loveliest of +views on glass, is the most poetical. But here is the crocodile lying in +wait for us on the sandy bank of the Nile, and we must leave Egypt for +Syria. + +Damascus makes but a poor show, with its squalid houses, and glaring +clayed roofs. We always wanted to invest in real estate there in Abraham +Street or Noah Place, or some of its well-established thoroughfares, but +are discouraged since we have had these views of the old town. Baalbec +does better. See the great stones built into the wall there,--the +biggest 64 x 13 x 13! What do you think of that?--a single stone bigger +than both your parlors thrown into one, and this one of three almost +alike, built into a wall as if just because they happened to be lying +round, handy! So, then, we pass on to Bethlehem, looking like a fortress +more than a town, all stone and very little window,--to Nazareth, with +its brick oven-like houses, its tall minaret, its cypresses, and the +black-mouthed, open tombs, with masses of cactus growing at their +edge,--to Jerusalem,--to the Jordan, every drop of whose waters seems +to carry a baptismal blessing,--to the Dead Sea,--and to the Cedars of +Lebanon. Almost everything may have changed in these hallowed places, +except the face of the stream and the lake, and the outlines of hill and +valley. But as we look across the city to the Mount of Olives, we know +that these lines which run in graceful curves along the horizon are the +same that He looked upon as he turned his eyes sadly over Jerusalem. We +know that these long declivities, beyond Nazareth, were pictured in the +eyes of Mary's growing boy just as they are now in ours sitting here by +our own firesides. + +This is no _toy_, which thus carries us into the very presence of all +that is most inspiring to the soul in the scenes which the world's +heroes and martyrs, and more than heroes, more than martyrs, have +hallowed and solemnized by looking upon. It is no toy: it is a divine +gift, placed in our hands nominally by science, really by that +inspiration which is revealing the Almighty through the lips of the +humble students of Nature. Look through it once more before laying it +down, but not at any earthly sight. In these views, taken through the +telescopes of De la Rue of London and of Mr. Rutherford of New York, and +that of the Cambridge Observatory by Mr. Whipple of Boston, we see +the "spotty globe" of the moon with all its mountains and chasms, its +mysterious craters and groove-like valleys. This magnificent stereograph +by Mr. Whipple was taken, the first picture February 7th, the second +April 6th. In this way the change of position gives the solid effect of +the ordinary stereoscopic views, and the sphere rounds itself out so +perfectly to the eye that it seems as if we could grasp it like an +orange. + +If the reader is interested, or like to become interested, in the +subject of sun-sculpture and stereoscopes, he may like to know what the +last two years have taught us as to the particular instruments best +worth owning. We will give a few words to the subject. Of simple +instruments, for looking at one slide at a time, Smith and Beck's is the +most perfect we have seen, but the most expensive. For looking at paper +slides, which are light, an instrument which may be held in the hand +is very convenient. We have had one constructed which is better, as +we think, than any in the shops. Mr. Joseph L. Bates, 129, Washington +Street, has one of them, if any person is curious to see it. In buying +the instruments which hold many slides, we should prefer two that hold +fifty to one that holds a hundred. Becker's small instrument, containing +fifty paper slides, back to back, is the one we like best for these +slides, but the top should be arranged so as to come off,--the first +change we made in our own after procuring it. + +We are allowed to mention the remarkable instrument contrived by our +friend Dr. H.J. Bigelow, for holding fifty glass slides. The spectator +looks in: all is darkness. He turns a crank: the gray dawn of morning +steals over some beautiful scene or the _façade_ of a stately temple. +Still, as he turns, the morning brightens through various tints of rose +and purple, until it reaches the golden richness of high noon. Still +turning, all at once night shuts down upon the picture as at a tropical +sunset, suddenly, without blur or gradual dimness,--the sun of the +picture going down, + + "Not as in Northern climes obscurely bright, + But one unclouded blaze of living light." + +We have not thanked the many friendly dealers in these pictures, who +have sent us heaps and hundreds of stereographs to look over and select +from, only because they are too many to thank. Nor do we place any price +on this advertisement of their most interesting branch of business. But +there are a few stereographs we wish some of them would send us, +with the bill for the same: such as Antwerp and Strasbourg +Cathedrals,--Bologna, with its brick towers,--the Lions of Mycenae, if +they are to be had,--the Walls of Fiesole,--the Golden Candlestick in +the Arch of Titus,--and others which we can mention, if consulted; +some of which we have hunted for a long time in vain. But we write +principally to wake up an interest in a new and inexhaustible source of +pleasure, and only regret that the many pages we have filled can do no +more than hint the infinite resources which the new art has laid open to +us all. + + + + +THE LONDON WORKING-MEN'S COLLEGE. + + +In what is now as near the centre of the Map of London as any house +can properly be said to be is an old-fashioned dwelling-house on +Great-Ormond Street, which is occupied, and densely occupied, by +Frederic Denison Maurice's "Working-Men's College." The house looks, I +suppose, very much as it did in 1784, when Great-Ormond Street bordered +on the country,--when Lord Thurlow, the Chancellor of England, lived in +this house,--when some thieves jumped over his garden-wall, forced +two bars from the kitchen-window, entered a room adjoining the Lord +Chancellor's study, and stole the Great Seal of England, "inclosed in +two bags, one of leather and one of silk." London has grown so much +since, that anything that is stolen from the Working-Men's College +will not be stolen by thieves entering from the fields. I may say, in +passing, that this theft "threw London into consternation"; there being +an impression, that, for want of the Great Seal, all the functions of +the Executive Government must be suspended. The Privy-Council, however, +did not share this impression. They had a new seal made before night; +and though the Government of England has often moved very slowly since, +it has never confessedly stopped, as some Governments nearer home have +done, from that day to this day. + +In view of what is done in Lord Thurlow's old house now, it is worth +while to linger a moment on what it was then and what he was. He was the +Keeper of George III.'s conscience, until he caballed against Mr. Pitt, +and was unceremoniously turned out by him. As Lord High-Chancellor, he +was guardian-in-chief of all the wards in Chancery; and I suppose, for +instance, without looking up the quotation in Boswell, that he was the +particular Lord Chancellor to whom Dr. Johnson said he should like to +intrust the making of all the matches in England. Louis Napoleon has +just now undertaken to make all the friction-matches in France,--but Dr. +Johnson's proposal referred to the matrimonial matches, the _dénouemens_ +of the comedies and tragedies of domestic life. To us Americans, Thurlow +is notable for the strong and uncompromising language which he used +against us all through our Revolution, which excessively delighted the +King. As to his faculty for keeping a conscience, it may be said, that, +though he never married, he resided in this Great-Ormond Street house +with his own mistress and his illegitimate children. Lord Campbell, who +mentions this fact, informs us, that, as early as his own youth, the +British Bench had reached such purity that judges were expected to marry +their mistresses when they were appointed to the Bench. He adds, that +it is long since any such condition as that was necessary. In Thurlow's +time this stage of decency had not been attained even by Lord +Chancellors. His humanity may be indicated by his stiff opposition to +every reform ever proposed in the English criminal law, or in the social +order of the time. He battled the bills for suppressing the slave-trade +with all his might. "I desire of you, my Lords, in your humane +frenzy, to show some humanity to the whites as well as to the +negroes",--illustrating this remark by a picture of the sufferings of an +English trader who had risked thirty thousand pounds on the slave-trade +that year. When an entering wedge was attempted for the improvement of +the bloody code of criminal law, Thurlow opposed it with passion. The +particular clause selected by the reformers was one which demanded that +women who had been connected with any treasonable movements should be +burnt alive. It was proposed to reduce their punishment to the same +scale as men's. Thurlow made it his duty to defend the ancient practice. +He was, in short, mixed up with every effort of his time, which we now +consider disgraceful, for arresting the gradual progress of reform. + +Now that Thurlow's wine-cellar is a college-chapel, that young men study +arithmetic in the room the Great Seal was stolen from, that Mr. Ruskin +teaches water-color drawing in Thurlow's bed-chamber, that Tom Brown, +_alias_ Mr. Hughes, presides over a weekly tea-party in the three-pair +back, and drills the awkward squad of the working-men's battalion in the +garden, it seems worth while to show that at least some places in the +world have improved in eighty years, whether the world itself is to +be given up as a mistake or not. We will let Lord Thurlow go, as Lord +Campbell does, with this charitable wish:--"I have not learned," he +says, "any particulars of his end, but I will hope that it was a +good one. I trust, that, conscious of the approaching change, having +sincerely repented of his violence of temper, of the errors into which +he had been led by worldly ambition, and of the irregularities of his +private life, he had seen the worthlessness of the objects by which he +had been allured; that, having gained the frame of mind which his awful +situation required, he received the consolations of religion; and that, +in charity with mankind, he tenderly bade a long and last adieu to the +relations and friends who surrounded him." There is not an atom of fact +known on which to found Lord Campbell's hope. But I, also, will leave +Lord Thurlow with this charitable wish, and I will now ask the readers +of the "Atlantic," who may be enough interested in social reform and a +mutual education, to see what has happened between his wine-cellar and +ridge-pole since the "London Working-Men's College" was established +there. + +The founder of the Working-Men's College, as I have intimated, is the +Rev. Frederic Denison Maurice, the eminent practical theologian. Its +age is now six years,--as it was founded in the autumn of 1854. He says +himself, in a striking speech he made at Manchester not long since, that +the plan originated in that "awful year 1848, which I shall always look +upon as one of the great epochs in history." He says that "a knot of +men, of different professions, lawyers, doctors, parsons, artists, +chemists, and such like," thought they saw, in the convulsions of 1848, +a handwriting on the wall, sent them by God himself, testifying, "that, +if either rank or wealth or knowledge is not held as a trust for men, if +any one of these things is regarded as a possession of our own, it must +perish." In a real desire, then, to "make their own little education of +use to such persons as had less," and, in so doing, to establish a +vital and effective relation between themselves and the men of the +working-classes below them, they looked round for opportunities to work +in the education of _men_. Anybody who remembers "Amyas Leigh" will +remember how earnestly Charles Kingsley there presses the theory that +most of what we learn as children should be left to be learned by men, +as it was in the days of Queen Bess. I suppose that Maurice's "knot of +parsons and such like" shared that view. At all events, they lectured to +Mechanics' Institutes, and did other such wish-wash work, which is not +good for much, except for the motive it shows; and having found that +out, they were all the more willing to join in arrangements more +definite and profitable. According to Mr. Maurice, the formation of the +People's College in Sheffield started them on the plan of a college, +and determined them, as far as they could, to give consistency to +their dreams by carrying out the plan of an English college in their +arrangements for working-men. + +At this point I must beg the accomplished company of readers to +recollect what an English college is. In its organization, and in much +of its consequent _esprit du corps_, it is as different from an American +college as an Odd-Fellows' lodge is from a country academy. The +difference is also of precisely the same sort. The man or the boy who +connects himself with an English college is, in theory, still the +student of a thousand years ago, who came on foot to Oxford or +Cambridge, because he had heard, in the wilds of Mercia or of Wessex, +that there were some books at those places,--and that some Alfred or +Ethelred or Eldred had given some privileges to students coming there. +When he has arrived, he joins one or other of the societies of students +whom he may find there, just as the Mercian Athelstan may have done. +From the moment that the established society has tested him,--and the +tests are very mild,--he is admitted as a member of a fraternity, +sharing the privileges of that fraternity, and, to a certain extent, its +duties. He is at first a junior member, it is true. Among his duties, +therefore, will be obedience to some of the senior members, and respect +to all. But none the less is he a neophyte member of a corporation which +extends back hundreds of years perhaps,--he is a co-proprietor of its +honors and privileges, is responsible for their preservation, and is, +from the first, inoculated with its _esprit du corps_. + +Now in an American college there is _esprit du corps_ enough, and sense +of college dignity enough. But the student's _esprit du corps_ is one +thing, and the government's is another. The Commons Hall, for instance, +has died out of most of our colleges. Why? Why, because it had ceased to +be a _Commons_ Hall. It was not the place where the junior and senior +members of a college, the pupils and all their instructors, met +together. It was the place where the undergraduates were fed,--and where +a few wretched tutors were fed at their sides. But every member of the +governing body who could possibly escape did so. At our Cambridge, +they even went so far as to set apart a Commons Hall for each class of +undergraduates at last,--for fear men should see each other eat; as at +"Separate Prisons" the idea of communion in worship is carried out by +introducing each prisoner into a state-pew or royal-box whose partitions +are so high that he cannot see his neighbors. This was before they gave +the _coup-de-grace_ to the whole thing, and scattered the members of +their college just as widely as they could at meal-times, as at all +other times. The recitation, again, probably the only occasion when an +American student meets his instructor, is conducted according to an +arrangement by which the instructor meets all of a large section or +class together, meeting them for recitation simply. In a word, the +American college differs from any other American school chiefly in +having larger endowments and older pupils. + +In the English college, on the other hand, before a freshman has +been there three months, he may have established his claim to some +"scholarship," which shall be his post and his "foundation" there +for years. From the very beginning, one or another honor or prize +is proposed to him,--which is the first stepping-stone on a line of +promotion of which the last may be his appointment to the highest +dignities in the University or in the Church. From the beginning, +therefore, he has his duties in the college assigned to him, if he have +earned any right to such honors. Thus, it may be his place to read the +Scripture Lesson at prayers, or to read the Latin grace at the end of +dinner,--the President and Vice-President of his college having done the +same at the beginning. + +These arrangements are not to be confounded with the services rendered +by charity students. We have imitated some of these, which are so sadly +described in "Tom Brown at Oxford." But we have no arrangements which +correspond at all to those of the system which in England brings +graduates and undergraduates to a certain extent into a common life, +mutually interested in the honor and popularity of "Our College." + +When Mr. Maurice and his friends spoke of "a college," they meant to +carry to the utmost these social and mutual views of college life. They +wanted to come into closer connection with the working-men of London, +and formed the Working-Men's College that they might do so. + +They had, therefore, something in mind very different from sitting for +an hour in presence of a dozen students, hearing them recite a lesson, +saying then, "_Ite, missa est_," and departing all, every man to his +own way. They foresaw their difficulties, undoubtedly, and they have +undoubtedly met some which they did not foresee. But they meant to +establish, on paper, if nowhere else, a mutual society,--a society, it +is true, in which those who knew the most should teach those who knew +the least, but still a society where the learners and the teachers met +as members of the same fraternity,--equals so far as the laws of that +society went,--and with certain common interests arising from their +connection with it. + +Not only does the necessity for such an undertaking appear in England +as it does not here, but the difficulty of it is, on a moderate +calculation, ten thousand times greater than it is here. Here, in the +first place, if the "working-man" as a boy has felt any particular fancy +for algebra or Greek or Latin, (and those fancies, in a fast country, +are apt to develop before the boy is eighteen,) he has e'en gone to a +high-school, and, if he wanted, to a "college," where, if he had not the +means himself, some State Scholarship or Education Society has floated +him through, and he has gained his fill of algebra, Latin, or Greek, or +is on the way to do so. Or, if he have not done this,--if the appetite +for these things, or for physical science, historical science, or +political science, has developed itself a little later in life, he has +hoarded up books for a few years, and has made himself meanwhile rather +more necessary to his master than he was before, so that, when he says, +some day, "I think we must arrange so that I can leave the shop earlier +in the afternoon," the master has bowed submiss, and the incipient +chemist, historian, or politician has worked his own sweet will. Or, +thirdly, if he wanted instruction from anybody in the category we first +named, who had tried the high-school and college plan, he had only to go +and ask for it. + +Very likely the man is his brother; at all events, he is somebody's +brother: and there is no difference in their social _status_ which makes +any practical difficulty in their meeting together, man-fashion, to +teach and to learn. But in saying all this, we speak of things which +London understands no more than it does the system of society of the +Chinese Empire. To begin: the thriving Oxford-Street retailer will tell +you very frankly, perhaps, that he had rather his son should not learn +to read, if he could only sign his name without learning. Reason: that +the father has observed that his older son read so much more of bad than +good, that he is left to doubt the benefits conferred by letters. I do +not mean, that, practically, the London tradesman's son does not learn +to read; but I do mean that that process meets this sort of prejudice. +Grant, however, that he does learn to read, and has appetite for more; +grant that he gets well through with A B C, and what follows; grant that +he can read well enough to read the translations from French filth which +his father is afraid of; but grant that his father and his mother, +working with the blessing of his God, have kept him pure enough to steer +clear of that temptation; grant that he becomes one-and-twenty, eager +for algebra, for chemistry, for Latin, or for Greek. What are you going +to do about it then? Then comes in the necessity which Mr. Maurice +wanted to meet,--and there comes in, by the same steps, the exceeding +difficulty of his experiment. + +It is the difficulty of caste. I do not know how many castes there are +in England; but I should think there were about thirty-seven. Any member +of either of these finds it as hard to associate with a member of any +other as a Sudra does to associate with a Brahmin, or a Brahmin with a +Sudra. It is not that people are unwilling to condescend to the castes +below them. At least, it is not that chiefly. It is, quite as much or +more, that, with a good, solid, English pride, they do not care to be +snobbish, and do not choose to put themselves upon people who are above +them. They "know their place," they say. And, for a race which has as +good reason as the English for pride in its ability to stand firm, +to "know one's place" is a great thing to boast of. People who have +travelled on the Continent have been amused to see how zealously Sir +John and Lady Jane and Miss Jeanette talked together at the _table +d'hôte_ for a week, never by accident speaking to Mr. Williams, Mrs. +Williams, and Miss Williamina, who sat next them. This is not inability +to condescend, however. The Ws are as unwilling to speak to the Js. This +difficulty is the same difficulty which Mr. Litchfield describes in an +account of his "Five Years' Teaching at Working-Men's College." "When a +man first comes to our college," he says, "he is apt to walk into his +class-room in the solemn and discreet manner befitting an entry into a +public institution, and generally for a night or two will persist in +regarding his teacher as a severely official personage, whose dignity is +not to be lightly trifled with. Now nothing, I believe, can really be +done, till this notion is extinguished,--till teacher and students have +got to understand each other, and have agreed to banish the foolish +_mauvaise honte_ which makes every Englishman shy of talking to a +fellow-creature. The freer the colloquial intercourse between teacher +and students, the more is learned in the time. To establish this is not +easy; but harder still is the task of setting the students on a familiar +footing with each other. There seems to be _some impassable obstacle to +the fraternization of a dozen Londoners_, though sitting side by side, +week after week, doing the same work." The truth being, that the dozen +Londoners might belong to twelve different castes. And just as in "the +Rifle Movement" the clerks in the Queen's civil service could not serve +in the same battalion with architects' clerks on the one hand, or +students at law on the other,--you may have, in your algebra class, +a goldsmith who is afraid of being snobbish if he speaks to a +map-engraver, or a tailor who does not presume to address an opinion on +Archimedes' square to a piano-forte maker. + +But the Brahmin and the Sudra may both be converted to Christianity. In +that case, though it seems very odd to both, the distinction of caste +goes to the wall. And the "knot of parsons and such like," spoken of +above, having, very fortunately for the world, been born into the +Christian Church, made it, as we have seen, their business to face the +difficulty because of the necessity,--and the Working-Men's College is +the result of their endeavor. Mr. Maurice himself took the first step. +Before the College itself was opened, he undertook a Bible-class. He +invited whoever would to come. He read a portion of the Scriptures, +explained its meaning as he could,--and invited all possible +questioning. He testifies, in the most public way, that he got more good +than he gave in the intercourse which followed. "I have learned more +myself than I have imparted. Again and again the wish has come into my +mind, when I have left those classes, 'Would to God that anything I have +said to them has been as useful to them as what they have said to me has +been to me!'" + +If now the American reader will free his mind from any comparisons +with an American college, and take, instead, his notion of this +"Bible-class," we can give him some conception of what the Working-Men's +College is. For there is not a clergyman in America who has not +conducted such a class, for the benefit of any who would come. And +such classes are considered as mutual classes. Everybody may ask +questions,--everybody may bring in any contribution he can to the +conversation. Very clearly there is no reason why chemistry, algebra, +Latin, or Greek may not be taught from the same motive, in classes +gathered in much the same way, and with a like feeling of cooperation +among those concerned. This is what the Working-Men's College attempts. +The instructors volunteer their services. They go, for the love of +teaching, or to be of use, or to extend their acquaintance among their +fellow-men. The students go, in great measure, doubtless, to learn. But +they are encouraged to feel themselves members of a great coöperation +society. So soon as possible, they are commissioned as teachers +themselves, and are put in a position to take preparatory classes in the +College. A majority of the finance-board consists of students. Let us +now see what is the programme which grows out of such a plan. I have not +at hand the schedule of exercises for the current year. I must therefore +give that which was in force in the autumn of 1859, when by paying +half-a-crown I became a member of the Working-Men's College. As I +make this boast, I must confess that I never took any certificate of +proficiency there, nor was I ever "sent up" for any, even the humblest, +degree. For the Working-Men's College may send up students to the +University of London for degrees. + +Remember, then, that to accommodate London working-hours, all the +classes begin as late as seven o'clock in the evening. There are some +Women's Classes in the afternoon, but they are under a wholly different +management. From seven to ten every evening, Lord Thurlow's house is, so +to speak, in full blast. Mr. Ruskin is the earliest professor. He comes +at seven on Thursday, to teach drawing in landscape from seven till +half-past ten. Work begins on other evenings and in other classes at +half-past seven. Four other teachers of drawing are at work with their +pupils on different evenings of the week. Monday and Thursday are the +Latin days, Monday and Wednesday the Greek,--all taught by graduates of +the Universities. The mathematics are Arithmetic, Algebra, Geometry in +two classes, and Trigonometry. There was a class in Geology the winter I +knew the College,--there had been classes in Botany and Chemistry. There +were also classes in French, in German, in English Grammar, in Logic, +in Political Economy, and in Vocal Music, a class on the Structure and +Functions of the Human Body, and some general lectures or studies in +History. There were also "practice classes," where the students worked +with others more advanced than themselves on the subjects of the several +exercises,--there were preparatory classes, and an adult school to teach +men to read. + +Now this is rather a rambling conspectus of a curriculum of study. But +it teaches, I suppose, first, what the right men would volunteer to +teach,--second, what the working-men wanted to learn. It is pretty +clear, that, if the plan succeeds, it will bring up a body of young men +who will know what is the advantage of a systematic line of study a good +deal better than any of them can be expected to know at the beginning. +Meanwhile here is certainly a very remarkable exhibition of instruction +to any man in London for a price merely nominal. After he has once paid +an entrance-fee,--half-a-crown, as I have said,--he may join any +class in the College whenever he wishes, on the payment of a very +insignificant additional fee. For the drawing-classes this fee is five +shillings. For the courses of one hour a week it is two shillings +sixpence, for those of two hours it is four shillings. The +drawing-classes are a trifle more costly, because the room for drawing +is kept open ready for practice-work every evening in the week. There +is also open for everybody every evening a Library, and the Principal's +Bible-class is open to all comers. + +So much for the instruction side. Now to describe the social side, I +had best perhaps give the detail of one or two of my own visits at the +College. Walk into the front room on the lower floor of any house in +Colonnade Row in Boston, where the entry is on the right of the house, +and you see such a room as the present "Library" was when Lord Thurlow +lived there. Here is the office of the College. Here I found Mr. +Shorter, the Secretary, in a corner, at a little desk piled with +catalogues, circulars, "Working-Men's College Magazines," etc. There +was a coal fire in a grate, [_Mem._ Hot-air furnaces hardly known in +England,] a plain suite of book-shelves on one or more sides of the +room, and a suite of narrow tables for readers running across. There +were, perhaps, a dozen young men sitting there to read. This is +virtually a club-room for the College, and serves just the same +purpose that the reading-room of the Christian Union or the Christian +Association does with us, but that they take no newspapers. [_Mem. 2d_. +If you are in England, you say, "They _take in_ none." In America, the +newspapers take in the subscribers.] + +I told Mr. Shorter that I wanted to learn about the practical working +of the College. He informed me very pleasantly of all that I inquired +about. It proved that they published a monthly magazine, "The +Working-Men's College Magazine," which was devoted to their interests. +The subscription is a trifle, and I took the volume for the year. It +proved, again, that I could become a member of the College by paying +half-a-crown; so I paid, was admitted to the privilege of the +reading-room, and sat down to read up, from the Magazine, as to the +working of the College. It appeared, that, after my initiation, I might +join any class, though it were not at the beginning of the term. So I +boldly proposed to Mr. Shorter that I would join Mr. Ruskin's class. +To tell the whole truth, I thought the experiment would be well worth +making, if I only gained by it a single personal interview with the +Oxford graduate, though I was doubtful about the quality of my impromptu +skies. + + "Says Paddy, 'There's few play + This music,--can you play?'-- + Says I, 'I don't know, for I never did try.'" + +I could at least have said this to the distinguished critic, if I found +that his class was more advanced than I. But it proved that their +session was within quarter of an hour of its end,--and with some +lingering remains of native modesty, I waited for another occasion,--a +morrow which never came,--before putting myself under Mr. Ruskin's +volunteer tuition. But I tell the story to illustrate what might have +been. Had I been legitimately a working-man in London, whatever the +character of my work, I had a right to that privilege. + +The Library proved to be one of those miscellaneous collections, such as +all new establishments have, so long as they rely on the books which +are given to them. I took down a volume of the "Reports of the Social +Association,"--an institution which they have in England now, for the +double purpose of giving an additional chance to philanthropists to +talk, and of saving the world from the Devil by drainage, statistics, +statutes, and machinery generally. But I looked over the edge of the +book a good deal to see who drifted in and out. As different classes +finished their work, one and another member came in,--and a few lingered +to read. The aspect of activity and resolute purpose was the striking +thing about the whole. The men were all young,--seemed at home, and +interested in what they were doing. Half-past nine, or thereabouts, +came, and a bell announced that all instruction was over, and that +evening prayers would close the work of the day. Down-stairs I went, +therefore, with those who stayed, into Lord Thurlow's wine-cellar, +which, as I said, is the chapel. + +The arrangements for this religious service, if I understood the matter +rightly, are in the hands of Mr. Hughes, the well-known biographer +of Tom Brown at Rugby and at Oxford. In an amusing speech about his +connection with the College, Mr. Hughes gives an account of the way his +services as a law professor were gradually dispensed with, and says, +"Being a loose hand, they cast round to see what should be done with +me." Then, he says, they gave him the charge of the common room of the +College,--and that he considers it his business to promote, in whatever +way he can, the "common life," or the communion, we may say, of the +members who belong to different classes. In this view, for instance, in +the tea-room, where there is always tea for any one who wants it, he +presides at a social party weekly;--he had charge, when I was there, of +the drill class, and, I think, at other seasons, conducted the cricket +club, the gymnastics, or had an eye to them. In such a relation as that, +such a man would think of the union in worship as an essential feature +in his plans. And here I am tempted to say, that in a thousand things +in England which seem a hopeful improvement on English lethargy, one +catches sight of Dr. Arnold as being, behind all, the power that is +moving. Hodson, in the East-Indian army, seems so different from anybody +else, that you wonder where he came from, till it proves he was one +of Arnold's boys. Price's Candle-Works, in London, and Spottiswoode's +Printing-House have been before us here, in all our studies for the +Christian oversight of great workshops,--and it turns out that it was +Arnold who started the men who set these successes in order. The Bishop +of London would not thank me for intimating that he gained something +from being Arnold's successor; but I am sure Mr. Hughes would be +pleased to think that Arnold's spirit still lives and works in his +cellar-chapel. + +The chapel is but one of the recitation-rooms,--and, like all the +others, is fitted with the plainest unpainted tables and benches. Two +gentlemen read the lessons and a short form of prayer, prepared, I +think, by Mr. Maurice himself,--and so adapted to the place and the +occasion. Thirty or more of the students were present. + +I dare not say that it was a piece of Working-Men's College +good-fellowship,--but, led either by that or by English hospitality, one +of the gentlemen who officiated, to whom I had introduced myself with +no privilege but that of a "fellow-commoner" at the College, not only +showed me every courtesy there, but afterwards offered me every service +which could facilitate my objects in London. This fact is worth +repeating, because it shows, at least, what is possible in such an +institution. + +After an introduction so cordial, it may well be supposed that I often +looked in on the College of an evening. If I were in that part of the +town when evening came on, I made the Library my club-room, to write a +note or to waste an hour. I am sure, that, had it been in my power, I +should have dropped in often,--so pleasant was it to watch the modest +work of the place, and the energy of the crowded rooms,--and so new +to me the aspects of English life it gave. I felt quite sure that the +College was gaining ground, on the whole. I can easily understand that +some classes drag,--perhaps some studies, which the managers would be +most glad to see successful. But, on the whole, there seems spirit and +energy,--and of course success. + +My travelling companion, Chiron, is fond of twitting me as to the +success of one of the "social meetings" to which I dragged him, +promising to show him something of working-men's life. We arrived too +early. But the Secretary told us that the garden was lighted up for +drill, and that the working-men's battalion was drilling there. It was +under the charge of Sergeant Reed, a medal soldier from the Crimea. At +that time England was in one of her periodical fits of expecting an +invasion. For some reason they will not call on every able-bodied man to +serve in a militia;--I thought because they were afraid to arm all their +people,--though no Englishman so explained it to me. They did, however, +call for volunteers from those classes of society which could afford +to buy uniforms and obtain "practice-grounds three hundred yards in +length." This included, I should say, about eleven of the thirty-seven +castes of English society. It intentionally left out those beneath,--as +it did all Ireland. Mr. Hughes, however, seized on it as an admirable +chance for his College,--its common feeling, its gymnastics,--and many +other "good things," looking down the future. In general, the drills +which were going on all over England were sad things to me. This idea +of staking guineas against _sous_, when the contest with Napoleon did +come,--staking an English judge, for instance, with his rifle, against +some wretched conscript whom Napoleon had been drilling thoroughly, with +his, seemed and seems to me wretched policy. But--if it were to be done +this way--of course the best thing possible was to work as widely as you +could in getting your recruits; and,--if England were too conservative +to say, "We are twenty-eight millions, one-fifth fighting men,"--too +conservative to put rifles or muskets into the hands of those five or +six million fighters,--the next best thing was to rank as many as you +could in your handful of upper-class riflemen. However, I offered my +advice liberally to all comers, and explained that at home I was a +soldier when the Government wanted me,--was registered somewhere,--and +could be marched to San Juan, about which General Harney was vaporing +just then, whenever the authorities chose. So it was that I and Chiron +stood superior to see Sergeant Reed drill thirty-nine working-men. Mr. +Hughes was on the terrace, teaching an awkward squad their facings. + +Sergeant Reed paraded his men,--and wanted one or two more. He came and +asked Mr. Hughes for them,--and he in turn told us very civilly, that, +if "we knew our facings," we might fall in. Alas for the theory of the +_Landsturm!_ Alas for the fame of the Massachusetts militia! Here are +two of the "one hundred and fifty-two thousand eight hundred and fifty +non-commissioned officers, musicians, artificers, and privates" whom +Massachusetts that year registered at Washington,--two soldiers for +whom somebody, somewhere, has two cartridge-boxes, two muskets, two +shoulder-straps, and the rest;--here is an opportunity for them to show +the gentlemen of a foreign service how much better we know our facings +than they theirs,--and, alas, the representative two do not know their +facings at all! We declined the invitation as courteously as it was +offered. Perhaps we thus escaped a prosecution under the Act of 1819, +when we came home,--for having entered the service of a foreign power. +Certainly we avoided the guilt of felony, in England; for it is felony +for an alien to take any station of trust or honor under the Queen,--and +when Mr. Bates and Louis Napoleon were sworn in as special constables on +the Chartists' day, they might both have been tried for felony on the +information of Fergus O'Connor, and sent to some Old Bailey or other. +None the less did we regret our ignorance of the facings, and, after a +few minutes, sadly leave the field of glory. + +My last visit to the Working-Men's College was to attend one of Mr. +Maurice's Sunday-evening classes, and this was the only occasion when I +ever appeared as a student. It was held at nine in the evening,--out of +the way, therefore, of any Church-service. There gathered nearly twenty +young men, who seemed in most instances to be personally strangers to +each other. Mr. Maurice is so far an historical person that I have a +right, I believe, to describe his appearance. He must be about fifty +years old now. He looks as if he had done more than fifty years' worth +of work,--and yet does not look older than that, on the whole. His hair +is growing white; his face shows traces of experience of more sorts +than one, but is very gentle and winning in its expression, both in his +welcome, and in the vivid conversation which is called his lecture. He +sat at a large table, and we gathered around it with our Testaments and +note-books. The subject was the fourth chapter of the Epistle to the +Hebrews,--the conversation turning mostly, of course, on the "rest" +which the people of God enter into. This is not the place for a +report of the exposition, at once completely devout and completely +transcendental, by which this distinguished theologian lighted up this +passage for that cluster of young men. But I may say something of the +manner of one so well known and so widely honored among a "present +posterity" in America, for his works. He read the chapter through,--with +a running commentary at first,--blocking out, as it were, his ground +notion of it. This was the first _ébauche_ of his criticism; but you +felt after its details without quite finding them. In a word, the +impression was precisely the uneasy impression you feel after the first +reading of one of his sermons or lectures,--that there is a very grand +general conception, but that you do not see how it is going to "fay in" +in its respective parts. One of the students intimated some such doubt +regarding some of the opening verses,--and there at once appeared enough +to show how frank was the relation, in that class at least, between the +teacher and the pupils. Then began the real work and the real joy of the +evening. Then on the background he had washed in before he began to put +in his middle-distance, and at last his foreground, and, last of all, +to light up the whole by a set of flashes, which he had reserved, +unconsciously, to the close. He dropped his forehead on his hand, worked +it nervously with his fingers, as if he were resolved that what was +within should serve him, went over the whole chapter in much more detail +a second time, held us all charged with his electricity, so that we +threw in this, that, or another question or difficulty,--till he fell +back yet a third time, and again went through it, weaving the whole +together, and making part illustrate part under the light of the comment +and illumination which it had received before,--and so, when we read +it with him for the fourth and last time, it was no longer a string +of beads,--a set of separate verses,--Jewish, antiquated, and +fragmentary,--but one vivid illustration of the "peace which passeth all +understanding" into which the Christian man may enter. + +With this fortunate illustration and exposition of the worth and work of +the Working-Men's College my connection with it closed. It seems to me a +beautiful monument of the love and energy of its founder. Perhaps we are +all best known through our friends, or, as the proverb says, "by the +company we keep." Let the reader know Mr. Maurice, then, by remembering +that he is the godfather of Tennyson's son,-- + + "Come, when no graver cares annoy, + Godfather, come and see your boy,"-- + +that Charles Kingsley has a Frederic Maurice among his children,--and +that Thomas Hughes has a Maurice also. The last was lost, untimely, from +this world, in bathing in the Thames. The magnetism of such a man has +united the group of workers who have formed the Working-Men's College. +We need not wonder that with such a spirit it succeeds. + + + + +EMANCIPATION IN RUSSIA. + + +Two great nations are peculiarly entitled to be considered modern +in their general character, though each is living under ancient +institutions. They are the _United States_ and _Russia_. Neither of +these nations is a century old, regarded as a power that largely affects +affairs by its action, and into the composition of each there enters a +great variety of elements. The United States may be said to date from +1761, just one hundred years ago, when the American debate began on the +question of granting Writs of Assistance to the revenue-officers of the +crown. The struggle between England and America was then commenced in +the chief court of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay, and the Declaration +of Independence was but the logical conclusion of the argument of James +Otis; but that conclusion would not have established anything, had it +not been confirmed by the inexorable logic of cannon. The last resort of +kings was then on the side of the people, and gave them the victory. +The fifteen years that passed between the time when James Otis spoke +in Boston and the time when John Adams spoke in Philadelphia belong +properly to our national history, and should be so regarded. The +grandson and biographer of John Adams says that Mr. Adams "was attending +the court as a member of the bar, and heard, with enthusiastic +admiration, the argument of Otis, the effect of which was to place him +at the head of that race of orators, statesmen, and patriots, by whose +exertions the Revolution of American Independence was achieved. This +cause was unquestionably the incipient struggle for that independence. +It was to Mr. Adams like the oath of Hamilcar administered to Hannibal. +It is doubtful whether Otis himself, or any person of his auditory, +perceived or imagined the consequences which were to flow from the +principles developed in that argument. For although, in substance, +it was nothing more than the question upon the legality of general +warrants,--a question by which, when afterward raised in England, in +Wilkes's case, Lord Camden himself was taken by surprise, and gave at +first an incorrect decision,--yet, in the hands of James Otis, this +question involved the whole system of the relations of authority and +subjection between the British government and their colonies in America. +It involved the principles of the British Constitution, and the whole +theory of the social compact and the natural rights of mankind." + +In the summer of 1762, about seventeen months after Otis had made his +argument, the existence of modern Russia began. Catharine II. then +commenced her wonderful reign, having dethroned and murdered her +husband, Peter III., the last of the sovereigns of Russia who could make +any pretensions to possession of the blood of the Romanoffs. A minor +German princess, who originally had no more prospect of becoming +Empress-Regnant of Russia than she had of becoming Queen-Regnant of +France, Sophia-Augusta of Anhalt-Zerbst was elevated to the throne of +the Czars on the 9th of July, 1762; and a week later her miserable +husband learned how true was the Italian dogma, that the distance +between the prisons of princes and their graves is but short. Catharine +II. founded a new dynasty in Russia, and gave to that country the +peculiar character which it has ever since borne, and which has enabled +it on more than one occasion to decide the fate of Europe, and therefore +of the world. Important as were the labors of Peter the Great, it does +not appear to admit of a doubt that their force was wellnigh spent when +Peter III. ascended the throne; and his conduct indicated the triumph of +the old Russian party and policy, as the necessary consequence of his +violent feeling in behalf of German influences, ideas, and practices. +The Czarina, like those Romans who became more German than the Germans +themselves, affected to be fanatically Russian in her sentiments and +purposes, and so acquired the power to Europeanize the policy of her +empire. She it was who definitely placed the face of Russia to the West, +and prepared the way for the entrance of Russian armies into Italy and +France, and for the partition of Poland, the ultimate effect of which +promises to be the reunion of that country under the sceptre of the +Czar. It was the seizure of so much of Poland by Russia that fixed the +latter's international character; and it was Catharine II. who destroyed +Poland, and added so much of its territory to the dominions of the +Czars. After the first partition had been effected, it was no longer +in Russia's power to refrain from taking a leading part in European +politics; and when her grandson, in 1814, was on the point of making +war on England, France, and Austria, rather than abandon the new Polish +spoil which he had torn from Napoleon I., he was but carrying out the +great policy of the Great Catharine. If we look into the political +literature of the last century, we shall find that Peter I.'s action +had very little effect in the way of increasing the influence of Russia +abroad. His eccentric conduct caused him to be looked upon as a sort of +royal wild man of the woods, rather than as a great reformer whose aim +it was to elevate his country to an equality with kingdoms that had +become old while Russia was ruled by barbarians of the remote East. He +was "a self-made man" on a throne, and displayed all the oddities and +want of breeding that usually mark the demeanor of persons whose youth +has not had the advantages that proceed from good examples and regular +instruction. Of the courtly graces, and of those accomplishments +which are most valued in courts, he had as many as belong to an +ill-conditioned baboon. A railway-car on a cattle-train does not require +more cleaning, at the end of a long journey, than did a room in a palace +after it had been occupied by Peter and his clever spouse. Some of his +best-authenticated acts could not be paralleled outside of a piggery. +The Prussian court, one hundred and sixty years since, was not a very +nice place, and its members were by no means remarkable for refinement; +but they were shocked by the proceedings of the Czar and the Czarina, +some of which greatly resembled those which are not uncommon in a very +wild "wilderness of monkeys." The last of Peter's descendants who +reigned _and ruled_ was his daughter Elizabeth, who died in 1761, and +who was a most admirable representative of her admirable parents. +Neither the manners nor the morals of the Russian court and the Russian +empire had improved during the twenty years that she governed; and as to +policy in government, she had none, and apparently she was incapable of +comprehending a political principle. Had her reign been followed by that +of some Russian prince of kindred character as well as of kindred blood, +and had that reign extended to twenty years' time, Russia would have +fallen back to the position she had held in 1680, and never could have +become a European power. Fortunately or unfortunately,--who shall as yet +undertake to decide which, considering as well European interests as +Russian interests?--the reign of Peter III. was too short to be worth +historical counting, and Elizabeth's real successor was a foreigner, +who not only was capable of comprehending Peter the Great's ideas and +purpose, but who had the advantage of understanding that world the +civilization and vices of which Peter had sought to engraft on the +Russian stock. The grand barbarian himself never could understand more +than one-half of the work to which he devoted his life, as there was +nothing in his nature to which Occidental thought could firmly fasten +itself. He knew little of that the effects of which he so much admired. +His mind was essentially Oriental in its cast, and the creation of his +Northern capital was a piece of work that might have been done by some +Eastern despot; and in the preceding century something like it had +been done by Shah Jehan, when he created the new city of Delhi. In no +European country could such an undertaking have been attempted. It +pleased Catharine II., in after-days, to say of Peter, that "he +introduced European manners and European costumes amongst a European +people"; but this was only a piece of flattery to her subjects, whom +she did so much to Europeanize by making them believe that they were of +Europe, and were destined to rule that continent. She it was who did +what Peter planned, and by making use of Russians as her agents. Her +statesmen, her generals, and her "favorites" were Russians; and it was +after her character and purposes became known that the rulers of Western +Europe were forced to the conclusion that a change of policy was +inevitable. But for the occurrence of the French Revolution, that +Anglo-French Alliance which has been regarded as one of the prodigies of +our prodigy-creating age would have been anticipated by more than sixty +years. By destroying Poland and humiliating Turkey, Catharine forever +settled the character of the Russian Empire; and her successors were +enabled to solidify her work in consequence of the course which events +took after the overthrow of the old French monarchy. Russian support +was highly bidden for by both those parties in Europe which were headed +respectively by France and by England; and it is difficult to decide +from which Russia most profited in those days, the friendship of England +or the enmity of France. One thing was sufficiently clear,--and that +was, that, when the war had been decided in favor of the reactionists, +Russia was the greatest power in the world. In the autumn of 1815, a +Russian army one hundred and sixty thousand strong was reviewed near +Paris, a spectacle that must have caused the sovereigns and statesmen of +the West to have some doubts as to the wisdom of their course in paying +so very high a price for the overthrow of Napoleon. It was certain that +the genie had broken from his confinement, and that, while he towered to +the skies, his shadow lay upon the world. The hegemony which Russia held +for almost forty years after that date justified the fears which then +were expressed by reflecting men. It only remained to be seen whether +the Russian sovereigns, proceeding in the spirit that had moved Peter +and Catharine, would take those measures by which alone a _Russian +People_ could be formed; and to that end, the abolition of serfdom was +absolutely necessary: the masses of their subjects, the very population +from which their victorious armies were conscribed, being in a certain +sense slaves, a state of things that had no parallel in the condition of +any European country.[A] + +[Footnote A: At what precise time Russia's policy began to influence +the action of the European powers it would not be easy to say. +Unquestionably, Peter I.'s conduct was not without its effect, and his +triumph over Charles XII. makes itself felt even to this day, and it +ever will be felt. "Pultowa's day" was one of the grand field-days of +history. Sweden had obtained a high place in Europe, in consequence of +the grand part she played in the Thirty Years' War, to which contest she +contributed the greatest generals, the ablest statesmen, and the best +soldiers; and the successes of Charles XII. in the first half of his +reign promised to increase the power of that country, which had become +great under the rule and direction of Gustavus Adolphus and Oxenstierna. +This fair promise was lost with the Battle of Pultowa; and a country +that might have successfully resisted Russia, and which, had its +greatness continued, could have protected Poland,--if, indeed, +Poland could have been threatened, had Russia been unsuccessful at +Pultowa,--was thrown into the list of third-rate nations. Poland was +virtually given up to Russia through the defeat of Charles XII., just +as, a century later, she failed of revival through the defeat of +Napoleon I. in his Russian expedition. But the effect of Sweden's defeat +was not fully seen until many years after its occurrence. Prussia became +alarmed at the progress of Russia at an early day. The War of the Polish +Succession was decided by Russian intervention, in 1733. In 1741 Maria +Theresa relied on Russia, and in 1746 Russia and the Empress of Germany +formed a defensive alliance. The _Cotillon_ Coalition of the Seven +Years' War, formed for the destruction of Frederic II., and the parties +to which were the Czarina Elizabeth, Maria Theresa, and Madame de +Pompadour,--a drunkard, a prude, and a harlot,--brought Russia famously +forward in Europe. In the Eighty-Seventh Letter of Goldsmith's _Citizen +of the World_, published a century ago, are some very just and +discriminating remarks on "the folly of the Western parts of Europe in +employing the Russians to fight their battles," which show that their +author was far in advance of his time, and that he foresaw the growth +of Russia in importance before she had seized upon Poland. In Catharine +II.'s time, the Russian Empire was the object of much adulation from +Western envoys, and the English sought to obtain the assistance of +the barbarians in the American War, but with not such success as they +desired, though they managed to keep our envoy from the court, and to +make Russia unfriendly to us. Our diplomatic relations with Russia did +not begin until a generation after the Declaration of Independence.] + +Thus the United States and Russia began their careers at the same time, +as nations destined to have influence in the ordering of Western life. +They were then, as they are now, very unlike to each other. In one +respect only was there any resemblance between them: In this country +there were some myriads of slaves, and in Russia there were many +millions of serfs. Now who, of all the sagacious, far-sighted men then +living, could have ventured to predict that at the end of one hundred +years the American nation that was so soon to be should be engaged in a +civil contest having for its object, on the part of those who began +it, the perpetuation and extension of slavery, while Russia should be +threatened with such a contest because her government, an autocracy, +had abolished serfdom? Many years earlier, Berkeley had predicted that +Time's last and noblest offspring would be the nation that was growing +up in North America; and when he died, in 1753, he would not have +admitted that slavery was an institution which his favorite land could +hug to its bosom, or that America would be less benevolent than that +semi-barbarous empire which was rising in the East,--an empire, to use +his own thought, which Europe was breeding in her decay. Franklin was +then at the height of his fame as a philosopher, and his merits as a +statesman were beginning to be acknowledged; but, wise as he was, he +would have smiled, had there been a prophet capable of telling him the +exact truth as to the future of America. Probably there was not a person +then on earth who could have supposed that that would be which was +written in the Book of Fate. That freedom should come to a people from +a despot's throne was almost as hard to understand as that the rankest +kind of despotism should rise up from among a people the most boastful +of their liberty that ever existed. There are, unhappily, but too many +instances of free nations that have behaved oppressively. The first +African slaves that were brought into the territory of the American +nation came under the flag of a people who had most heroically struggled +for their rights, and the recollection of whose efforts has been revived +by the brilliant labors of the most accomplished of living American +historians. The Greeks, who had so much to say about their own liberty, +believed that they had the right to enslave all other men; and the +Romans, who sometimes talked as if they had a Fourth of July of their +own, assumed that it was in the power of society to enslave any race +whose services its members required. The slaves of free peoples have +generally fared worse than the slaves of men themselves despotically +governed. Thus there is nothing so very strange in the conduct of those +Americans who, concerned for their "right" to trade in black humanity, +and to live on the sweat of black humanity's brows. That which is +strange in the condition of the world is the contrast which is furnished +to the action of our Southern population by the action of the rulers of +Russia. Since American democrats have endeavored to show that no such +contrast exists,--that between the enslavement of black men and the +granting of freedom to white men there is a close resemblance,--and that +the two proceedings are one in fact, how much soever they may differ in +name; that it is not because he is an enemy of slavery, as it is here +understood, that the Czar has become an emancipationist, but because he +is hostile to the slavery of white men,--that, were the Russian serfs as +dark as American slaves, his heart would have remained as hard toward +them as that of Pharaoh toward the Israelites when the plague-pressure +was temporarily removed from his people,--that he would as soon have +thought of washing the Ethiopian white with his own imperial hands as of +conferring freedom upon this race. Such is the theory of those of our +democrats who would still maintain their regard for the Czar and their +worship of Czarism. Alexander has not, they aver, been so bad as the +Abolitionists have drawn him. Like another illustrious personage, he +is not half so black as he is painted. Nay, he is not black at all. He +worships the white theory, and might run for the Montgomery Congress in +South Carolina without any danger of being numbered among the victims +of Lynch-law. Other democrats are not so well disposed toward the Czar, +their feelings respecting him having changed as completely as did those +of certain earlier democrats in regard to Mr. O'Connell, when the great +Irishman denounced slavery in America. It is a sore subject with our +pro-slavery people, this faithlessness of Russia to the cause of human +oppression. How they sympathized with her in the war with the Western +powers, and prophesied the defeat of the Allies in the Crimea, is well +remembered; but when the new Czar announced his purpose to abolish +serfdom, they, as Lord Castlereagh would have said, "turned their backs +upon themselves," and could see no good in the great Northern Empire. +Russia as the great revolution-queller, reading the Riot Act to the +liberals of Europe, and sending one hundred and fifty thousand men to +"crush out" the nationality of Hungary, and to revivify the power of +Austria, was to them an object of reverence; but Russia the liberator of +serfs, and the backer of France in the Italian War, became an object of +hate and fear. Nicholas might have patronized our Secessionists, for he +was partial to rebels who supported his opinions; but his son can +have no sympathy with men whose every act is a condemnation of those +principles which govern his conduct as a Russian ruler,--though in his +bearing toward Poland and others of the conquered portions of his empire +he may prove himself no more lenient than Mr. Jefferson Davis would +toward a Northern State that had declared itself independent of Southern +supremacy, could he "subdue" it. + +It would, however, be most unjust so to speak of Russian serfdom as to +convey the impression that it ever was quite so bad as American slavery +is. It is the peculiarity of American slavery, that it has no redeeming +features. Long before it had become so odious as we see it, and before +its existence was found incompatible with the peaceful prevalence of +a constitutional system of government, its character was emphatically +summed up in a few words by a great man, who called it "the sum of +all villanies." Time has not improved its character, but has made the +institution worse, by extending the effect of its operations. The +political character which American slavery has had ever since the +formation of the Constitution has not only stood in the way of every +emancipation project, but it has made slaveholders, and men who have +sought political preferment through working on the prejudices of +slaveholders, supporters of the institution on grounds that have had no +existence in other countries; and the contest in which this country is +now involved is the natural effect of the more rapid growth of the Free +States in everything that leads to political power in modern times. Had +the Slave States in 1860 been found relatively as strong as they were in +1840, the Secession movement could not have occurred; for most of the +men who lead in it would have preferred to rule the United States, and +would have cared little for the defeat of any political party, confident +as they would have been in their capacity to control all American +parties. As slavery is the foundation of political power in this +country, its friends cannot abandon their ideas without abdicating their +position. Hence the fierceness with which they have put forth, and +advocated with all their strength, opinions that never were held by any +other class of man-owners, and which would have been scouted in Barbary +even in those days when religious animosity added additional venom to +the feelings of the Mussulmans toward their Christian captives, and when +Spain and Italy were Africa's Africa. The slave population of the United +Slates are forbidden to hope. They form a doomed race, the physical +peculiarities of which are forever to keep them out of the list of +the elect. They are slaves, they and their ancestors always have been +slaves, and they and their descendants always must be slaves. Such is +the Southern theory, and the practice under it does that theory no +violence. In Russia the condition of the enslaved has never been so +bad as this, nor anything like it. Between the slave and the serf the +difference has been almost as great as that between the serf and the +free citizen. + +Nothing certain is known as to the origin of Russian serfage. Able men +have found the institution existing in very early times; and other men, +of not less ability, and well acquainted with Russian history, are +confident that it is a modern institution. Count Gurowski, whose +authority on such a point he ought to be a very bold man to question, +says,--"In Russia, slavery dates, with the utmost probability, since the +introduction of the Northmen, originating with prisoners of war, and +being established over conquered tribes of no Slavic descent. This was +done when Rurik and his successors descended the Dwina, the Dnieper, and +established there new dominions. In the course of time, the conquerors +cleared the forests, established villages and cities. As, in other +feudal countries, the tower, the _Schloss_, was outside of the village +or of the borough,--so was In Russia the _dwor_ or manor, where the +conqueror or master dwelt,--and from which was derived his name of +_dworianin_. That the genuine Russian of that time, whatever may have +been his social position, was free in his village, is beyond doubt,--as, +according to old records, the boroughs and villages, dependencies of the +manor, were settled principally with prisoners of war and the conquered +population. It was during the centuries of the Tartar dominion that the +people, the peasantry, became nailed to the soil, and deprived of +the right of freely changing their domicile. Then successively every +peasant, that is, every agriculturist tilling the soil with his own +hands, became enslaved. Only in estates owned by monasteries and +convents, which were very numerous and generally very rich, slavery +being judged to be opposed to Christian doctrine, it did not take +root at once. Generally, monks were reluctant to the utmost, and even +directly opposed to the sale of men in the markets, and the dependants +of a monastery were never sold in such a manner." The common view is, +that Borys Gudenoff, who reigned at the beginning of the seventeenth +century, established serfage age in Russia; but though the exact +character of his legislation is yet in dispute, it is obvious that no +Czar, and least of all one situated as was Borys, could have enslaved a +people. His legislation is involved in as much doubt as for a long time +were the Sempronian Laws of Rome. If we could believe that he instituted +the system of serfage, or seriously strengthened it, we should find that +Russian slavery came into existence but a few years before American +slavery; but such a "coincidence" cannot be rigidly insisted upon. It +would, however, we think, be difficult to show that the condition of +the Russian laboring classes was not made worse by the action of the +usurper. + +Peter the Great was so affected by the circumstance that men and women +and children could be sold like cattle, as American slaves now are, that +he sought to put a stop to the infamous traffic, but without success. +Catharine II. was a philosopher, and a patron of that eighteenth-century +philosophy which so largely favored human rights, and she regretted +the existence of serfage; but, in spite of this regret, and of some +sentimental efforts toward emancipation, she strengthened the system of +slavery under which so great a majority of her subjects lived. She gave +peasants to her "favorites," and to others whom she wished to reward +or to bribe. The brothers Orloff are said to have received forty-five +thousand peasants from her, being in part payment for what was done by +their family in setting up the new Russian dynasty founded by the German +princess. Potemkin received myriads of peasants. Some outrageous abuses +were practised by wealthy landholders, in consequence of the Czarina +having proclaimed that the laborers in Little Russia should belong to +the soil on which they were at that date employed. Thousands of persons +were entrapped into serfdom through a measure which the sovereign had +intended should lessen the evils of that institution. Catharine's +authority was never but once seriously disputed at home, and that was +by the rebellion of Pugatscheff, which is sometimes spoken of as an +outbreak against serfdom, which it was not in any proper sense, though +the abuses of the owners of serfs may have contributed to swell the +ranks of the pretender,--Pugatscheff calling himself Peter III. The Czar +Paul would not allow serfs to be sold apart from the soil to which they +belonged. It is a curious incident, that, when Paul restored Kosciusko +to liberty, he offered to give him a number of Russian peasants. The +Polish patriot had no hesitation in refusing to accept the Emperor's +offer, for which, in these times, there are Americans who think he was a +fool; but in 1797 certain lights had not been vouchsafed to the American +mind, that have since led some of our countrymen to become champions of +the cause of darkness. + +Alexander, whose reign began in 1801, was moved by a sincere desire to +get rid of serfdom. Schnitzler says that he "solemnly declared that he +would not endure the habit of making grants of peasants, a practice +hitherto common with the autocrats, and forbade the announcement in +public papers of the sales of human beings,"--and that "he permitted his +nobles to sell to their serfs, together with their personal liberty, +portions of land, which should thus become the _bona fide_ property of +the serf purchaser. This was a most important act; for Alexander thus +laid the basis of a class of free cultivators." A public man having +requested an estate with its serfs as hereditary possessions, the Czar +replied as follows:--"The peasants of Russia are for the most part +_slaves_. I need not expatiate upon the degradation or the misfortune +of such a condition. Accordingly, I have made a vow not to augment the +number; and to this end I have laid down the principle, that I will not +give away peasants as property." The Czar was determined to go farther +than this. Not only would he not increase the number of the serfs, but +he would lessen their number. The serfs of Esthonia were first favored, +their emancipation beginning in 1802, and being completed in 1816, the +year in which Alexander may be regarded as having been at the height of +his greatness, for he had completed the overthrow of Napoleon, and had +seen France saved from partition through his influence and exertions. +The Courland serfs were emancipated in 1817. Two years later, the nobles +of Livonia formed a plan of emancipation in their country, and when they +submitted it to the Czar, his answer was,--"I am delighted to see that +the nobility of Livonia have fulfilled my expectations. You have set an +example that ought to be imitated. You have acted in the spirit of our +age, and have felt that liberal principles alone can form the basis of +the people's happiness." So long as Alexander remained true to liberal +principles himself, there was some hope that he might abolish serfdom +throughout his dominions. He abhorred the "peculiar institution" of his +empire with all the force of a mind that certainly was generous, and +which had a strong bias in the direction of justice. Once he made a +solemn religious vow that he would abolish it. It is probable that +he would have made an attempt at complete emancipation, if the +circumstances of his time and his country had enabled him to concentrate +his thoughts and his labors upon domestic affairs. Unhappily for Russia, +and for the Czar's fame, he was soon drawn into the European vortex, and +became one of the principal actors in the grand drama of that age, so +that Russian interests were sacrificed to ambition, to the love of +military glory, and to the Czar's desire to become Don Quixote with an +imperial crown and sceptre. He wished to reconstruct the map of Europe, +which had been so terribly deranged by those terrible map-destroyers and +map-makers, the French republicans. Catharine II. had had the sense to +keep out of the war that had been waged against France, though no person +in Europe--not even George III. himself--hated the revolutionists more +intensely. She wished to see them subdued, but she preferred that the +work of subjugation should be done by others, so that she might be at +liberty to pursue her designs against Poland and Turkey and Persia. The +destruction of Poland she completed, but she was called away before she +could conquer the followers of Omar and of Ali. Paul was a party to the +second coalition against France, and his armies tore Italy from its +conquerors, and but for the stupidity of Austria there might have been +a Russian restoration of the Bourbons in 1709. Alexander resumed the +policy which his father had adopted only to discard, and though at one +period of his reign he appeared well inclined to Napoleon, there never +was any sincerity in the alliance between the two masters of so many +millions. The Czar was easily induced to favor the strange scheme of +an Italian adventurer for the rehabilitation of Europe, which had been +adopted by his friend and counsellor, the Prince Czartoryski, and +which ultimately furnished the basis, and many of the details, of that +pacification which was effected in 1815. We have seen the treaties of +that memorable year torn to tatters by Napoleon III., but the adoption +of Piatoli's project by Alexander affected the last generation as +intimately as the French Emperor's conduct has affected the men of +to-day. It led the Czar away from his original purpose, and converted +him, from a benevolent ruler, into a harsh, suspicious, unfeeling +despot. There could be nothing done for Russian serfs while their +sovereign was crusading it for the benefit of the Bourbons in particular +and of legitimacy in general. "God is in heaven, and the Czar is afar +off!" words once common with the suffering serfs, were of peculiar force +when the Czar, who believed himself to be the chosen instrument of +Heaven, was at Paris or Vienna, laboring for the settlement of Europe +according to ideas adopted in the early years of his reign. Napoleonism +and Liberalism were the same thing in the mind of Alexander, and he +finally came to regard serfdom itself as something that should not be +touched. It was a stone in that social edifice which he was determined +to maintain at all hazards. The plan of emancipation had worked well in +the outlying Baltic provinces, where there were few or no Russians, but +he discouraged its application to other portions of his dominions. +Some of his greatest nobles were anxious to take the lead as +emancipationists, but he would not allow them to proceed in the only way +that promised success, and so the bondage system was continued with the +approbation of the Czar. In his last years, Alexander, though still +quite a young man,--he was but forty-eight when he died,--was the most +determined enemy of liberty in Europe or Asia. + +The Emperor Nicholas began his remarkable reign with the desire strong +in his mind to emancipate the serfs,--or, if that be too sweeping +an expression, so to improve their condition as to render their +emancipation by his successors a comparatively easy proceeding. Much of +his legislation shows this, and that he was aware that the time must +come when the serfs could no longer be deprived of their freedom. Such +was the effect of his conduct, however, that all that he did in +behalf of the serfs was attributed to a desire on his part to create +ill-feeling between the nobility and the peasants. Then he was so +thoroughly arbitrary in his disposition, that he often neutralized the +good he did by his manner of doing it. But that which mainly prevented +him from doing much for his people was his determination to maintain the +position which Russia had acquired in Europe, and to maintain it, too, +in the interest of despotism, "pure and simple." A succession of events +caused the Czar's attention to be drawn to foreign affairs. The French +Revolution of 1830, the Polish Revolution of the same year, the troubles +in Germany, the Reform contest in England, the change in the order of +the Spanish succession, the outbreaks in Italy,--these things, and +others of a similar character, all of which were protests against +that European system which Russia had established and still favored, +compelled Nicholas to look abroad, and to neglect, measurably, domestic +government. At a later period, he was one of the parties to that +combination of great powers which threatened France with a renewal of +those invasions from which she had suffered so much in 1814 and 1815. +Turkey was the source of perpetual trouble to the Czar; and his eyes +were frequently drawn to India, where one of his envoys half threatened +an English minister that the troops of their two countries might meet, +and was curtly answered by the minister that he cared not how soon the +interview should begin. The extinction of Cracow served to show how +close was the watch which the Czar kept upon the West, and that he was +ready to crush even the smallest of those countries in which the spirit +of liberty should show itself. Had San Marino lain within his reach, he +would have been induced neither by its weakness nor its age to spare +it. The struggle with the Circassians was long, vexatious, and costly. +Finally, the Revolutions of 1848, leading, as they did, to the invasion +of Hungary, in the first place, and then to the war with the Western +Powers, operated to prejudice the Imperial mind against every form of +freedom, and to provide too much occupation for the Emperor and his +ministers to permit them to labor with care and effect in behalf of the +oppressed serfs at home. It would have been a strange spectacle, had +the man who was trampling down the Hungarians employed his leisure in +raising his own serfs from the dust. + +The Emperor Nicholas died in March, 1855, having lived long enough after +the beginning of that great war which he had so rashly provoked to see +his armies everywhere beaten and his fleets everywhere blockaded, while +the Russian leadership of Europe was struck down at a blow, never to be +resumed, unless there should be a radical change effected in Russian +institutions. Nearly thirty years of the most arrogant rule ever known +to the world came to an end in a moment, because the Emperor took "a +slight cold." A breath of the Northern winter served to stop the breath +of the Emperor of the North. He slept with his fathers, and his +son, Alexander II., reigned in his stead. The new Czar, who has the +reputation of being a much milder man than his father, and to bear +considerable resemblance to his uncle, as that uncle was in his best +days, was soon reported to be an emancipationist; but as the same +reports had prevailed respecting both Alexander I. and Nicholas, the +world gave little heed to what was said on the subject. It was not until +he had reigned for almost two years that something definite was done in +relation to it by the Czar; and then as many obstacles were thrown in +the way of the reform as would have served to disgust any man who had +not been in downright earnest. The Czar then took matters into his own +hands, so far as that was possible, and the work was pushed forward +with considerable speed. There was much discussion, and there were many +disappointments, in the course of the business; but through all the Czar +held to his determination, with a pertinacity that was not expected of +him, and which leaves the impression that his character has not been +properly understood. The history of the undertaking is yet to be +written, but, from what little is known of its details, we should say +that Alexander II. experienced more opposition, and that of an extremely +disagreeable character, from the nobility, than Alexander I. would +have encountered from the nobles of his time, had he resolved upon +emancipation in good faith, and adhered to his resolution, as his nephew +has done. Persons who suppose that a Russian Czar cannot be drowned, +because belonging to that select class who are born to be strangled, +would have it that the question would be settled by an application of +the bowstring, or the sash of some guardsman, to the Imperial throat; +and so a successful palace revolution lead to the postponement of the +plan of emancipation for another quarter of a century. But Russian +morality is of a much higher character than it was, and the members +of the reigning house are models of decorum, and know how to defer to +opinion. The nobles, too, are men of a very different stamp from their +predecessors of 1762 and 1801. The Russian polity is no longer a +despotism tempered by the cord. Fighting the good fight with something +of a Puritanical perseverance, the Czar was enabled to triumph over all +opposition to his preliminary project; and on the 3d of March, (N.S.,) +1861, the "Imperial Manifesto" emancipating the serfs was published. + +In the opening paragraph of this document, the Autocrat declares, that, +on ascending the throne, he took a vow in his innermost heart so to +respond to the mission which was intrusted to him as to surround with +his affection and his Imperial solicitude all his faithful subjects of +every rank and of every condition, from the warrior who nobly bears arms +for the defence of the country to the humble artisan devoted to the +works of industry,--from the official in the career of the high offices +of the State to the laborer whose plough furrows the soil; and then +proceeds to say,--"In considering the various classes and conditions +of which the State is composed, we came to the conviction that the +legislation of the empire, having wisely provided for the organization +of the upper and middle classes, and having defined with precision their +obligations, their rights, and their privileges, has not attained the +same degree of efficiency as regards the peasants attached to the soil, +thus designated because either from ancient laws or from custom they +have been hereditarily subjected to the authority of the proprietors, on +whom it was incumbent at the same time to provide for their welfare. +The rights of the proprietors have been hitherto very extended and very +imperfectly defined by the law, which has been supplied by tradition, +custom, and the good pleasure of the proprietors. In the most favorable +cases this state of things has established patriarchal relations founded +upon a solicitude sincerely equitable and benevolent on the part of +the proprietors, and on an affectionate submission on the part of the +peasants; but in proportion as the simplicity of morals diminished, +as the diversity of the mutual relations became complicated, as the +paternal character of the relations between the proprietors and the +peasants became weakened, and, moreover, as the seigneurial authority +fell sometimes into hands exclusively occupied with their personal +interests, those bonds of mutual good-will slackened, and a wide opening +was made for an arbitrary sway which weighed upon the peasants, was +unfavorable to their welfare, and made them indifferent to all progress +under the conditions of their existence. These facts had already +attracted the notice of our predecessors of glorious memory, and they +had taken measures for improving the condition of the peasants; but +among those measures some were not stringent enough, insomuch as they +remained subordinate to the spontaneous initiative of such proprietors +as showed themselves animated with liberal intentions; and others, +called forth by peculiar circumstances, have been restricted to certain +localities, or simply adopted as an experiment. It was thus that +Alexander I. published the regulation for the free cultivators, and that +the late Emperor Nicholas, our beloved father, promulgated that one +which concerns the peasants bound by contract. ... We thus came to the +conviction that the work of a serious improvement of the condition +of the peasants was a sacred inheritance bequeathed to us by our +ancestors,--a mission which, in the course of events, Divine Providence +called upon us to fulfil." + +It will be observed that the Czar goes no farther back than the +beginning of the reign of his uncle, sixty years since, in speaking of +the measures that have been taken for the improvement of the peasants' +condition; and he names only his father and his uncle as reforming +Emperors, though his language is such as to warrant the belief that +all his ancestors, who had reigned, had been friends of the serf, +and anxious to promote their welfare. But Alexander II. is too well +acquainted with the history of his family to venture to speak of the +actions of either the Great Peter or the Grand Catharine toward the +peasants. Gurowski tells us of the effect of one of Peter's acts in very +plain language. "In 1718," he says, "Peter the Great ordered a general +census to be taken all over the empire. The census officials, most +probably through thoughtlessness or caprice, divided the whole rural +population into two sections: First, the free peasants belonging to the +crown or its domains; and, secondly, all the rest of the peasantry, +the _krestianins_, or serfs living on private estates, were inscribed +_khrepostnoie kholopy_, that is, as chattels. The primitive Slavic +communal organization thus survived only on the royal domain, and there +it exists till the present day. The census of Peter having thus fairly +inaugurated chattelhood, it immediately began to develop itself in all +its turpitude. The masters grew more reckless and cruel; they sold +chattels separately from the lands; they brought them singly into +market, disregarding all family-ties and social bonds. Estates were no +more valued according to the area of land they contained, but according +to the number of their chattels, who were now called souls. In short, +all the worst features of chattelism, as it exists at the present day in +the American Slave States, immediately followed the publication of this +accursed census."[B] The same authority states that Nicholas in reality +was the first Emperor who granted estates excepting therefrom the +resident peasantry. + +[Footnote B: _Slavery in History_, pp. 245, 246.] + +Alexander II., in his Manifesto, expresses his confidence in the +nobility of Russia, which compliment is pronounced ironical, inasmuch as +they did not yield their consent to emancipation until they discovered +that the Czar and the serfs had united to extort it. "It is to the +nobles themselves," says the Czar, "conformably to their own wishes, +that we have reserved the task of drawing up the propositions for the +new organization of the peasants,--propositions which make it incumbent +upon them to limit their rights over the peasants, and to accept the +_onus_ of a reform which could not be accomplished without some material +losses. Our confidence has not been deceived. We have seen the nobles +assembled in committees in the districts, through the medium of their +confidential agents, making the voluntary sacrifice of their rights as +regards the personal servitude of the peasants. These committees, +after having collected the necessary _data_, have formulated their +propositions concerning the new organization of the peasants attached +to the soil in their relations with the proprietors. These propositions +having been found very diverse, as was to be expected from the nature +of the question, they have been compared, collated, and reduced to a +regular system, then rectified and completed in the superior committee +instituted for that purpose; and these new dispositions thus formulated +relative to the peasants and domestics of the proprietors have been +examined in the Council of the Empire." Invoking the Divine assistance, +the Czar says that he is resolved to carry this work into execution. In +virtue of the new dispositions, the peasants attached to the soil are to +be invested with all the rights of free cultivators. The proprietors are +to retain their rights of property in all the land belonging to them, +but they are to grant to the peasants for a fixed regulated rental the +full enjoyment of their _close_, or homestead; and, to assure their +livelihood, and to guaranty the fulfilment of their obligations toward +the Government, the quantity of arable land is fixed, as well as other +rural appurtenances. In return for the enjoyment of these territorial +allotments, the peasants are obligated to acquit the rentals fixed +to the profit of the proprietors; but in this state, which must be a +transitory one, the peasants shall be designated as "temporarily bound." +The peasants are granted the right of purchasing their homesteads, and, +with the consent of the proprietors, they may acquire in full property +the arable lands and other appurtenances which are allotted to them as a +permanent holding. By the acquisition in full property of the quantity +of land fixed the peasants will become free from their obligations +toward the proprietors for land thus purchased, and they will enter +definitively into the condition of free peasants, or landholders. A +transitory state is fixed for the domestics, adapted to their callings, +and to the exigencies of their position. At the close of two years, +they are to receive their full enfranchisement, and some temporary +immunities. "It is according to these fundamental principles," says the +Manifesto, "that the dispositions have been formulated which define +the future organization of the peasants and of the domestics, which +establish the order of the general administration of this class, and +specify in all their details the rights given to the peasants and to +the domestics, as well as the obligations imposed upon them toward the +Government and toward the proprietors. Although these dispositions, +general as well as local, and the special supplementary rules for some +particular localities, for the lands of small proprietors, and for +the peasants who work in the manufactories and establishments of the +proprietors, have been, as far as was possible, adapted to economical +necessities and local customs, nevertheless, to preserve the existing +state where it presents reciprocal advantages, we leave it to the +proprietors to come to amicable terms with the peasants, and to conclude +transactions relative to the extent of the territorial allotment, and to +the amount of rental to be fixed in consequence, observing at the +same time the established rules to guaranty the inviolability of such +agreements." The new organization, however, cannot be immediately put in +execution, in consequence of the inevitable complexity of the changes +which it necessitates. Not less than two years, or thereabout, will be +required to perfect the work; and to avoid all misunderstanding, and to +protect public and private interests during this interval, the existing +system will be maintained up to the moment when a new one shall have +been instituted by the completion of the required preparatory measures. +To this end, the Czar has deemed it advisable,-- + +"1. To establish in each district a special court for the question of +the peasants; it will have to investigate the affairs of the rural +communes established on the land of the lords of the soil. + +"2. To appoint in each district justices of the peace to investigate +on the spot all misunderstandings and disputes which may arise on the +occasion of the introduction of the new regulation, and to form district +assemblies with these justices of the peace. + +"3. To organize in the seigneurial properties communal administrations, +and to this end to leave the rural communes in their actual composition, +and to open in the large villages district administrations (provincial +boards) by uniting the small communes under one of these district +administrations. + +"4. To formulate, verify, and confirm in each rural district or estate +a charter of rules, in which shall be enumerated, on the basis of the +local statute, the amount of land reserved to the peasants in permanent +enjoyment, and the extent of the charges which may be exacted from them +for the benefit of the proprietor, as well for the land as for other +advantages granted by him. + +"5. To put these charters of rules into execution as they are gradually +confirmed in each estate, and to introduce their definitive execution +within the term of two years, dating from the day of publication of the +present manifesto. + +"6. Up to the expiration of this term the peasants and domestics are to +remain in the same obedience towards their proprietors, and to fulfil +their former obligations without scruple. + +"7. The proprietors will continue to watch over the maintenance of order +on their estates, with the right of jurisdiction and of police, until +the organization of the districts and of the district tribunals has been +effected." + +In the concluding portion of the Manifesto, the Czar expresses his +confidence in the nobility, and his belief that they will so labor as to +perfect the great work upon which all parties in Russia are engaged; but +there is something in the language he employs that sounds hollow, as +if he were not altogether so certain of support as he claims to be. He +speaks less like a man stating a fact than like one appealing to the +controllers of powerful interests. He also warns those persons who +have misunderstood the Imperial purpose, "individuals more intent upon +liberty than mindful of the duties which it imposes," and whose conduct +was not beyond reproach when the first news of the great reform became +diffused among the rural population. The serfs are called upon, with +much unction, to appreciate and recognize the considerable sacrifices +which the nobility have made on their behalf. They are expected to +understand that the blessings of an existence supported upon the +basis of guarantied property, as well as a greater liberty in the +administration of their goods, entail upon them, with new duties toward +society and themselves, the obligation of justifying the protecting +designs of the law by a loyal and judicious use of the rights which are +now accorded to them. "For," says the Autocrat, "if men do not labor +themselves to insure their own well-being under the shield of the laws, +the best of those laws cannot guaranty it to them." These are "noble +sentiments"; but the shrewder portion of the serfs will probably attach +more importance to the declaration, that, "to render the transactions +between the proprietors and the peasants more easy, in virtue of which +the latter may acquire in full property their homestead and the land +they occupy, the Government will advance assistance, according to +a special regulation, by means of loans, or a transfer of debts +encumbering an estate." + +Such are the principal details of this great measure, the most important +undertaking of modern days, whether we refer only to the measure itself, +or take its probable consequences into consideration. That forty-five +millions of human beings should be lifted out of the slough of slavery, +and placed in a condition to become _men_, would alone be a proceeding +that ought to take first rank among the illustrations of this age. But +we cannot consider it solely by itself. Every deed that is likely to +influence the life of a nation that is endowed with great vitality and +energy must be considered in connection with its probable consequences. +Russia stands in the fore-front rank of the leading nations of the +world. In the European Pentarchy, she is the superior of Austria, the +controller of Prussia, and the equal of France and England. The growth +of the United States in political power having received a check through +the occurrence of the Secession Rebellion, the relations of the great +empires, which our advance had threatened to disturb in an essential +manner, will probably remain unchanged; and so Russia, unless she should +become internally convulsed, will maintain her place. Assuming that the +work of emancipation is to be peacefully and successfully accomplished, +it would be fair to argue that the power of the Russian Empire will +be incalculably increased through the elevation of the masses of its +population. The Czar is doing for his dominions what Tiberius Gracchus +sought to do for the Roman Republic when he began that course of much +misunderstood agrarian legislation which led to his destruction, and to +the overthrow of the constitutional party in his country. As the Roman +Tribune sought to renew the Roman people, and to substitute a nation of +independent cultivators for those slaves who had already begun to eat +out the heart of the republic, so does the Russian Autocrat seek to +create a nation of freemen to take the place of a nation of serfs. If +the Roman had succeeded, the course of history must have been entirely +changed; and if the Russian shall succeed, we may feel assured that his +success will have prodigious results, though different from what are +expected, perhaps, by the Imperial reformer himself. His motives +of action are probably of that mixed character which governs the +proceedings of most men. Undoubtedly he wishes well to the millions for +whose freedom he has labored and is laboring; but then he would improve +their condition in order that he may become more powerful than ever +were his predecessors. He would rule over men rather than over slaves, +because men make better subjects and better soldiers than slaves ever +could be expected to make. The Russian serf has certainly proved himself +to be possessed of high military qualities in the past, but it admits +of a good deal of doubt whether he is equal to the present military +standard; and Russia cannot safely fall behind her neighbors and +contemporaries in the matter of soldiership. The events of all the wars +in which Russia has been engaged since 1815 prove that her armies +have not kept pace with those of most other countries. The first of +Nicholas's wars with Turkey would have ended in his total defeat, if the +Turks had been able to find a leader of ordinary capacity and average +integrity. The Persian War was successful because Persia is weak, and +she had not the means of making a powerful resistance to her old enemy. +The Poles, in 1831, held the Russians at bay for months, and would have +established their independence but for their own dissensions; and even +then Russia was much assisted by Prussia. The invasion of Hungary was a +military promenade, and the failure of the patriots was owing less to +the ability of Paskevitch than to the treason of Görgei. In the contest +between Russia and the Western powers, (1854-6,) the former was beaten +in every battle; and when she had only the Turks on her hands, in 1853, +her every purpose was foiled, and not one victory did her armies in +Europe win over that people. The world saw that a new breed of men had +taken the places of those soldiers who had been so prominent in the work +of overthrowing Napoleon; and even the heroes of 1812-15 were admitted +to be inferior to _their_ predecessors, the soldiers of Zürich and +Trebbia and Novi. It is the fact, and one upon which military men can +ruminate at their leisure, that the Russian armies showed more real +power and "pluck" a century ago than they have exhibited in any of +the wars of the last sixty years. They fought better at Zorndorf and +Kunersdorf, against the great Frederic, than they did at Austerlitz +and Friedland, against the greater Napoleon, or than we have seen them +fight, at the Alma, and at Inkerman, and at Eupatoria, against Raglan, +and St. Arnaud, and Omar Pacha. There was no falling off in the soldiers +of Suvaroff; but personal character had much to do with his successes, +as he was a man of genius, and the only original soldier that Russia +has ever had; and the men whom he led to victory in Turkey, Poland, +and Italy were trained by officers who had learned their trade of the +warriors who had fought against Frederic. But in the nineteenth Century +the change in the Russian army was perceptible to all men, and in none +could that change have produced more serious feelings than in the +present Czar and his father. Nicholas is supposed to have died of +mortification because his army, the instrument of his power over Europe, +had been cut through by the swords of the West; and Alexander II. +succeeded to a disgraced throne because his troops had proved themselves +unworthy successors of the men of Kulm. Wishing to have better soldiers +than he found in his armies, or than had served his father, Alexander +II. hastened that scheme of emancipation which he had been thinking of, +we may presume, for years, and which, he asserts, is the hereditary +idea of his line. We do not suppose that he is less inclined to rule +despotically than was his father, or that he would be averse to the +recovery of the position which was held by his uncle and his father. We +find not the slightest evidence, in all the proceedings of the Russian +Government, that the _people_ whom the Czar means to create are to +be endowed with political freedom. A more vigorous race of Russians, +morally speaking, is needed, and, except in some parts of the United +States, there are no men to be found capable of arguing that any portion +of the human family is susceptible of improvement through servitude. The +serf is naturally clever, and can "turn his hand" to almost anything. +The inference that freedom would exalt his mind and improve his +condition is one that was logically drawn at St. Petersburg and Moscow, +though they reason differently at Richmond and Montgomery. An army +recruited from slaves could not, in these times, when even bayonets +think and cannon reason much more accurately than they did when Louis +XIV. was a pattern monarch, ever look in the face the intelligent +trained legions of France or England or Germany. A combination of +political circumstances, similar to those of 1840, might give victory to +a grand Russian army, like that laurelless triumph which was then won +in Hungary, when the victors were nothing but the bloodhounds and +gallows-feeders of the House of Austria; but of _military_ glory the +present Russians could hope to have no more. To regain the place they +had held, it was necessary that they should be made personally free. +That they might be the better prepared to enslave others, they were +themselves to be converted into men. The freedom of the individuals +might be the means of supplying soldiers who should equal the fanatics +who followed Suvaroff, or the patriots who followed Kutusoff, or the +avengers who followed the first Alexander to Paris. The experiment, at +all events, was worth trying; and the Czar is trying it on a scale that +most impressively affects both the mind and the imagination of mankind, +who may learn that his works are destined greatly to bear upon their +interests. + +In war, it is not only men that are wanted, and in large numbers, but +money, and in large sums. Always of importance to the military monarch, +money is now the first thing that he must think of and provide, or his +operations will be checked effectually. War is a luxury that no poor +nation or poor king can now long enjoy. It is reserved for wealthy +nations, and for sovereigns who may possess the riches of Solomon +without being endowed with his wisdom. Having impressed so many agents +into its service, and subdued science itself to the condition of a +bondman, war consumes gold almost as rapidly as the searches and labors +of millions can produce it. The only sure, enduring source of wealth +is industry,--industry as enlightened in its modes and processes as +imperfect man will allow to exist. Russia is an empire that abounds with +the means of wealth, rather than with wealth itself. It is a country, or +collection of countries, of which almost anything in the way of +riches may be predicated, should intelligent labor be directed to the +development of its immense and various resources. Russian sovereigns +have frequently sought to do something for the people; but Alexander +II., a wiser man than any of his predecessors, is willing that the +people should do something for themselves, because he knows that all +that they shall gain, each man for himself, will be so much added to the +common stock of the empire. The many must become wealthy, in order that +one, the head of all, may become strong. Time and again has Russia found +her armies paralyzed and her victories barren because she was moneyless; +and but for the gold of foreign nations she must have halted in her +course, and never have become a European power. With a nation of freemen +all this may be, and most probably it will be, changed,--though it is +not so certain that the change will be attended with exactly that +order of results which the Czar may have arranged in his own mind. The +mightiest of monarchs are not exempt from the rule, that, while man +proposes, it is God who disposes the things of this world. Not one of +those reforming kings who broke down the power of the great nobles of +Western Europe, and so created absolute monarchies, appears to have had +any just conception of the business in which he was engaged; but all +were instruments in the hands of that mighty Power which overrules the +ambition of individuals so that it shall promote the welfare of the +world. + +The two years that are set apart for the completion of the plan of +emancipation will be the trial time of Russia. They may expire, and +nothing have been done, and the condition of the peasants be no more +hopeful than it was in those years which followed the "good intentions" +of Alexander I. It is not difficult to see that there are numerous and +powerful disturbing causes to the success of the project. These causes +are of a twofold character. They are to be found in the internal state +of the empire, and in the relations which it holds to foreign +countries. There is still a powerful party in Russia who are opposed to +emancipation, and who, though repulsed for the time, are far from being +disheartened. One-half the nobility are supposed to be enemies of the +Imperial plan, and they will continue to throw every possible obstacle +in the way of its success. There is nothing so pertinacious, so +unrelenting, and so difficult to change, as an aristocratical body. The +best liberals the world has seen have been of aristocratical origin, +or democracy would have made but little advance; but what is true of +individuals is not true of the mass, which is obstinate and unyielding. +There is nothing that men so reluctantly abandon as direct power over +their fellows. The chief of egotists is the slaveholder, unless he +happen to be the wisest and best of men. Man loves his fellow-man--as +a piece of property, as a chattel, above all things. It is a striking +proof of superiority to be able to command men with the certainty of +being as blindly obeyed as was the Roman centurion. The sense of power +that is created by the possession of slaves is sure to render men +arbitrary of disposition and insolent in their conduct. The troubles of +our own country ought to be sufficient to convince every one that there +must be nobles in Russia who would prefer resistance to the Czar to the +elevation of millions whose depression is evidence of the power of the +privileged classes. But for the conviction that the United States could +no longer be ruled in the interest of the slaveholders, the Secession +movement would have been postponed for another generation, and certain +traitors would have gone to their graves with the reputation of having +been honest men. There are Secessionists in Russia, and for the next two +years they may be able to do much to prevent the completion of the work +so well begun by Alexander II. But he appears to be as resolute as they +can be, and even fanatically determined upon having his way. Supported +by one-half the nobles, and by all the serfs, and confident of the +army's loyalty, he ought to be able to triumph over all internal +opposition. What he has already effected has been extorted from a +powerful foe; and that costly step, the first step, having been taken, +the Russian reformers, headed by the Emperor, ought to prove victorious +in so vitally important a contest as that in which they have voluntarily +engaged. + +The greatest danger to the emancipation project proceeds from the side +of foreign countries. As we have seen, both Alexander I. and Nicholas +were led away from the pursuit of a policy that might long since have +converted the Russian serfs into a Russian people, through their desire +to interfere in the affairs of other nations. They could not reform +Russia and crush reformers elsewhere. That they might decide grand +contests in which Russia had no immediate interest, it was necessary +that Russians should remain enslaved. What was it to Russia whether +Bourbons or Bonapartes should reign over France? If she had an interest +in the question, it was rather favorable to the Bonapartes, whom she +overthrew, than to the Bourbons, whom she set up in order that the +French might again overthrow them. The old Bourbons were never friendly +to Russia, and would gladly have headed a coalition to drive her back to +her forests; and the first Bonaparte was very desirous of being on good +terms with the Northern Colossus, as if he were dimly forewarned of his +coming fate at its hands. Led away from the true path, Alexander I. +squandered on foreign affairs the time, the industry, and the money that +should have been devoted to the prosecution of those internal reforms +that were necessary to convert his subjects into men. Nicholas inherited +from his unwise brother that policy which he so vehemently supported, +and which caused him to waste on France and Austria the attention and +the energy which, as a conscientious sovereign, he was bound to bestow +upon Russia. The danger now is that Alexander II. will walk in the same +wrong path that was found to lead only to destruction by his uncle and +his father. The world was never so unsettled as it is now, and wars of +the most extensive character threaten every country that is competent to +put an army into the field. The Italian question is yet to be solved, +and its solution concerns Russia, which is strongly interested in +every movement that threatens to break up the Austrian Empire, or that +promises to create in the Kingdom of Italy a new Mediterranean nation. +The Schleswig-Holstein question is yet to be settled, and Russia has an +immediate interest in its settlement, as Denmark, she expects, will one +day be her own. The Eastern question is as unanswerable as ever it has +been, and it is but a few weeks since the belief was common that Russia +and France were to unite for the purpose of settling it, which could +have meant nothing less than the partition of the Turkish Empire,--the +union of one of the "sick man's" old protectors with his enemy, for the +perfect plundering of his possessions. This arrangement, had it been +completed, would have led to a war between France and Russia, on the one +side, and England and Austria on the other, while half a dozen lesser +nations would have been drawn into the conflict. But if an alliance for +any such purpose was ever thought of by the Autocrat and the Stratocrat, +it is supposed that it fell through in consequence of the occurrence of +troubles in Russian Poland,--the Polish question, after having been kept +entirely out of sight for years, having suddenly forced itself on the +attention of Europe's monarchs, to the no small increase of their +perplexities. Here are four great questions that are intimately +connected with Russia's interests, any one of which, if pressed by +circumstances to a decision, would probably plunge her into a long +and costly war, one of the effects of which would be to postpone the +emancipation of the serfs for many years. No empire could effect an +internal change like that which the Czar has begun, and at the same time +carry on a war that would require immense expenditures and the active +services of a million of men. The Czar is in constant danger of being +"coerced" into a foreign war; and the enemies of emancipation would +throw all their weight on the side of the war faction, even if they +should feel but little interest in the fortunes of either party to +a contest into which Russia might be plunged. Leaving aside all the +questions mentioned but that of Turkey, that alone is ever threatening +to bring Russia into conflict with some of her neighbors. Neither +England nor Austria could allow her to have her will of Turkey, no +matter how excellent an opportunity might be presented by the death of +the Sultan, or some similar event, to strike an effectual blow at that +tottering, doomed empire. So that war ever hangs over the Czar from that +side, unless he should, for the sake of the domestic reform he so much +desiderates, disregard the traditions and abandon the purpose of his +house. Were he to do so, it would be a splendid example of self-denial, +and such as few men who have reigned have ever been capable of affording +either to the admiration or the derision of the world. But could he +safely do it? Then it does not altogether depend either upon the Czar or +upon his subjects whether he or they shall preserve the peace of their +country. Suppose Poland to rise,--and she has been becoming very wakeful +of late,--then war would be forced upon Russia; and that war might be +extended over most of Continental Europe. A Polish war could hardly +fail to draw Prussia and Austria into it, they being almost as much +interested in the maintenance of the partition as Russia; and France +could scarcely be kept out of such a contest, she having been the patron +of Poland ever since the partition was effected. + +Considering the matter in its various bearings, and noting how +inflammable is the condition of the world, and observing that a Russian +war would be fatal to emancipation, we can but say, that the freedom of +the serfs is something that may be hoped for, but which we should not +speak of as assured. Alexander II. wishes to complete his work, but he +is only an instrument in the hands of Fate, and things may so fall +out as to cover the present fair prospect with those clouds and +that darkness in which have been forever enveloped some of the best +undertakings for the promotion of man's welfare. We may hope and pray +for a good ending to the reform that has been commenced, but it is not +without fear and trembling that we do so. + + * * * * * + + +THE HAUNTED SHANTY. + + +As the principal personage of this story is dead, and there is no +likelihood that any of the others will ever see the "Atlantic Monthly," +I feel free to tell it without reservation. + +The mercantile house of which I was until recently an active member +had many business connections throughout the Western States, and I was +therefore in the habit of making an annual journey through them, in the +interest of the firm. In fact, I was always glad to escape from the dirt +and hubbub of Cortland Street, and to exchange the smell of goods and +boxes, cellars and gutters, for that of prairie grass and even of +prairie mud. Although wearing the immaculate linen and golden studs of +the city Valentine, there still remained a good deal of the country +Orson in my blood, and I endured many hard, repulsive, yea, downright +vulgar experiences for the sake of a run at large, and the healthy +animal exaltation which accompanied it. + +Eight or nine years ago, (it is, perhaps, as well not to be very +precise, as yet, with regard to dates,) I found myself at Peoria, in +Illinois, rather late in the season. The business I had on hand was +mostly transacted; but it was still necessary that I should visit +Bloomington and Terre Haute before returning to the East. I had come +from Wisconsin and Northern Illinois, and, as the great railroad spider +of Chicago had then spun but a few threads of his present tremendous +mesh, I had made the greater part of my journey on horseback. By the +time I reached Peoria the month of November was well advanced, and the +weather had become very disagreeable. I was strongly tempted to sell my +horse and take the stage to Bloomington, but the roads were even worse +to a traveller on wheels than to one in the saddle, and the sunny day +which followed my arrival flattered me with the hope that others as fair +might succeed it. + +The distance to Bloomington was forty miles, and the road none of the +best; yet, as my horse "Peck" (an abbreviation of "Pecatonica") had had +two days' rest, I did not leave Peoria until after the usual dinner at +twelve o'clock, trusting that I should reach my destination by eight or +nine in the evening, at the latest. Broad bands of dull, gray, felt-like +clouds crossed the sky, and the wind had a rough edge to it which +predicted that there was rain within a day's march. + +The oaks along the rounded river-bluffs still held on to their leaves, +although the latter were entirely brown and dead, and rattled around me +with an ominous sound, as I climbed to the level of the prairie, leaving +the bed of the muddy Illinois below. Peck's hoofs sank deeply into the +unctuous black soil, which resembled a jetty tallow rather than earth, +and his progress was slow and toilsome. The sky became more and more +obscured: the sun faded to a ghastly moon, then to a white blotch in the +gray vault, and finally retired in disgust. Indeed, there was nothing in +the landscape worth his contemplation. Dead flats of black, bristling +with short corn-stalks, flats of brown grass, a brown belt of low woods +in the distance,--that was all the horizon inclosed: no embossed bowl, +with its rim of sculptured hills, its round of colored pictures, but a +flat earthen pie-dish, over which the sky fell like a pewter cover. + +After riding for an hour or two over the desolate level, I descended +through rattling oaks to the bed of a stream, and then ascended through +rattling oaks to the prairie beyond. Here, however, I took the wrong +road, and found myself, some three miles farther, at a farm-house, where +it terminated. "You kin go out over the perairah yander," said the +farmer, dropping his maul beside a rail he had just split off,--"there's +a plain trail from Sykes's that'll bring you onto the road not fur from +Sugar Crick." With which knowledge I plucked up heart and rode on. + +What with the windings and turnings of the various cart-tracks, the +family resemblance in the groves of oak and hickory, and the heavy, +uniform gray of the sky, I presently lost my compass-needle,--that +natural instinct of direction, on which I had learned to rely. East, +west, north, south,--all were alike, and the very doubt paralyzed the +faculty. The growing darkness of the sky, the _watery_ moaning of +the wind, betokened night and storm; but I pressed on, hap-hazard, +determined, at least, to reach one of the incipient villages on the +Bloomington road. + +After an hour more, I found myself on the brink of another winding +hollow, threaded by a broad, shallow stream. On the opposite side, a +quarter of a mile above, stood a rough shanty, at the foot of the rise +which led to the prairie. After fording the stream, however, I found +that the trail I had followed continued forward in the same direction, +leaving this rude settlement on the left. On the opposite side of the +hollow, the prairie again stretched before me, dark and flat, and +destitute of any sign of habitation. I could scarcely distinguish the +trail any longer; in half an hour, I knew, I should be swallowed up in a +gulf of impenetrable darkness; and there was evidently no choice left +me but to return to the lonely shanty, and there seek shelter for the +night. + +To be thwarted in one's plans, even by wind or weather, is always +vexatious; but in this case, the prospect of spending a night in such +a dismal corner of the world was especially disagreeable. I am--or at +least I consider myself--a thoroughly matter-of-fact man, and my first +thought, I am not ashamed to confess, was of oysters. Visions of a +favorite saloon, and many a pleasant supper with Dunham and Beeson, (my +partners,) all at once popped into my mind, as I turned back over the +brow of the hollow and urged Peck down its rough slope. "Well," thought +I, at last, "this will be one more story for our next meeting. Who knows +what originals I may not find, even in a solitary settler's shanty?" + +I could discover no trail, and the darkness thickened rapidly while I +picked my way across dry gullies, formed by the drainage of the prairie +above, rotten tree-trunks, stumps, and spots of thicket. As I approached +the shanty, a faint gleam through one of its two small windows showed +that it was inhabited. In the rear, a space of a quarter of an acre, +inclosed by a huge worm-fence, was evidently the vegetable patch, at one +corner of which a small stable, roofed and buttressed with corn-fodder, +leaned against the hill. I drew rein in front of the building, and was +about to hail its inmates, when I observed the figure of a man issue +from the stable. Even in the gloom, there was something forlorn and +dispiriting in his walk. He approached with a slow, dragging step, +apparently unaware of my presence. + +"Good evening, friend!" I said. + +He stopped, stood still for half a minute, and finally responded,-- + +"Who air you?" + +The tone of his voice, querulous and lamenting, rather implied, "Why +don't you let me alone?" + +"I am a traveller," I answered, "bound from Peoria to Bloomington, and +have lost my way. It is dark, as you know, and likely to rain, and I +don't see how I can get any farther to-night." + +Another pause. Then he said, slowly, as if speaking to himself,-- + +"There a'n't no other place nearer 'n four or five mile." + +"Then I hope you will let me stay here." + +The answer, to my surprise, was a deep sigh. + +"I am used to roughing it," I urged; "and besides, I will pay for any +trouble I may give you." + +"It a'n't _that_," said he; then added, hesitatingly,--"fact is, we're +lonesome people here,--don't often see strangers; yit I s'pose you can't +go no furder;--well, I'll talk to my wife." + +Therewith he entered the shanty, leaving me a little disconcerted with +so uncertain, not to say suspicious, a reception. I heard the sound of +voices--one of them unmistakable in its nasal shrillness--in what seemed +to be a harsh debate, and distinguished the words, "I didn't bring +it on," followed with, "Tell him, then, if you like, and let him +stay,"--which seemed to settle the matter. The door presently opened, +and the man said,-- + +"I guess we'll have t' accommodate you. Give me your things, an' then +I'll put your horse up." + +I unstrapped my valise, took off the saddle, and, having seen Peck to +his fodder-tent, where I left him with some ears of corn in an +old basket, returned to the shanty. It was a rude specimen of the +article,--a single room of some thirty by fifteen feet, with a large +fireplace of sticks and clay at one end, while a half-partition of +unplaned planks set on end formed a sort of recess for the bed at the +other. A good fire on the hearth, however, made it seem tolerably +cheerful, contrasted with the dismal gloom outside. The furniture +consisted of a table, two or three chairs, a broad bench, and a +kitchen-dresser of boards. Some golden ears of seed-corn, a few sides of +bacon, and ropes of onions hung from the rafters. + +A woman in a blue calico gown, with a tin coffee-pot in one hand and a +stick in the other, was raking out the red coals from under the burning +logs. At my salutation, she partly turned, looked hard at me, nodded, +and muttered some inaudible words. Then, having levelled the +coals properly, she put down the coffee-pot, and, facing about, +exclaimed,--"Jimmy, git off that cheer!" + +Though this phrase, short and snappish enough, was not worded as an +invitation for me to sit down, I accepted it as such, and took the chair +which a lean boy of some nine or ten years old had hurriedly vacated. +In such cases, I had learned by experience, it is not best to be too +forward: wait quietly, and allow the unwilling hosts time to get +accustomed to your presence. I inspected the family for a while, in +silence. The spare, bony form of the woman, her deep-set gray eyes, +and the long, thin nose, which seemed to be merely a scabbard for her +sharp-edged voice, gave me her character at the first glance. As for the +man, he was worn by some constant fret or worry, rather than naturally +spare. His complexion was sallow, his face honest, every line of it, +though the expression was dejected, and there was a helpless patience +in his voice and movements, which I have often seen in women, but never +before in a man. "Henpecked in the first degree," was the verdict I +gave, without leaving my seat. The silence, shyness, and puny appearance +of the boy might be accounted for by the loneliness of his life, and +the usual "shakes"; but there was a wild, frightened look in his eye, a +nervous restlessness about his limbs, which excited my curiosity. I +am no believer in those freaks of fancy called "presentiments," but I +certainly felt that there was something unpleasant, perhaps painful, in +the private relations of the family. + +Meanwhile, the supper gradually took shape. The coffee was boiled, (far +too much, for my taste,) bacon fried, potatoes roasted, and certain +lumps of dough transformed into farinaceous grape-shot, called +"biscuits." Dishes of blue queensware, knives and forks, cups and +saucers of various patterns, and a bowl of molasses were placed upon the +table; and finally the woman said, speaking to, though not looking at, +me,-- + +"I s'pose you ha'n't had your supper." + +I accepted the invitation with a simple "No," and ate enough of the rude +fare (for I was really hungry) to satisfy my hosts that I was not proud. +I attempted no conversation, knowing that such people never talk when +they eat, until the meal was over, and the man, who gladly took one of +my cigars, was seated comfortably before the fire. I then related my +story, told my name and business, and by degrees established a mild flow +of conversation. The woman, as she washed the dishes and cleared up +things for the night, listened to us, and now and then made a remark +to the coffee-pot or frying-pan, evidently intended for our ears. Some +things which she said must have had a meaning hidden from me, for I +could see that the man winced, and at last he ventured to say,-- + +"Mary Ann, what's the use in talkin' about it?" + +"Do as you like," she snapped back; "only I a'n't a-goin' to be blamed +for _your_ doin's. The stranger'll find out, soon enough." + +"You find this life rather lonely, I should think," I remarked, with a +view of giving the conversation a different turn. + +"Lonely!" she repeated, jerking out a fragment of malicious laughter. +"It's lonely enough in the daytime, Goodness knows; but you'll have your +fill o' company afore mornin'." + +With that, she threw a defiant glance at her husband. + +"Fact is," said he, shrinking from her eye, "we're sort o' troubled +with noises at night. P'raps you'll be skeered, but it's no more 'n +noise,--onpleasant, but never hurts nothin'." + +"You don't mean to say this shanty is haunted?" I asked. + +"Well,--yes: some folks 'd call it so. There _is_ noises an' things +goin' on, but you can't see nobody." + +"Oh, if that is all," said I, "you need not be concerned on my account. +Nothing is so strange, but the cause of it can be discovered." + +Again the man heaved a deep sigh. The woman said, in rather a milder +tone,-- + +"What's the good o' knowin' what makes it, when you can't stop it?" + +As I was neither sleepy nor fatigued, this information was rather +welcome than otherwise. I had full confidence in my own courage; and if +anything _should_ happen, it would make a capital story for my first +New-York supper. I saw there was but one bed, and a small straw mattress +on the floor beside it for the boy, and therefore declared that I should +sleep on the bench, wrapped in my cloak. Neither objected to this, and +they presently retired. I determined, however, to keep awake as long as +possible. I threw a fresh log on the fire, lit another cigar, made a few +entries in my note-book, and finally took the "Iron Mask" of Dumas from +my valise, and tried to read by the wavering flashes of the fire. + +In this manner another hour passed away. The deep breathing--not to say +snoring--from the recess indicated that my hosts were sound asleep, and +the monotonous whistle of the wind around the shanty began to exercise a +lulling influence on my own senses. Wrapping myself in my cloak, with my +valise for a pillow, I stretched myself out on the bench, and strove to +keep my mind occupied with conjectures concerning the sleeping family. +Furthermore, I recalled all the stories of ghosts and haunted houses +which I had ever heard, constructed explanations for such as were still +unsolved, and, so far from feeling any alarm, desired nothing so much as +that the supernatural performances might commence. + +My thoughts, however, became gradually less and less coherent, and I +was just sliding over the verge of slumber, when a faint sound in the +distance caught my ear. I listened intently: certainly there _was_ a +far-off, indistinct sound, different from the dull, continuous sweep +of the wind. I rose on the bench, fully awake, yet not excited, for my +first thought was that other travellers might be lost or belated. By +this time the sound was quite distinct, and, to my great surprise, +appeared to proceed from a drum, rapidly beaten. I looked at my watch: +it was half-past ten. Who could be out on the lonely prairie with +a drum, at that time of night? There must have been some military +festival, some political caucus, some celebration of the Sons of Malta, +or jubilation of the Society of the Thousand and One, and a few of the +scattered members were enlivening their dark ride homewards. While I was +busy with these conjectures, the sound advanced nearer and nearer,--and, +what was very singular, without the least pause or variation,--one +steady, regular roll, ringing deep and clear through the night. + +The shanty stood at a point where the stream, leaving its general +southwestern course, bent at a sharp angle to the southeast, and faced +very nearly in the latter direction. As the sound of the drum came from +the east, it seemed the more probable that it was caused by some person +on the road which crossed the creek a quarter of a mile below. Yet, on +approaching nearer, it made directly for the shanty, moving, evidently, +much more rapidly than a person could walk. It then flashed upon my mind +that _this_ was the noise I was to hear, _this_ the company I was to +expect! Louder and louder, deep, strong, and reverberating, rolling +as if for a battle-charge, it came on: it was now but a hundred +yards distant,--now but fifty,--ten,--just outside the rough +clapboard-wall,--but, while I had half risen to open the door, it passed +directly through the wall and sounded at my very ears, inside the +shanty! + +The logs burned brightly on the hearth: every object in the room could +be seen more or less distinctly: nothing was out of its place, nothing +disturbed, yet the rafters almost shook under the roll of an invisible +drum, beaten by invisible hands! The sleepers tossed restlessly, and a +deep groan, as if in semi-dream, came from the man. Utterly confounded +as I was, my sensations were not those of terror. Each moment I doubted +my senses, and each moment the terrific sound convinced me anew. I do +not know how long I sat thus in sheer, stupid amazement. It may have +been one minute, or fifteen, before the drum, passing over my head, +through the boards again, commenced a slow march around the shanty. When +it had finished the first, and was about commencing the second round, I +shook off my stupor, and determined to probe the mystery. Opening the +door, I advanced in an opposite direction to meet it. Again the sound +passed close beside my head, but I could see nothing, touch nothing. +Again it entered the shanty, and I followed. I stirred up the fire, +casting a strong illumination into the darkest corners; I thrust my hand +into the very heart of the sound, I struck through it in all directions +with a stick,--still I saw nothing, touched nothing. + +Of course, I do not expect to be believed by half my readers,--nor can +I blame them for their incredulity. So astounding is the circumstance, +even yet, to myself, that I should doubt its reality, were it not +therefore necessary, for the same reason, to doubt every event of my +life. + +At length the sound moved away in the direction whence it came, becoming +gradually fainter and fainter until it died in the distance. But +immediately afterwards, from the same quarter, came a thin, sharp blast +of wind,--or what seemed to be such. If one could imagine a swift, +intense stream of air, no thicker than a telegraph-wire, producing a +keen, whistling rush in its passage, he would understand the impression +made upon my mind. This wind, or sound, or whatever it was, seemed to +strike an invisible target in the centre of the room, and thereupon +ensued a new and worse confusion. Sounds as of huge planks lifted at +one end and then allowed to fall, slamming upon the floor, hard, wooden +claps, crashes, and noises of splitting and snapping, filled the shanty. +The rough boards of the floor jarred and trembled, and the table and +chairs were jolted off their feet. Instinctively, I jerked away my legs, +whenever the invisible planks fell too near them. + +It never came into my mind to charge the family with being the authors +of these phenomena: their care and distress were too evident. There was +certainly no other human being but myself in or near the shanty. +My senses of sight and touch availed me nothing, and I confined my +attention, at last, to simply noting the manifestations, without +attempting to explain them. I began to experience a feeling, not of +terror, but of disturbing uncertainty. The solid ground was taken from +beneath my feet. + +Still the man and his wife groaned and muttered, as if in a nightmare +sleep, and the boy tossed restlessly on his low bed. I would not disturb +them, since, by their own confession, they were accustomed to the +visitation. Besides, it would not assist me, and, so long as there was +no danger of personal injury, I preferred to watch alone. I recalled, +however, the woman's remarks, remembering the mysterious blame she had +thrown upon her husband, and felt certain that she had adopted some +explanation of the noises, at his expense. + +As the confusion continued, with more or less violence, sometimes +pausing for a few minutes, to begin again with renewed force, I felt an +increasing impression of somebody else being present. Outside the shanty +this feeling ceased, but every time I opened the door I fully expected +to see some one standing in the centre of the room. Yet, looking through +the little windows, when the noises were at their loudest, I could +discover nothing. Two hours had passed away since I first heard the +drum-beat, and I found myself at last completely wearied with my +fruitless exertions and the unusual excitement. By this time the +disturbances had become faint, with more frequent pauses. All at once, +I heard a long, weary sigh, so near me that it could not have proceeded +from the sleepers. A weak moan, expressive of utter wretchedness, +followed, and then came the words, in a woman's voice,--came I know not +whence, for they seemed to be uttered close beside me, and yet far, far +away,--"How great is my trouble! How long shall I suffer? I was married, +in the sight of God, to Eber Nicholson. Have mercy, O Lord, and give him +to me, or release me from him!" + +These were the words, not spoken, but rather moaned forth in a slow, +monotonous wail of utter helplessness and broken-heartedness. I have +heard human grief expressed in many forms, but I never heard or imagined +anything so desolate, so surcharged with the despair of an eternal woe. +It was, indeed, too hopeless for sympathy. It was the utterance of a +sorrow which removed its possessor into some dark, lonely world girdled +with iron walls, against which every throb of a helping or consoling +heart would beat in vain for admittance. So far from being moved or +softened, the words left upon me an impression of stolid apathy. When +they had ceased, I heard another sigh,--and some time afterwards, +far-off, retreating forlornly through the eastern darkness, the wailing +repetition,--"I was married, in the sight of God, to Eber Nicholson. +Have mercy, O Lord!" + +This was the last of those midnight marvels. Nothing further disturbed +the night except the steady sound of the wind. The more I thought of +what I had heard, the more I was convinced that the phenomena were +connected, in some way, with the history of my host. I had heard his +wife call him "Ebe," and did not doubt that he was the Eber Nicholson +who, for some mysterious crime, was haunted by the reproachful ghost. +Could murder, or worse than murder, lurk behind these visitations? It +was useless to conjecture; yet, before giving myself up to sleep, I +determined to know everything that could be known, before leaving the +shanty. + +My rest was disturbed: my hip-bones pressed unpleasantly on the hard +bench; and every now and then I awoke with a start, hearing the +same despairing voice in my dreams. The place was always quiet, +nevertheless,--the disturbances having ceased, as nearly as I could +judge, about one o'clock in the morning. Finally, from sheer weariness, +I fell into a deep slumber, which lasted until daylight. The sound of +pans and kettles aroused me. The woman, in her lank blue gown, was +bending over the fire; the man and boy had already gone out. As I rose, +rubbing my eyes and shaking myself, to find out exactly where and who +I was, the woman straightened herself and looked at me with a keen, +questioning gaze, but said nothing. + +"I must have been very sound asleep," said I. + +"There's no sound sleepin' here. Don't tell me that." + +"Well," I answered, "your shanty is rather noisy; but, as I'm neither +scared nor hurt, there's no harm done. But have you never found out what +occasions the noise?" + +Her reply was a toss of the head and a peculiar snorting interjection, +"Hngh!" (impossible to be represented by letters,) "it's all _her_ +doin'." + +"But who is _she_?" + +"You'd better ask _him_." + +Seeing there was nothing to be got out of her, I went down to the +stream, washed my face, dried it with my pocket-handkerchief, and then +looked after Peck. He gave a shrill whinny of recognition, and, I +thought, seemed to be a little restless. A fresh feed of corn was in the +old basket, and presently the man came into the stable with a bunch of +hay, and commenced rubbing off the marks of Peck's oozy couch which were +left on his flanks. As we went back to the shanty I noticed that he +eyed me furtively, without daring to look me full in the face. As I was +apparently none the worse for the night's experiences, he rallied at +last, and ventured to talk _at_, as well as to, me. + +By this time, breakfast, which was a repetition of supper, was ready, +and we sat down to the table. During the meal, it occurred to me to make +an experimental remark. Turning suddenly to the man, I asked,-- + +"Is your name Eber Nicholson?" + +"There!" exclaimed the woman, "I knowed he'd heerd it!" + +He, however, flushing a moment, and then becoming move sallow than ever, +nodded first, and then--as if that were not sufficient--added, "Yes, +that's my name." + +"Where did you move from?" I continued, falling back on the first plan I +had formed in my mind. + +"The Western Reserve, not fur from Hudson." + +I turned the conversation on the comparative advantages of Ohio and +Illinois, on farming, the price of land, etc., carefully avoiding the +dangerous subject, and by the time breakfast was over had arranged, +that, for a consideration, he should accompany me as far as the +Bloomington road, some five miles distant. + +While he went out to catch an old horse, ranging loose in the +creek-bottom, I saddled Peck, strapped on my valise, and made myself +ready for the journey. The feeling of two silver half-dollars in her +hard palm melted down the woman's aggressive mood, and she said, with a +voice the edge whereof was mightily blunted,-- + +"Thankee! it's too much fur sich as you had." + +"It's the best you can give," I replied. + +"That's so!" said she, jerking my hand up and down with a pumping +movement, as I took leave. + +I felt a sense of relief when we had climbed the rise and had the open +prairie again before us. The sky was overcast and the wind strong, +but some rain had fallen during the night, and the clouds had lifted +themselves again. The air was fresh and damp, but not chill. We rode +slowly, of necessity, for the mud was deeper than ever. + +I deliberated what course I should take, in order to draw from my guide +the explanation of the nightly noises. His evident shrinking, whenever +his wife referred to the subject, convinced me that a gradual approach +would render him shy and uneasy; and, on the whole, it seemed best to +surprise him by a sudden assault. Let me strike to the heart of the +secret, at once,--I thought,--and the details will come of themselves. + +While I was thus reflecting, he rode quietly by my side. Half turning +in the saddle, I looked steadily at his face, and said, in an earnest +voice,-- + +"Eber Nicholson, who was it to whom you were married in the sight of +God?" + +He started as if struck, looked at me imploringly, turned away his eyes, +then looked back, became very pale, and finally said, in a broken, +hesitating voice, as if the words were forced from him against his +will,-- + +"Her name is Rachel Emmons." + +"Why did you murder her?" I asked, in a still sterner tone. + +In an instant his face burned scarlet. He reined up his horse with a +violent pull, straightened his shoulders so that he appeared six inches +taller, looked steadily at me with a strange, mixed expression of anger +and astonishment, and cried out,-- + +"Murder her? _Why, she's livin' now!_" + +My surprise at the answer was scarcely less great than his at the +question. + +"You don't mean to say she's not dead?" I asked. + +"Why, no!" said he, recovering from his sudden excitement, "she's not +dead, or she wouldn't keep on troublin' me. She's been livin' in Toledo, +these ten year." + +"I beg your pardon, my friend," said I; "but I don't know what to think +of what I heard last night, and I suppose I have the old notion in my +head that all ghosts are of persons who have been murdered." + +"Oh, if I had killed her," he groaned, "I'd 'a' been hung long ago, an' +there 'd 'a' been an end of it." + +"Tell me the whole story," said I. "It's hardly likely that I can help +you, but I can understand how you must be troubled, and I'm sure I pity +you from my heart." + +I think he felt relieved at my proposal,--glad, perhaps, after long +silence, to confide to another man the secret of his lonely, wretched +life. + +"After what you've heerd," said he, "there's nothin' that I don't care +to tell. I've been sinful, no doubt,--but, God knows, there never was a +man worse punished. + +"I told you," he continued, after a pause, "that I come from the Western +Reserve. My father was a middlin' well-to-do farmer,--not rich, nor yit +exactly poor. He's dead now. He was always a savin' man,--looked after +money a _leetle_ too sharp, I've often thought sence: howsever, 't isn't +my place to judge him. Well, I was brought up on the farm, to hard work, +like the other boys. Rachel Emmons,--she's the same woman that haunts +me, you understand,--she was the girl o' one of our neighbors, an' poor +enough _he_ was. His wife was always sickly-like,--an' you know it +takes a woman as well as a man to git rich farmin'. So they were always +scrimped, but that didn't hinder Rachel from bein' one o' the likeliest +gals round. We went to the same school in the winter, he an' me, ('t +isn't much schoolin' I ever got, though,) an' I had a sort o' nateral +hankerin' after her, as fur back as I can remember. She was different +lookin' then from, what she is now,--an' me, too, for that matter. + +"Well, you know how boys an' gals somehow git to likin' each other afore +they know it. Me an' Rachel was more an' more together, the more we +growed up, only more secret-like; so by the time I was twenty an' she +was nineteen, we was promised to one another as true as could be. I +didn't keep company with her, though,--leastways, not reg'lar: I was +afeard my father 'd find it out, an' I knowed what _he_ 'd say to it. He +kep' givin' me hints about Mary Ann Jones,--that was my wife's maiden +name. Her father had two hundred acres an' money out at interest, an' +only three children. He'd had ten, but seven of 'em died. I had nothin' +agin Mary Ann, but I never thought of her that way, like I did towards +Rachel. + +"Well, things kep' runnin' on; I was a good deal worried about it, but +a young feller, you know, don't look fur ahead, an' so I got along. One +night, howsever,--'t was jist about as dark as last night was,--I'd been +to the store at the Corners, for a jug o' molasses. Rachel was +there, gittin' a quarter of a pound o' tea, I think it was, an' some +sewin'-thread. I went out a little while after her, an' follered as fast +as I could, for we had the same road nigh to home. + +"It weren't long afore I overtook her. 'T was mighty dark, as I was +sayin', an' so I hooked her arm into mine, an' we went on comfortable +together, talkin' about how we jist suited each other, like we was cut +out o' purpose, an' how long we'd have to wait, an' what folks 'd say. +O Lord! don't I remember every word o' _that_ night? Well, we got quite +tender-like when we come t' Old Emmons's gate, an' I up an' giv' her a +hug and a lot o' kisses, to make up for lost time. Then she went into +the house, an' I turned for home; but I hadn't gone ten steps afore I +come agin somebody stan'in' in the middle o' the road. 'Hullo!' says +I. The next thing he had a holt o' my coat-collar an' shuck me like a +tarrier-dog shakes a rat. I knowed who it was afore he spoke; an' I +couldn't 'a' been more skeered, if the life had all gone out o' me. He'd +been down to the tavern to see a drover, an' comin' home he'd follered +behind us all the way, hearin' every word we said. + +"I don't like to think o' the words he used that night. He was a +professin' member, an' yit he swore the awfullest I ever heerd."--Here +the man involuntarily raised his hands to his ears, as if to stop them +against even the memory of his father's curses.--"I expected every +minute he'd 'a' struck me down. I've wished, sence, he _had_: I don't +think I could 'a' stood _that_. Howsever, he dragged me home, never +lettin' go my collar, till we got into the room where mother was settin' +up for us. Then he told _her_, only makin' it ten times harder 'n it +really was. Mother always kind o' liked Rachel, 'cause she was mighty +handy at sewin' an' quiltin', but she'd no more dared stan' up agin +father than a sheep agin a bull-dog. She looked at me pityin'-like, I +must say, an' jist begun to cry,--an' I couldn't help cryin' nuther, +when I saw how it hurt her. + +"Well, after that, 't wa'n't no use thinkin' o' Rachel any more. I _had_ +to go t' Old Jones's, whether I wanted to or no. I felt mighty mean when +I thought o' Rachel, an' was afeard no good 'd come of it; but father +jist managed things _his_ way, an' I couldn't help myself. Old Jones had +nothin' agin me, for I was a stiddy, hard-workin' feller as there was +round,--an' Mary Ann was always as pleasant as could be, _then_;--well, +I oughtn't to say nothin' agin her now; she's had a hard life of it, +'longside o' me. Afore long we were bespoke, an' the day set. Father +hurried things, when it got that fur. I don't think Rachel knowed +anything about it till the day afore the weddin', or mebby the very day. +Old Mr. Larrabee was the minister, an' there was only the two families +at the house, an' Miss Plankerton,--her that sewed for Mary Ann. I never +felt so oneasy in my life, though I tried hard not to show it. + +"Well, 't was all jist over, an' the kissin' about to begin, when I +heerd the house-door bu'st open, suddent. I felt my heart give one jump +right up to the root o' my tongue, an' then fall back ag'in, sick an' +dead-like. + +"The parlor-door flew open right away, an' in come Rachel without a +bunnet, an' her hair all frowzed by the wind. She was as white as a +sheet, an' her eyes like two burnin' coals. She walked straight through +'em all an' stood right afore me. They was all so taken aback that they +never thought o' stoppin' her. Then she kind o' screeched out,--'Eber +Nicholson, what are you doin'?' Her voice was strange an' +onnatural-like, an' I'd never 'a' knowed it to be hern, if I hadn't 'a' +seen her. I couldn't take my eyes off of her, an' I couldn't speak: I +jist stood there. Then she said ag'in,--'Eber Nicholson, what are you +doin'? You are married to me, in the sight of God. You belong to me an' +I to you, forever an' forever!' Then they begun cryin' out,--'Go 'way!' +'Take her away!' 'What d's she mean?' an' old Mr. Larrabee ketched holt +of her arm. She begun to jerk an' trimble all over; she drawed in her +breath in a sort o' groanin' way, awful to hear, an' then dropped down +on the floor in a fit. I bu'st out in a terrible spell o' cryin';--I +couldn't 'a' helped it, to save my life." + +The man paused, drew his sleeve across his eyes, and then timidly looked +at me. Seeing nothing in my face, doubtless, but an expression of the +profoundest commiseration, he remarked, with a more assured voice, as if +in self-justification,-- + +"It was a pretty hard thing for a man to go through with, now, wasn't +it?" + +"You may well say that," said I. "Your story is not yet finished, +however. This Rachel Emmons,--you say she is still living,--in what way +does she cause the disturbances?" + +"I'll tell you all I know about it," said he,--"an' if you understand +it _then_, you're wiser 'n I am. After they carried her home, she had a +long spell o' sickness,--come near dyin', they said; but they brought +her through, at last, an' she got about ag'in, lookin' ten year older. +I kep' out of her sight, though. I lived awhile at Old Jones's, till I +could find a good farm to rent, or a cheap un to buy. I wanted to git +out o' the neighborhood: I was oneasy all the time, bein' so near +Rachel. Her mother was wuss, an' her father failin'-like, too. Mother +seen 'em often: she was as good a neighbor to 'em as she dared be. Well, +I got sort o' tired, an' went out to Michigan an' bought a likely farm. +Old Jones giv' me a start. I took Mary Ann out, an' we got along well +enough, a matter o' two year. We heerd from home now an' then. Rachel's +father an' mother both died, about the time we had our first boy,--him +that you seen,--an' she went off to Toledo, we heerd, an' hired out to +do sewin'. She was always a mighty good hand at it, an' could cut out as +nice as a born manty-maker. She'd had another fit after the funerals, +an' was older-lookin' an' more serious than ever, they said. + +"Well, Jimmy was six months old, or so, when we begun to be woke up +every night by his cryin'. Nothin' seemed to be the matter with him: +he was only frightened-like, an' couldn't be quieted. I heerd noises +sometimes,--nothin' like what come afterwards,--but sort o' crackin' an' +snappin', sich as you hear in new furnitur', an' it seemed like somebody +was in the room; but I couldn't find nothin'. It got wuss and wuss: Mary +Ann was sure the house was haunted, an' I had to let her go home for a +whole winter. When she was away, it went on the same as ever,--not every +night,--sometimes not more 'n onst a week,--but so loud as to wake me +up, reg'lar. I sent word to Mary Ann to come on, an' I'd sell out an' go +to Illinois. Good perairah land was cheap then, an' I'd ruther go furder +off, for the sake o' quiet. + +"So we pulled up stakes an' come out here: but it weren't long afore the +noise follered us, wuss 'n ever, an' we found out at last what it was. +One night I woke up, with my hair stan'in' on end, an' heerd Rachel +Emmons's voice, jist as you heerd it last night. Mary Ann heerd it too, +an' it's little peace she's giv' me sence that time. An' so it's been +goin' on an' on, these eight or nine year." + +"But," I asked, "are you sure she is alive? Have you seen her since? +Have you asked her to be merciful and not disturb you?" + +"Yes," said he, with a bitterness of tone which seemed quite to +obliterate the softer memories of his love, "I've seen her, an' I've +begged her on my knees to let me alone; but it's no use. When it got to +be so bad I couldn't stan' it, I sent her a letter, but I never got no +answer. Next year, when our second boy died, frightened and worried to +death, I believe, though he _was_ scrawny enough when he was born, I +took some money I'd saved to buy a yoke of oxen, an' went to Toledo o' +purpose to see Rachel. It cut me awful to do it, but I was desprit. I +found her livin' in a little house, with a bit o' garden, she'd bought. +I s'pose she must 'a' had five or six hundred dollars when the farm was +sold, an' she made a good deal by sewin', besides. She was settin' at +her work when I went in, an' knowed me at onst, though I don't believe +I'd ever 'a' knowed _her_. She was old, an' thin, an' hard-lookin'; her +mouth was pale an' sot, like she was bitin' somethin' all the time; an' +her eyes, though they was sunk into her head, seemed to look through an' +through an' away out th' other side o' you. + +"It jist shut me up when she looked at me. She was so corpse-like I was +afraid she'd drop dead, then and there: but I made out at last to say, +'Rachel, I've come all the way from Illinois to see you.' She kep' +lookin' straight at me, never sayin' a word. 'Rachel,' says I, 'I know +I've acted bad towards you. God knows I didn't mean to do it. I don't +blame you for payin' it back to me the way you're doin', but Mary Ann +an' the boy never done you no harm. I've come all the way o' purpose +to ask your forgiveness, hopin' you'll be satisfied with what's _been_ +done, an' leave off bearin' malice agin us.' She looked kind o' +sorrowful-like, but drawed a deep breath, an' shuck her head, 'Oh, +Rachel,' says I,--an' afore I knowed it I was right down on my knees at +her feet,--'Rachel, don't be so hard on me. I'm the onhappiest man that +lives. I can't stan' it no longer. Rachel, you didn't use to be so +cruel, when we was boys an' girls together. Do forgive me, an' leave +off' hauntin' me so.' + +"Then she spoke up, at last, an' says she,-- + +"'Eber Nicholson, I was married to you, in the sight o' God!' + +"'I know it,' says I; 'you say it to me every night; an' it wasn't my +doin's that you're not my wife now: but, Rachel, if I'd 'a' betrayed +you, an' ruined you, an' killed you, God couldn't 'a' punished me wuss +than you're a-punishin' me.' + +"She giv' a kind o' groan, an' two tears run down her white face. 'Eber +Nicholson,' says she, 'ask God to help you, for I can't. There might 'a' +been a time,' says she, 'when I could 'a' done it, but it's too late +now.' + +"'Don't say that, Rachel,' says I; 'it's never too late to be merciful +an' forgivin'.' + +"'It doesn't depend on myself,' says she; 'I'm _sent_ to you. It's th' +only comfort I have in life to be near you; but I'd give up that, if I +could. Pray to God to let me die, for then we shall both have rest.' + +"An' that was all I could git out of her. + +"I come home ag'in, knowin' I'd spent my money for nothin'. Sence then, +it's been jist the same as before,--not reg'lar every night, but sort o' +comes on by spells, an' then stops three or four days, an' then comes +on ag'in. Fact is, what's the use o' livin' in this way? We can't be +neighborly; we're afeard to have anybody come to see us; we've got no +peace, no comfort o' bein' together, an' no heart to work an' git ahead, +like other folks. It's jist killin' me, body an' soul." + +Here the poor wretch fairly broke down, bursting suddenly into an +uncontrollable fit of weeping. I waited quietly until the violence of +his passion had subsided. A misery so strange, so completely out of the +range of human experience, so hopeless apparently, was not to be reached +by the ordinary utterances of consolation. I had seen enough to enable +me fully to understand the fearful nature of the retribution which had +been visited upon him for what was, at worst, a weakness to be pitied, +rather than a sin to be chastised. "Never was a man worse punished," he +had truly said. But I was as far as ever from comprehending the secret +of those nightly visitations. The statement of Rachel Emmons, that they +were now produced without her will, overturned--supposing it to be +true--the conjecture which I might otherwise have adopted. However, it +was now plain that the unhappy victim sobbing at my side could throw no +further light on the mystery. He had told me all he knew. + +"My friend," said I, when he had become calmer, "I do not wonder at your +desperation. Such continual torment as you must have endured is enough +to drive a man to madness. It seems to me to spring from the malice of +some infernal power, rather than the righteous justice of God. Have you +never tried to resist it? Have you never called aloud, in your heart, +for Divine help, and gathered up your strength to meet and defy it, as +you would to meet a man who threatened your life?" + +"Not in the right way, I'm afeard," said he. "Fact is, I always tuck it +as a judgment hangin' over me, an' never thought o' nothin' else than +jist to grin and bear it." + +"Enough of that," I urged,--for a hope of relief had suggested itself to +me,--"you have suffered enough, and more than enough. Now stand up to +meet it like a man. When the noises come again, think of what you have +endured, and let it make you indignant and determined. Decide in your +heart that you _will_ be free from it, and perhaps you may be so. If +not, build another shanty and sleep away from your wife and boy, so +that they may escape, at least. Give yourself this claim to your wife's +gratitude, and she will be kind and forbearing." + +"I don't know but you're more 'n half right, stranger," he replied, in +a more cheerful tone. "Fact is, I never thought on it that way. It's +lightened my heart a heap, tellin' you; an' if I'm not too broke an' +used-up-like, I'll try to foller your advice. I couldn't marry Rachel +now, if Mary Ann _was_ dead, we've been druv so fur apart. I don't know +how it'll be when we're _all_ dead: I s'pose them 'll go together that +belongs together;--leastways, 't ought to be so." + +Here we struck the Bloomington road, and I no longer needed a guide. +When we pulled our horses around, facing each other, I noticed that the +flush of excitement still burned on the man's sallow cheek, and his +eyes, washed by probably the first freshet of feeling which had +moistened them for years, shone with a faint lustre of courage. + +"No, no,--none o' that!" said he, as I was taking out my porte-monnaie; +"you've done me a mighty sight more good than I've done you, let alone +payin' me to boot. Don't forgit the turn to the left, after crossin' +Jackson's Run. Good-bye, stranger! Take good keer o' yourself!" + +And with a strong, clinging, lingering grasp of the hand, in which the +poor fellow expressed the gratitude which he was too shy and awkward +to put into words, we parted. He turned his horse's head, and slowly +plodded back through the mud towards the lonely shanty. + +On my way to Bloomington, I went over and over the man's story, in +memory. The facts were tolerably clear and coherent: his narrative was +simple and credible enough, after my own personal experience of the +mysterious noises, and the secret, whatever it was, must be sought for +in Rachel Emmons. She was still living in Toledo, Ohio, he said, and +earned her living as a seamstress; it would, therefore, not be difficult +to find her. I confess, after his own unsatisfactory interview, I +had little hope of penetrating her singular reserve; but I felt the +strongest desire to see her, at least, and thus test the complete +reality of a story which surpassed the wildest fiction. After visiting +Terre Haute, the next point to which business called me, on the homeward +route, was Cleveland; and by giving an additional day to the journey, I +could easily take Toledo on my way. Between memory and expectation the +time passed rapidly, and a week later I registered my name at the Island +House, Toledo. + +After wandering about for an hour or two, the next morning, I +finally discovered the residence of Rachel Emmons. It was a small +story-and-a-half frame building, on the western edge of the town, with a +locust-tree in front, two lilacs inside the paling, and a wilderness of +cabbage-stalks and currant-bushes in the rear. After much cogitation, I +had not been able to decide upon any plan of action, and the interval +between my knock and the opening of the door was one of considerable +embarrassment to me. A small, plumpish woman of forty, with peaked nose, +black eyes, and but two upper teeth, confronted me. She, certainly, was +not the one I sought. + +"Is your name Rachel Emmons?" I asked, nevertheless. + +"No, I'm not her. This is her house, though." + +"Will you tell her a gentleman wants to see her?" said I, putting my +foot inside the door as I spoke. The room, I saw, was plainly, but +neatly furnished. A rag-carpet covered the floor; green rush-bottomed +chairs, a settee with chintz cover, and a straight-backed rocking-chair +were distributed around the walls; and for ornament there was an +alphabetical sampler in a frame, over the low wooden mantel-piece. + +The woman, however, still held the door-knob in her hand, saying, "Miss +Emmons is busy. She can't well leave her work. Did you want some sewin' +done?" + +"No," said I; "I wish to speak with her. It's on private and particular +business." + +"Well," she answered with some hesitation, "I'll _tell_ her. Take a +cheer." + +She disappeared through a door into a back room, and I sat down. In +another minute the door noiselessly reopened, and Rachel Emmons came +softly into the room. I believe I should have known her anywhere. Though +from Eber Nicholson's narrative she could not have been much over +thirty, she appeared to be at least forty-five. Her hair was streaked +with gray, her face thin and of an unnatural waxy pallor, her lips of a +whitish-blue color and tightly pressed together, and her eyes, seemingly +sunken far back in their orbits, burned with a strange, ghastly--I had +almost said phosphorescent--light. I remember thinking they must shine +like touch-wood in the dark. I have come in contact with too many +persons, passed through too wide a range of experience, to lose my +self-possession easily; but I could not meet the cold, steady gaze of +those eyes without a strong internal trepidation. It would have been the +same, if I had known nothing about her. + +She was probably surprised at seeing a stranger, but I could discern no +trace of it in her face. She advanced but a few steps into the room, and +then stopped, waiting for me to speak. + +"You are Rachel Emmons?" I asked, since a commencement of some sort must +be made. + +"Yes." + +"I come from Eber Nicholson," said I, fixing my eyes on her face. + +Not a muscle moved, not a nerve quivered, but I fancied that a faint +purple flush played for an instant under the white mask. If I were +correct, it was but momentary. She lifted her left hand slowly, pressed +it on her heart, and then let it fall. The motion was so calm that I +should not have noticed it, if I had not been watching her so steadily. + +"Well?" she said, after a pause. + +"Rachel Emmons," said I,--and more than one cause conspired to make my +voice earnest and authoritative,--"I know all. I come to you not to +meddle with the sorrow--let me say the sin--which has blighted your +life; not because Eber Nicholson sent me; not to defend him or to +accuse you; but from that solemn sense of duty which makes every man +responsible to God for what he does or leaves undone. An equal pity +for him and for you forces me to speak. He cannot plead his cause; you +cannot understand his misery. I will not ask by what wonderful power you +continue to torment his life; I will not even doubt that you pity while +you afflict him; but I ask you to reflect whether the selfishness of +your sorrow may not have hardened your heart, and blinded you to that +consolation which God offers to those who humbly seek it. You say that +you are married to Eber Nicholson, in His sight. Think, Rachel Emmons, +think of that moment when you will stand before His awful bar, and the +poor, broken, suffering soul, whom your forgiveness might still make +yours in the holy marriage of heaven, shrinks from you with fear and +pain, as in the remembered persecutions of earth!" + +The words came hot from my very heart, and the ice-crust of years under +which hers lay benumbed gave way before them. She trembled slightly; +and the same sad, hopeless moan which I had heard at midnight in the +Illinois shanty came from her lips. She sank into a chair, letting her +hands fall heavily at her side. There was no movement of her features, +yet I saw that her waxy cheeks were moist, as with the slow ooze of +tears so long unshed that they had forgotten their natural flow. + +"I do pity him," she murmured at last, "and I believe I forgive him; +but, oh! I've become an instrument of wrath for the punishment of both." + +If any feeling of reproof still lingered in my mind, her appearance +disarmed me at once. I felt nothing but pity for her forlorn, helpless +state. It was the apathy of despair, rather than the coldness of +cherished malice, which had so frozen her life. Still, the mystery of +those nightly persecutions! + +"Rachel Emmons," I said, "you certainly know that you still continue to +destroy the peace of Eber Nicholson and his family. Do you mean to say +that you _cannot_ cease to do so, if you would?" + +"It is too late," said she, shaking her head slowly, as she clasped both +hands hard against her breast. "Do you think I would suffer, night after +night, if I could help it? Haven't I stayed awake for days, till my +strength gave way, rather than fall asleep, for _his_ sake? Wouldn't I +give my life to be free?--and would have taken it, long ago, with my own +hands, but for the sin!" + +She spoke in a low voice, but with a wild earnestness which startled me. +She, then, was equally a victim! + +"But," said I, "this thing had a beginning. Why did you visit him in the +first place, when, perhaps, you might have prevented it?" + +"I am afraid that was my sin," she replied, "and this is the punishment. +When father and mother died, and I was layin' sick and weak, with +nothin' to do but think of _him_, and me all alone in the world, and not +knowin' how to live without him, because I had nobody left,--that's when +it begun. When the deadly kind o' sleeps came on--they used to think I +was dead, or faintin', at first--and I could go where my heart drawed +me, and look at him away off where he lived, 't was consolin', and I +didn't try to stop it. I used to long for the night, so I could go and +be near him for an hour or two. I don't know how I went: it seemed to +come of itself. After a while I felt I was troublin' him and doin' no +good to myself, but the sleeps came just the same as ever, and then I +couldn't help myself. They're only a sorrow to me now, but I s'pose I +shall have 'em till I'm laid in my grave." + +This was all the explanation she could give. It was evidently one of +those mysterious cases of spiritual disease which completely baffle our +reason. Although compelled to accept her statement, I felt incapable of +suggesting any remedy. I could only hope that the abnormal condition +into which she had fallen might speedily wear out her vital energies, +already seriously shattered. She informed me, further, that each attack +was succeeded by great exhaustion, and that she felt herself growing +feebler, from year to year. The immediate result, I suspected, was a +disease of the heart, which might give her the blessing of death sooner +than she hoped. Before taking leave of her, I succeeded in procuring +from her a promise that she would write to Eber Nicholson, giving him +that free forgiveness which would at least ease his conscience, and make +his burden somewhat lighter to bear. Then, feeling that it was not in my +power to do more, I rose to depart. Taking her hand, which lay cold and +passive in mine,--so much like a dead hand that it required a strong +effort in me to repress a nervous shudder,--I said, "Farewell, Rachel +Emmons, and remember that they who seek peace in the right spirit will +always find it at last." + +"It won't be many years before I find it", she replied, calmly; and the +weird, supernatural light of her eyes shone upon me for the last time. + +I reached New York in due time, and did not fail, sitting around the +broiled oysters and celery, with my partners, to repeat the story of the +Haunted Shanty. I knew, beforehand, how they would receive it; but the +circumstances had taken such hold of my mind,--so _burned_ me, like a +boy's money, to keep buttoned up in the pocket,--that I could no more +help telling the tale than the man I remember reading about, a great +while ago, in a poem called "The Ancient Mariner". Beeson, who, I +suspect, don't believe much of anything, is always apt to carry +his raillery too far; and thenceforth, whenever the drum of a +target-company, marching down Broadway, passed the head of our street, +he would whisper to me, "There comes Rachel Emmons!" until I finally +became angry, and insisted that the subject should never again be +mentioned. + +But I none the less recalled it to my mind, from time to time, with +a singular interest. It was the one supernatural, or, at least, +inexplicable experience of my life, and I continued to feel a profound +curiosity with regard to the two principal characters. My slight +endeavor to assist them by such counsel as had suggested itself to me +was actuated by the purest human sympathy, and upon further reflection +I could discover no other means of help. A spiritual disease could be +cured only by spiritual medicine,--unless, indeed, the secret of Rachel +Emmons's mysterious condition lay in some permanent dislocation of the +relation between soul and body, which could terminate only with their +final separation. + +With the extension of our business, and the increasing calls upon my +time during my Western journeys, it was three years before I again found +myself in Toledo, with sufficient leisure to repeat my visit. I had +some difficulty in finding the little frame house; for, although it +was unaltered in every respect, a number of stately brick "villas" had +sprung up around it and quite disguised the locality. The door was +opened by the same little black-eyed woman, with the addition of four +artificial teeth, which were altogether too large and loose. They were +attached by plated hooks to her eye-teeth, and moved up and down when +she spoke. + +"Is Rachel Emmons at home?" I asked. + +The woman stared at me in evident surprise. + +"She's dead," said she, at last, and then added,--"let's see,--ain't you +the gentleman that called here, some three or four years ago?" + +"Yes", said I, entering the room; "I should like to hear about her +death." + +"Well,--_'twas_ rather queer. She was failin' when you was here. After +that she got softer and weaker-like, an' didn't have her deathlike +wearin' sleeps so often, but she went just as fast for all that. The +doctor said 'twas heart-disease, and the nerves was gone, too; so he +only giv' her morphy, and sometimes pills, but he knowed she'd no chance +from the first. 'Twas a year ago last May when she died. She'd been +confined to her bed about a week, but I'd no thought of her goin' so +soon. I was settin' up with her, and 'twas a little past midnight, +maybe. She'd been layin' like dead awhile, an' I was thinkin' I could +snatch a nap before she woke. All't onst she riz right up in bed, with +her eyes wide open, an' her face lookin' real happy, an' called out, +loud and strong,--'Farewell, Eber Nicholson! farewell! I've come for the +last time! There's peace for me in heaven, an' peace for you on earth! +Farewell! farewell!' Then she dropped back on the piller, stone-dead. +She'd expected it, 't seems, and got the doctor to write her will. She +left me this house and lot,--I'm her second cousin on the mother's +side,--but all her money in the Savin's Bank, six hundred and +seventy-nine dollars and a half, to Eber Nicholson. The doctor writ +out to Illinois, an' found he'd gone to Kansas, a year before. So the +money's in bank yit; but I s'pose he'll git it, some time or other." + +As I returned to the hotel, conscious of a melancholy pleasure at the +news of her death, I could not help wondering,--"Did he hear that last +farewell, far away in his Kansas cabin? Did he hear it, and fall asleep +with thanksgiving in his heart, and arise in the morning to a liberated +life?" I have never visited Kansas, nor have I ever heard from him +since; but I know that the _living ghost_ which haunted him is laid +forever. + +Reader, you will not believe my story: BUT IT IS TRUE. + + * * * * * + + + RHOTRUDA. + + + In the golden reign of Charlemaign the king, + The three-and-thirtieth year, or thereabout, + Young Eginardus, bred about the court, + (Left mother-naked at a postern-door,) + Had thence by slow degrees ascended up,-- + First page, then pensioner, lastly the king's knight + And secretary; yet held these steps for nought, + Save as they led him to the Princess' feet, + Eldest and loveliest of the regal three, + Most gracious, too, and liable to love: + For Bertha was betrothed; and she, the third, + Giselia, would not look upon a man. + So, bending his whole heart unto this end, + He watched and waited, trusting to stir to fire + The indolent interest in those large eyes, + And feel the languid hands beat in his own, + Ere the new spring. And well he played his part,-- + Slipping no chance to bribe or brush aside + All that would stand between him and the light: + Making fast foes in sooth, but feeble friends. + But what cared he, who had read of ladies' love, + And how young Launcelot gained his Guenovere,-- + A foundling, too, or of uncertain strain? + And when one morning, coming from the bath, + He crossed the Princess on the palace-stair, + And kissed her there in her sweet disarray, + Nor met the death he dreamed of in her eyes, + He knew himself a hero of old romance,-- + Not seconding, but surpassing, what had been. + + And so they loved; if that tumultuous pain + Be love,--disquietude of deep delight, + And sharpest sadness: nor, though he knew her heart + His very own,--gained on the instant, too, + And like a waterfall that at one leap + Plunges from pines to palms, shattered at once + To wreaths of mist and broken spray-bows bright,-- + He loved not less, nor wearied of her smile; + But through the daytime held aloof and strange + His walk; mingling with knightly mirth and game; + Solicitous but to avoid alone + Aught that might make against him in her mind; + Yet strong in this,--that, let the world have end, + He had pledged his own, and held Rhotruda's troth. + + But Love, who had led these lovers thus along, + Played them a trick one windy night and cold: + For Eginardus, as his wont had been, + Crossing the quadrangle, and under dark,-- + No faint moonshine, nor sign of any star,-- + Seeking the Princess' door, such welcome found, + The knight forgot his prudence in his love; + For lying at her feet, her hands in his, + And telling tales of knightship and emprise + And ringing war, while up the smooth white arm + His fingers slid insatiable of touch, + The night grew old: still of the hero-deeds + That he had seen he spoke, and bitter blows + Where all the land seemed driven into dust, + Beneath fair Pavia's wall, where Loup beat down + The Longobard, and Charlemaign laid on, + Cleaving horse and rider; then, for dusty drought + Of the fierce tale, he drew her lips to his, + And silence locked the lovers fast and long, + Till the great bell crashed One into their dream. + + The castle-bell! and Eginard not away! + With tremulous haste she led him to the door, + When, lo! the courtyard white with fallen snow, + While clear the night hung over it with stars! + A dozen steps, scarce that, to his own door: + A dozen steps? a gulf impassable! + What to be done? Their secret must not lie + Bare to the sneering eye with the first light; + She could not have his footsteps at her door! + Discovery and destruction were at hand: + And, with the thought, they kissed, and kissed again; + When suddenly the lady, bending, drew + Her lover towards her half-unwillingly, + And on her shoulders fairly took him there,-- + Who held his breath to lighten all his weight,-- + And lightly carried him the courtyard's length + To his own door; then, like a frightened hare, + Fled back in her own tracks unto her bower, + To pant awhile, and rest that all was safe. + + But Charlemaign the king, who had risen by night + To look upon memorials, or at ease + To read and sign an ordinance of the realm,-- + The Fanolehen or Cunigosteura + For tithing corn, so to confirm the same + And stamp it with the pommel of his sword,-- + Hearing their voices in the court below, + Looked from his window, and beheld the pair. + + Angry the king,--yet laughing-half to view + The strangeness and vagary of the feat: + Laughing indeed! with twenty minds to call + From his inner bed-chamber the Forty forth, + Who watched all night beside their monarch's bed, + With naked swords and torches in their hands, + And test this lover's-knot with steel and fire; + But with a thought, "To-morrow yet will serve + To greet these mummers," softly the window closed, + And so went back to his corn-tax again. + + But, with the morn, the king a meeting called + Of all his lords, courtiers and kindred too, + And squire and dame,--in the great Audience Hall + Gathered; where sat the king, with the high crown + Upon his brow, beneath a drapery + That fell around him like a cataract, + With flecks of color crossed and cancellate; + And over this, like trees about a stream, + Rich carven-work, heavy with wreath and rose, + Palm and palmirah, fruit and frondage, hung. + + And more the high hall held of rare and strange: + For on the king's right hand Leoena bowed + In cloudlike marble, and beside her crouched + The tongueless lioness; on the other side, + And poising this, the second Sappho stood,-- + Young Erexcéa, with her head discrowned, + The anadema on the horn of her lyre: + And by the walls there hung in sequence long + Merlin himself, and Uterpendragon, + With all their mighty deeds, down to the day + When all the world seemed lost in wreck and rout, + A wrath of crashing steeds and men; and, in + The broken battle fighting hopelessly, + King Arthur, with the ten wounds on his head. + + But not to gaze on these appeared the peers. + Stern looked the king, and, when the court was met,-- + The lady and her lover in the midst,-- + Spoke to his lords, demanding them of this: + "What merits he, the servant of the king, + Forgetful of his place, his trust, his oath, + Who, for his own bad end, to hide his fault, + Makes use of her, a Princess of the realm, + As of a mule,--a beast of burden!--borne + Upon her shoulders through the winter's night + And wind and snow?" "Death!" said the angry lords; + And knight and squire and minion murmured, "Death!" + Not one discordant voice. But Charlemaign-- + Though to his foes a circulating sword, + Yet, as a king, mild, gracious, exorable, + Blest in his children too, with but one born + To vex his flesh like an ingrowing nail-- + Looked kindly on the trembling pair, and said: + "Yes, Eginardus, well hast thou deserved + Death for this thing; for, hadst thou loved her so, + Thou shouldst have sought her Father's will in this,-- + Protector and disposer of his child,-- + And asked her hand of him, her lord and thine. + Thy life is forfeit here; but take it, thou!-- + Take even two lives for this forfeit one; + And thy fair portress--wed her; honor God, + Love one another, and obey the king." + + Thus far the legend; but of Rhotrude's smile, + Or of the lords' applause, as truly they + Would have applauded their first judgment too, + We nothing learn: yet still the story lives, + Shines like a light across those dark old days, + Wonderful glimpse of woman's wit and love, + And worthy to be chronicled with hers + Who to her lover dear threw down her hair, + When all the garden glanced with angry blades; + Or like a picture framed in battle-pikes + And bristling swords, it hangs before our view,-- + The palace-court white with the fallen snow, + The good king leaning out into the night, + And Rhotrude bearing Eginard on her back. + + + + +GREEK LINES. + + +[Concluded.] + + + "As when a ship, by skilful steersman wrought + Nigh river's mouth or foreland, where the + wind + Veers oft, as oft so steers, and shifts her sail,-- + So varied he, and of his tortuous train + Curl'd many a wanton wreath in sight of + Eve + To lure her eye." + +And Eve, alas! yielded to the blandishments of the wily serpent, as we +moderns, in our Art, have yielded to the licentious, specious life-curve +of Hogarth. When I say Art, I mean that spirit of Art which has made us +rather imitative than creative, has made us hold a too faithful mirror +up to Nature, and has been content to let the great Ideal remain +petrified in the marbles of Greece. + +I have endeavored to show how this Ideal may be concentrated in a +certain abstract line, not only of sensuous, but of intellectual +Beauty,--a line which, while it is as wise and subtle as the serpent, is +as harmless and loving as the sacred dove of Venus. I have endeavored +to prove how this line, the gesture of Attic eloquence, expresses the +civilization of Pericles and Plato, of Euripides and Apelles. It is now +proposed briefly to relate how this line was lost, when the politeness +and philosophy, the literature and the Art of Greece were chained to the +triumphal cars of Roman conquerors,--and how it seems to have been found +again in our own day, after slumbering so long in ruined temples, broken +statues, and cinerary urns. + +The scholar who studies the aesthetical anatomy of Greek Art has +a melancholy pleasure, like a surgeon, in watching its slow, but +inevitable atrophy under the incubus of Rome. The wise, but childlike +serenity and cheerfulness of soul, so tenderly pictured in the white +stones from the quarries of Pentelicus, had, it is true, a certain +sickly, exoteric life in Magna Graecia, as Pompeii and Herculaneum have +proved to us. But the brutal manhood of Rome overshadowed and tainted +the gentle exotic like a Upas-tree. Where, as in these places, +the imported Greek could have some freedom, it grew up into a dim +resemblance of its ancient purity under other skies. It had, I think, +an elegiac plaintiveness in it, like a song of old liberty sung in +captivity. Yet there was added to it a certain fungus-growth, never +permitted by that far-off Ideal whose seeds were indigenous in the +Peloponnesus, but rather springing from the rank ostentation of Rome. In +its more monumental developments, under these new influences, the true +line of Beauty became gradually vulgarized, and, by degrees, less +intellectual and pure, till its spirit of fine and elegant reserve was +quite lost in a coarse splendor. It must be admitted, however, that the +Greek colonies of Italy expressed not a little of the old refinement +in the lamps and candelabra and vases and _bijouterie_ which we have +exhumed from the ashes of Vesuvius. + +But, turning to Rome herself, the most casual examination will impress +us with the fact that there the lovely Greek lines were seized by rude +conquerors, and at once were bent to answer base and brutal uses. To +narrow a broad subject down to an illustration, let us look at a single +feature, the _Cymatium_, as it was understood in Greece and Rome. This +is a moulding of very frequent occurrence in classic entablatures, a +curved surface with a double flexure. Perhaps the type of Greek lines, +as represented in the previous paper on this subject, may be safely +accepted as a fair example of the Greek interpretation of this feature. +The Romans, on the other hand, not being able to understand and +appreciate the delicacy and deep propriety of this line, seized their +compasses, and, without thought or love, mechanically produced a gross +likeness to it by the union of two quarter-circles thus:-- + +[Illustration: + +Greek. + +Roman.] + +Look upon this picture, and on this!--the one, refined, delicate, +sensitive, fastidious, severe, never repeated; the other, thoughtless, +vulgar, mathematical, common-sense, sensuous, reappearing ever with a +stolid monotony. And such is the sentiment pervading all Roman Art. +The conquerors took the _letter_ from the Greeks, but never had the +slightest feeling for its Ideal. But even this _letter_, when they +transcribed it, writhed and was choked beneath hands which knew better +the iron caestus of the gladiator than the subtile and spiritual touch +of the artist. + +We can have no stronger and more convincing proof that Architecture is +the truest record of the various phases of civilization than we find in +this. There was Greek Art, living and beautiful, full of inductive power +and capacities of new expressions; and there were the boundless wealth +and power of Rome. But Rome had her own ideas to enunciate; and so +possessed was she with the impulse to give form to these ideas, to +her ostentatious brutality, her barbarous pride, her licentious +magnificence, that she could not pause to learn calm and serious lessons +from the Greeks who walked her very forums, but, seizing their fair +sanctuaries, she stretched them out to fit her standard; she took the +pure Greek orders to decorate her arches, she piled these orders one +above the other, she bent them around her gigantic circuses, till at +last they had become acclimated and lost all their peculiar refinement, +all their intellectual and dignified humanity. Every moulding, every +capital, every detail was changed. The Romans had neither time nor +inclination to bestow any love or thought on the expressiveness and +tender meaning of subordinate parts. But out of the suggestions and +reminiscences of Greek lines they made a rigid and inflexible grammar of +their own,--a grammar to suit the mailed clang of Roman speech, which, +in its cruel martial strength, sought no refinements, no delicate +inflections from a distant Acropolis. The result was the coarse splendor +of the Empire. How utterly the still Greek Ideal was forgotten in this +noisy splendor, how entirely the chaste spirituality of the Greek line +was lost in the round and lusty curves which are the _inevitable_ +footprints of Sensual Life, scarcely needs further amplification. I +have referred to the Ionic capital of the Erechtheum as containing a +microcosm of Attic Art, as presenting a fair epitome of the thought and +love which Hellenic artists offered in the worship of their gods. Turn +now to the Roman Ionic, as developed in any one of the most familiar +examples of it, in the Temple of Concord, near the Via Sacra, in the +Theatre of Marcellus, or the Colosseum. What a contrast! How formal, +mechanical, pattern-like it has become! The grace of its freedom, the +intellectual reserve of its strength, the secret humanity that thrilled +through all its lines, the divine Art which obtained such sweet repose +there,--all these are gone. Quality has yielded to quantity, and nothing +is left save those external characteristics which he who runs may read, +and he who pauses to study finds cold, vacant, and unsatisfactory. What +the Ionic capital of Rome wants, and what all Roman Art wants, is _the +inward life_, the living soul, which gives a peculiar expressiveness +to every individual work, and raises it infinitely above the dangerous +academic formalism of the schools. + +In view of our own architecture, that which touches our own experience +and is of us and out of us, the danger of this academic formalism +cannot be too emphatically spoken of. When one carefully examines the +transition from Greek to Roman Art, he cannot but be impressed with the +fact, that the spirit which worked in this transition was the spirit of +a vulgar and greedy conqueror. To illustrate his rude magnificence +and to give a finer glory to his triumph, by right of conquest he +appropriated the Greek orders. But the living soul which was in those +orders, and gave them an infinity of meaning, an ever-varying poetry of +expression, could not be enslaved; nor could the worshipful Love which +created them find a home under the helmet of the soldier. So they became +lifeless; they were at once formally systematized and classified, +subjected to strict proportions and rules, and cast, as it were, in +moulds. This arrangement enabled the conqueror, without waste of time in +that long contemplative stillness out of which alone the beauty of the +true Ideal arises, out of which alone man can create like a god, to +avail himself at once of the Greek orders, not as a sensitive and +delicate means of fine aesthetic expression, but as a mechanical +language of contrasts of form to be used according to the exigencies of +design. The service of Greek Art was perfect freedom; enslaved at Rome, +it became academic. Thus systematized, it is true, it awes us by the +superb redundancy and sumptuousness of its use in the temples and forums +reared by that omnipresent power from Britannia to Baalbec. But the Art +which is systematized is degraded. Emerson somewhere remarks that man +descends to meet his fellows,--meaning, I suppose, that he has to +sacrifice some of the higher instincts of his individuality when he +desires to become social, and to meet his fellows on that low level of +society, which, made up as it is of many individualities, has none of +those secret aspirations which arise out of his own isolation. Society +is a systematic aggregation for the benefit of the multitude, but great +men lift themselves above it into a purer atmosphere. As Longfellow +says, "They rise like towers in the city of God." So with Art,--when we +systematize it for the indiscriminate use of thoughtless and unloving +men, we degrade it. And a singular proof of this is found in the fact +that the Roman academical orders never have anything in them reserved +from the common ken. They are superficial. They say all that they have +to say and express all that they have to express at once, and disturb +the mind with no doubt about any hidden meaning. They are at once +understood. All their intention and purpose are patent to the most +casual observer. He does not pause to inquire what motives actuated the +architect in the composition of any Corinthian capital, because he feels +that it is made according to the dictates of a rigid school created for +the convenience of an unartistic age, and there is no individual love or +aspiration in it. + +Virtually, the Roman orders died in the first century of the Christian +era. We all know how, when the authority of the Pagan schools was gone +and the stern Vitruvian laws had become lost in the mists of antiquity, +these orders gradually fell from their strict allegiance, and imbibed a +new and healthy life from that rude but earnest Romanesque spirit, as in +Byzantium and Lombardy. And we know, too, how, in after Gothic times, +the spirit of the forgotten Aphrodite, Ideal Beauty, sometimes +lurked furtively in the image of the Virgin Mary, and inspired the +cathedral-builders with somewhat of the old creative impulse of Love. +But the workings of this impulse are singularly contrasted in the +productions of the Greek and Mediaeval artists. Nature, we have seen, +offered to the former mysterious and oracular Sibylline leaves, +profoundly significant of an indwelling humanity diffused through all +her woods and fields and mountains, all her fountains, streams, and +seas. Those meditative creators sat at her feet, earnest disciples, +but gathering rather the spirit and motive of her gifts than the gifts +themselves, making an Ideal and worshipping it as a deity. But for the +cathedral-builder, Dryads and Hamadryads, Oreads, Fauns, and Naiads did +not exist,--the Oak of Dodona uttered no oracles. + + "A primrose by the river's brim + A yellow primrose was to him, + And it was nothing more." + +To him Nature was an open book, from which he continually quoted with a +loving freedom, not to illustrate his own deep relationships with her, +but to give greater glory to that vast Power which stood behind her +beautiful text and was revealed to him in the new religion from +Palestine. He loved fruits and flowers and leaves because they were +manifestations of the Love of God; and he used them in his Art, not as +motives out of which to create abstract forms, out of which to eliminate +an ideal humanity, but to show his intense appreciation of the Divine +Love which gave them. Had he been a Pantheist, as Orpheus was, it is +probable he would have idealized these things and created Greek lines. +But believing in a distinct God, the supreme Originator of all things, +he was led to a worship of sacrifice and offerings, and needed no Ideal. +So, with a lavish hand, he appropriated the abundant Beauty of Nature, +imitating its external expressions with his careful chisel, and +suffering his sculptured lines to throw their wayward tendrils and +vagrant leaflets outside the strict limits of his spandrels. The life of +Gothic lines was in their sensuous liberty; the life of Greek lines +was in their intellectual reserve. Those arose out of a religion of +emotional ardor; these, out of a religion of philosophical reflection. +Hence, while the former were wild and picturesque, the latter were +serious, chaste, and very human. + +Doubtless the nearest approach to ideal abstractions to be found in +Mediaeval Art is contained in that remarkable and very characteristic +system of foliations and cuspidations in tracery, which were suggested +by the leaf-forms in Nature. In this adaptation, when first it was +initiated in the earliest phases of Gothic, there is something like +Greek Love. The simple trefoil aperture seems a fair architectural +version of the clover-leaves. But the propriety of the use of these +clover-lines was hinted by a constructive exigency, the pointed arch. +The inevitable assimilation of the natural forms of leaves with this +feature was too evident not to be improved by such active and ardent +worshippers as the Freemasons. Thus originated Gothic tracery, which +afterwards branched out into such sumptuous and unrestrained luxury as +we find in the Decorated styles of England, the Flamboyant of France, +the late Geometric of Germany. Thus were the masons true to the zealous +and passionate enthusiasm of their religion. They used foliations, not +on account of their subjective significance, as the Greek artists did, +but on account of their objective and material applicability to the +decoration of their architecture. But no natural form was ever made +use of by a Greek artist merely because suggested by a constructive +exigency. It was the inward life of the thing itself which he saw, and +it was his love for it which made him adopt it. This love refined and +purified its object, and never would have permitted it to grow into any +wild and licentious Flamboyant under the serene and quiet skies of the +Aegean. + +And so the Greek lines slept in patient marble through the long Dark +Ages, and no one came to awaken them into beautiful life again. No one, +consecrated Prince by the chrism of Nature, wandered into the old land +to kiss the Sleeping Beauty into life, and break the deep spell which +was around her kingdom. + +Then came the Renaissance in the fifteenth century. But--alas that we +must say it!--it was fundamentally a Renaissance of error rather than of +truth. It was a revival of Roman Art, and not of Greek. The line which +we call Hogarth's, but which in reality is as old as human life and its +passions, was the key-note of it all. So wanton were the wreaths it +curled in the sight of the great masters of that period, that they all +yielded to its subtle fascinations and sinned,--sinned, inasmuch as they +devoted their vast powers to the revival and refinement of a sensuous +academic formalism, instead of breathing into all the architectural +forms and systems then known (a glorious material to work with) the pure +life of the Ideal. Had such men as Michel Angelo, San Gallo, Palladio, +Scamozzi, Vignola, San Michele, Bernini, been inspired by the highest +principles of Art, and known the thoughtful lines of Greece, so catholic +to all human moods, and so wisely adapted to the true spirit of +reform,--had they known these, all subsequent Art would have felt the +noble impulse, and been developed into that sphere of perfection +which we see rendering illustrious the primitive posts and lintels of +antiquity, and which we picture to ourselves in the imaginary future of +Hope as glorifying a far wider scope of human knowledge and ingenuity. + +The Gothic architecture of the early part of the fifteenth century +was ripe for the spirit of healthy reform. It had been actively +accumulating, during the progress of the age of Christianity, a +boundless wealth of forms, a vast amount of constructive resources, and +material fit for innumerable architectural expressions of human power. +But in the last two centuries of this era the Love which gave life to +this architecture in its earlier developments gradually became swallowed +up in the Pride of the workman; and the luscious and abandoned luxury of +line led it farther and farther astray from the true path, till at last +it became like an unweeded garden run to seed, and there was no health +in it. In the year 1555, at Beauvais, the masonic workmen uttered their +last cry of defiance against the old things made new in Italy. Jean Wast +and François Maréchal of that town, two cathedral-builders, said,--"that +they had heard of the Church of St. Peter at Rome, and would maintain +that their Gothic could be built as high and on as grand a scale as the +antique orders of this Michel Angelo." And with this spirit they built a +wonderful pyramid over the cross of their cathedral. But, alas! it fell +in the fifth year of its arrogant pride, and this is the last we hear of +Gothic architecture in those times. Over the wild and picturesque ruins +the spirits of the old conquerors of Gaul once more strode with measured +tread, and began to set up their prevailing standards in the very +strongholds of Gothic supremacy. These conquerors trampled down the true +as well as the false in the Mediaeval _régime_, and utterly extinguished +that sole lamp of knowledge which had given light to the Ages of +Darkness and had kindled into life and beauty the cathedrals of Europe. + +This was the error of the Renaissance. Its apostles would not recognize +the capacities existing in the great architecture they displaced, +for opening into a new life under the careful culture of a revived +knowledge. But they rooted it out bodily, and planted instead an exotic +of the schools. It was the re-birth of an Art _system_, which in its +former existence had developed in an atmosphere of conquest. It taught +them to kill, burn, and destroy all that opposed the progress of its +triumph. It was eminently revolutionary in its character, and its reign, +to all those multitudinous expressions of life and thought which had +arisen under the intermediate and more liberal dynasty, was one of +terror. Truly, it was a fierce and desolating instrument of reform. + +It would be a tempting theme of speculation to follow in the imagination +the probable progress of a Greek, instead of a Roman Renaissance, into +such active, but misguided schools as those of Rouen and Tours in the +latter part of the fifteenth century,--of Rouen, with its Roger Arge, +its brothers Leroux, who built the old and famous Hôtel Bourgtheroulde +there, its Pierre de Saulbeaux, and all that legion of architects and +builders who were employed by the Cardinal Amboise in his castle of +Gaillon,--of Tours, with its Pierre Valence, its François Marchant, its +Viart and Colin Byart, out of whose rich and picturesque craft-spirit +arose the quaint fancies of the palaces of Blois and Chambord, and the +playfulness of many an old Flemish house-front. Such a Renaissance +would not have come among these venial sins of _naïveté_, this sportive +affluence of invention, to overturn ruthlessly and annihilate. Its +mission would inevitably have been, not to destroy, but to fulfil,--to +invest these strange results of human frailty and human power with that +grave ideal beauty which nineteen centuries before had done a good work +with the simple columns and architraves on the banks of the Ilissus, and +which, under the guidance of Love, would have made the arches and vaults +and buttresses and pinnacles of a later civilization illustrious with +even more eloquent expressions of refinement. For Greek lines do not +stand apart from the sympathies of men by any spirit of ceremonious and +exclusive rigor, as is undeniably the case with those which were adopted +from Rome. They are not a _system_, but a _sentiment_, which, wisely +directed, might creep into the heart of any condition of society, and +leaven all its architecture with a purifying and pervading power without +destroying its independence, where an inflexible system could assume a +position only by tyrannous oppression. + +Yet when we examine the works of the Renaissance, after the system had +become more manageable and acclimated under later Italian and French +hands, we cannot but admire the skill with which the lightest fancies +and the most various expressions of human contrivance were reconciled to +the formal rules and proportions of the Roman orders. The Renaissance +palaces and civil buildings of the South and West of Europe are so full +of ingenuity, and the irrepressible inventive power of the artist moves +with so much freedom and grace among the stubborn lines of that revived +architecture, that we cannot but regard the results with a sort of +scholastic pride and pleasure. We cannot but ask ourselves, If the +spirit of those architects could obtain so much liberty under the +restrictions of such an unnatural and unnecessary despotism, what would +have been the result, if they had been put in possession of the very +principles of Hellenic Art, instead of these dangerous and complex +models of Rome, which were so far removed from the purity and simplicity +of their origin? Up to a late day, the great aim of the Renaissance has +been to interpret an advanced civilization with the sensuous line; and +_so far as this line is capable of such expression_, the result has been +satisfactory. + +Thus four more weary centuries were added to the fruitless slumbers +of Ideal Beauty among the temples of Greece. Meanwhile, in turn, the +Byzantine, the Northman, the Frank, the Turk, and finally the bombarding +Venetian, left their rude invading footprints among her most cherished +haunts, and defiled her very sanctuary with the brutal touch of +barbarous conquest. But the kiss which was to dissolve this enchantment +was one of Love; and not Love, but cold indifference, or even scorn, +was in the hearts of the rude warriors. So she slept on undisturbed in +spirit, though broken and shattered in the external type, and it was +reserved for a distant future to be made beautiful by her disenchantment +and awakening. + +In 1672, a pupil of the artist Lebrun, Jacques Carrey, accompanied the +Marquis Ollier de Nointee, ambassador of Louis XIV., to Constantinople. +On his way he spent two months at Athens, making drawings of the +Parthenon, then in an excellent state of preservation. These drawings, +more useful in an archaeological than an artistic point of view, are +now preserved in the Bibliothèque Impériale of Paris. In 1676, two +distinguished travellers, one a Frenchman, Dr. Spon, the other an +Englishman, Sir George Wheler, tarried at Athens, and gave valuable +testimony, in terms of boundless admiration, to the beauty and splendor +of the temples of the Acropolis and its neighborhood, then quite unknown +to the world. Other travellers followed these pioneers in the traces of +that old civilization. But in 1687 Königsmark and his Venetian forces +threw their hideous bombshells among the exquisite temples of the +Acropolis, and, igniting thereby the powder-magazine with which the +Turks had desecrated the Parthenon, tore into ruins that loveliest of +the lovely creations of Hellas. It was not until the publishing of the +famous work of Stuart and Revett on "The Antiquities of Athens," in +1762, that the world was made familiar with the external expressions +of Greek Architecture. This publication at once created a curious +revolution in the practice of architecture,--a revolution extending in +its effects throughout Europe. A fever arose to reproduce Greek temples; +and to such an extent was this vacant and thoughtless reproduction +carried out, that at one time it bid fair to supplant the older +Renaissance. The spirit of the new Renaissance, however, was one of mere +imitation, and had not the elements of life and power to insure its +ultimate success. No attempt was made to acclimate the exotic to suit +the new conditions it was thus suddenly called upon to fulfil; for the +_sentiment_ which actuated it, and the Love with which it was created, +were not understood. It was the mere setting up of old forms in new +places; and the Grecian porticos and pediments and columns, which were +multiplied everywhere from the models supplied by Stuart and Revett, +and found their way profusely into this New World, still stare upon us +gravely with strange alien looks. The impetuous current of modern life +beats impatiently against that cumbrous solidity of peristyle which +sheltered well in its day the serene philosophers of the Agora, but +which is now the merest impediment in the way of modern traffic and +modern necessities. But presently the spirit of formalism, engendered by +the old Renaissance, took hold of the revived Greek lines, and +stiffened them into acquiescence with a base mathematical system, which +effectually deprived them of that life and reproductive power which +belong only to a state of artistic freedom. They were reduced to rule +and deadened in the very process of their revival. + +So the Greek Ideal, though strangely transplanted thus into the noise of +modern streets, was not awakened from its long repose by the clatter and +roaring of our new civilization. As regarded the uses of life, it still +slept in petrifactions of Pentelic marble. And when those petrifactions +were repeated in modern quarries, it was merely the shell they gave; the +spirit within had not yet broken through. + +Greek lines, therefore, owed their earliest revival to the vagaries of a +capricious taste, and the desire to give zest to the architecture of the +day by their novelty. It was not for the sake of the new life there was +in them, and of that pliable spirit of refinement so suited to the wise +re-birth of ancient Love in Art. It is not surprising that some of the +more modern masters of the old Renaissance, with whom that system had +become venerable, from its universal use as the vehicle by which +the greatest artists of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries had +expressed their thoughts and inspirations, regarded with peculiar +distrust these outlandish innovations on the exclusive walks of their +own architecture. For they saw only a few external forms which the +beautiful principles of Hellenic Art had developed to fit an old +civilization; the applicability of these primary principles to the +refinement of the architectural expressions of a modern state of society +they could not of course comprehend. About the year 1786, we find Sir +William Chambers, the leading architect of his day in England, in his +famous treatise on "The Decorative Part of Civil Architecture," giving +elaborate and emphatic expression to his contempt of that Greek Art, +which had presented itself to him in a guise well suited to cause +misapprehension and error. "It must candidly be confessed," he says, +"that the Grecians have been far excelled by other nations, not only in +the magnitude and grandeur of their structures, but likewise in point of +fancy, ingenuity, variety, and elegant selection." A heresy, indeed! + +Two distinguished German artists--the one, Schinkel of Berlin, born in +1781,--the other, Klenze of Munich, born in 1784--were children when +Chambers uttered these treasonable sentiments concerning Greek Art. +Later, at separate times, these artists visited Greece, and so filled +themselves with the feeling and sentiment of the Art there, so +consecrated their souls with the appreciative study of its divine Love, +that the patient Ideal at last awoke from its long slumbers, entered +into the breathing human temples thus prepared for it by the pure rites +of Aphrodite, _and once more lived_. Thus in the opening years of the +nineteenth century was a new and reasonable Renaissance, not of an +antique type, but of a spirit which had the gift of immortal youth, and +uttered oracles of prophecy to these chosen Pythians of Art. + +Through Schinkel, the pure Hellenic style, only hinted at previously in +the attempts of less inspired Germans, such as Langhaus, who embodied +his crude conceptions in the once celebrated Brandenburg Gate, was +fairly and grandly revived in the Hauptwache Theatre and the beautiful +Museum and the Bauschule and Observatory of Berlin. He competed with +Klenze in a series of designs for the new palace at Athens, rich with a +truly royal array of courts, corridors, saloons, and colonnades. But the +evil fate which ever hangs over the competitions of genius was baleful +even here, and the barrack-like edifice of Gütner was preferred. His +latest conception was a design of a summer palace at Orianda, in the +Crimea, for the Empress of Russia, where the purity of the old Greek +lines was developed into the poetry of terraces and hanging-gardens and +towers, far-looking over the Black Sea. Schinkel was called the Luther +of Architecture; and the spiritual serenity which he breathed into the +pomp and ceremonious luxury of the Art of his day seems to give him some +title to this distinction. Yet, with all the freedom and originality +with which he wrought out the new advent, he was perhaps rather too +timid than too bold in his reforms,--adhering too strictly to the +original letter of Greek examples, especially with regard to the orders. +He could not entirely shake off the old incubus of Rome. + +And so, though in a less degree, with Klenze. When, in 1825, Louis of +Bavaria came to the throne, he was appointed Government Architect, and +in this capacity gave shape to the noble dreams of that monarch, in the +famous Glyptothèque, the Pinacothèque, the palace, and those civil and +ecclesiastical buildings which render Munich one of the most monumental +cities of Europe. It was his confessed aim to take up the work of the +Renaissance artists, having regard to our increased knowledge of that +antique civilization of which the masters of the sixteenth century could +study only the most complex developments, and those models of Rome which +were farthest removed from the pure fountain-head of Greece. "To-day," +he said, "put in possession of the very principles of Hellenic Art, +we can apply them to all our actual needs,--learning from the Greeks +themselves to preserve our independence, and at the same time to be duly +novel and unrestrained according to circumstances." These are certainly +noble sentiments; and one cannot but wish, that, when, in 1830, Klenze +was called upon to prepare plans for the grand Walhalla of Bavaria, he +had remembered his sublime theory and worked up to its spirit, instead +of recalling the Parthenon in his exterior and the Olympian temple of +Agrigentum in his interior. The last effort of this distinguished artist +was the building of three superb palaces for the museum of the Emperor +at St. Petersburg, finished in 1851. + +The seed thus planted fell upon good ground and brought forth a +hundred-fold. Then, throughout Germany, the scholastic formalism of the +old Renaissance began to fall into disrepute, and a finer feeling for +the eloquence of pure lines began to show itself. The strict limitations +of the classic orders were no longer recognized as impassable; a +sentiment of artistic freedom, a consciousness of enlarged resources, +a far wider range of form and expression, were evident in town and +country, in civil and ecclesiastical structures; and with all this +delightful and refreshing liberty was mingled that peculiar refinement +of line which was revived from Greece and was the secret of this change. +It was not over monumental edifices alone that this calm and thoughtful +spirit was breathed, but the most playful fancies of domestic +architecture derived from it an increased grace and purity, and the +study of Love moved over them, elegant and light-footed as Camilla. + + "The flower she touched on dipped and rose, + And turned to look at her." + +This revival of Hellenic principles is now infusing life into modern +German designs; and so well are these principles beginning to be +understood, that architects do not content themselves with the mere +reproduction of that narrow range of motives which was uttered in the +temples of heroic Greece, but, under these new impulses, they gather in +for their use all that has been done in ancient or modern Italy, in the +Romanesque of Europe, in the Gothic period, in Saracenic or Arabic Art, +in all the expressions of the old Renaissance. By the very necessity +of the Greek line, they are rendered catholic and unexcluding in their +choice of forms, but fastidious and hesitating in their interpretation +of them into this new language of Art. Thus the good work is going on in +Germany, and architecture _lives_ there, thanks to those two illustrious +pilgrims who brought back from the land of epics, not only the +scallop-shells upon their shoulders, but in their hearts the +consecration of Ideal Beauty. + +According to the usual custom, in the year 1827, a scholar of the École +des Beaux Arts in Paris, having achieved the distinguished honor of +being named _Grand Pensionnaire_ of Architecture for that year,--was +sent to the Académie Française in the Villa Medici at Rome, to pursue +his studies there for five years at the expense of the Government. This +scholar was Henri Labrouste. While in Italy, his attention was directed +to the Greek temples of Paestum. Trained, as he had been, in the +strictest academic architecture of the Renaissance, he was struck by +many points of difference between these temples and the Palladian +formulae which had hitherto held despotic sway over his studies. In +grand and minor proportions, in the disposition of triglyphs in the +frieze, in mouldings and general sentiment, he perceived a remarkable +freedom from the restraints of his school,--a freedom which, so far from +detracting from the grandeur of the architecture, gave to it a degree of +life and refinement which his appreciative eye now sought for in vain +among the approved models of the Academy. Studying these new revelations +with love and veneration, it was not long before the pure Hellenic +spirit, confined in the severe peristyles and cellas of the Paestum +temples, entered into his heart, with all its elastic capacities, all +its secret and mysterious sympathies for the new life which had sprung +up during its long imprisonment in those stained and shattered marbles. +Labrouste, on his return to Paris, in 1830, surprised the grave +professors of the Academy, Le Bas, Baltard, and the rest, by presenting +to them, as the result of his studies, carefully elaborated drawings +of the temples at Paestum. Witnessing, with pious horror, the grave +departures from their rules contained in the drawings of their former +favorite, they charged him with error, even as a copyist. True to their +prejudices, their eyes did not penetrate beyond the outward type, and +they at once began to find technical objections. They told him, never +did such an absurdity occur in classic architecture as a triglyph on a +corner! Palladio and the Italian masters never committed such an obvious +crime against propriety, nor could an instance of it be found in all +Roman antiquities. It was in vain that poor Labrouste upheld the +accuracy of his work, and reminded the Academy that among the Roman +models no instance had been found of a Doric corner,--that this order +occurred only so ruined that no corner was left for examination, or in +the grand circumferences of the Colosseum and the Theatre of Marcellus, +where, from the nature of the case, no corner could be. The professors +still maintained the integrity of their long-established ordinances, +and, to disprove the assertions of the young pretender, even sent +a commission to examine the temples in question. The result was a +confirmation of the fact, the ridicule of Paris, the consequent branding +of the young artist as an architectural heretic, and a continued +persecution of him by the École des Beaux Arts. Undaunted, however, +Labrouste established an _atelier_ in Paris, to which flocked many +intelligent students, sympathizing with the courage which could be +so strong in the conviction of truth as to brave in its defence the +displeasure of the powerful hierarchy of the School. + +Thus was founded the new Renaissance in France; and, in this genial +atmosphere, Greek lines began to exercise an influence far more thorough +and healthy than had hitherto been experienced in the whole history of +Art. To the lithe and elegant fancy of the French this Revelation was +especially grateful. For the youth of this nation soon learned that +in these newly opened paths, their invention and sentiment, so long +straitened and confined within the severe limits of the old system, +could move with the utmost freedom, and at the same time be preserved +from licentious excess by the delicate spirit of the new lines. Thus +natural fervor, grace, and fecundity of thought found here a most +welcome outlet. + +For some time the designs of the new school were not recognized in the +competitions of the École des Beaux Arts; but when, in the course of +Nature, some two or three of the more strenuous and bigoted professors +of Palladio's golden rules were removed from the scene of contest, the +_Romantique_ (for so the new system had been named) was received at +length into the bosom of the architectural church, and now it may be +justly deemed _the distinctive architectural expression of French Art_. + +Labrouste was not alone in his efforts; but Duban and Constant Dufeux +seconded him with genius and energy. Most of the important buildings +which have been erected in France within the last six or eight years +have either been unreservedly and frankly in the new style, or been +refined by more limited applications of Hellenic principles. Even the +revived Mediaeval school, which, under the distinguished leadership of +M. Viollet le Duc and the lamented M. J.B.A. Lassus, has lately been +strengthened to a remarkable degree in France, and which shared with +the _Romantique_ the displeasure of the Academy,--even this has tacitly +acknowledged the power of Greek lines, and instinctively suffered them +to purify, to a certain degree, the old grotesque Gothic license. Most +of the modern buildings of Paris along the new Boulevards, around the +tower of St. Jacques, and wherever else the activity of the Emperor +has made itself felt in the improvements of the French capital, are by +masters or pupils of the _Romantique_ persuasion, and, in their design, +are distinguished by that tenderness of Love and earnestness of Thought +which are the fountains of living Art. One of the most remarkable +peculiarities of this school is, that it brings out of every mind which +studies and builds in it strong traits of individuality; so that every +work appears as if its author had something particular to express in +it,--something to say with especial grace and emphasis. The ordinary +decorations of windows and doors are not made in conventional shapes, +as of yore, but are highly idiosyncratic. The designer had a distinct +thought about this window or that door,--and when he would use his +thought to ornament these features, he idealized it with his Greek lines +to make it architectural, just as a poet attunes his thought to the +harmony and rhythm of verse. Antique prejudices, bent into rigid +conformity with antique rubrics, are often shocked at the strange +innovations of these new Dissenters from the faith of Palladio and +Philibert Delorme,--shocked at the naked humanity in the new works, +and would cover it with the conventional fig-leaves prescribed in the +homilies of Vignola. Laymen, accustomed to the cold architectural +proprieties of the old Renaissance, and habituated to the formalities +of the five orders, the prudish decorum of Italian window-dressings and +pediments and pilasters and scrolls, are apt to be surprised at such +strange dispositions of unprecedented and heretical features, that the +intention of the building in which they occur is at once patent to the +most casual observer, and the story of its destination told with the +eloquence of a poetical and monumental language. All great revolutions +have proved how hard it is to break through the crust of custom, and +this has been no exception to the rule; yet in justice it must be said +that every intelligent mind, every eye possessing the "gifted simplicity +of vision", to use a happy phrase of Hawthorne's, recognizes the truth +and wisdom there are in the blessed renovations of the _Romantique_, +and looks upon them as the sweeps of a besom clearing away the dust +and cobwebs which ages of prejudice have spread thickly around the +magnificent art of architecture. + +Unlike the unwieldy and ponderous classic or Italian systems, whose +pride cannot stoop to anything beneath the haughtiest uses of life +without being broken into the whims of the grotesque and _Rococo_, the +_Romantique_ has already exhibited the graceful ease with which it may +be applied to the most playful as well as the most serious employments +of Art. It has decorated the perfumer's shop on the Boulevards with the +most delicate fancies woven out of the odor of flowers and the finest +fabrics of Nature, and, in the hands of Labrouste, has built the great +Bibliothèque Ste. Geneviève, the most important work with pure Greek +lines, and perhaps the most exquisite, while it is one of the most +serious, of modern buildings. The lore of the classics and the knowledge +of the natural world, idealized and harmonized by affectionate study, +are built up in its walls, and, internally and externally, it is a work +of the highest Art. The _Romantique_ has also been used with especial +success in funereal monuments. Structures of this character, demanding +earnestly in their composition the expression of human sentiment, have +hitherto been in most cases unsatisfactory, as they have been built +out of a narrow range of Renaissance, Egyptian and Gothic _motives_, +originally invented for far different purposes, and, since then, +_classified_, as it were, for use, and reduced to that inflexible system +out of which have come the formal restrictions of modern architecture. +Hence these _motives_ have never come near enough to human life, in its +individual characteristics, to be plastic for the expression of those +emotions to which we desire to give the immortality of stone in memory +of departed friends. The _Romantique_, however, confined to no rigid +types of external form, out of its noble freedom is capable of giving +"a local habitation and a name" to a thousand affections which hitherto +have wandered unseen from heart to heart, or been palpable only in words +and gestures which disturb our sympathies for a while and then die. +Probably the most remarkable indication of this capacity, as yet shown, +is contained in a tomb erected by Constant Dufeux in the Cimetière du +Sud, near Paris, for the late Admiral Dumont d'Urville. This structure +contains in its outlines a symbolic expression of human life, death, +and immortality, and in its details an architectural version of the +character and public services of the distinguished deceased. The finest +and most eloquent resources of color and the chisel are brought to bear +on the work; and the whole, combined by a very sensitive and delicate +feeling for proportion, thus embodies one of the most expressive elegies +ever written. The tomb of Madame Delaroche, _née_ Vernet, in the +Cimetière Montmartre, by Duban, is another remarkable instance of this +elastic capacity of Greek lines; and though taken frankly, in its +general form, from a common Gothic type, its chaste and graceful +freedom from Gothic restrictions in detail gives it a life and poetic +expressiveness which must be exceedingly grateful to the Love which +commanded its erection. + +Paris thus affords us, in its modern architecture, a happy proof of the +inevitable reforming and refining tendencies of the abstract lines +of Greece, when properly understood and fairly applied. Under their +influence old things have been made new, and the coldness and hardness +of Academic Art have been warmed and softened into life. Through the +agency of the _Romantique_ school, perhaps more new and directly +symbolic architectural expressions have been uttered within the last +four years than within the last four centuries combined. Like the +gestures of pantomime, which constitute an instinctive and universal +language, these abstract lines, coming out of our humanity and rendered +elegant by the idealization of study, are restoring to architecture its +highest capacity of conveying thought in a monumental manner. One of the +most dangerous results of that eclecticism which the advanced state of +our archaeological knowledge has made the principal characteristic +of modern design consists in the fatal facility thus afforded us +of availing ourselves of vast resources of forms and combinations +ready-made to suit almost all the exigencies of composition, as we have +understood it. The public has thus been made so familiar with the set +variations of classic orders and Palladian windows and cornices, with +all manner of Gothic chamfers and cuspidations and foliations, and the +other conventional symbols of architecture, which undeniably have more +of _knowledge_ than _love_ in them,--so accustomed have the people +become to these things, that the great art of which these have been the +only language now almost invariably fails to strike any responsive chord +in the human heart or to do any of that work which it is the peculiar +province of the fine arts to accomplish. Instead of leading the age, it +seems to lag behind it, and to content itself with reflecting into our +eyes the splendor of the sun which has set, instead of facing the east +and foretelling the glory which is coming. Architecture, properly +conceived, should always contain within itself a direct appeal to the +sense of fitness and propriety, the common-sense of mankind, which is +ever ready to recognize reason, whether conveyed by the natural motions +of the mute or the no less natural motions of lines. Now history has +proved to us, as has been shown, how, when the eloquence of these +simple, instinctive lines has been used as the primary element of +design, great eras of Art have arisen, full of the sympathies of +humanity, immortal records of their age. It cannot be denied, on the +other hand, that our eclectic architecture, popularly speaking, is not +comprehended, even by the most intelligent of cultivated people; and +this is plainly because it is based on learning and archeology, +instead of that natural love which scorns the limitations of any other +_authorities and precedents_ than those which can be found in the human +heart, where the true architecture of our time is lying unsuspected, +save in those half-conscious Ideals which yearn for free expression in +Art. + +Let our artists turn to Greece, and learn how, in the meditative repose +of that antiquity, these Ideals arose to life beneficent with the +baptism of grace, and became visible in the loveliness of a hundred +temples. Let them there learn how in our own humanity is the essence of +form as a language, and that _to create_, as true artists, we must +know ourselves and our own distinctive capacities for the utterance of +monumental history. After this sublime knowledge comes the necessity +of the knowledge of precedent. The great Past supplies us with the raw +material, with orders, colonnades and arcades, pediments, consoles, +cornices, friezes and architraves, buttresses, battlements, vaults, +pinnacles, arches, lintels, rustications, balustrades, piers, pilasters, +trefoils, and all the innumerable conventionalities of architecture. It +is plainly our duty not to revive and combine these in those cold and +weary changes which constitute modern design, but to make them live and +speak intelligibly to the people through the eloquent modifications of +our own instinctive lines of Life and Beauty. + +The riddle of the modern Sphinx is, How to create a new architecture? +and we find the Oedipus who shall solve it concealed in our own hearts. + + + * * * * * + + +THE ORDEAL BY BATTLE. + + +Virginia, which began by volunteering as peacemaker in our civil +troubles, seems likely to end by being their battleground; as Mr. +Pickwick, interfering between the belligerent rival editors, only +brought upon his own head the united concussion of their carpet-bags. +And as Dickens declares that the warriors engaged far more eagerly in +that mimic strife, on discovering that all blows were to be received +by deputy, so there is evidently an increased willingness to deal hard +knocks on both sides, in the present case, so long as it is clear that +only Virginia will take them. Maryland, under protection of our army, +adroitly contrives to shift the scene of action farther South. The Gulf +States, with profuse courtesies for the Old Dominion, consent to shift +it farther North. The Southern Confederacy has talked about +paying Richmond the "compliment" of selecting it for the seat of +government;--as if a bully, about to be lynched in his own house by the +crowd, should compliment his next-door neighbor by climbing in at his +window. It is very pleasant to have a hospitable friend; but it is +counting on his hospitality rather too strongly, when you make choice of +his apartments to be tarred and feathered in. + +Thus fades the fancy of an "independent neutrality" for the Old +Dominion. It ought to fade;--for neutrality is a crime, where one's +mother's life is at stake; and the Border theory of independence only +reminds one of Pitt's definition of an independent statesman, "a +statesman not to be depended on". How sad has been the decline of +Virginia! How strange, that in 1790, of the ten American post-offices +yielding more than a thousand dollars annually, that stately old +commonwealth held five! Now "a poverty-stricken State", by confession of +her own newspapers,--beleaguered, blockaded,--with no imports but +hungry and moneyless soldiers, and no exports save fugitives of all +colors,--what has she to hope from the present warfare? Elsewhere riches +have wings; in Virginia they are yet more transitory, having legs. Two +hundred million dollars' worth of her property has become unsalable, if +not worthless, within two months. She has but two great staples: tobacco +to send North, and slaves to send South. The slaves at present go only +to the wrong point of the compass, at rates remunerative to themselves +alone; and the tobacco-trade, for this season, will not even end in +smoke. + +But that which is now the condition of Virginia must ultimately be +the condition of the other seceding States. The tide of Secession has +already turned, and such tides never turn twice. The conspirators in +Maryland and Missouri had but one opportunity, and it was lost; with it +also went the whole cause of the Secessionists. For one week the North +shuddered, knowing the defenceless condition of Washington. Now no +Northern man shudders, except those whose Southern female cousins have +not yet found a refuge with the household gods of the eminent Senator +from Texas. + +The man who ever doubted that the first gun fired by the insurgents +would instantly unite the nation against them knew as little of the +American people as if he were editor of the London "Times." There is no +chemical solvent like gunpowder. Even the Mexican War, utterly opposed +to the moral convictions of the majority of Northern men, swept them +away in such a current that the very party which opposed it could find +no path to the Presidency but for its chief hero. Had the present +outbreak occurred far less favorably than it has, had the discretion of +President Lincoln been much less, or that of Mr. Davis much greater, +still the unanimity would have been merely a question of time, and +the danger of Washington would have reconciled all minor feuds. The +Democratic party would inevitably have embraced the war, when once +declared; Douglas would have made speeches for it, Buchanan subscribed +money for it, and Butler joined in it; Bennett would still have floated +triumphant on the tide of zeal, and Caleb Cushing still have offered to +the Government his cavalry company of one. It is a grace not given to +any American party, to stand out long against the enthusiasm of a war. + +No doubt the Secession leaders have treated us very handsomely, as to +amount of provocation. It is rare that any great contest begins by a +blow so unequivocal as the bombardment of Fort Sumter; and rare in +recent days for any set of belligerents to risk the ignominy of +privateering. But, after all, it is the startling social theories +announced by the new "government" which form the chief strength of its +enemies. Either slavery is essential to a community, or it must be fatal +to it,--there is no middle ground; and the Secessionists have taken one +horn of the dilemma with so delightful a frankness as to leave us no +possible escape from taking the other. Never, in modern days, has there +been a conflict in which the contending principles were so clearly +antagonistic. The most bigoted royal house in Europe never dreamed of +throwing down the gauntlet for the actual ownership of man by man. Even +Russia never fought for serfdom, and Austria has only enslaved nations, +not individuals. In civil wars, especially, all historic divergences +have been trivial compared to ours, so far as concerned the avowed +principles of strife. In the French wars of the Fronde, the only +available motto for anybody was the _Tout arrive en France_, "Anything +may happen in France," which gayly recognized the absurd chaos of the +conflict. In the English civil wars, the contending factions first +disagreed upon a shade more or less of royal prerogative, and it took +years to stereotype the hostility into the solid forms with which we now +associate it. Even at the end of that contest, no one had ventured to +claim such a freedom as our Declaration of Independence asserts, on +the one side,--nor to recognize the possibility of such a barbarism +as Jefferson Davis glorifies, on the other. The more strongly the +Secessionists state their cause, the more glaringly it is seen to differ +from any cause for which any sane person has taken up arms since the +Roman servile wars. Their leaders may be exhibiting very sublime +qualities; all we can say is, as Richardson said of Fielding's heroes, +that their virtues are the vices of a decent man. + +We are now going through not merely the severest, but the only danger +which has ever seriously clouded our horizon. The perils which harass +other nations are mostly traditional for us. Apart from slavery, +democratic government is long since _un fait accompli_, a fixed fact, +and the Anglo-American race can no more revert in the direction of +monarchy than of the Saurian epoch. Our geographical position frees us +from foreign disturbance, and there is no really formidable internal +trouble, slavery alone excepted. Let us come out of this conflict +victorious in the field, escaping also the more serious danger of +conquering ourselves by compromise, and the case of free government is +settled past cavil. History may put up her spy-glass, like Wellington at +Waterloo, saying, "The field is won. Let the whole line advance." + +There has been a foolish suspicion that the North was strong in +diplomacy and weak in war. The contrary is the case. We are proving +ourselves formidable enough in war to cover our shortcomings in +diplomacy. How narrowly we escaped demoralizing ourselves, at the last +moment before Congress adjourned, by some concession which would have +destroyed our consistency without strengthening our position! If we +could even now bind our generals to imitate our Cabinet in its admirable +and novel policy of silence,--to eschew pen and ink as carefully as if +they were in training for the Presidency! The country is safe so long as +they shut their mouths and open their batteries. + +The ordeal by battle is a stern test of the solid power of a nation. +There must always be some great quality to produce great military +superiority,--skill, or daring, or endurance, or numbers, or wealth, +or all together. Except the first two, neither of these special +qualifications has been even claimed by the Secessionists; and these two +have been taken for granted with such superfluous boastfulness as to +yield strong internal evidence against the claim. Certainly their +general strategy, up to this moment, has yielded not a single evidence +of far-sighted judgment or conscious power, while it has shown decided +glimpses of weakness and indecision. Indeed, how can an army like theirs +be strong? Its members mostly unaccustomed to steady exertion or precise +organization; without mechanic skill or invention; without cash or +credit; fettered in their movements by the limited rolling stock of +their scanty railways; tethered to their own homes by the fear of +insurrection;--what element of solid strength have they, to set against +these things? In the present state of the world, strong in peace is +strong in war. In modern times an army of heroes is useless without +facilities for arming, transporting, and feeding it, to say nothing of +the more ignoble circumstance of pay. Considerations of simple political +economy render it almost impossible for a slaveholding army to be strong +collectively, nor do the habits of Southern life usually fit its members +to be strong singly. + +In remembering the Battle of New Orleans, we forget that the Southwest +was then a region of hardy pioneers, such as are now rather to be sought +for in Kansas and California. The famous Tennessee riflemen of that day +were not necessarily slaveholders, and their legitimate descendants are +yet to be found among the brave men who rally round the nearest approach +to Andrew Jackson whom the State now boasts,--a tolerable fac-simile +both as to character and etymology,--Andrew Johnson. There is no need of +disparaging the personal courage of any man, and the Southern army has +some good officers,--too good, probably, in spite of themselves, to +bring to bear their clearest judgment and their best energies in +striking down the flag they have all sworn to die for. They have +eminent foreign advisers also, or one at least; for Mr. W.H. Russell, +self-appointed plenipotentiary near the Court of St. Jefferson, is +said to have lent the aid of his valuable military experience to that +commanding officer so appropriately named Captain Bragg. But, Bragg or +no brag, it is almost a moral impossibility that a slaveholding army +should be strong. + +The Secessionists have suggested to us a fatal argument. "The superior +race must control the inferior." Very well; if they insist on invoking +the ordeal by battle to decide which is the superior, let it be so. It +will be found that they have made the common mistake of confounding +barbarism with strength. Because the Southern masses are as ignorant of +letters and of arts as the Scottish Highlanders, they infer themselves +to be as warlike. But even the brave and hardy Highlanders proved +powerless against the imperfect military resources of England, a century +ago, and it is not easy to see why those who now parody them should +fare better. The absence of the alphabet does not necessarily prove the +presence of strength, nor is the ignorance of all useful arts the best +preparation for the elaborate warfare of modern times. The nation is +grown well weary of this sham "chivalry," that would sell Bayard or Du +Gueselin at auction, if it could be shown that the mother of either had +a drop of marketable blood in her veins. It had always been charitably +fancied that in South Carolina at least there was some remnant of more +knightly honor, until a kind Providence sent Preston S. Brooks to dispel +the illusion. It may be possible that even a brave man, in some moment +of insane inconsistency, may commit some act which is the consummation +of all cowardice; but it is utterly and absolutely impossible that any +brave community should approve it. Time has long since carried the +perpetrator of that dastardly outrage to a higher tribunal, but nothing +can ever redeem the State of his birth from the crowning shame of its +indorsement. + +It is not recorded whether the proverbial English army in Flanders lied +as terribly as they swore; the genius of the nation did not take that +direction. But if they did, they have now met their match in audacity of +falsehood. Captain Bobadil in the play, who submitted a plan of killing +off an army of forty thousand men by the prowess of twenty, each man to +do his twenty _per diem_ in successive single combats, might have raised +his proposed score of heroes among any handful of Secessionists. There +seems to be no one to stop these prodigious fellows as a party of +Buford's men were once checked by their commander, in the writer's +hearing, on their way down the Missouri River, in 1856. "Boys," quoth +the contemptuous official, "you had better shut up. Whenever we came in +sight of the enemy, you always took a vote whether to fight or run, +and you always voted to run." Then the astounding tales they have told +respecting our people, down to the last infamous fabrication of "Booty +and Beauty," as the supposed war-cry for the placid Pennsylvanians! +Booty, forsooth! In the words of the "Richmond Whig," "there is more +rich spoil within a square mile of New York and Philadelphia than can be +found in the whole of the poverty-stricken State of Virginia"; and the +imaginary war-cry suggests Wilkes's joke about the immense plunder +carried off by some freebooter from the complete pillage of seven Scotch +isles: he reëmbarked with three-and-sixpence. + +It might not be wise to claim that the probable lease of life for our +soldiers is any longer than for the Secessionists, but it certainly +looks as if ours would have the credit of dying more modestly. Indeed, +the men of the Free States, as was the wont of their ancestors, have +made up their minds to this fight with a slow reluctance which would +have been almost provoking but for the astonishing promptness which +marked their action when once begun. It is interesting to notice how +clearly the future is sometimes foreseen by foreigners, while still +veiled from the persons most concerned. Thus, twelve years before the +Battle of Bunker's Hill, the Duc de Choiseul predicted and prepared for +the separation of the American colonies from England. One month after +that, the Continental Congress still clung to the belief that they +should escape a division. And so, some seven years ago, the veteran +French advocate Guépin, in a most able essay suggested by the "Burns +affair" in Boston, prophesied civil war in America within ten years. +"_Une grande lutte s'apprête donc_," he wrote; "A great contest is at +hand." + +Thus things looked to foreigners, both in 1775 and in 1854, while in +both cases our people were yielding only step by step to the inevitable +current which swept events along. It is the penalty of caution, that it +sometimes appears, even to itself, like irresolution, or timidity. Not a +foolish charge has been brought against Northern energy in this contest, +that was not urged equally in the time of the Revolution. The royal +troops thought Massachusetts as easy to subdue as the South +Carolinians affect to think, and expressed it in almost the same +language:--"Whenever it comes to blows, he that can run the fastest will +think himself best off." The revolutionists admitted that "the people +abroad have too generally got the idea that the Americans are all +cowards and poltroons." A single regiment, it was generally asserted, +could march triumphant through New England. The people took no pains to +deny it. The guard in Boston captured thirteen thousand cartridges at +a stroke. The people did not prevent it. A citizen was tarred and +feathered in the streets by the royal soldiery, while the band played +"Yankee Doodle." The people did not interfere. "John Adams writes, there +is a great spirit in the Congress, and that we must furnish ourselves +with artillery and arms and ammunition, but avoid war, if possible,--if +possible." At last, one day, these deliberate people finally made up +their minds that it was time to rise,--and when they rose, everything +else fell. In less than a year afterwards, Boston being finally +evacuated, one of General Howe's mortified officers wrote home to +England, in words which might form a Complete Letter-Writer for every +army-officer who has turned traitor, from Beauregard downward,--"Bad +times, my dear friend. The displeasure I feel in the small share I have +in our present insignificancy is so great, that I do not know the thing +so desperate I would not undertake, in order to change our situation." + +It is fortunate that the impending general contest has also been +recently preceded by a local one, which, though waged under +circumstances far less favorable to the North, yet afforded important +hints by its results. It was worth all the cost of Kansas to have +the lesson she taught, in passing through her ordeal. It was not the +Emigrant Aid Society which gave peace at last to her borders, nor was it +her shifting panorama of evanescent governors; it was the sheer physical +superiority of her Free-State emigrants, after they took up arms. Kansas +afforded the important discovery, as some Southern officers once naïvely +owned at Lecompton, that "Yankees _would_ fight." Patient to the verge +of humiliation, the settlers rose at last only to achieve a victory so +absurdly rapid that it was almost a new disappointment; the contest was +not so much a series of battles as a succession of steeplechases, of +efforts to get within shot,--Missouri, Virginia, and South Carolina +invariably disappearing over one prairie-swell, precisely as the +Sharp's rifles of the emigrants appeared on the verge of the next. The +slaveholders had immense advantages: many of the settlers were in league +with them to drive out the remainder; they had the General Government +always aiding them, more or less openly, with money, arms, provisions, +horses, men, and leaders; they had always the Missouri border to retreat +upon, and the Missouri River to blockade. Yet they failed so miserably, +that every Kansas boy at last had his story to tell of the company of +ruffians whom he had set scampering by the casual hint that Brown or +Lane was lurking in the bushes. The terror became such a superstition, +that the largest army which ever entered Kansas--three thousand men, by +the admission of both sides--turned back before a redoubt at Lawrence +garrisoned by only two hundred, and retreated over the border without +risking an engagement. + +It is idle to say that these wore not fair specimens of Southern +companies. They were composed of precisely the same material as the +flower of the Secession army,--if flower it have. They were members of +the first families, planters' sons and embryo Wigfalls. South Carolina +sent them forth, like the present troops, with toasts and boasts and +everything but money. They had officers of some repute; and they had +enthusiasm with no limit except the supply of whiskey. Slavery was +divine, and Colonel Buford was its prophet. The city of Atchison was +before the dose of 1857 to be made the capital of a Southern republic. +Kansas was to be conquered: "We will make her a Slave State, or form a +chain of locked arms and hearts together, and die in the attempt." Yet +in the end there were no chains, either of flesh or iron,--no chains, +and little dying, but very liberal running away. Thus ended the war in +Kansas. It seems impossible that Slavery should not make in this case a +rather better fight, where all is at stake. But it is well to remember +that no Border Ruffian of Secession can now threaten more loudly, swear +more fiercely, or retreat more rapidly, than his predecessors did then. + +One does not hear much lately of that pleasant fiction, so abundant a +year or two ago, that North and South really only needed to visit each +other and become better acquainted. How cordially these endearing words +sounded, to be sure, from the lips of Southern gentlemen, as they sat at +Northern banquets and partook unreluctantly of Northern wine! Can those +be the gay cavaliers who are now uplifting their war-whoops with such a +modest grace at Richmond and Montgomery? Can the privations of the +camp so instantaneously dethrone Bacchus and set up Mars? It is to be +regretted; they appeared more creditably in their cups, and one would +gladly appeal from Philip sober to Philip drunk. Intimate intercourse +has lost its charm. New York merchants more than ever desire an +increased acquaintance with the coffers of their repudiating debtors; +but so far as the knowledge of their peculiar moral traits is concerned, +enough is as good as a feast. No Abolitionist has ever dared to pillory +the slave-propagandists so conspicuously as they are doing it for +themselves every day. Sumner's "Barbarism of Slavery" seemed tolerably +graphic in its time, but how tamely it reads beside the "New Orleans +Delta"! + +A Scotchman once asked Dr. Johnson what opinion he would form of +Scotland from what strangers had said of it. + +"Sir," said the Doctor, "I should think it a region of the earth to be +avoided, so far as convenient." + +"But how," persisted the patriot, "if you listened to what its natives +say of it?" + +"Then, Sir," roared Old Obstinacy, "I should avoid it altogether." + +Take the seceded States upon their own showing, and it is absurd to +suppose that they can ever resume their former standing in the nation. +Are there any stronger oaths than their generals have broken, any closer +ties to honesty than their financiers have spurned, any deeds more +damning than their legislatures have voted thanks for? No one supposes +that the individual traitors can be restored to confidence, that Twiggs +can re-dye his reputation, or any deep-sea-soundings fish up Maury's +drowned honor. But the influence of the States is gone with that of +their representatives. They may worship the graven image of President +Lincoln in Mobile; they may do homage to the ample stuffed regimentals +of General Butler in Charleston; but it will not make the nation forget. +Could their whole delegation resume its seat in Congress to-morrow, with +the three-fifths representation intact, it would not help them. Can we +ever trust them to build a ship or construct a rifle again? No time, +no formal act can restore the past relations, so long as slavery shall +live. It is easy for the Executive to pardon some convict from the +penitentiary; but who can pardon him out of that sterner prison of +public distrust which closes its disembodied walls around him, moves +with his motions, and never suffers him to walk unconscious of it +again? Henceforth he dwells as under the shadow of swords, and holds +intercourse with men only by courtesy, not confidence. And so will they. + +Not that the United States Government is yet prepared to avow itself +anti-slavery, in the sense in which the South is pro-slavery. We +conscientiously strain at gnats of Constitutional clauses, while they +gulp down whole camels of treason. We still look after their legal +safeguards long after they have hoisted them with their own petards. But +both sides have trusted themselves to the logic of events, and there is +no mistaking the direction in which that tends. In times like these, men +care more for facts than for phrases, and reason quite as rapidly as +they act. It is impossible to blink the fact that Slavery is the root +of the rebellion; and so War is proving itself an Abolitionist, whoever +else is. Practically speaking, the verdict is already entered, and the +doom of the destructive institution pronounced, in the popular mind. +Either the Secessionists will show fight handsomely, or they will fail +to do so. If they fail to do it, they are the derision of the world +forever,--since no one ever spares a beaten bully,--and thenceforward +their social system must go down of itself. If, on the other hand, they +make a resistance which proves formidable and costly, then the adoption +of the John-Quincy-Adams policy of military emancipation is an ultimate +necessity, and there is nobody more likely to put it in effective +operation than a certain gentleman who lately wrote an eloquent +letter to his Governor on the horrors of slave-insurrection. No doubt +insurrection is a terrible thing, but so is all war, and every man of +humanity approaches either with a shudder. But if the truth were told, +it would be that the Anglo-Saxon habitually despises the negro because +he is _not_ an insurgent, for the Anglo-Saxon would certainly be one in +his place. Our race does not take naturally to non-resistance, and has +far more spontaneous sympathy with Nat Turner than with Uncle Tom. But +be it as it may with our desires, the rising of the slaves, in case of +continued war, is a mere destiny. We must take facts as they are. + +Insurrection is one of the risks voluntarily assumed by Slavery,--and +the greatest of them. The slaves know it, and so do the masters. When +they seriously assert that they feel safe on this point, there is really +no answer to be made but that by which Traddles in "David Copperfield" +puts down Uriah Heep's wild hypothesis of believing himself an innocent +man. "But you don't, you know," quoth the straightforward Traddles; +"therefore, if you please, we won't suppose any such thing." They cannot +deceive us, for they do not deceive themselves. Every traveller who has +seen the faces of a household suddenly grow pale, in a Southern +city, when some street tumult struck to their hearts the fear of +insurrection,--every one who has seen the heavy negro face brighten +unguardedly at the name of John Brown, though a thousand miles away +from Harper's Ferry,--has penetrated the final secret of the military +weakness which saved Washington for us and lost the war for them. + +It is time to expose this mad inconsistency which paralyzes common sense +on all Southern tongues, so soon as Slavery becomes the topic. These +same negroes, whom we hear claimed, at one moment, as petted darlings +whom no allurements can seduce, are denounced, next instant, as fiends +whom a whisper can madden. Northern sympathizers are first ridiculed +as imbecile, then lynched as destructive. Either position is in itself +intelligible, but the combination is an absurdity. We can understand +why the proprietor of a powder-house trembles at the sight of flint +and steel; and we can also understand why some new journeyman, being +inexperienced, may regard the peril without due concern. But we should +decide either to be a lunatic, if he in one breath proclaimed his +gunpowder to be incombustible, and at the next moment assassinated a +visitor for lighting a cigar on the premises. A slave population is +either contented and safe, or discontented and unsafe; it cannot at the +same time be friendly and hostile, blissful and desperate. + +The result described is inevitable, should the Secessionists dare to +tempt the ordeal by battle long enough. If it stop short of this, it +will be because the prestige of Southern military power is so easily +broken down that there is no temptation to declare the Adams policy. +But even this consummation must have the most momentous results, and +entirely modify the whole anti-slavery movement of the nation. Should +the war cease to-morrow, it has inaugurated a new era in our nation's +history. The folly of the Gulf States, in throwing away a political +condition where the conservative sentiment stood by them only too well, +must inevitably recoil on their own heads, whether the strife last a day +or a generation. No man can estimate the new measures and combinations +to which it is destined to give rise. There stands the Constitution, +with all its severe conditions,--severe or weak, however, according to +its interpretations;--which interpretations, again, will always prove +plastic before the popular will. The popular will is plainly destined +to a change; and who dare predict the results of its changing? The +scrupulous may still hold by the letter of the bond; but since the +South has confessedly prized all legal guaranties only for the sake of +Slavery, the North, once free to act, will long to construe them, up to +the very verge of faith, in the interest of Liberty. Was the original +compromise, a Shylock bond?--the war has been our Portia. Slavery long +ruled the nation politically. The nation rose and conquered it with +votes. With desperate disloyalty, Slavery struck down all political +safeguards, and appealed to arms. The nation has risen again, ready to +meet it with any weapons, sure to conquer with any Twice conquered, what +further claim will this defeated desperado have? If it was a disturbing +element before, and so put under restriction, shall it be spared when it +has openly proclaimed itself a destroying element also? Is this to be +the last of American civil wars, or only the first one? These are the +questions which will haunt men's minds, when the cannon are all bushed, +and the bells are pealing peace, and the sons of our hearth-stones come +home. The watchword "Irrepressible Conflict" only gave the key, but War +has flung the door wide open, and four million slaves stand ready to +file through. It is merely a question of time, circumstance, and method. +There is not a statesman so wise but this war has given him new light, +nor an Abolitionist so self-confident but must own its promise better +than his foresight. Henceforth, the first duty of an American legislator +must be, by the use of all legitimate means, to weaken Slavery. _Delenda +est Servitudo_. What the peace which the South has broken was not doing, +the war which she has instituted must secure. + + * * * * * + + +THE UNITED STATES AND EUROPE. + + +The modern world differs from the world of antiquity in nothing more +than in the existence of a brotherhood of nations, which was unknown to +the ancients, who seem to have been incapable of understanding that it +was impossible for either good or evil to be confined within certain +limits. The attempts of the Persians to extend their dominion into +Europe did for a time cause some faint approach to ideas and practices +that are common to the moderns; but, as a general rule, every monarchy +or people had its own system, to which it adhered until it was worn out +by internal decay, or was overthrown by foreign conquest. It was owing +to this exclusiveness, and to the inability of ancient statesmen to work +out an international system, that the Romans were enabled to extend +their dominion until it comprehended the best parts of the world. Had +the rulers and peoples of Carthage, Macedonia, Greece, and Syria been +capable of forming an alliance for common defence, the conquests of Rome +in the East might have been early checked, and her efforts have been +necessarily confined to the North and the West. But no international +system then existed, and the rude attempts at mutual assistance that +were occasionally made, as the conquering race strode forward, were of +no avail; and the swords of the legionaries reaped the whole field. It +is singular that what is so well known to the moderns, and was known +to them at times when they were far inferior to the best races of +antiquity, should have remained unknown to the latter. The chief reason +of this want of combining power in men who have never been surpassed in +ability is to be found in the then prevailing idea, that every stranger +was an enemy. There was a total want of confidence in one another among +the peoples of the ante-Christian period. Differences of race were +augmented by differences in religion, and by the absence of strong +business interests. Christianity had not been vouchsafed to man, and +commerce had very imperfectly done its work, while war was carried on in +the most ruthless and destructive manner. + +The modern world differs in this matter entirely from the ancient world; +and though the change is perfect only in Christendom, the effect of it +is felt in countries where the Christian religion does not prevail, but +into which Christian armies and Christian merchants have penetrated. +Christendom is the leading portion of the world, and is fast giving +law to lands in which Christianity is still hated. It is the policy of +Christendom that orders the world. A Christian race rules over the whole +of that immense country, or collection of countries, which is known as +India. Another Christian race threatens to seize upon Persia. Christians +from the extreme West of Europe have dictated the terms of treaties to +the Tartar lords of China; and Christians from America have led the way +in breaking through the exclusive system of Japan. Christian soldiers +have for a year past acted as the police of Syria, Christianity's early +home, but now held by the most bigoted and cruel of Mussulmans; and it +is only the circumstance that they cannot agree upon a division of the +spoil that prevents the five great powers of Europe--the representatives +of the leading branches of the Christian religion--from partitioning +the vast, but feeble Ottoman Empire. The Christian idea of man's +brotherhood, so powerful in itself, is supported by material forces so +vast, and by ingenuity and industry so comprehensive and so various in +themselves and their results, that it must supersede all others, and +be accepted in every country where there are people capable of +understanding it. From the time of the first Crusade there has been a +steady tendency to the unity of Christian countries; and notwithstanding +all their conflicts with one another, and partly as one of the effects +of those conflicts, they have "fraternized," until now there exists a +mighty Christian Commonwealth, the members of which ought to be able to +govern the world in accordance with the principles of a religion that is +in itself peace. Under the influence of these principles, the Christian +nations, though not in equal degrees, have developed their resources, +and a commercial system has been created which has enlisted the material +interests of men on the same side with the highest teachings of the +purest religion. Selfishness and self-denial march under the same +banner, and men are taught to do unto others as they would that others +should do unto them, because the rule is as golden economically as it is +morally. This teaching, however, it must be allowed, is very imperfectly +done, and it encounters so many disturbing forces to its proper +development that an observer of the course of Christian nations might be +pardoned, if he were at times to suppose there is little of the spirit +of Christianity in the ordering of the policy of Christendom, and also +that the true nature of material interests is frequently misunderstood. +Still, it is undeniable that there is a general bond of union in +Christendom, and that no part of that division of the world can be +injured or improved without all the other parts of it being thereby +affected. What is known as "the business world" exists everywhere, but +it is in Christendom that it has its principal seats, and in which its +mightiest works are done. It forms one community of mankind; and what +depresses or exalts one nation is felt by its effects in all nations. +There cannot be a Russian war, or a Sepoy mutiny, or an Anglo-French +invasion of China, or an emancipation of the serfs of Russia, without +the effect thereof being sensibly experienced on the shores of Superior +or on the banks of the Sacramento; and the civil war that is raging in +the United States promises to produce permanent consequences to the +inhabitants of Central India and of Central Africa. The wars, floods, +plagues, and famines of the farthest East bear upon the people of the +remotest West. The Oregon flows in sympathy with the Ganges; and a very +mild winter in New England might give additional value to the ice-crop +of the Neva. So closely identified are all nations at this time, that +the hope that there may be no serious difficulties between the United +States and the Western powers of Europe, as a consequence of the Federal +Government's blockade of the Southern ports of the Union, is based as +much upon the prospect of the European food-crops being small this year +as upon the sense of justice that may exist in the bosoms of the rulers +of France and England. If those crops should prove to be of limited +amount, peace could be counted upon; if abundant, we might as well make +ample preparation for a foreign war. Nations threatened with scarcity +cannot afford to begin war, though they may find themselves compelled +to wage it. A cold season in Europe would be the best security that we +could have that we shall not be vexed with European intervention in +our troubles; for then Europeans would desire to have the privilege +of securing that portion of our food which should not be needed for +home-consumption. This is the fair side of the picture that is presented +by the bond of nations. There is another side to the picture, which is +far from being so agreeable to us, and which may be called the Cotton +side; and it is because England, and to a lesser degree France, is +of opinion that American cotton must be had, that our civil troubles +threaten to bring upon us, if not a foreign war, at least grave disputes +and difficulties with those European nations with which we are most +desirous of remaining on the best of terms, and to secure the friendship +of which all Americans are disposed to make every sacrifice that is +compatible with the preservation of national honor. + +From the beginning of the troubles in this country that have led to +civil war, the desire to know what course would be pursued by the +principal nations of Europe toward the contending parties has been very +strongly felt on both sides; but the feeling has been greater on the +side of the rebels than on that of the nation, because the rebellion has +depended even for the merest chance of success upon the favorable view +of European governments, and the nation has got beyond the point of +caring much for the opinions or the actions of those governments. The +Union's existence depends not upon European friendship or enmity; but +without the aid of the Old World, the new Confederacy could not look for +success, had it received twice the assistance it did from the Buchanan +administration, and were it formed of every Slaveholding State, with +not a Union man in it to wound the susceptible minds of traitors by his +presence. The belief among the friends of order was, that Europe would +maintain a rigid neutrality, not so much from regard to this country as +from disgust at the character of the Confederacy's polity, and at the +opinions avowed by its officers, its orators, and its journals, opinions +which had been most forcibly illustrated in advance by acts of the +grossest robbery. That any civilized nation should be willing to afford +any countenance, and exclusively on grounds of interest, to a band of +ruffians who avowed opinions that could not now find open supporters +in Bokhara or Barbary, was what the American people could not believe. +Conscious that the Southern rebellion was utterly without provocation, +and that it had been brought about by the arts of disappointed +politicians, most of us were convinced that the rebels would be +discountenanced by the rulers of every European state to whom their +commissioners should apply either for recognition or for assistance. +We knew the power of King Cotton was great, though much exaggerated in +words by his servile subjects; but we did not, because we could not, +believe that he was able to control the policy of old empires, to +subvert the principle of honor upon which aristocracies profess to rely +as their chief support, and to turn whole nations from the roads in +which they had been accustomed to travel. That Cotton has done this we +do not assert; but it has done not a little to show how feeble; the +regard of certain classes in Europe for morality, when adherence to +principle may possibly cause them some trouble, and perhaps lead to some +loss. If the Southern plant has not become the tyrant of Europe, as for +a long time it was of America, it has certainly done much in a brief +time to unsettle English opinion, and to convert the Abolitionists of +Great Britain, the men who could tax the whites of their empire in the +annual interest of one hundred million dollars in order that the slavery +of the blacks in that empire might come to an end, into the supporters +of American slavery, and of its extension over this continent, which +might be made into a Cotton paradise, if the supply of negroes from +Africa should not be interrupted; and the logical conclusion from the +position laid down by Lord John Russell is, that the slave-trade must +be revived, as that is what his "belligerent" friends of the Southern +Confederacy are contending for. The American people had long been +taunted by the English with their subserviency to the slaveholding +interest, and with their readiness to sacrifice the welfare of a weak +and wronged race on the altars of Mammon. Whether these taunts were +well deserved by us, we shall not stop to inquire; but it is the most +melancholy of facts, that, no sooner have we given the best evidence +which it is in our power to give of our determination to confine slavery +within its present limits, and to put an end to the abuse of our +Government's power by the slaveholders, than the Government of Great +Britain, acting as the agent and representative of the British nation, +places itself directly across our path, and prepares to tell us to +stay our hand, and not dare to meddle with the institution of slavery, +because from the success of that institution proceeds cotton, and upon +the supply of cotton not being interfered with depend the welfare and +the strength of the liberty-and-order loving and morality-and-religion +worshipping race! So far as they have dared to do it, the British +ministers have placed their country on the side of those men who have +revolted in America because they saw that they could no longer make use +of slavery to misgovern the Union; and we must wait to see how far they +are to be supported by the opinion of that country, before a distinction +can be made between the ministers and the people. Left to themselves, +and unbiased by any of those selfish motives that go to make up the sum +of politics, we have not the slightest doubt that the English people, in +the proportion of ten to one, would decide in behalf of the supporters +of freedom in this country; but we are by no means so sure that the +ministers would not be sustained, were they to plunge their country into +a third American War, and sustained, too, in sending fleets to raise +our blockade of the American coast of Africa, and armies to fight the +battles of Slavery in Virginia and the Carolinas, where British officers +stole negroes eighty years ago, and sent them to the West India markets, +and found that that kind of commerce flourished well in war. A war for +the maintenance of American slavery, and to secure for slaveholders +the full and perfect enjoyment of all the "rights" of their "peculiar" +property, would be no worse than was the war which was waged against our +ancestors of the Revolution, or than those wars which were carried on +against Republican and Imperial France, ostensibly for the preservation +of order, but really for the restoration of a despotism which cannot now +find a single apologist on earth. There is often a wide distinction to +be made between a nation and its government, as our own recent history +but too deplorably proves; and the men who govern England may be enabled +to do that now which has more than once been done by their predecessors, +array their country in support of evil against that country's sense and +wishes. We should be prepared for this, and should look the evil that +threatens us fairly in the face, as the first thing to be done to +prevent it from getting beyond the threatening-point. The words of Sir +Boyle Roche, that the best way to avoid danger is to meet it plump, are +strikingly applicable to our condition. If we would not have a foreign +war on our hands before we shall have settled with the rebels, we should +make it very clear to foreigners that to fight with us would be a sort +of business that would be sure not to pay. + +That war may follow from the course which England has elected to pursue +toward the parties to our civil conflict will not appear a strange view +of affairs to those who know something of the history of Great Britain +and the United States in the early part of this century. That which the +British Government is now doing bears strong resemblance to the course +which the same Government, with different ministers, pursued toward the +United States during the war with Napoleon I., and which led to the +contest of 1812,--a contest which Franklin had predicted, and which he +said would be our War of _Independence_, as that of 1775-83 had been +our War of _Revolution_. The same ignorance of America, and the same +disposition to insult, to annoy, and to injure Americans, that were so +common under the ministries of Pitt, Portland, and Perceval, and which +move both our mirth and our indignation when we read of them long after +the tormentors and the tormented have gone to their last repose, are +exhibited by the Palmerston Ministry,--though it is but justice to Lord +Palmerston to say, that he has borne himself more manfully toward us +than have his associates. England treats us as she would not dare to +treat any European power, making an exception in our case to her +general policy, which has been, since 1815, to truckle before her +contemporaries. She has crouched before France repeatedly, when she +had much better ground for fighting her than she now has for taking +preliminary steps to fight us. We are not entitled to the same treatment +that she thinks is due to the nations of the continent of Europe. She +cannot rid herself of the feeling that we still are colonists, and that +the rules which apply to her intercourse with old nations cannot apply +to her intercourse with us, the United States having been a portion of +the British Empire within the recollection of persons yet living. No +sooner, therefore, had a state of things arisen here that seemed to +warrant a renewal of the insulting treatment that was a thing of course +in 1807, than we were made to see how hollow were those professions of +friendship for America that were not uncommon in the mouths of British +statesmen during the ten or twelve years that preceded the advent of +Secession. So long as we were deemed powerful, we received assurances of +"the most distinguished consideration"; but we have at last ascertained +that those assurances were as false as they are when they are appended +to the letter of some diplomatist who is engaged in the work of cheating +some one who is neither better nor worse than himself. It is positively +mortifying to think how shockingly we have been taken in, and that the +"cordial understanding" that had, apparently, been growing up between +the two nations was a misunderstanding throughout, though we were +sincere in desiring its existence. Perhaps, when the evidences of the +strength that we possess, in spite of Secession, shall have all been +placed before the rulers of England, they will be found less ready to +quarrel with the American people than they were a month ago. A nation +that is capable of placing a quarter of a million of men in the field in +sixty days, and of giving to that immense force a respectable degree of +consistency and organization, is worth being conciliated after having +been insulted. But would any amount of conciliation suffice to restore +the feeling that existed here when the Prince of Wales was our guest? We +fear that it would not, and that for some years to come the sentiment +in America toward England will be as hostile as it was in the last +generation, when it was in the power of any politician to make political +capital by assailing the mother-land. The belief is created that England +in her heart hates us as profoundly as ever she did, that the forty-six +years' peace has produced no change in her feeling with respect to us, +and that she is watching ever for an opportunity to gratify the grudge +of which we are the object. Practically it will matter very little +whether this belief shall be well founded or not, so long as English +ministers, whether from want of judgment or from any other cause, shall +omit no occasion for the insulting and annoying of the United States. An +opinion that is sincerely held by the people of a powerful nation is in +itself a fact of the first importance, no matter whether it be founded +in truth or not; and if the blundering of another powerful nation shall +help to maintain that opinion, that nation would have no right to +complain of any consequences that should follow from its inability to +comprehend the condition of its neighbor. This country will not submit +to the degradation which England would inflict upon it, and which no +other European nation appears inclined to aid the insular empire in +inflicting. Even Spain, proverbially foolish in her foreign policy, and +seemingly unable to get within a hundred years of the present time, +observes a decorum in the premises to which Great Britain is a stranger. + +The manner of proceeding on the part of the British Government, and +the arguments which have been put forward in justification of its +pro-slavery policy, are serious aggravations of its original offence. +The first declaration of Lord John Russell, Secretary of State for +Foreign Affairs, was to the effect that England would not show any favor +to the Secessionists. His subordinate (Lord Wodehouse, Under-Secretary +of State for Foreign Affairs) was even more emphatic than his chief in +speaking to the same purpose. Suddenly, the Foreign Secretary turned +about, with a facility and promptness for which men had not been +prepared even by his rapid changes on the questions of the Russian War +and Italian Nationality, and said that the Southern Confederacy would be +recognized as a belligerent, which is, to all intents and purposes of a +practical character, the same thing as acknowledging it to be a nation. +What was the cause of this sudden change? We have only to look at the +dates of the events that, followed the fall of Fort Sumter to find an +answer. Lord John Russell believed that the capital of the United States +had fallen into the hands of the rebels, and he was anxious to please +the masters of the cotton-fields by showing them that he had not waited +to hear of their victory to behold their virtues. There was some excuse +for his belief that the raid upon Washington had succeeded; for down to +the 27th of April there was but too much reason for supposing that that +city was in serious danger of becoming the prey of the Confederates, +who might have taken it, if they had been half as forward in their +preparations for war as they were supposed to have been by the chiefs of +the British Government. But this belief that the rebels had delivered +an effective blow at the Union only places the meanness of Lord John +Russell and his associates in a worse light than we could view it in, +if they had acted solely upon principle. Their political opinions had +pledged them to oppose the principles of the Secessionists; but they +were in a hurry to give all the support they could to those principles, +because they had come to the conclusion that victory was to be with the +Secessionists. They desired to appropriate the merit of being the first +of European statesmen to welcome the destroyers of the American Union +into the family of nations. Had the event justified their expectations, +they would have gained much by their action, and would have enjoyed +whatever of glory the European world might have been disposed to accord +to the allies of American pirates. + +The Royal Proclamation of May 13th, in which the neutrality of England +is peremptorily laid down, and all British subjects are forbidden to +take any part in the war "between the Government of the United States of +America and certain States calling themselves the Confederate States of +America," is a paper in many respects most offensive to the people of +this country, though probably it was better in its intention than it +is in its execution. That part of it which most concerns us is the +recognition of "any blockade lawfully and actually established by or on +behalf of either of the said contending parties." It is important to us +that the British Government has admitted our right to blockade the ports +of the rebels, provided we shall do so in force; and though Lord Derby +has exhibited his ignorance of our naval power by saying that we cannot +enforce the blockade we have declared and instituted, we shall show to +the world, before the next cotton-crop shall be ready for exportation, +that we are fully up to the work that is demanded of us, by having at +least one hundred vessels, strongly armed and well manned, employed in +watching every part of the Southern coast to which any foreign ship +would think of going with a cargo or for the purpose of receiving one. +The naval strength of the Union is as capable of vast and effective +development as its military strength; and there is no reason why we +should not have afloat, and ready for action, by the beginning of +autumn, fleets sufficient to close up the Confederate ports as +thoroughly as the Allies closed those of Russia in 1854-6, and the +advanced guard of other fleets to be made ready to contend with the +forces that insolent foreign nations may send into the waters of America +for the purpose of fighting the battles of the slaveholders. + +With the single exception of the admission of the right of blockade, the +Royal Proclamation is unfriendly to the United States. It admits the +right of the Confederacy's Government to issue letters of marque, from +which it follows that American ships captured by cruisers of the rebels +could be taken into English ports, and there sold, after having been +condemned by prize courts sitting at any one of the places belonging +to the Confederacy. This is no light aid to the pirates; for there are +English ports on every sea, and on almost every one of the ocean's +tributaries. Vessels belonging to America, and captured by the +Confederacy's privateers in the Mediterranean, could be taken into +Gibraltar, into Valetta, and into Corfu, all of which are English ports. +Those captured in the Mexican Gulf and the Caribbean could be sent into +any one of the many ports that belong to England in the West Indies. +If captured in the North Atlantic, or the Baltic, or any other of the +waters of Northern Europe, they could be sent into the ports of England, +Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. In the South Atlantic are St. Helena and +Cape Town, which would afford shelter to Mr. Davis's privateers and +their prizes. In the East Indies British ports are numerous, from Aden +to the last places wrested from the Chinese, and they would be all open +to the enterprise of the Confederacy's cruisers. In the Pacific are +the English harbors on the Northwest Coast; and in Australia there are +British ports that ought, considering their origin, to be particularly +friendly to men who should enter the navy of the Secessionists. England +has in advance provided places for the transaction of all the business +that shall be necessary to render privateering profitable to the +"lawless brood" of the whole world. Into all of her thousand seaports +could the lucky Confederates go, and dispose of their captures, just as +the old Buccaneers used to sell their prizes in the ports of the English +colonies. Nor could all the efforts of all the navies of the world +prevent privateers from preying upon our commerce, as they are to be +commissioned in foreign countries, and will sail from the ports of those +countries. The East Indian seas, the Levant, and the Caribbean are the +old homes and haunts of pirates; and under the encouragement which +England is disposed to afford to piracy, for the especial benefit +of Slavery, the buccaneering business could not fail to flourish +exceedingly. True, our Government would not allow privateers to be +fitted out in our ports, during the Russian War, to prey upon the +commerce of France and England; but what of that? One good turn does +_not_ deserve another, according to the public morality of nations so +orderly and pious as are England and France. + +According to the Royal Proclamation, the blockade of any one of the +Northern ports by one of the ships of the Secessionists would be as +lawful an act as the blockade of Charleston by a dozen of the Union's +cruisers; and England allows that a privateer from Pensacola could seize +an English ship that should be engaged in bringing arras to New York or +Philadelphia. Thus are the two "parties" to the war placed on the same +footing by the decision of the English Government, though the one party +is a nation having treaties with England, and engaged in maintaining the +cause of order, and the other is only a band of conspirators, who have +established their power through the institution of a system of terror, +much after the fashion of Monsieur Robespierre and his associates, whose +conduct was so offensive to all Britons seven-and-sixty years ago. But +Montgomery is much farther from England than Paris, and the French had +no cotton to tempt the British statesmen of 1793-4 to strike an account +between manufacturing and morality. Distance and time appear to have +united their powers to make things appear fair in the eyes of Russell +that inexpressibly horrible to those of "the monster Pitt." + +The Royal Proclamation forbids Englishmen affording the Union assistance +in any way. No British gunmaker can sell us a weapon, no English +merchant can use one of his ships to send us the cannon and rifles we +have purchased in his country, and no English subject of any degree can +lawfully carry a despatch for our Government. Never was there--a +more forbidding state-paper put forth; and the arid language of the +Proclamation is rendered doubly disagreeable by the purpose for which +it is employed. We are placed by its terms on the level of the men of +Montgomery, who must be vastly pleased to see that they are held in as +much esteem in England as are the constitutional authorities of the +United States. If we were to seek for a contrast to this extraordinary +document, we should find it in the proclamation put forth by our own +Government at the time of the "Canadian Rebellion," and in which it was +_not_ sought to convey the impression that we had the right to regard +rebels and loyalists as men entitled to the same treatment at our hands. +It is a source of pride to Americans, that nothing in their own history +can be quoted in justification of the cold-blooded conduct of the +British Government. + +It has been sought to defend the action of England by referring to +precedents. We are reminded by Lord John Russell of the acknowledgment +of the Greeks as belligerents by England; and others have pointed to her +acknowledgment of the Belgians, and of those Spanish--Americans who had +revolted against the rule of Old Spain. We cannot go into an extended +examination of these precedents, for the purpose of showing that they do +not apply to the present case; but we may say, and an examination into +the facts will be found to justify our assertion, that England was in +no such hurry to acknowledge the Greeks, the Belgians, and the +Spanish-Americans as she has been to acknowledge the Secessionists. +Years elapsed after the beginning of the struggle in Greece before the +English Government professed to regard the parties to that memorable +conflict even with indifference. The British historian of the Greek +Revolution, writing of the year 1821, says,--"Among the European +Governments, England was probably, next to Austria, the one most hostile +to Greece at that period, when her foreign policy was guided by a spirit +akin to that of Metternich; the hired organs of Ministry were loud in +defence of Islam, and gall dropped from their pens on the Christian +cause." And when, some years later, England did profess neutrality +between the "parties" to the war, it was less to prevent the Greeks +from falling into the hands of the Turks than to prevent the Turks from +falling into the hands of the Russians. Another object she had in view +was the suppression of that horrible piracy which then raged in the +Hellenic seas. She was then as anxious to suppress piracy because it was +injurious to her commerce, as, apparently, she is now anxious to promote +it because its existence would be injurious to our commerce. The famous +Treaty of London, made in 1827, the parties to which were Russia, +France, and England, was justified on the ground of "the necessity of +putting an end to the sanguinary contest which, by delivering up the +Greek provinces and the isles of the Archipelago to the disorders +of anarchy, produces daily fresh impediments to the commerce of the +European states, and gives occasion to piracies which not only expose +the subjects of the contracting powers to considerable losses, but +render necessary burdensome measures of suppression and protection." +In the autumn of the same year, an Order in Council decreed that "the +British ships in the Mediterranean should seize every vessel they saw +under the Greek flag, or armed and fitted out at a Greek port, except +such as were under the immediate orders of the Greek Government." The +object of this strong measure was the suppression of piracy. Thus +England had to interfere to put down the Greek pirates; and if she means +to insist upon there being any resemblance between the case of the +Greeks and that of the Secessionists, (President Lincoln to appear as +the Grand Turk, or Sultan Mahmoud II., the destroyer of the Janizaries,) +we should not object, so far as relates to the finale of the piece, +which is very likely, through her most injudicious action, to produce +a large crop of Selims and Abdallahs, by whom any amount of sea-roving +will be done, but as much at Britain's expense as at ours. + +The case of Belgium is not at all to the point, the Dutch being by no +means anxious that the foolish arrangement made at Vienna, by which +Holland and Belgium had been formally united, should be continued, +though the House of Orange was averse to the loss of so much of its +dominions. The disputes that followed the expulsion of the Dutch from +Belgium were about details, and the whole matter was finally settled by +the action of the Great Powers, and England was not then in a condition +to decide it, had it been left for her decision. The makers of the +Kingdom of the Netherlands destroyed their own work, after it had been +found to be a bad job, and had had fifteen years and upward of fair +trial. England had no choice in the matter,--especially as the effect +of determined opposition on her part would have thrown Belgium into the +arms of France, and have brought about a French war, which would have +extended to the whole of Europe, with the revolutionists in every +country for the allies of France. Louis Philippe either would have been +overthrown very speedily after his elevation, or he would have been +enabled to wear his new crown only by placing the old _bonnet rouge_ +above it. + +That England recognized the Spanish-Americans is true; but why did +she recognize them? Because she had to choose between doing that and +allowing the Holy Alliance to enter upon the reconquest of the Spanish +colonies. Mr. Canning declared that he had called a new world into +existence to redress the balance of the old,--and that, if France, as +the tool of the Holy Alliance, should have Spain, it should not be +"Spain--with the Indies." This was in 1823, though it was not until 1826 +that Mr. Canning made use of the language quoted; and so serious was the +matter, that our country was prepared to make common cause with England +in resisting the interference of the Allies and their dependants in the +affairs of Spanish-America. The question was one which did not relate to +English interests alone, but concerned those of the whole world; and it +was not decided with reference to the interests of any one country, +but after it had been ascertained that its decision would closely and +immediately affect the welfare of Christendom. England had to choose +between diplomatic resistance to the Continental Powers and the support +of a policy which she could not adopt without degrading herself. +Naturally she elected to resist, and she did so with success. The +Spanish-American countries, however, were freed from the rule of Spain +long before she recognized them, and Spain had not the means of subduing +them. England, therefore, did not acknowledge them as against Spain, but +as against France, and in opposition to the Holy Alliance, the decrees +of which France was engaged in enforcing at the expense of the Spanish +Constitutionalists, and which process of enforcement the French +Government was prepared to extend to Peru and Mexico, and to the whole +of that part of America which had belonged to the Spanish Bourbons. Mr. +Canning's conduct was statesmanlike, but it was also spiteful; and had +England been in the condition to send sixty thousand men to Spain, +probably the recognition of the independence of Spanish-America would +have been much longer delayed. He had to strike a blow at a mighty +enemy, and he delivered it skilfully at that enemy's only exposed point, +where it told at once, and where it is telling to this day. But his +action affords no precedent to the present rulers of England for the +treatment of our case, for he moved not until after the colonies had +achieved their independence. Now the British Government proclaims its +purpose to acknowledge the Southern Confederacy in less than a month +after the beginning of the attack on Fort Sumter, and in about a week +after it had heard of the fall of that ill-used fortress! Is there not +some difference between the two cases? + +England did not admit the Poles to the honors she has allowed to the +American Secessionists, after their revolt from the Czar, in 1830-31, +though their cause was popular in that country, and they had achieved +such successes over the Russian armies as the Secessionists have not +won over the armies of the Union. Neither did she acknowledge the +Hungarians, in 1849, though they had actually won their independence, +which they would have preserved but for the intervention of Russia. It +was not for her interest that Austria should be weakened. Is it for her +interest that the United States should be weakened? Is it the purpose of +her Government to give our rebels encouragement, step by step, in order +that the American nation may be thrown back to the place it held twenty +years ago? + +The Cottonocracy of England, and those who for reasons of political +interest support them, proceed erroneously, we think, when they assume +that American cotton is the chief necessary of English life, and that +without a full supply of it there must ensue great suffering throughout +the British Empire. That it would be better for England to receive her +cotton without interruption may be admitted, without its following that +she must be ruined if there should be a discontinuance of the American +cotton-trade. Men are so accustomed to think that that which is must +ever continue to be, or all will be lost, that it is not surprising that +British manufacturers should suppose change in this instance to be ruin. +They are quite ready to innovate on the British Constitution, because in +that way they hope to obtain political power, and to injure the landed +aristocracy; but the idea of change in modes of business strikes them +with terror, and hence all their wonted sagacity is now at fault. +Lancashire is to become a Sahara, because President Lincoln, in +accordance with the demands of twenty million Americans, proclaims the +ports of the rebels under blockade, and enforces that blockade with a +fleet quite sufficient to satisfy even Lord John Russell's notions as to +effectiveness. We have never believed, and we do not now believe, that +it is in the power of any part of America thus to control the condition +of England. We would not have it so, if we could, as we are sure that +the power would be abused. If America really possessed the ability to +rule England that her cotton-manufacturers assert she possesses, all +Englishmen should rejoice that events have occurred here that promise to +work out their country's deliverance from so degrading a vassalage. But +it is not so, and England will survive the event of our conflict, no +matter what that event may be. The nation that triumphed over the +Continental System of Napoleon, and which was not injured by our Embargo +Acts of fifty years ago, should be ashamed to lay so much stress upon +the value of our cotton-crop, when it has its choice of the lands of the +tropics from which to draw the raw material it requires. As to France, +it would be most impolitic in her to seek our destruction, unless she +wishes to see the restoration of England's maritime supremacy. The +French navy, great and powerful as it now is, can be regarded only as +the result of a skilful and most costly forcing process, carried on by +Bourbons, Orleanists, Republicans, and Imperialists, during forty-six +years of maritime peace. It could not be maintained against the attacks +of England, which is a naval country by position and interest. We never +could be the rival of France, but we could always be relied upon to +throw our weight on her side in a maritime war; and while our policy +would never allow of our having a very large navy in time of peace, we +have in abundance all the elements of naval power. Nor should England +be indifferent to the aid which we could afford her, were she to be +assailed by the principal nations of Continental Europe. Strike the +American Union out of the list of the nations, or cause it to be +sensibly weakened, or treat it so as to revive in force the old American +hatred of England, and it is possible that the predictions of those who +see in Napoleon III. only the Avenger of Napoleon I. may be justified by +the event. + + * * * * * + + +WASHINGTON AS A CAMP. + + +OUR BARRACKS AT THE CAPITOL. + + +We marched up the hill, and when the dust opened there was our Big Tent +ready pitched. + +It was an enormous tent,--the Sibley pattern modified. A simple soul in +our ranks looked up and said,--"Tent! canvas! I don't see it: that's +marble!" Whereupon a simpler soul informed us,--"Boys, that's the +Capitol." + +And so it was the Capitol,--as glad to see the New York Seventh Regiment +as they to see it. The Capitol was to be our quarters, and I was pleased +to notice that the top of the dome had been left off for ventilation. + +The Seventh had had a wearisome and anxious progress from New York, as I +have chronicled in the June "Atlantic." We had marched from Annapolis, +while "rumors to right of us, rumors to left of us, volleyed and +thundered." We had not expected that the attack upon us would be merely +verbal. The truculent citizens of Maryland notified us that we were to +find every barn a Concord and every hedge a Lexington. Our Southern +brethren at present repudiate their debts; but we fancied they would +keep their warlike promises. At least, everybody thought, "They will +fire over our heads, or bang blank cartridges at us." Every nose was +sniffing for the smell of powder. Vapor instead of valor nobody looked +for. So the march had been on the _qui vive_. We were happy enough that +it was over, and successful. + +Successful, because Mumbo Jumbo was not installed in the White House. It +is safe to call Jeff. Davis Mumbo Jumbo now. But there is no doubt that +the luckless man had visions of himself receiving guests, repudiating +debts, and distributing embassies in Washington, May 1, 1861. And as to +La' Davis, there seems to be documentary evidence that she meant to be +"At Home" in the capital, bringing the first strawberries with her from +Montgomery for her May-day _soirée_. Bah! one does not like to sneer at +people who have their necks in the halter; but one happy result of this +disturbance is that the disturbers have sent themselves to Coventry. The +Lincoln party may be wanting in finish. Finish comes with use. A little +roughness of manner, the genuine simplicity of a true soul like Lincoln, +is attractive. But what man of breeding could ever stand the type +Southern Senator? But let him rest in such peace as he can find! He and +his peers will not soon be seen where we of the New York Seventh were +now entering. + +They gave us the Representatives Chamber for quarters. Without running +the gauntlet of caucus primary and election, every one of us attained +that sacred shrine. + +In we marched, tramp, tramp. Bayonets took the place of buncombe. The +frowzy creatures in ill-made dress-coats, shimmering satin waistcoats, +and hats of the tile model, who lounge, spit, and vociferate there, and +name themselves M.C., were off. Our neat uniforms and bright barrels +showed to great advantage, compared with the usual costumes of the usual +_dramatis personae_ of the scene. + +It was dramatic business, our entrance there. The new Chamber is +gorgeous, but ineffective. Its ceiling is flat, and panelled with +transparencies. Each panel is the coat-of-arms of a State, painted on +glass. I could not see that the impartial sunbeams, tempered by this +skylight, had burned away the insignia of the malecontent States. Nor +had any rampant Secessionist thought to punch any of the seven lost +Pleiads out from that firmament with a long pole. Crimson and gold are +the prevailing hues of the decorations. There is no unity and breadth of +coloring. The desks of the members radiate in double files from a white +marble tribune at the centre of the semicircle. + +In came the new actors on this scene. Our presence here was the +inevitable sequel of past events. We appeared with bayonets and bullets +because of the bosh uttered on this floor; because of the bills--with +treasonable stump-speeches in their bellies--passed here; because of +the cowardice of the poltroons, the imbecility of the dodgers, and the +arrogance of the bullies, who had here cooperated to blind and corrupt +the minds of the people. Talk had made a miserable mess of it. The +_ultima ratio_ was now appealed to. + +Some of our companies were marched up-stairs into the galleries. The +sofas were to be their beds. With their white cross-belts and bright +breastplates, they made a very picturesque body of spectators for +whatever happened in the Hall, and never failed to applaud in the right +or the wrong place at will. + +Most of us were bestowed in the amphitheatre. Each desk received its +man. He was to scribble on it by day, and sleep under it by night. When +the desks were all taken, the companies overflowed into the corners and +into the lobbies. The staff took committee-rooms. The Colonel reigned in +the Speaker's parlor. + +Once in, firstly, we washed. + +Such a wash merits a special paragraph. I compliment the M.C.s, our +hosts, upon their water-privileges. How we welcomed this chief luxury +after our march! And thenceforth how we prized it! For the clean face +is an institution which requires perpetual renovation at Washington. +"Constant vigilance is the price" of neatness. When the sky here is not +travelling earthward in rain, earth is mounting skyward in dust. So much +dirt must have an immoral effect. + +After the wash we showed ourselves to the eyes of Washington, marching +by companies, each to a different hotel, to dinner. This became one of +the ceremonies of our barrack-life. We liked it. The Washingtonians were +amused and encouraged by it. Three times a day, with marked punctuality, +our lines formed and tramped down the hill to scuffle with awkward +squads of waiters for fare more or less tolerable. In these little +marches, we encountered by-and-by the other regiments, and, most +soldierly of all, the Rhode Island men, in blue flannel blouses and +_bersaglière_ hats. But of them hereafter. + +It was a most attractive post of ours at the Capitol. Spring was at its +freshest and fairest. Every day was more exquisite than its forerunner. +We drilled morning, noon, and evening, almost hourly, in the pretty +square east of the building. Old soldiers found that they rattled +through the manual twice as alert as ever before. Recruits became old +soldiers in a trice. And as to awkward squads, men that would have been +the veriest louts and lubbers in the piping times of peace now learned +to toe the mark, to whisk their eyes right and their eyes left, to drop +the butts of their muskets without crushing their corns, and all the +mysteries of flank and file,--and so became full-fledged heroes before +they knew it. + +In the rests between our drills we lay under the young shade on the +sweet young grass, with the odors of snowballs and horse-chestnut blooms +drifting to us with every whiff of breeze, and amused ourselves with +watching the evolutions of our friends of the Massachusetts Eighth, and +other less experienced soldiers, as they appeared upon the field. They, +too, like ourselves, were going through the transformations. These +sturdy fellows were then in a rough enough chrysalis of uniform. That +shed, they would look worthy of themselves. + +But the best of the entertainment was within the Capitol. Some three +thousand or more of us were now quartered there. The Massachusetts +Eighth were under the dome. No fear of want of air for them. The +Massachusetts Sixth were eloquent for their State in the Senate Chamber. +It was singularly fitting, among the many coincidences in the history of +this regiment, that they should be there, tacitly avenging the assault +upon Sumner and the attempts to bully the impregnable Wilson. + +In the recesses, caves, and crypts of the Capitol what other legions +were bestowed I do not know. I daily lost myself, and sometimes when +out of my reckoning was put on the way by sentries of strange corps, a +Reading Light Infantry man, or some other. We all fraternized. There was +a fine enthusiasm among us: not the soldierly rivalry in discipline that +may grow up in future between men of different States acting together, +but the brotherhood of ardent fellows first in the field and earnest in +the cause. + +All our life in the Capitol was most dramatic and sensational. + +Before it was fairly light in the dim interior of the Representatives +Chamber, the _réveilles_ of the different regiments came rattling +through the corridors. Every snorer's trumpet suddenly paused. The +impressive sound of the hushed breathing of a thousand sleepers, marking +off the fleet moments of the night, gave way to a most vociferous +uproar. The boy element is large in the Seventh Regiment. Its slang +dictionary is peculiar and unabridged. As soon as we woke, the pit began +to chaff the galleries, and the galleries the pit. We were allowed noise +nearly _ad libitum_. Our riotous tendencies, if they existed, escaped +by the safety-valve of the larynx. We joked, we shouted, we sang, we +mounted the Speaker's desk and made speeches,--always to the point; for +if any but a wit ventured to give tongue, he was coughed down without +ceremony. Let the M.C.s adopt this plan and silence their dunces. + +With all our jollity we preserved very tolerable decorum. The regiment +is _assez bien composé_. Many of its privates are distinctly gentlemen +of breeding and character. The tone is mainly good, and the _esprit de +corps_ high. If the Colonel should say, "Up, boys, and at 'em!" I know +that the Seventh would do brilliantly in the field. I speak now of its +behavior in-doors. This certainly did it credit. Our thousand did the +Capitol little harm that a corporal's guard of Biddies with mops and +tubs could not repair in a forenoon's campaign. + +Perhaps we should have served our country better by a little Vandalism. +The decorations of the Capitol have a slight flavor of the Southwestern +steamboat saloon. The pictures (now, by the way, carefully covered) +would most of them be the better, if the figures were bayoneted and the +backgrounds sabred out. Both--pictures and decorations--belong to that +bygone epoch of our country when men shaved the moustache, dressed like +parsons, said "Sir," and chewed tobacco,--a transition epoch, now become +an historic blank. + +The home-correspondence of our legion of young heroes was illimitable. +Every one had his little tale of active service to relate. A decimation +of the regiment, more or less, had profited by the tender moment of +departure to pop the question and to receive the dulcet "Yes." These +lucky fellows were of course writing to Dulcinea regularly, three meals +of love a day. Mr. Van Wyck, M.C., and a brace of colleagues were kept +hard at work all day giving franks and saving threepennies to the ardent +scribes. Uncle Sam lost certainly three thousand cents a day in this +manner. + +What crypts and dens, caves and cellars there are under that great +structure! And barrels of flour in every one of them this month of May, +1861. Do civilians eat in this proportion? Or does long standing in the +"Position of a Soldier" (_vide_ "Tactics" for a view of that graceful +_pose_) increase a man's capacity for bread and beef so enormously? + +It was infinitely picturesque in these dim vaults by night. Sentries +were posted at every turn. Their guns gleamed in the gaslight. Sleepers +were lying in their blankets wherever the stones were softest. Then in +the guard-room the guard were waiting their turn. We have not had much +of this scenery in America, and the physiognomy of volunteer military +life is quite distinct from anything one sees in European service. The +People have never had occasion until now to occupy their Palace with +armed men. + + +THE FOLLOWING IS THE OATH. + + +We were to be sworn into the service of the United States the afternoon +of April 26th. All the Seventh, raw men and ripe men, marched out +into the sweet spring sunshine. Every fellow had whitened his belts, +burnished his arms, curled his moustache, and was scowling his manliest +for Uncle Sam's approval. + +We were drawn up by companies in the Capitol Square for mustering in. + +Presently before us appeared a gorgeous officer, in full fig. "Major +McDowell!" somebody whispered, as we presented arms. He is a General, +or perhaps a Field Marshal, now. Promotions come with a hop, skip, and +jump, in these times, when demerit resigns and merit stands ready to +step to the front. + +Major-Colonel-General McDowell, in a soldierly voice, now called the +roll, and we all answered, "Here!" in voices more or less soldierly. He +entertained himself with this ceremony for an hour. The roll over, we +were marched and formed in three sides of a square along the turf. Again +the handsome officer stepped forward, and recited to us the conditions +of our service. "In accordance with a special arrangement, made with the +Governor of New York," says the Major, "you are now mustered into the +service of the United States, to serve for thirty days, unless sooner +discharged"; and continues he, "The oath will now be read to you by the +magistrate." + +Hereupon a gentleman _en mufti_, but wearing a military cap with an +oil-skin cover, was revealed. Until now he had seemed an impassive +supernumerary. But he was biding his time, and--with due respect be it +said--saving his wind, and now in a Stentorian voice he ejaculated,-- + +"_The following is the oath!_" + +_Per se_ this remark was not comic. But there was something in the +dignitary's manner which tickled the regiment. As one man the thousand +smiled, and immediately adopted this new epigram among its private +countersigns. + +But the good-natured smile passed away as we listened to the impressive +oath, following its title. + +We raised our right hands, and, clause by clause, repeated the solemn +obligation, in the name of God, to be faithful soldiers of our country. +It was not quite so comprehensive as the beautiful knightly pledge +administered by King Arthur to his comrades, and transmitted to our time +by Major-General Tennyson of the Parnassus Division. We did not swear, +as they did of yore, to be true lovers as well as loyal soldiers. _Ça va +sans dire_ in 1861,--particularly when you were engaged to your Amanda +the evening before you started, as was the case with many a stalwart +brave and many a mighty man of a corporal or sergeant in our ranks. + +We were thrilled and solemnized by the stately ceremony of the oath. +This again was most dramatic. A grand public recognition of a duty. A +reavowal of the fundamental belief that our system was worthy of the +support, and our Government of the confidence, of all loyal men. And +there was danger in the middle distance of our view into the future, +--danger of attack, or dangerous duty of advance, just enough to keep +any trifler from feeling that his pledge was mere holiday business. + +So, under the cloudless blue sky, we echoed in unison the sentences of +the oath. A little low murmur of rattling arms, shaken with the hearty +utterance, made itself heard in the pauses. Then the band crashed in +magnificently. + +We were now miserable mercenaries, serving for low pay and rough +rations. Read the Southern papers and you will see us described. +"Mudsills,"--that, I believe, is the technical word. By repeating a form +of words after a gentleman in a glazed cap and black raiment, we had +suffered change into base assassins, the offscouring of society, +starving for want of employment, and willing to "imbrue our coarse fists +in fraternal blood" for the sum of eleven dollars a month, besides hard +tack, salt junk, and the hope of a Confederate States bond apiece for +bounty, or free loot in the treasuries of Florida, Mississippi, and +Arkansas, after the war. How carefully from that day we watched the +rise and fall of United States stocks! If they should go low among +the nineties, we felt that our eleven dollars _per mensem_ would be +imperilled. + +We stayed in our palace for a week or so after April 26th, the day of +the oath. That was the most original part of our duty thus far. New York +never had so unanimous a deputation on the floor of the Representatives +Chamber before, and never a more patriotic one. Take care, Gentlemen +Members of Congress! look to your words and your Acts honestly and +wisely in future! don't palter with Liberty again! it is not well that +soldiers should get into the habit of thinking they are always to +unravel the snarls and cut the knots twisted and tied by clumsy or +crafty fingers. The traitor States already need the _main de fer_,--yes, +and without the _gant de velours_. Let us beware, and keep ourselves +worthy of the boon of self-government, man by man! I do not wish to +hear, "Order arms!" and "Charge bayonets!" in the Capitol. But this +present defence of Free Speech and Free Thought ends, let us hope, that +danger forever. + +When we had been ten days in our showy barracks we began to quarrel with +luxury. What had private soldiers to do with the desks of law-givers? +Why should we be allowed to revel longer in the dining-rooms of +Washington hotels, partaking the admirable dainties there? + +The May sunshine, the birds and the breezes of May, invited us to +Camp,--the genuine thing, under canvas. Besides, Uncles Sam and Abe +wanted our room for other company. Washington was filling up fast with +uniforms. It seemed as if all the able-bodied men in the country were +moving, on the first of May, with all their property on their backs, to +agreeable, but dusty lodgings on the Potomac. + +We also made our May move. One afternoon, my company, the Ninth, and the +Engineers, the Tenth, were detailed to follow Captain Vielé, and lay out +a camp on Meridian Hill. + + +CAMP CAMERON. + + +As we had the first choice, we got, on the whole, the best site for a +camp. We occupy the villa and farm of Dr. Stone, two miles due north of +Willard's Hotel. I assume that hotel as a peculiarly American point of +departure, and also because it is the hub of Washington,--the centre of +an eccentric, having the White House at the end of its shorter, and the +Capitol at the end of its longer radius,--moral, so they say, as well +as geometrical. + +Sundry dignitaries, Presidents and what not, have lived here in times +gone by. Whoever chose the site ought to be kindly remembered for his +good taste. The house stands upon the pretty terrace commanding the +plain of Washington. From the upper windows we can see the Potomac +opening southward like a lake, and between us and the water ambitious +Washington stretching itself along and along, like the shackly files of +an army of recruits. + +Oaks love the soil of this terrace. There are some noble ones on the +undulations before the house. It may be permitted even for one who is +supposed to think of nothing but powder and ball to notice one of these +grand trees. Let the ivy-covered stem of the Big Oak of Camp Cameron +take its place in literature! And now enough of scenery. The landscape +will stay, but the troops will not. There are trees and slopes of +green-sward elsewhere, and shrubbery begins to blossom in these bright +days of May before a thousand pretty homes. The tents and the tent-life +are more interesting for the moment than objects which cannot decamp. + +The old villa serves us for head-quarters. It is a respectable place, +not without its pretensions. Four granite pillars, as true grit as if +the two Presidents Adams had lugged them on their shoulders all the way +from Quincy, Mass., make a carriage-porch. Here is the Colonel in the +big west parlor, the Quartermaster and Commissary in the rooms with +sliding-doors on the east, the Hospital upstairs, and so on. Other +rooms, numerous as the cells in a monastery, serve as quarters for the +Engineer Company. These dens are not monastic in aspect. The house is, +of course, a Certosa, so far as the gentler sex are concerned; but no +anchorites dwell here at present. If the Seventh disdained everything +but soldiers' fare,--which it does not,--common civility would require +that it should do violence to its disinclination for comfort and luxury, +and consume the stores sent down by ardent patriots in New York. The +cellars of the villa overflow with edibles, and in the greenhouse is a +most appetizing array of barrels, boxes, cans, and bottles, shipped here +that our Sybarites might not sigh for the flesh-pots of home. Such trash +may do very well to amuse the palate in these times of half-peace, +half-hostility; but when + + "war, which for a space does fail, + Shall doubly thundering swell the gale," + +then every soldier should drop gracefully to the simple ration, and +cease to dabble with frying-pans. Cooks to their aprons, and soldiers to +their guns! + +Our tents are pitched on a level clover-field sloping to the front +for our parade-ground. We use the old wall tent without a fly. It is +necessary to live in one of these awhile to know the vast superiority of +the Sibley pattern. Sibley's tent is a wrinkle taken from savage life. +It is the Sioux buffalo-skin, lodge, or _Tepee_, improved,--a cone +truncated at the top and fitted with a movable apex for ventilation. A +single tent-pole, supported upon a hinged tripod of iron, sustains the +structure. It is compacter, more commodious, healthier, and handsomer +than the ancient models. None other should be used in permanent +encampments. For marching troops, the French _Tente d'abri_ is a capital +shelter. + +Still our fellows manage to be at home as they are. Some of our +model tents are types of the best style of temporary cottages. Young +housekeepers of limited incomes would do well to visit and take heed. A +whole elysium of household comfort can be had out of a teapot,--tin; a +brace of cups,--tin; a brace of plates,--tin; and a frying-pan. + +In these days of war everybody can see a camp. Every one who stays at +home has a brother or a son or a lover quartered in one of the myriad +tents that have blossomed with the daffodil-season all over our green +fields of the North. I need not, then, describe our encampment in +detail,--its guard-tent in advance,--its guns in battery,--its +flagstaff,--its companies quartered in streets with droll and fanciful +names,--its officers' tents in the rear, at right angles to the lines of +company-tents,--its kitchens, armed with Captain Vielé's capital army +cooking-stoves,--its big marquees, "The White House" and "Fort Pickens," +for the lodging and messing of the new artillery company,--its barbers' +shops,--its offices. The same, more or less well arranged, can be seen +in all the rendezvous where the armies are now assembling. Instead of +such description, then, let me give the log of a single day at our camp. + + +JOURNAL OF A DAY AT CAMP CAMERON, BY PRIVATE W., COMPANY I. + + +BOOM! + +I would rather not believe it; but it is--yes, it is--the morning gun, +uttering its surly "Hullo!" to sunrise. + +Yes,--and, to confirm my suspicions, here rattle in the drums and pipe +in the fifes, wooing us to get up, _get up_, with music too peremptory +to be harmonious. + +I rise up _sur mon séant_ and glance about me. I, Private W., chance, by +reason of sundry chances, to be a member of a company recently largely +recruited and bestowed all together in a big marquee. As I lift myself +up, I see others lift themselves up on those straw bags we kindly call +our mattresses. The tallest man of the regiment, Sergeant K., is on one +side of me. On the other side I am separated from two of the fattest men +of the regiment by Sergeant M., another excellent fellow, prime cook and +prime forager. + +We are all presently on our pins,--K. on those lengthy continuations of +his, and the two stout gentlemen on their stout supporters. The deep +sleepers are pulled up from those abysses of slumber where they had been +choking, gurgling, strangling, death-rattling all night. There is for a +moment a sound of legs rushing into pantaloons and arms plunging into +jackets. + +Then, as the drums and fifes whine and clatter their last notes, at the +flap of our tent appears our orderly, and fierce in the morning sunshine +gleams his moustache,--one month's growth this blessed day. "Fall in, +for roll-call!" he cries, in a ringing voice. The orderly can speak +sharp, if need be. + +We obey. Not "Walk in!" "March in!" "Stand in!" is the order; but "Fall +in!" as sleepy men must. Then the orderly calls off our hundred. There +are several boyish voices which reply, several comic voices, a few +mean voices, and some so earnest and manly and alert that one says to +himself, "Those are the men for me, when work is to be done!" I read the +character of my comrades every morning in each fellow's monosyllable +"Here!" + +When the orderly is satisfied that not one of us has run away and +accepted a Colonelcy from the Confederate States since last roll-call, +he notifies those unfortunates who are to be on guard for the next +twenty-four hours of the honor and responsibility placed upon their +shoulders. Next he tells us what are to be the drills of the day. Then, +"Right face! Dismissed! Break ranks! March!" + +With ardor we instantly seize tin basins, soap, and towels, and invade a +lovely oak-grove at the rear and left of our camp. Here is a delicious +spring into which we have fitted a pump. The sylvan scene becomes +peopled with "National Guards Washing,"--a scene meriting the notice of +Art as much as any "Diana and her Nymphs." But we have no Poussin +to paint us in the dewy sunlit grove. Few of us, indeed, know how +picturesque we are at all times and seasons. + +After this _beau idéal_ of a morning toilet comes the ante-prandial +drill. Lieutenant W. arrives, and gives us a little appetizing exercise +in "Carry arms!" "Support arms!" "By the right flank, march!" "Double +quick!" + +Breakfast follows. My company messes somewhat helter-skelter in a big +tent. We have very tolerable rations. Sometimes luxuries appear of +potted meats and hermetical vegetables, sent us by the fond New +Yorkers. Each little knot of fellows, too, cooks something savory. Our +table-furniture is not elegant, our plates are tin, there is no silver +in our forks; but _à la guerre, comme à la guerre_. Let the scrubs +growl! Lucky fellows, if they suffer no worse hardships than this! + +By-and-by, after breakfast, come company-drills, bayonet-practice, +battalion-drills, and the heavy work of the day. Our handsome Colonel, +on a nice black nag, manoeuvres his thousand men of the line-companies +on the parade for two or three hours. Two thousand legs step off +accurately together. Two thousand pipe-clayed cross-belts--whitened with +infinite pains and waste of time, and offering a most inviting mark to +a foe--restrain the beating bosoms of a thousand braves, as they--the +braves, not the belts--go through the most intricate evolutions +unerringly. Watching these battalion movements, Private W., perhaps, +goes off and inscribes in his journal,--"Any clever, prompt man, with a +mechanical turn, an eye for distance, a notion of time, and a voice +of command, can be a tactician. It is pure pedantry to claim that the +manoeuvring of troops is difficult: it is not difficult, if the troops +are quick and steady. But to be a general, with patience and purpose and +initiative,--ah!" thinks Private W., "for that you must have the man of +genius; and already in this war he begins to appear out of Massachusetts +and elsewhere." + +Private W. avows without fear that about noon, at Camp Cameron, he takes +a hearty dinner, and with satisfaction. Private W. has had his feasts +in cot and chateau in Old World and New. It is the conviction of said +private that nowhere and no-when has he expected his ration with more +interest, and remembered it with more affection, than here. + +In the middle hours of the day it is in order to get a pass to go to +Washington, or to visit some of the camps, which now, in the middle +of May, begin to form a cordon around the city. Some of these I may +criticize before the end of this paper. Our capital seems arranged by +Nature to be protected by fortified camps on the circuit of its hills. +It may be made almost a Verona, if need be. Our brother regiments have +posts nearly as charming as our own in these fair groves and on these +fair slopes on either side of us. + +In the afternoon, comes target-practice, skirmishing-drill, more +company- or recruit-drill, and, at half-past five, our evening parade. +Let me not forget tent-inspection, at four, by the officer of the day, +when our band plays deliciously. + +At evening parade all Washington appears. A regiment of ladies, +rather indisposed to beauty, observe us. Sometimes the Dons +arrive,--Secretaries of State, of War, of Navy,--or military Dons, +bestriding prancing steeds, but bestriding them as if "'twas _not_ their +habit often of an afternoon." All which,--the bad teeth, pallid skins, +and rustic toilets of the fair, and the very moderate horsemanship of +the brave,--privates, standing at ease in the ranks, take note of, not +cynically, but as men of the world. + +Wondrous gymnasts are some of the Seventh, and after evening parade they +often give exhibitions of their prowess to circles of admirers. Muscle +has not gone out, nor nerve, nor activity, if these athletes are to be +taken as the types or even as the leaders of the young city-bred men of +our time. All the feats of strength and grace of the gymnasiums are to +be seen here, and show to double advantage in the open air. + +Then comes sweet evening. The moon rises. It seems always full moon +at Camp Cameron. Every tent becomes a little illuminated pyramid. +Cooking-fires burn bright along the alleys. The boys lark, sing, shout, +do all those merry things that make the entertainment of volunteer +service. The gentle moon looks on, mild and amused, the fairest lady of +all that visit us. + +At last, when the songs have been sung and the hundred rumors of the day +discussed, at ten the intrusive drums and scolding fifes get together +and stir up a concert, always premature, called tattoo. The Seventh +Regiment begins to peel for bed: at all events, Private W. does; for +said W. takes, when he can, precious good care of his cuticle, and never +yields to the lazy and unwholesome habit of soldiers,--sleeping in the +clothes. At taps--half-past ten--out go the lights. If they do not, +presently comes the sentry's peremptory command to put them out. Then, +and until the dawn of another day, a cordon of snorers inside of a +cordon of sentries surrounds our national capital. The outer cordon +sounds its "All's well"; and the inner cordon, slumbering, echoes it. + +And that is the history of any day at Camp Cameron. It is monotonous, it +is not monotonous, it is laborious, it is lazy, it is a bore, it is a +lark, it is half war, half peace, and totally attractive, and not to be +dispensed with from one's experience in the nineteenth century. + + +OUR ADVANCE INTO VIRGINIA. + + +Meantime the weeks went on. May 23d arrived. Lovely creatures with their +taper fingers had been brewing a flag for us. Shall I say that its red +stripes were celestial rosy as their cheeks, its white stripes virgin +white as their brows, its blue field cerulean as their eyes, and its +stars scintillating as the beams of the said peepers? Shall I say this? +If I were a poet, like Jeff. Davis and each and every editor of each +and every newspaper in our misbehaving States, I might say it. And +involuntarily I have said it. + +So the young ladies of New York--including, I hope, her who made my +sandwiches for the march hither--had been making us a flag, as they +have made us havelocks, pots of jelly, bundles of lint, flannel +dressing-gowns, embroidered slippers for a rainy day in camp, and other +necessaries of the soldier's life. + +May 23d was the day we were to get this sweet symbol of good-will. At +evening parade appeared General Thomas, as the agent of the ladies, the +donors, with a neat speech on a clean sheet of paper. He read it with +feeling; and Private W., who has his sentimental moments, avows that he +was touched by the General's earnest manner and patriotic words. Our +Colonel responded with his neat speech, very _apropos_. The regiment +then made its neat speech, nine cheers and a roar of tigers,--very brief +and pointed. + +There had been a note of preparation in General Thomas's remarks,--a +"_Virginia, cave canem!_" And before parade was dismissed, we saw our +officers holding parley with the Colonel. + +Something in the wind! As I was strolling off to see the sunset and the +ladies on parade, I began to hear great irrepressible cheers bursting +from the streets of the different companies. + +"Orders to be ready to march at a moment's notice!"--so I learned +presently from dozens of overjoyed fellows. "Harper's Ferry!" says one. +"Alexandria!" shouts a second. "Richmond!" only Richmond will content +a third. And some could hardly be satisfied short of the hope of a +breakfast in Montgomery. + +What a happy thousand were the line-companies! How their suppressed +ardors stirred! No want of fight in these lads! They may be rather +luxurious in their habits, for camp-life. They may be a little impatient +of restraint. They may have--as the type regiment of militia--the type +faults of militia on service. But a desire to dodge a fight is not one +of these faults. + +Every man in camp was merry, except two hundred who were grim. These +were the two artillery companies, ordered to remain in guard of our +camp. They swore as if Camp Cameron were Flanders. + +I by rights belonged with these malecontent and objurgating gentlemen; +but a chronicler has privileges, and I got leave to count myself into +the Eighth Company, my old friend Captain Shumway's. We were to move, +about midnight, in light marching order, with one day's rations. + +It has been always full moon at our camp. This night was full moon at +its fullest,--a night more perfect than all perfection, mild, dewy, +refulgent. At one o'clock the drum beat; we fell into ranks, and marched +quietly off through the shadowy trees of the lane, into the highway. + + +ACROSS THE LONG BRIDGE. + + +I have heretofore been proud of my individuality, and resisted, so +far as one may, all the world's attempts to merge me in the mass. +_In pluribus unum_ has been my motto. But whenever I march with the +regiment, my pride is that I lose my individuality, that I am merged, +that I become a part of a machine, a mere walking gentleman, a No. 1 +or a No. 2, front rank or rear rank, file-leader or file-closer. The +machine is so steady and so mighty, it moves with such musical cadence +and such brilliant show, that I enjoy it entirely as the _unum_ and lose +myself gladly as a _pluribus_. + +Night increases this fascination. The outer world is vague in the +moonlight. Objects out of our ranks are lost. I see only glimmering +steel and glittering buttons and the light-stepping forms of my +comrades. Our array and our step connect us. We move as one man. A +man made up of a thousand members and each member a man is a grand +creature,--particularly when you consider that he is self-made. And the +object of this self-made giant, men-man, is to destroy another like +himself, or the separate pigmy members of another such giant. We have +failed to put ourselves--heads, arms, legs, and wills--together as a +unit for any purpose so thoroughly as to snuff out a similar unit. Up to +1861, it seems that the business of war compacts men best. + +Well, the Seventh, a compact projectile, was now flinging itself along +the road to Washington. Just a month ago, "in such a night as this," +we made our first promenade through the enemy's country. The moon of +Annapolis,--why should we not have our ominous moon, as those other +fellows had their sun of Austerlitz?--the moon of Annapolis shone over +us. No epithets are too fine or too complimentary for such a luminary, +and there was no dust under her rays. + +So we pegged along to Washington and across Washington,--which at that +point consists of Willard's Hotel, few other buildings being in sight. A +hag in a nightcap reviewed us from an upper window as we tramped by. + +Opposite that bald block, the Washington Monument, and opposite what was +of more importance to us, a drove of beeves putting beef on their bones +in the seedy grounds of the Smithsonian Institution, we were halted +while the New Jersey brigade--some three thousand of them--trudged by, +receiving the complimentary fire of our line as they passed. New Jersey +is not so far from New York but that the dialects of the two can +understand each other. Their respective slangs, though peculiar, are of +the same genus. By the end of this war, I trust that these distinctions +of locality will be quite annulled. + +We began to feel like an army as these thousands thronged by us. This +was evidently a movement in force. We rested an hour or more by the +road. Mounted officers galloping along down the lines kept up the +excitement. + +At last we had the word to fall in again and march. It is part of the +simple perfection of the machine, a regiment, that, though it drops to +pieces for a rest, it comes together instantly for a start, and nobody +is confused or delayed. We moved half a mile farther, and presently a +broad pathway of reflected moonlight shone up at us from the Potomac. + +No orders, at this, came from the Colonel, "Attention, battalion! Be +sentimental!" Perhaps privates have no right to perceive the beautiful. +But the sections in my neighborhood murmured admiration. The utter +serenity of the night was most impressive. Cool and quiet and tender the +moon shone upon our ranks. She does not change her visage, whether it be +lovers or burglars or soldiers who use her as a lantern to their feet. + +The Long Bridge thus far has been merely a shabby causeway with +waterways and draws. Shabby,--let me here pause to say that in Virginia +shabbiness is the grand universal law, and neatness the spasmodic +exception, attained in rare spots, an _aeon_ beyond their Old Dominion +age. + +The Long Bridge has thus far been a totally unhistoric and prosaic +bridge. Roads and bridges are making themselves of importance and +shining up into sudden renown in these times. The Long Bridge has done +nothing hitherto except carry passengers on its back across the Potomac. +Hucksters, planters, dry-goods drummers, Members of Congress, _et ea +genera omnia_, have here gone and come on their several mercenary +errands, and, as it now appears, some sour little imp--the very reverse +of a "sweet little cherub"--took toll of every man as he passed,--a +heavy toll, namely, every man's whole store of Patriotism and Loyalty. +Every man--so it seems--who passed the Long Bridge was stripped of his +last dollar of _Amor Patriae_, and came to Washington, or went home, +with a waistcoat-pocket full of bogus in change. It was our business now +to open the bridge and see it clear, and leave sentries along to keep it +permanently free for Freedom. + +There is a mile of this Long Bridge. We seemed to occupy the whole +length of it, with our files opened to diffuse the weight of our column. +We were not now the tired and sleepy squad which just a moon ago had +trudged along the railroad to the Annapolis Junction, looking up a +Capital and a Government, perhaps lost. + +By the time we touched ground across the bridge, dawn was breaking,--a +good omen for poor old sleepy Virginia. The moon, as bright and handsome +as a new twenty-dollar piece, carried herself straight before us,--a +splendid oriflamme. + +Lucky is the private who marches with the van! It may be the post of +more danger, but it is also the post of less dust. My throat, therefore, +and my eyes and beard, wore the less Southern soil when we halted half a +mile beyond the bridge, and let sunrise overtake us. + +Nothing men can do--except picnics, with ladies in straw flats with +feathers--is so picturesque as soldiering. As soon as the Seventh halt +anywhere, or move anywhere, or camp anywhere, they resolve themselves +into a grand _tableau_. + +Their own ranks should supply their own Horace Vernet. Our groups +were never more entertaining than at this halt by the roadside on the +Alexandria road. Stacks of guns make a capital framework for drapery, +and red blankets dot in the lights most artistically. The fellows lined +the road with their gay array, asleep, on the rampage, on the lounge, +and nibbling at their rations. + +By-and-by, when my brain had taken in as much of the picturesque as it +could stand, it suffered the brief congestion known as a nap. I was +suddenly awaked by the rattle of a horse's hoofs. Before I had rubbed +my eyes the rider was gone. His sharp tidings had stayed behind him. +Ellsworth was dead,--so he said hurriedly, and rode on. Poor Ellsworth! +a fellow of genius and initiative! He had still so much of the boy in +him, that he rattled forward boyishly, and so died. _Si monumentum +requiris_, look at his regiment. It was a brilliant stroke to levy it; +and if it does worthily, its young Colonel will not have lived in vain. + +As the morning hours passed, we learned that we were the rear-guard of +the left wing of the army advancing into Virginia. The Seventh, as the +best organized body, acted as reserve to this force. It didn't wish +to be in the rear; but such is the penalty of being reliable for an +emergency. Fellow-soldier, be a scalawag, be a bashi-bazouk, be a +Billy-Wilsoneer, if you wish to see the fun in the van! + +When the road grew too hot for us, on account of the fire of sunshine +in our rear, we jumped over the fence into the Race-Course, a big field +beside us, and there became squatter sovereigns all day. I shall be +a bore, if I say again what a pretty figure we cut in this military +picnic, with two long lines of blankets draped on bayonets for parasols. + +The New Jersey brigade were meanwhile doing workie work on the ridge +just beyond us. The road and railroad to Alexandria follow the general +course of the river southward along the level. This ridge to be +fortified is at the point where the highway bends from west to south. +The works were intended to serve as an advanced _tête du pont_,--a +bridge-head, with a very long neck connecting it with the bridge. That +fine old Fabius, General Scott, had no idea of flinging an army out +broadcast into Virginia, and, in the insupposable case that it turned +tail, leaving it no defended passage to run away by. + +This was my first view of a field-work in construction,--also, my first +hand as a laborer at a field-work. I knew glacis and counterscarp on +paper; also, on paper, superior slope, banquette, and the other dirty +parts of a redoubt. Here they were, not on paper. A slight wooden +scaffolding determined the shape of the simple work; and when I arrived, +a thousand Jerseymen were working, not at all like Jerseymen,--with +picks, spades, and shovels, cutting into Virginia, digging into +Virginia, shovelling up Virginia, for Virginia's protection against +pseudo-Virginians. + +I swarmed in for a little while with our Paymaster, picked a little, +spaded a little, shovelled a little, took a hand to my great +satisfaction at earth-works, and for my efforts I venture to suggest +that Jersey City owes me its freedom in a box, and Jersey State a basket +of its finest Clicquot. + +Is my gentle reader tired of the short marches and frequent halts of +the Seventh? Remember, gentle reader, that you must be schooled by such +alphabetical exercises to spell bigger words--skirmish, battle, defeat, +rout, massacre--by-and-by. + +Well,--to be Xenophontic,--from the Race-Course that evening we marched +one stadium, one parasang, to a cedar-grove up the road. In the grove +is a spring worthy to be called a fountain, and what I determined by +infallible indications to be a _lager-bier_ saloon. Saloon no more! War +is no respecter of localities. Be it Arlington House, the seedy palace +of a Virginia Don,--be it the humbler, but seedy, pavilion where the +tired Teuton washes the dust of Washington away from his tonsils,--each +must surrender to the bold soldier-boy. Exit Champagne and its goblet; +exit _lager_ and its mug; enter whiskey-and-water in a tin pot. Such are +the horrors of civil war! + +And now I must cut short my story, for graver matters press. As to +the residence of the Seventh in the cedar-grove for two days and two +nights,--how they endured the hardship of a bivouac on soft earth and +the starvation of coffee _sans_ milk,--how they digged manfully in the +trenches by gangs all these two laborious days,--with what supreme +artistic finish their work was achieved,--how they chopped off their +corns with axes, as they cleared the brushwood from the glacis,--how +they blistered their hands,--how they chafed that they were not +lunging with battailous steel at the breasts of the minions of the +oligarchs,--how Washington, seeing the smoke of burning rubbish, and +hearing dropping shots of target-practice, or of novices with the musket +shooting each other by accident,--how Washington, alarmed, imagined a +battle, and went into panic accordingly,--all this, is it not written +in the daily papers? + +On the evening of the 26th, the Seventh travelled back to Camp Cameron +in a smart shower. Its service was over. Its month was expired. The +troops ordered to relieve it had arrived. It had given the other +volunteers the benefit of a month's education at its drills and parades. +It had enriched poor Washington to the tune of fifty thousand dollars. +Ah, Washington! that we, under Providence and after General Butler, +saved from the heel of Secession! Ah, Washington, why did you charge us +so much for our milk and butter and strawberries? The Seventh, then, +after a month of delightful duty, was to be mustered out of service, and +take new measures, if it would, to have a longer and a larger share in +the war. + + +ARLINGTON HEIGHTS. + + +I took advantage of the day of rest after our return to have a gallop +about the outposts. Arlington Heights had been the spot whence the +alarmists threatened us daily with big thunder and bursting bombs. I was +curious to see the region that had had Washington under its thumb. + +So Private W., tired of his foot-soldiering, got a quadruped under him, +and felt like a cavalier again. The horse took me along the tow-path of +the Cumberland Canal, as far as the redoubts where we had worked our +task. Then I turned up the hill, took a look at the camp of the New York +Twenty-Fifth at the left, and rode along for Arlington House. + +Grand name! and the domain is really quite grand, but ill-kept. Fine +oaks make beauty without asking favors. Fine oaks and a fair view make +all the beauty of Arlington. It seems that this old establishment, like +many another old Virginian, had claimed its respectability for its +antiquity, and failed to keep up to the level of the time. The road +winds along through the trees, climbing to fairer and fairer reaches of +view over the plain of Washington. I had not fancied that there was any +such lovely site near the capital. But we have not yet appreciated what +Nature has done for us there. When civilization once makes up its mind +to colonize Washington, all this amphitheatre of hills will blossom with +structures of the sublimest gingerbread. + +Arlington House is the antipodes of gingerbread, except that it is +yellow, and disposed to crumble. It has a pompous propylon of enormous +stuccoed columns. Any house smaller than Blenheim would tail on +insignificantly after such a frontispiece. The interior has a certain +careless, romantic, decayed-gentleman effect, wholly Virginian. It was +enlivened by the uniforms of staff-officers just now, and as they rode +through the trees of the approach and by the tents of the New York +Eighth, encamped in the grove to the rear, the _tableau_ was brilliantly +warlike. Here, by the way, let me pause to ask, as a horseman, though a +foot-soldier, why generals and other gorgeous fellows make such guys of +their horses with trappings. If the horse is a screw, cover him thick +with saddle-cloths, girths, cruppers, breast-bands, and as much brass +and tinsel as your pay will enable you to buy; but if not a screw, let +his fair proportions be seen as much as may be, and don't bother a lover +of good horseflesh to eliminate so much uniform before he can see what +is beneath. + +From Arlington I rode to the other encampments,--the Sixty-Ninth, Fifth, +and Twenty-Eighth, all of New York,--and heard their several stories +of alarms and adventures. This completed the circuit of the new +fortification of the Great Camp. Washington was now a fortress. The +capital was out of danger, and therefore of no further interest to +anybody. The time had come for myself and my regiment to leave it by +different ways. + + +"PARTANT POUR LA SYRIE." + + +I should have been glad to stay and see my comrades through to their +departure; but there was a Massachusetts man down at Fortress Monroe, +Butler by name,--has any one heard of him?--and to this gentleman it +chanced that I was to report myself. So I packed my knapsack, got my +furlough, shook hands with my fellows, said good-bye to Camp Cameron, +and was off, two days after our month's service was done. + + +FAREWELL TO THE SEVENTH. + + +Under Providence, Washington owes its safety, 1st, To General Butler, +whose genius devised the circumvention of Baltimore and its rascal rout, +and whose utter bravery executed the plan;--he is the Grand Yankee of +this little period of the war. 2d, To the other Most Worshipful Grand +Yankees of the Massachusetts regiment who followed their leader, as he +knew they would, discovered a forgotten colony called Annapolis, and +dashed in there, asking no questions. 3d, And while I gladly yield the +first places to this General and his men, I put the Seventh in, as +last, but not least, in saving the capital. Character always tells. The +Seventh, by good, hard, faithful work at drill, had established its fame +as the most thorough militia regiment in existence. Its military and +moral character were excellent. The mere name of the regiment carried +weight. It took the field as if the field were a ball-room. There were +myriads eager to march; but they had not made ready beforehand. Yes, +the Seventh had its important share in the rescue. Without our support, +whether our leaders tendered it eagerly or hesitatingly, General +Butler's position at Annapolis would have been critical, and his forced +march to the capital a forlorn hope,--heroic, but desperate. + +So, honor to whom honor is due. + +Here I must cut short my story. So good-bye to the Seventh, and thanks +for the fascinating month I have passed in their society. In this pause +of the war our camp-life has been to me as brilliant as a permanent +picnic. + +Good-bye to Company I, and all the fine fellows, rough and smooth, cool +old hands and recruits verdant but ardent! Good-bye to our Lieutenants, +to whom I owe much kindness! Good-bye, the Orderly, so peremptory on +parade, so indulgent off! Good-bye, everybody! + +And so in haste I close. + + + + +BETWEEN SPRING AND SUMMER. + +(A BIRTHDAY POEM, WITH ROSES.) + + + To her whose birth and being + Touch summer out of spring, + These roses, reaching forward + From May to June, I bring. + + To her whose fragrant friendship + Sweetens the life I live, + These flowers, Love's message hinting + With perfumed breath, I give. + + The violet and the lily + Shall stand for these and those; + But give her roses only + Whose soul suggests the rose,-- + + Whose Life's idea ranges + Through all of sweet and bright, + A vernal flow of feeling, + A summer day of light. + + I bless the child whose coming + Sheds grace around us, where + Her voice falls soft as music, + Her step drops light as air: + + Fair grace, to good related + In her, sweet sisters twin; + As in this House of Roses + The fruits and flowers are kin. + + * * * * * + + +ELLSWORTH. + + +The beginnings of great periods have often been marked and made +memorable by striking events. Out of the cloud that hangs around the +vague inceptions of revolutions, a startling incident will sometimes +flash like lightning, to show that the warring elements have begun their +work. The scenes that attended the birth of American nationality formed +a not inaccurate type of those that have opened the crusade for its +perpetuation. The consolidation of public sentiment which followed the +magnificent defeat at Bunker's Hill, in which the spirit of indignant +resistance was tempered by the pathetic interest surrounding the fate +of Warren, was but a foreshadowing of the instant rally to arms which +followed the fall of the beleaguered fort in Charleston harbor, and of +the intensity of tragic pathos which has been added to the stern purpose +of avenging justice by the murder of Colonel Ellsworth. + +Ephraim Elmer Ellsworth was born in the little village of +Mechanicsville, on the left bank of the Hudson, on the 23d day of April, +1837. When he was very young, his father, through no fault of his own, +lost irretrievably his entire fortune, in the tornado of financial ruin +that in those years swept from the sea to the mountains. From this +disaster he never recovered. Misfortune seems to have followed him +through life, with the insatiable pertinacity of the Nemesis of a Greek +tragedy. And now in his old age, when for a moment there seemed to shine +upon his path the sunshine that promised better days, he finds that +suddenly withdrawn, and stands desolate, "stabbed through the heart's +affections, to the heart." His younger son died some years ago, of +small-pox, in Chicago, and the murder at Alexandria leaves him with his +sorrowing wife, lonely, amid the sympathy of the world. + +The days of Elmer's childhood and early youth--were passed at Troy +and in the city of New York, in pursuits various, but energetic and +laborious. There is little of interest in the story of these years. He +was a proud, affectionate, sensitive, and generous boy, hampered by +circumstance, but conscious of great capabilities,--not morbidly +addicted to day-dreaming, but always working heartily for something +beyond. He was still very young--when he went to Chicago, and associated +himself in business with Mr. Devereux of Massachusetts.[A] They managed +for a little while, with much success, an agency for securing patents to +inventors. Through the treachery of one in whom they had reposed great +confidence they suffered severe losses which obliged them to close +their business, and Devereux went back to the East. The next year of +Ellsworth's life was a miracle of endurance and uncomplaining fortitude. +He read law with great assiduity, and supported himself by copying, +in the hours that should have been devoted to recreation. He had no +pastimes and very few friends. Not a soul beside himself and the baker +who gave him his daily loaf knew how he was living. During all that +time, he never slept in a bed, never ate with friends at a social board. +So acute was his sense of honor, so delicate his ideas of propriety, +that, although himself the most generous of men, he never would accept +from acquaintances the slightest favors or courtesies which he was +unable to return. He told me once of a severe struggle between +inclination and a sense of honor. At a period of extreme hunger, he +met a friend in the street who was just starting from the city. He +accompanied his friend into a restaurant, wishing to converse with him, +but declined taking any refreshment. He represented the savory fragrance +of his friend's dinner as almost maddening to his famished senses, +while he sat there pleasantly chatting, and deprecating his friend's +entreaties to join him in his repast, on the plea that he had just +dined. + +[Footnote A: Arthur F. Devereux, Esq., now in command of the Salem +Zouave Corps, Eighth Massachusetts Regiment, distinguished for the +gallant part borne by it in opening the route to Washington through +Annapolis, and in the rescue of the frigate Constitution, "Old +Ironsides," from the hands of the rebels.] + +What would have killed an ordinary man did not injure Ellsworth. His +iron frame seemed incapable of dissolution or waste. Circumstance had no +power to conquer his spirit. His hearty good-humor never gave way. His +sense of honor, which was sometimes even fantastic in its delicacy, +freed him from the very temptation to wrong. He knew there was a better +time coming for him. Conscious of great mental and bodily strength, with +that bright outlook that industry and honor always give a man, he was +perfectly secure of ultimate success. His plans mingled in a singular +manner the bright enthusiasm of the youthful dreamer and the eminent +practicality of the man of affairs. At one time, his mind was fixed +on Mexico,--not with the licentious dreams that excited the ragged +_Condottieri_ who followed the fated footsteps of the "gray-eyed man of +Destiny," in the wild hope of plunder and power,--nor with the vague +reverie in which fanatical theorists construct impossible Utopias on +the absurd framework of Icarias or Phalansteries. His clear, bold, and +thoroughly executive mind planned a magnificent scheme of commercial +enterprise, which, having its centre of operations at Guaymas, should +ramify through the golden wastes that stretch in silence and solitude +along the tortuous banks of the Rio San José. This was to be the +beginning and the ostensible end of the enterprise. Then he dreamed of +the influence of American arts and American energy penetrating into the +twilight of that decaying nationality, and saw the natural course of +events leading on, first, Emigration, then Protection, and at last +Annexation. Yet there was no thought of conquest or rapine. The idea was +essentially American and Northern. He never wholly lost that dream. +One day last winter, when some one was discussing the propriety of an +amputation of the States that seemed thoroughly diseased, Ellsworth +swept his hand energetically over the map of Mexico that hung upon the +wall, and exclaimed,--"_There_ is an unanswerable argument against the +recognition of the Southern Confederacy." + +But the central idea of Ellsworth's short life was the thorough +reorganization of the militia of the United States. He had studied with +great success the theory of national defence, and, from his observation +of the condition of the militia of the several States, he was convinced +that there was much of well-directed effort yet lacking to its entire +efficiency. In fact, as he expressed it, a well-disciplined body of five +thousand troops could land anywhere on our coast and ravage two or three +States before an adequate force could get into the field to oppose them. +To reform this defective organization, he resolved to devote whatever +of talent or energy was his. This was very large undertaking for a boy, +whose majority and moustache were still of the substance of things hoped +for. But nothing that he could propose to himself ever seemed absurd. He +attacked his work with his usual promptness and decision. + +The conception of a great idea is no proof of a great mind; a man's +calibre is shown by the way in which he attempts to realize his idea. A +great design planted in a little mind frequently bursts it, and nothing +is more pitiable than the spectacle of a man staggering into insanity +under a thought too large for him. Ellsworth chose to begin his work +simply and practically. He did not write a memorial to the President, to +be sent to the Secretary of War, to be referred to the Chief Clerk, to +be handed over to File-Clerk No. 99, to be glanced at and quietly thrust +into a pigeon-hole labelled "Crazy and trashy." He did not haunt the +anteroom of Congressman Somebody, who would promise to bring his plan +before the House, and then, bowing him out, give general orders to his +footman, "Not at home, hereafter, to that man." He did not float, as +some theorists do, ghastly and seedy, around the _Adyta_ of popular +editors, begging for space and countenance. He wisely determined to +keep his theories to himself until he could illustrate them by living +examples. He first put himself in thorough training. He practised the +manual of arms in his own room, until his dexterous precision was +something akin to the sleight of a juggler. He investigated the theory +of every movement in an anatomical view, and made several most valuable +improvements on Hardee. He rearranged the manual so that every movement +formed the logical groundwork of the succeeding one. He studied the +science of fence, so that he could hold a rapier with De Villiers, the +most dashing of the Algerine swordsmen. He always had a hand as true as +steel, and an eye like a gerfalcon. He used to amuse himself by shooting +ventilation-holes through his window-panes. Standing ten paces from the +window, he could fire the seven shots from his revolver and not shiver +the glass beyond the circumference of a half-dollar. + +I have seen a photograph of his arm taken at this time. The knotted coil +of thews and sinews looks like the magnificent exaggerations of antique +sculpture. + +His person was strikingly prepossessing. His form, though +slight,--exactly the Napoleonic size,--was very compact and commanding; +the head statuesquely poised, and crowned with a luxuriance of curling +black hair; a hazel eye, bright, though serene, the eye of a gentleman +as well as a soldier; a nose such as you see on Roman medals; a light +moustache just shading the lips, that were continually curving into +the sunniest smiles. His voice, deep and musical, instantly attracted +attention; and his address, though not without soldierly brusqueness, +was sincere and courteous. There was one thing his backwoods detractors +could never forgive: he always dressed well; and sometimes wore the +military insignia presented to him by different organizations. One of +these, a gold circle, inscribed with the legend, NON NOBIS, SED PRO +PATRIA, was driven into his heart by the slug of the Virginian assassin. + +He had great tact and executive talent, was a good mathematician, +possessed a fine artistic eye, sketched well and rapidly, and in short +bore a deft and skilful hand in all gentlemanly exercise. + +No one ever possessed greater power of enforcing the respect and +fastening the affections of men. Strangers soon recognized and +acknowledged this power; while to his friends he always seemed like a +Paladin or Cavalier of the dead days of romance and beauty. He was so +generous and loyal, so stainless and brave, that Bayard himself would +have been proud of him. The grand bead-roll of the virtues of the Flower +of Kings contains the principles that guided his life; he used to read +with exquisite appreciation these lines:-- + + "To reverence the King as if he were + Their conscience, and their conscience as + their King,-- + To break the heathen and uphold the + Christ,-- + To ride abroad redressing human wrongs,-- + To speak no slander, no, nor listen to it,-- + To lead sweet lives in purest chastity,-- + To love one maiden only, cleave to her, + And worship her by years of noble deeds, + Until they won her"; + +and the rest,-- + + "high thoughts, and amiable words, + And courtliness, and the desire of fame, + And love of truth, and all that makes a man." + +Such, in person and character, was Ellsworth, when he organized, on the +4th day of May, 1859, the United States Zouave Cadets of Chicago. + +This company was the machine upon which he was to experiment. +Disregarding all extant works upon tactics, he drew up a simpler system +for the use of his men. Throwing aside the old ideas of soldierly +bearing, he taught them to use vigor, promptness, and ease. Discarding +the stiff buckram strut of martial tradition, he educated them to move +with the loafing _insouciance_ of the Indian, or the graceful ease of +the panther. He tore off their choking collars and binding coats, and +invented a uniform which, though too flashy and conspicuous for actual +service, was very bright and dashing for holiday occasions, and left the +wearer perfectly free to fight, strike, kick, jump, or run. + +He drilled these young men for about a year at short intervals. His +discipline was very severe and rigid. Added to the punctilio of the +martinet was the rigor of the moralist. The slightest exhibition of +intemperance or licentiousness was punished by instant degradation and +expulsion. He struck from the rolls at one time twelve of his best men +for breaking the rule of total abstinence. His moral power over them was +perfect and absolute. I believe anyone of them would have died for him. + +In two or three principal towns of Illinois and Wisconsin he drilled +other companies: in Springfield, where he made the friends who best +appreciated what was best in him; and in Rockford, where he formed an +attachment which imparted a coloring of tender romance to all the days +of his busy life that remained. This tragedy would not have been perfect +without the plaintive minor strain of Love in Death. + +His company took the Premium Colors at the United States Agricultural +Pair, and Ellsworth thought it was time to show to the people some fruit +of his drill. They issued their soldierly _défi_ and started on their +_Marche de Triomphe_. It is useless to recall to those who read +newspapers the clustering glories of that bloodless campaign. Hardly had +they left the suburbs of Chicago when the murmur of applause began. New +York, secure in the championship of half a century, listened with quiet +metropolitan scorn to the noise of the shouting provinces; but when the +crimson phantasms marched out of the Park, on the evening of the 15th of +July, New York, with metropolitan magnanimity, confessed herself utterly +vanquished by the good thing that had come out of Nazareth. There was no +resisting the Zouaves. As the erring Knight of the Round Table said,-- + + "men went down before his spear at a touch, + But knowing he was Lancelot; his great name conquered." + +There were one or two Southern companies that issued insulting +defiances, but, after a little expenditure of epistolary valor, +prudently, though ingloriously, stayed afar,--as is usual in New +Gascony. With these exceptions, the heart of the nation went warmly out +to these young men. Their endurance, their discipline, their alertness, +their _élan_, surprised the sleepy drill-masters out of their propriety, +and waked up the people to intense and cordial admiration. Chicago +welcomed them home proudly, covered with tan and dust and glory. + +Ellsworth found himself for his brief hour the most talked-of man in +the country. His pictures sold like wildfire in every city of the land. +School-girls dreamed over the graceful wave of his curls, and shop-boys +tried to reproduce the _Grand Seigneur_ air of his attitude. Zouave +corps, brilliant in crimson and gold, sprang up, phosphorescently, in +his wake, making bright the track of his journey. The leading journals +spoke editorially of him, and the comic papers caricatured his drill. + +So one thing was accomplished. He had gained a name that would entitle +him hereafter to respectful attention, and had demonstrated the +efficiency of his system of drill. The public did not, of course, +comprehend the resistless moral power which he exercised,--imperiously +moulding every mind as he willed,--inspiring every soul with his own +unresting energy. But the public recognized success, and that for the +present was enough. + +He quietly formed a regiment in the upper counties of Illinois, and made +his best men the officers of it. He tendered its services to Governor +Yates immediately on his inauguration, "for any service consistent with +honor." This was the first positive tender made of an organized force in +defence of the Constitution. He seemed to recognize more clearly than +others the certainty of the coming struggle. It was the soldierly +instinct that heard "the battle afar off, the thunder of the captains, +and the shouting." + +Still intent upon the great plan of militia reform, he came to +Springfield. He hoped, in case of the success of Mr. Lincoln in the +canvass then pending, to be able to establish in the War Department a +Bureau of Militia, which would prove a most valuable auxiliary to his +work. His ideas were never vague or indefinite. Means always presented +themselves to him, when he contemplated ends. The following were the +duties of the proposed bureau, which may serve as a guide to some future +reformer: I copy from his own exquisitely neat and clear memorandum, +which lies before me:-- + +"First. The gradual concentration of all business pertaining to the +militia now conducted by the several bureaus of this Department. + +"Second. The collection and systematizing of accurate information of the +number, arm, and condition of the militia of all classes of the several +States, and the compilation of yearly reports of the same for the +information of this Department. + +"Third. The compilation of a report of the actual condition of the +militia and the working of the present systems of the General Government +and the various States. + +"Fourth. The publication and distribution of such information as is +important to the militia, and the conduct of all correspondence relating +to militia affairs. + +"Fifth. The compilation of a system of instruction for light troops for +distribution to the several States, including everything pertaining to +the instruction of the militia in the school of the soldier,--company +and battalion, skirmishing, bayonet, and gymnastic drill, adapted for +self-instruction. + +"Sixth. The arrangement of a system of organization, with a view to the +establishment of a uniform system of drill, discipline, equipment, and +dress, throughout the United States." + +His plan for this purpose was very complete and symmetrical. Though +enthusiastic, he was never dreamy. His idea always went forth fully +armed and equipped. + +Nominally, he was a student of law in the office of Lincoln and Herndon, +but in effect he passed his time in completing his plans of militia +reform. He made in October many stirring and earnest speeches for the +Republican candidates. He was very popular among the country people. +His voice was magnificent in melody and volume, his command of language +wonderful in view of the deficiencies of his early education, his humor +inexhaustible and hearty, and his manner deliberate and impressive, +reminding his audiences in Central Illinois of the earliest and best +days of Senator Douglas. + +When the Legislature met, he prepared an elaborate military bill, the +adoption of which would have placed the State in an enviable attitude +of defence. The stupid jealousy of colonels and majors who had won +bloodless glory, on both sides, in the Mormon War, and the malignant +prejudice instigated by the covert treason that lurked in Southern +Illinois, succeeded in staving off the passage of the bill, until it was +lost by the expiration of the term. Many of these men are now in the +ranks, shouting the name of Ellsworth as a battle-cry. + +He came to Washington in the escort of the President elect. Hitherto he +had been utterly independent of external aid. The time was come when he +must wait for the cooperation of others, for the accomplishment of his +life's great purpose. He wished a position in the War Department, which +would give him an opportunity for the establishment of the Militia +Bureau. He was a strange anomaly at the capital. He did not care for +money or luxury. Though sensitive in regard to his reputation, for the +honor of his work, his motto always was that of the sage Merlin,--"I +follow use, not fame." An office-seeker of this kind was an eccentric +and suspicious personage. The hungry thousands that crowded and pushed +at Willard's thought him one of them, only deeper and slier. The +simplicity and directness of his character, his quick sympathy and +thoughtless generosity, and his delicate sense of honor unfitted him for +such a scramble as that which degrades the quadrennial rotations of our +Departments. He withdrew from the contest for the position he desired, +and the President, who loved him like a younger brother, made him a +lieutenant in the army, intending to detail him for special service. + +The jealousy of the staff-officers of the regular army, who always +discover in any effective scheme of militia reform the overthrow of +their power, and who saw in the young Zouave the promise of brilliant +and successful innovation, was productive of very serious annoyance +and impediment to Ellsworth. In the midst of this, he fell sick at +Willard's. While he lay there, the news from the South began to show +that the rebels were determined upon war, and the rumors on the street +said that a wholesome North-westerly breeze was blowing from the +Executive Mansion. These indications were more salutary to Ellsworth +than any medicine. We were talking one night of coming probabilities, +and I spoke of the doubt so widely existing as to the loyalty of the +people. He rejoined, earnestly,--"I can only speak for myself. You know +I have a great work to do, to which my life is pledged; I am the only +earthly stay of my parents; there is a young woman whose happiness I +regard as dearer than my own: yet I could ask no better death than to +fall next week before Sumter. I am not better than other men. You will +find that patriotism is not dead, even if it sleeps." + +Sumter fell, and the sleeping awoke. The spirit of Ellsworth, cramped by +a few weeks' intercourse with politicians, sprang up full-statured +in the Northern gale. He cut at once the meshes of red tape that had +hampered and held him, threw up his commission, and started for New York +without orders, without assistance, without authority, but with the +consciousness that the President would sustain him. The rest the world +knows. I will be brief in recalling it. + +In an incredibly short space of time he enlisted and organized a +regiment, eleven hundred strong, of the best fighting material that ever +went to war. He divided it, according to an idea of his own, into +groups of four comrades each, for the campaign. He exercised a personal +supervision over the most important and the most trivial minutiae of the +regimental business. The quick sympathy of the public still followed +him. He became the idol of the Bowery and the pet of the Avenue. Yet not +one instant did he waste in recreation or lionizing. Indulgent to all +others, he was merciless to himself. He worked day and night, like an +incarnation of Energy. When he arrived with his men in Washington, he +was thin, hoarse, flushed, but entirely contented and happy, because +busy and useful. + +Of the bright enthusiasm and the quenchless industry of the next few +weeks what need to speak? Every day, by his unceasing toil and care, by +his vigor, alertness, activity, by his generosity, and by his relentless +rigor when duty commanded, he grew into the hearts of his robust and +manly followers, until every man in the regiment feared him as a Colonel +should be feared, and loved him as a brother should be loved. + +On the night of the twenty-third of May, he called his men together, +and made a brief, stirring speech to them, announcing their orders to +advance on Alexandria. "Now, boys, go to bed, and wake up at two o'clock +for a sail and a skirmish." When the camp was silent, he began to work. +He wrote many hours, arranging the business of the regiment. He finished +his labor as the midnight stars were crossing the zenith. As he sat in +his tent by the shore, it seems as if the mystical gales from the near +eternity must have breathed for a moment over his soul, freighted with +the odor of amaranths and asphodels. For he wrote two strange letters: +one to her who mourns him faithful in death; one to his parents. There +is nothing braver or more pathetic. With the prophetic instinct of love, +he assumed the office of consoler for the stroke that impended. + +In the dewy light of the early dawn he occupied the first rebel town. +With his own hand he tore down the first rebel flag. He added to the +glories of that morning the seal of his blood. + +The poor wretch who stumbled upon an immortality of infamy by murdering +him died at the same instant. The two stand in the light of that +event--clearly revealed--types of the two systems in conflict to-day: +the one, brave, refined, courtly, generous, tender, and true; the other, +not lacking in brute courage, reckless, besotted, ignorant, and cruel. + +Let the two systems, Freedom and Slavery, stand thus typified forever, +in the red light of that dawn, as on a Mount of Transfiguration. I +believe that may solve the dark mystery why Ellsworth died. + + + + +REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES. + + +_Chambers's Encyclopaedia: A Dictionary of Universal Knowledge for +the People; on the Basis of the Latest Edition of the German +Conversations-Lexicon_. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott & Co. Vols. I. and +II. + +An Encyclopaedia is both a luxury and a necessity. Few readers now +collect a library, however scant, without including one of some sort. +Many of them, even in the absence of all other books, of themselves +constitute a complete library. The Britannica, Edinburgh, Metropolitana, +English, Penny, London, Oxford, and that of Kees, are most elaborate +works, extending respectively to about a score of heavy volumes, +averaging eight or nine hundred pages each. Such publications must +necessarily be expensive. They are, moreover, to be regarded rather as a +collection of exhaustive treatises,--great prominence being given to +the physical and mathematical sciences, and to general history. For +instance, in the Britannica, the publication of the eighth edition +of which is just completed, the length of some of the articles is as +follows: Astronomy, 155 quarto pages; Chemistry, 88; Electricity, 104; +Hydrodynamics, 119; Optics, 176; Mammalia, 120; Ichthyology, 151; +Entomology, 265; Britain, 300; England, 136; France, 284. Each one of +these papers is equal to a large octavo volume; some of them would +occupy several volumes; and the entire work, containing a collection of +such articles, can be regarded in no other light than as an attempted +exhibition of the sum of human knowledge, commending itself, of course, +to professional and highly educated minds, but far transcending, in +extent and costliness, the requirements and the means of the great class +of general readers. For the wants of this latter class a different sort +of work is desirable, which shall be cheaper in price, less exhaustive +in its method, and more diversified in its range. In these particulars +the Germans seem to have hit upon the happy medium in their famous +"Conversations-Lexicon," which has passed through a great many editions, +and been translated into the principal languages of Europe. This is +taken as the type, and in some respects as the basis, of the present +publication,--there being engrafted upon it new contributions from +leading authors of this and other countries, together with such +extensive improvements, revisals, rewritings, additions, and +modifications throughout, as to constitute a substantially new work, +exhibiting in combination the results of the best labors of the German, +English, and American mind. In the departments of statistics, geography, +history, and science, the articles are all within readable limits, +accurate, and up to the times; while in the biographical and literary +articles there is a freshness and originality of criticism, and a +vivacity of style, seldom met with in this class of publications. + +The peculiar merit of this Encyclopaedia is its convenient adaptedness +to popular use. The subjects treated of are broken up and distributed +alphabetically under their proper heads, so as to facilitate reference. +We are thus furnished with a dictionary of facts and events, where we +may readily find whatever properly appertains to any particular point, +without being compelled to explore an entire treatise. This, by the +way, makes it a sort of hand-book even for those who possess the more +voluminous works. As a necessary result of such a method of treatment, +it will be found, upon an actual count and comparison, to contain more +separate titles than any other Encyclopaedia ever published. Although +the articles are generally brief, it must not be supposed that they are +meagre, for they will be found to present a clear and comprehensive view +of the existing information upon the particular topic, with a mastery +which arises only from familiarity. Montesquieu said that Tacitus +abridged all because he knew all; and no reader can peruse a number of +this Encyclopaedia without being convinced that the success in preparing +the perspicuous abridgments it contains is due to thorough knowledge. +Its excellence is not confined, however, to the letter-press; for we are +furnished with a series of colored maps, embodying the results of +the most recent explorations, and also with a profusion of admirable +woodcuts, illustrating the subject wherever pictorial exposition may aid +the verbal. It will be recollected that no other Encyclopaedia published +in this country has the advantage of illustrations. + +The character of Messrs. William and Robert Chambers of itself gives +ample assurance that the work is prepared and executed in a superior +manner; but when we superadd to this the fact that they have spared no +labor or expense, but have devoted to it all the resources of their +experience, enterprise, and skill, in order to make the work, in all its +departments, their crowning contribution to the cause of knowledge, we +are the more ready to believe that it actually is all that it claims to +be. The American edition by J.B. Lippincott & Co., of Philadelphia, +is published in numbers simultaneously with the Edinburgh and London +edition, and in an unexceptionable style of typography. Its low price +brings it within the reach of almost every reader. Indeed, when we +consider the size of the volumes, the number of illustrations and maps, +the mechanical execution, and the compensation to the writers, we are +at a loss to conceive how it can be profitably furnished at so cheap a +rate. + + +_The Recreations of a Country Parson_. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 12mo. + +The essays of which this volume is made up were originally contributed +to "Fraser's Magazine." The "Recreations" they record are therefore +those of an English, and not an American "Parson"; but there is nothing +in them which a parson of any church or denomination would feel inclined +to repudiate, on the score either of their fineness of mental perception +or healthiness of moral sense. The author tells us, that, in writing +these essays, he has not been rapt away into heroic times and distant +scenes, but has written of daily work and worry amid daily work and +worry: and herein lies the charm of his discourses. He has one of those +sensible, elastic, cheerful natures whose ideal qualities are not +perverted by fretfulness and discontent. That most wicked of Byronisms, +which consists in depreciating the duties of common life in order to +exalt the claims of a kind of spiritualized sensuality and poetic +self-importance, he instinctively avoids. The thirteen shrewd, +suggestive, and practical essays which compose the present volume are +transcripts of his own experience and meditations, and teem with facts +and observations such as might be expected from the clear insight of a +man who has mingled with his fellow-men, and who is curiously critical +of the non-romantic phenomena of their daily life. The essays on the Art +of Putting Things, on Petty Malignity and Petty Trickery, on Tidiness, +on Nervous Fears, on Hurry and Leisure, on Work and Play, on Dulness, +and on Growing Old, are full of fresh and delicate perceptions of the +ordinary facts of human experience. His best and brightest remarks +surprise us with the unexpectedness of homely common sense, as flashed +on a world of organized illusions. The entire absence of rhetoric in the +author's mode of "putting things" adds to its effectiveness. He attempts +to reveal the common,--one of the rarest of revelations; and shows what +heroic qualities are needed to overcome the superficial circumstances +of our life, and transmute them into occasions for that humble, obscure +heroism which God alone apprehends and rewards. The freedom of the +writer from all the stereotyped phraseology of sanctity in doing this +work, and his innocent sympathy with everything cheerful, pleasurable, +and lovable in Nature and human nature, only add to the power of his +teachings. These "Recreations" of the "Parson" will, to the generality +of readers, produce more beneficent results than could have been +produced, had he given us his most carefully prepared sermons,--for they +connect religion with life. Nobody can read the volume without feeling +the moral and religious purpose which underlies its graceful and genial +exhibition of human character and manners. The common objection to +clergymen is, that they are ignorant of the world. No sagacious reader +of the present book can doubt that this parson, at least, is an +exception to the general rule; for he palpably knows more of the world +than most men who have made it a special study. + + + + +RECENT AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS + +RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS OF THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + + +Afloat and Ashore. By J. Fenimore Cooper. Illustrated by Darley. New +York. W.A. Townsend & Co. 12mo. pp. 549. $1.50. + +Silas Marner, the Weaver of Raveloe. By the Author of "Adam Bede." New +York. Harper & Brothers. 12mo. pp. 265. 75 cts. + +The Works of Francis Bacon, Baron of Verulam. Collected and edited by +James Spedding, M.A., Robert Leslie Ellis, M.A., and Douglas Denon +Heath. Volume I. Boston. Brown & Taggard. 12mo. pp. 539. $1.50. + +History of Latin Christianity, including that of the Popes to the +Pontificate of Nicolas V. By Henry Hart Milman, D.D., Dean of St. +Paul's. Volume VIII. New York. Sheldon & Co. 12mo. pp. 561. $1.50. + +Chambers's Encyclopedia: A Dictionary of Universal Knowledge for +the People, on the Basis of the Latest Edition of the German +Conversations--Lexicon. Illustrated. Parts XXIX., XXX. Philadelphia. +J.B. Lippincott & Co. 8vo. paper, pp. 55, 65. 15 cts. each. + +The New American Cyclopedia: A Popular Dictionary of General Knowledge. +Edited by George Ripley and Charles A. Dana. Vol. XII. New York. D. +Appleton & Co. 8vo. pp. 788. $3.00. + +The Life of George Washington. By Washington Irving. In Five Volumes. +Vol. V. Illustrated. New York. G.P. Putnam & Co. 12mo. pp. 434. $1.50. + +The Crayon Miscellany. By Washington Irving. New Illustrated Edition. +Complete in One Volume. New York. G.P. Putnam. 12mo. pp. 379. $1.50. + +Another Letter to a Young Physician; to which are appended some other +Medical Papers. By James Jackson, II. D. Boston. Ticknor and Fields. +13mo. pp. 179. 80 cts. + +The Partisan Leader: A Key to the Disunion Conspiracy. By Beverly +Tucker, of Virginia. Secretly published in Washington in the Year 1836, +but afterwards suppressed. New York. Rudd & Carleton. 18mo. paper, pp. +l95. 50 cts. + +Exercises at the Consecration of the Flag of the Union, by the Old South +Society in Boston, May 1st. 1861. Boston. Alfred Mudge & Son. 8vo. +paper, pp. 16. 20 cts. + +The Life and Military and Civic Services of Lieutenant-General Winfield +Scott. Complete up to the Present Period. By 0.J. Victor. New York. +Beadle & Co. 18mo. pp. 118. 25 cts. + +The Zouave Drill. Being a Complete Manual of Arms for the Use of the +Rifled Musket; containing also the Complete Manual of the Sword and +Sabre. By Colonel E.E. Ellsworth. With a Biography of his Life. +Philadelphia. T.E. Peterson & Brothers. 16mo. paper, pp. 62. 25 cts. + +The Soldier's Guide. A Complete Manual and Drill-Book for the Use +of Volunteers and Militia. Revised, corrected, and adapted to the +Discipline of the Soldier of the Present Day. By an Officer in the +United States Army. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & Brothers. 16mo. pp. +63. paper, 25 cts. boards, 40 cts. + +The Soldier's Companion, for the Use of all Officers, Volunteers, and +Militia in the United States, in the Camp, Field, or on the March. +Compiled from the Latest Authorities. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & +Brothers. 16mo. paper, pp. 77. 25 cts. + +The Volunteer's Text-Book. Containing the whole of "The Soldier's +Guide," as well as all of "The Soldier's Companion," with Valuable +Information for the Use of Officers of all Grades, compiled from the +Latest Authorities, issued under Orders of Simon Cameron, Secretary of +War, and Lieutenant-General Winfield Scott. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson +& Brothers. 16mo. paper, pp. 154. 50 cts. + +United States Infantry Tactics, for the Instruction, Exercise, and +Manoeuvres of the United States Infantry, including Infantry of the +Line, Light Infantry, and Riflemen. Prepared under the Direction of the +War Department, and authorized and adopted by the Secretary of War, May +1,1861. Philadelphia. J.B. Lippincott & Co. 32mo. pp. 450. $1.25. + +A Manual of Military Surgery; or, Hints on the Emergencies of Field, +Camp, and Hospital Practice. Illustrated with Woodcuts. By S.D. +Gross, M.D., Professor of Surgery in the Jefferson Medical College of +Philadelphia. Philadelphia. J.B. Lippincott & Co. 24mo. pp. 186. 50 cts. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY, VOLUME 8, ISSUE +45, JULY, 1861*** + + +******* This file should be named 11154-8.txt or 11154-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/1/1/1/5/11154 + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +https://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS,' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at https://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +https://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at https://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit https://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including including checks, online payments and credit card +donations. To donate, please visit: https://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Each eBook is in a subdirectory of the same number as the eBook's +eBook number, often in several formats including plain vanilla ASCII, +compressed (zipped), HTML and others. + +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks replace the old file and take over +the old filename and etext number. The replaced older file is renamed. +VERSIONS based on separate sources are treated as new eBooks receiving +new filenames and etext numbers. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + +https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + +EBooks posted prior to November 2003, with eBook numbers BELOW #10000, +are filed in directories based on their release date. If you want to +download any of these eBooks directly, rather than using the regular +search system you may utilize the following addresses and just +download by the etext year. + +http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext06 + + (Or /etext 05, 04, 03, 02, 01, 00, 99, + 98, 97, 96, 95, 94, 93, 92, 92, 91 or 90) + +EBooks posted since November 2003, with etext numbers OVER #10000, are +filed in a different way. The year of a release date is no longer part +of the directory path. The path is based on the etext number (which is +identical to the filename). The path to the file is made up of single +digits corresponding to all but the last digit in the filename. For +example an eBook of filename 10234 would be found at: + +https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/2/3/10234 + +or filename 24689 would be found at: +https://www.gutenberg.org/2/4/6/8/24689 + +An alternative method of locating eBooks: +https://www.gutenberg.org/GUTINDEX.ALL + +*** END: FULL LICENSE *** diff --git a/old/11154-8.zip b/old/11154-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..2a2969c --- /dev/null +++ b/old/11154-8.zip diff --git a/old/11154.txt b/old/11154.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c4df4fd --- /dev/null +++ b/old/11154.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8794 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 45, July, +1861, by Various + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 45, July, 1861 + +Author: Various + +Release Date: February 18, 2004 [eBook #11154] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: US-ASCII + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY, VOLUME 8, ISSUE +45, JULY, 1861*** + + +E-text prepared by Joshua Hutchinson, Tonya Allen, and Project Gutenberg +Distributed Proofreaders + + + +THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + +A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS. + +VOL. VIII.--JULY, 1861.--NO. XLV. + + + + + + + + OUR ORDERS. + + Weave no more silks, ye Lyons looms, + To deck our girls for gay delights! + The crimson flower of battle blooms, + And solemn marches fill the nights. + + Weave but the flag whose bars to-day + Drooped heavy o'er our early dead, + And homely garments, coarse and gray, + For orphans that must earn their bread! + + Keep back your tunes, ye viols sweet, + That pour delight from other lands! + Rouse there the dancer's restless feet,-- + The trumpet leads our warrior bands. + + And ye that wage the war of words + With mystic fame and subtle power, + Go, chatter to the idle birds, + Or teach the lesson of the hour! + + Ye Sibyl Arts, in one stern knot + Be all your offices combined! + Stand close, while Courage draws the lot, + The destiny of humankind! + + And if that destiny could fail, + The sun should darken in the sky, + The eternal bloom of Nature pale, + And God, and Truth, and Freedom die! + + + + +AGNES OF SORRENTO. + + +CHAPTER VII. + +THE DAY AT THE CONVENT. + + +The Mother Theresa sat in a sort of withdrawing-room, the roof of which +rose in arches, starred with blue and gold like that of the cloister, +and the sides were frescoed with scenes from the life of the Virgin. +Over every door, and in convenient places between the paintings, tests +of Holy Writ were illuminated in blue and scarlet and gold, with a +richness and fancifulness of outline, as if every sacred letter had +blossomed into a mystical flower. The Abbess herself, with two of her +nuns, was busily embroidering a new altar-cloth, with a lavish profusion +of adornment; and, from time to time, their voices rose in the musical +tones of an ancient Latin hymn. The words were full of that quaint +and mystical pietism with which the fashion of the times clothed the +expression of devotional feeling:-- + + "Jesu, corona virginum, + Quem mater illa concepit, + Quae sola virgo parturit, + Haec vota clemens accipe. + + "Qui pascis inter lilia + Septus choreis virginum, + Sponsus decoris gloria + Sponsisque reddens praemia. + + "Quocunque pergis, virgines + Sequuntur atque laudibus + Post te canentes cursitant + Hymnosque dulces personant[A]." + +[Footnote A: + + "Jesus, crown of virgin spirits, + Whom a virgin mother bore, + Graciously accept our praises + While thy footsteps we adore. + + "Thee among the lilies feeding + Choirs of virgins walk beside, + Bridegroom crowned with glorious beauty + Giving beauty to thy bride. + + "Where thou goest still they follow + Singing, singing as they move, + All those souls forever virgin + Wedded only to thy love."] + +This little canticle was, in truth, very different from the hymns +to Venus which used to resound in the temple which the convent had +displaced. The voices which sang were of a deep, plaintive contralto, +much resembling the richness of a tenor, and us they moved in modulated +waves of chanting sound the effect was soothing and dreamy. Agnes +stopped at the door to listen. + +"Stop, dear Jocunda," she said to the old woman, who was about to push +her way abruptly into the room, "wait till it is over." + +Jocunda, who was quite matter-of-fact in her ideas of religion, made a +little movement of impatience, but was recalled to herself by observing +the devout absorption with which Agnes, with clasped hands and downcast +head, was mentally joining in the hymn with a solemn brightness in her +young face. + +"If she hasn't got a vocation, nobody ever had one," said Jocunda, +mentally. "Deary me, I wish I had more of one myself!" + +When the strain died away, and was succeeded by a conversation on the +respective merits of two kinds of gold embroidering-thread, Agnes and +Jocunda entered the apartment. Agnes went forward and kissed the hand of +the Mother reverentially. + +Sister Theresa we have before described as tall, pale, and sad-eyed,--a +moonlight style of person, wanting in all those elements of warm color +and physical solidity which give the impression of a real vital human +existence. The strongest affection she had ever known had been that +which had been excited by the childish beauty and graces of Agnes, and +she folded her in her arms and kissed her forehead with a warmth that +had in it the semblance of maternity. + +"Grandmamma has given me a day to spend with you, dear mother," said +Agnes. + +"Welcome, dear little child!" said Mother Theresa. "Your spiritual home +always stands open to you." + +"I have something to speak to you of in particular, my mother," said +Agnes, blushing deeply. + +"Indeed!" said the Mother Theresa, a slight movement of curiosity +arising in her mind as she signed to the two nuns to leave the +apartment. + +"My mother," said Agnes, "yesterday evening, as grandmamma and I were +sitting at the gate, selling oranges, a young cavalier came up and +bought oranges of me, and he kissed my forehead and asked me to pray for +him, and gave me this ring for the shrine of Saint Agnes." + +"Kissed your forehead!" said Jocunda, "here's a pretty go! it isn't like +you, Agnes, to let him." + +"He did it before I knew," said Agnes. "Grandmamma reproved him, and +then he seemed to repent, and gave this ring for the shrine of Saint +Agnes." + +"And a pretty one it is, too," said Jocunda. "We haven't a prettier in +all our treasury. Not even the great emerald the Queen gave is better in +its way than this." + +"And he asked you to pray for him?" said Mother Theresa. + +"Yes, mother dear; he looked right into my eyes and made me look into +his, and made me promise;--and I knew that holy virgins never refused +their prayers to any one that asked, and so I followed their example." + +"I'll warrant me he was only mocking at you for a poor little fool," +said Jocunda; "the gallants of our day don't believe much in prayers." + +"Perhaps so, Jocunda," said Agnes, gravely; "but if that be the case, he +needs prayers all the more." + +"Yes," said Mother Theresa. "Remember the story of the blessed Saint +Dorothea,--how a wicked young nobleman mocked at her, when she was going +to execution, and said, 'Dorothea, Dorothea, I will believe, when you +shall send me down some of the fruits and flowers of Paradise'; and she, +full of faith, said, 'To-day I will send them'; and, wonderful to tell, +that very day, at evening, an angel came to the young man with a basket +of citrons and roses, and said, 'Dorothea sends thee these, wherefore +believe.' See what grace a pure maiden can bring to a thoughtless young +man,--for this young man was converted and became a champion of the +faith." + +"That was in the old times," said Jocunda, skeptically. "I don't believe +setting the lamb to pray for the wolf will do much in our day. Prithee, +child, what manner of man was this gallant?" + +"He was beautiful as an angel," said Agnes, "only it was not a good +beauty. He looked proud and sad, both,--like one who is not at ease in +his heart. Indeed, I feel very sorry for him; his eyes made a kind of +trouble in my mind, that reminds me to pray for him often." + +"And I will join my prayers to yours, dear daughter," said the Mother +Theresa; "I long to have you with us, that we may pray together every +day;--say, do you think your grandmamma will spare you to us wholly +before long?" + +"Grandmamma will not hear of it yet," said Agnes; "and she loves me so, +it would break her heart, if I should leave her, and she could not be +happy here;--but, mother, you have told me we could carry an altar +always in our hearts, and adore in secret. When it is God's will I +should come to you, He will incline her heart." + +"Between you and me, little one," said Jocunda, "I think there will soon +be a third person who will have something to say in the case." + +"Whom do you mean?" said Agnes. + +"A husband," said Jocunda; "I suppose your grandmother has one picked +out for you. You are neither humpbacked nor cross-eyed, that you +shouldn't have one as well as other girls." + +"I don't want one, Jocunda; and I have promised to Saint Agnes to come +here, if she will only get grandmother to consent." + +"Bless you, my daughter!" said Mother Theresa; "only persevere and the +way will be opened." + +"Well, well," said Jocunda, "we'll see. Come, little one, if you +wouldn't have your flowers wilt, we must go back and look after them." + +Reverently kissing the hand of the Abbess, Agnes withdrew with her old +friend, and crossed again to the garden to attend to her flowers. + +"Well now, childie," said Jocunda, "you can sit here and weave your +garlands, while I go and look after the conserves of raisins and citrons +that Sister Cattarina is making. She is stupid at anything but her +prayers, is Cattarina. Our Lady be gracious to me! I think I got my +vocation from Saint Martha, and if it wasn't for me, I don't know what +would become of things in the Convent. Why, since I came here, our +conserves, done up in fig-leaf packages, have had quite a run at Court, +and our gracious Queen herself was good enough to send an order for a +hundred of them last week. I could have laughed to see how puzzled the +Mother Theresa looked;--much she knows about conserves! I suppose she +thinks Gabriel brings them straight down from Paradise, done up in +leaves of the tree of life. Old Jocunda knows what goes to their making +up; she's good for something, if she is old and twisted; many a scrubby +old olive bears fat berries," said the old portress, chuckling. + +"Oh, dear Jocunda," said Agnes, "why must you go this minute? I want to +talk with you about so many things!" + +"Bless the sweet child! it does want its old Jocunda, does it?" said the +old woman, in the tone with which one caresses a baby. "Well, well, it +should, then! Just wait a minute, till I go and see that our holy Saint +Cattarina hasn't fallen a-praying over the conserving-pan. I'll be back +in a moment." + +So saying, she hobbled off briskly, and Agnes, sitting down on the +fragment sculptured with dancing nymphs, began abstractedly pulling her +flowers towards her, shaking from them the dew of the fountain. + +Unconsciously to herself, as she sat there, her head drooped into the +attitude of the marble nymph, and her sweet features assumed the same +expression of plaintive and dreamy thoughtfulness; her heavy dark lashes +lay on her pure waxen cheeks like the dark fringe of some tropical +flower. Her form, in its drooping outlines, scarcely yet showed the full +development of womanhood, which after-years might unfold into the ripe +fulness of her countrywomen. Her whole attitude and manner were those of +an exquisitively sensitive and highly organized being, just struggling +into the life of some mysterious new inner birth,--into the sense of +powers of feeling and being hitherto unknown even to herself. + +"Ah," she softly sighed to herself, "how little I am! how little I can +do! Could I convert one soul! Ah, holy Dorothea, send down the roses of +heaven into his soul, that he also may believe!" + +"Well, my little beauty, you have not finished even one garland," said +the voice of old Jocunda, bustling up behind her. "Praise to Saint +Martha, the conserves are doing well, and so I catch a minute for my +little heart." + +So saying, she sat down with her spindle and flax by Agnes, for an +afternoon gossip. + +"Dear Jocunda, I have heard you tell stories about spirits that haunt +lonesome places. Did you ever hear about any in the gorge?" + +"Why, bless the child, yes,--spirits are always pacing up and down in +lonely places. Father Anselmo told me that; and he had seen a priest +once that had seen that in the Holy Scriptures themselves,--so it must +be true." + +"Well, did you ever hear of their making the most beautiful music?" + +"Haven't I?" said Jocunda,--"to be sure I have,--singing enough to draw +the very heart out of your body,--it's an old trick they have. Why, I +want to know if you never heard about the King of Amalfi's son coming +home from fighting for the Holy Sepulchre? Why, there's rocks not far +out from this very town where the Sirens live; and if the King's son +hadn't had a holy bishop on board, who slept every night with a piece of +the true cross under his pillow, the green ladies would have sung him +straight into perdition. They are very fair-spoken at first, and sing so +that a man gets perfectly drunk with their music, and longs to fly to +them; but they suck him down at last under water, and strangle him, and +that's the end of him." + +"You never told me about this before, Jocunda." + +"Haven't I, child? Well, I will now. You see, this good bishop, he +dreamed three times that they would sail past those rocks, and he was +told to give all the sailors holy wax from an altar-candle to stop their +ears, so that they shouldn't hear the music. Well, the King's son said +he wanted to hear the music, so he wouldn't have his ears stopped; but +he told 'em to tie him to the mast, so that he could hear it, but not to +mind a word he said, if he begged 'em ever so hard to untie him. + +"Well, you see they did it; and the old bishop, he had his ears sealed +up tight, and so did all the men; but the young man stood tied to the +mast, and when they sailed past he was like a demented creature. He +called out that it was his lady who was singing, and he wanted to go to +her,--and his mother, who they all knew was a blessed saint in paradise +years before; and he commanded them to untie him, and pulled and +strained on his cords to get free; but they only tied him the tighter, +and so they got him past,--for, thanks to the holy wax, the sailors +never heard a word, and so they kept their senses. So they all got safe +home; but the young prince was so sick and pining that he had to be +exorcised and prayed for seven times seven days before they could get +the music out of his head." + +"Why," said Agnes, "do those Sirens sing there yet?" + +"Well, that was a hundred years ago. They say the old bishop, he prayed +'em down; for he went out a little after on purpose, and gave 'em a +precious lot of holy water; most likely he got 'em pretty well under, +though my husband's brother says he's heard 'em singing in a small way, +like frogs in spring-time; but he gave 'em a pretty wide berth. You see, +these spirits are what's left of old heathen times, when, Lord bless us! +the earth was just as full of 'em as a bit of old cheese is of mites. +Now a Christian body, if they take reasonable care, can walk quit of +'em; and if they have any haunts in lonesome and doleful places, if one +puts up a cross or a shrine, they know they have to go." + +"I am thinking," said Agnes, "it would be a blessed work to put up some +shrines to Saint Agnes and our good Lord in the gorge, and I'll promise +to keep the lamps burning and the flowers in order." + +"Bless the child!" said Jocunda, "that is a pious and Christian +thought." + +"I have an uncle in Florence who is a father in the holy convent of San +Marco, who paints and works in stone,--not for money, but for the glory +of God; and when he comes this way I will speak to him about it," said +Agnes. "About this time in the spring he always visits us." + +"That's mighty well thought of," said Jocunda. "And now, tell me, little +lamb, have you any idea who this grand cavalier may be that gave you the +ring?" + +"No," said Agnes, pausing a moment over the garland of flowers she was +weaving,--"only Giulietta told me that he was brother to the King. +Giulietta said everybody knew him." + +"I'm not so sure of that," said Jocunda. "Giulietta always thinks she +knows more than she does." + +"Whatever he may be, his worldly state is nothing to me," said Agnes. "I +know him only in my prayers." + +"Ay, ay," muttered the old woman to herself, looking obliquely out of +the corner of her eye at the girl, who was busily sorting her flowers; +"perhaps he will be seeking some other acquaintance." + +"You haven't seen him since?" said Jocunda. + +"Seen him? Why, dear Jocunda, it was only last evening"-- + +"True enough. Well, child, don't think too much of him. Men are dreadful +creatures,--in these times especially; they snap up a pretty girl as a +fox does a chicken, and no questions asked." + +"I don't think he looked wicked, Jocunda; he had a proud, sorrowful +look. I don't know what could make a rich, handsome young man sorrowful; +but I feel in my heart that he is not happy. Mother Theresa says that +those who can do nothing but pray may convert princes without knowing +it." + +"May be it is so," said Jocunda, in the same tone in which thrifty +professors of religion often assent to the same sort of truths in our +days. "I've seen a good deal of that sort of cattle in my day; and one +would think, by their actions, that praying souls must be scarce where +they came from." + +Agnes abstractedly stooped and began plucking handfuls of lycopodium, +which was growing green and feathery on one side of the marble frieze on +which she was sitting; in so doing, a fragment of white marble, which +had been overgrown in the luxuriant green, appeared to view. It was +that frequent object in the Italian soil,--a portion of an old Roman +tombstone. Agnes bent over, intent on the mystic "_Dis Manibus_" in old +Roman letters. + +"Lord bless the child! I've seen thousands of them," said Jocunda; "it's +some old heathen's grave, that's been in hell these hundred years." + +"In hell?" said Agnes, with a distressful accent. + +"Of course," said Jocunda. "Where should they be? Serves 'em right, too; +they were a vile old set." + +"Oh, Jocunda, it's dreadful to think of, that they should have been in +hell all this time." + +"And no nearer the end than when they began," said Jocunda. + +Agnes gave a shivering sigh, and, looking up into the golden sky that +was pouring such floods of splendor through the orange-trees and +jasmines, thought, How could it be that the world could possibly be +going on so sweet and fair over such an abyss? + +"Oh, Jocunda!" she said, "it does seem _too_ dreadful to believe! How +could they help being heathen,--being born so,--and never hearing of the +true Church?" + +"Sure enough," said Jocunda, spinning away energetically, "but that's no +business of mine; my business is to save _my_ soul, and that's what I +came here for. The dear saints know I found it dull enough at first, for +I'd been used to jaunting round with my old man and the boys; but what +with marketing and preserving, and one thing and another, I get on +better now, praise to Saint Agnes!" + +The large, dark eyes of Agnes were fixed abstractedly on the old woman +as she spoke, slowly dilating, with a sad, mysterious expression, which +sometimes came over them. + +"Ah! how can the saints themselves be happy?" she said. "One might be +willing to wear sackcloth and sleep on the ground, one might suffer ever +so many years and years, if only one might save some of them." + +"Well, it does seem hard," said Jocunda; "but what's the use of thinking +of it? Old Father Anselmo told us in one of his sermons that the Lord +wills that his saints should come to rejoice in the punishment of all +heathens and heretics; and he told us about a great saint once, who took +it into his head to be distressed because one of the old heathen whose +books he was fond of reading had gone to hell,--and he fasted and +prayed, and wouldn't take no for an answer, till he got him out." + +"He did, then?" said Agnes, clasping her hands in an ecstasy. + +"Yes; but the good Lord told him never to try it again,--and He struck +him dumb, as a kind of hint, you know. Why, Father Anselmo said that +even getting souls out of purgatory was no easy matter. He told us of +one holy nun who spent nine years fasting and praying for the soul of +her prince, who was killed in a duel, and then she saw in a vision +that he was only raised the least little bit out of the fire,--and she +offered up her life as a sacrifice to the Lord to deliver him, but, +after all, when she died he wasn't quite delivered. Such things made me +think that a poor old sinner like me would never get out at all, if I +didn't set about it in earnest,--though it a'n't all nuns that save +their souls either. I remember in Pisa I saw a great picture of the +Judgment-Day in the Campo Santo, and there were lots of abbesses, and +nuns, and monks, and bishops too, that the devils were clearing off into +the fire." + +"Oh, Jocunda, how dreadful that fire must be!" + +"Yes," said Jocunda. "Father Anselmo said hell-fire wasn't like any kind +of fire we have here,--made to warm us and cook our food,--but a kind +made especially to torment body and soul, and not made for anything +else. I remember a story he told us about that. You see, there was an +old duchess that lived in a grand old castle,--and a proud, wicked old +thing enough; and her son brought home a handsome young bride to the +castle, and the old duchess was jealous of her,--'cause, you see, she +hated to give up her place in the house, and the old family-jewels, and +all the splendid things,--and so one time, when the poor young thing was +all dressed up in a set of the old family-lace, what does the old hag do +but set fire to it!" + +"How horrible!" said Agnes. + +"Yes; and when the young thing ran screaming in her agony, the old hag +stopped her and tore off a pearl rosary that she was wearing, for fear +it should be spoiled by the fire." + +"Holy Mother! can such things be possible?" said Agnes. + +"Well, you see, she got her pay for it. That rosary was of famous old +pearls that had been in the family a hundred years; but from that moment +the good Lord struck it with a curse, and filled it white-hot with +hell-fire, so that, if anybody held it a few minutes in their hand, it +would burn to the bone. The old sinner made believe that she was in +great affliction for the death of her daughter-in-law, and that it was +all an accident, and the poor young man went raving mad,--but that awful +rosary the old hag couldn't get rid of. She couldn't give it away,--she +couldn't sell it,--but back it would come every night, and lie right +over her heart, all white-hot with the fire that burned in it. She gave +it to a convent, and she sold it to a merchant, but back it came; and +she locked it up in the heaviest chests, and she buried it down in the +lowest vaults, but it always came back in the night, till she was worn +to a skeleton; and at last the old thing died without confession or +sacrament, and went where she belonged. She was found lying dead in her +bed one morning, and the rosary was gone; but when they came to lay her +out, they found the marks of it burned to the bone into her breast. +Father Anselmo used to tell us this, to show us a little what hell-fire +was like." + +"Oh, please, Jocunda, don't let us talk about it any more," said Agnes. + +Old Jocunda, with her tough, vigorous organization and unceremonious +habits of expression, could not conceive the exquisite pain with which +this whole conversation had vibrated on the sensitive being at her right +hand,--that what merely awoke her hard-corded nerves to a dull vibration +of not unpleasant excitement was shivering and tearing the tenderer +chords of poor little Psyche beside her. + +Ages before, beneath those very skies that smiled so sweetly over +her,--amid the bloom of lemon and citron, and the perfume of jasmine and +rose, the gentlest of old Italian souls had dreamed and wondered what +might be the unknown future of the dead, and, learning his lesson from +the glorious skies and gorgeous shores which witnessed how magnificent a +Being had given existence to man, had recorded his hopes of man's future +in the words--_Aut beatus, aut nihil_; but, singular to tell, the +religion which brought with it all human tenderness and pities,--the +hospital for the sick, the refuge for the orphan, the enfranchisement +of the slave,--this religion brought also the news of the eternal, +hopeless, living torture of the great majority of mankind, past and +present. Tender spirits, like those of Dante, carried this awful mystery +as a secret and unexplained anguish; saints wrestled with God and +wept over it; but still the awful fact remained, spite of Church and +sacrament, that the gospel was in effect, to the majority of the human +race, not the glad tidings of salvation, but the sentence of immitigable +doom. + +The present traveller in Italy sees with disgust the dim and faded +frescoes in which this doom is portrayed in all its varied refinements +of torture; and the vivid Italian mind ran riot in these lurid fields, +and every monk who wanted to move his audience was in his small way a +Dante. The poet and the artist give only the highest form of the ideas +of their day, and he who cannot read the "Inferno" with firm nerves may +ask what the same representations were likely to have been in the grasp +of coarse and common minds. + +The first teachers of Christianity in Italy read the Gospels by the +light of those fiendish fires which consumed their fellows. Daily made +familiar with the scorching, the searing, the racking, the devilish +ingenuities of torture, they transferred them to the future hell of the +torturers. The sentiment within us which asserts eternal justice and +retribution was stimulated to a kind of madness by that first baptism of +fire and blood, and expanded the simple and grave warnings of the gospel +into a lurid poetry of physical torture. Hence, while Christianity +brought multiplied forms of mercy into the world, it failed for many +centuries to humanize the savage forms of justice; and rack and wheel, +fire and fagot were the modes by which human justice aspired to a +faint imitation of what divine justice was supposed to extend through +eternity. + +But it is remarkable always to observe the power of individual minds +to draw out of the popular religious ideas of their country only those +elements which suit themselves, and to drop others from their thought. +As a bee can extract pure honey from the blossoms of some plants whose +leaves are poisonous, so some souls can nourish themselves only with the +holier and more ethereal parts of popular belief. + +Agnes had hitherto dwelt only on the cheering and the joyous features of +her faith; her mind loved to muse on the legends of saints and angels +and the glories of paradise, which, with a secret buoyancy, she hoped to +be the lot of every one she saw. The mind of the Mother Theresa was of +the same elevated cast, and the terrors on which Jocunda dwelt with such +homely force of language seldom made a part of her instructions. + +Agnes tried to dismiss these gloomy images from her mind, and, after +arranging her garlands, went to decorate the shrine and altar,--a +cheerful labor of love, in which she delighted. + +To the mind of the really spiritual Christian of those ages the air of +this lower world was not as it is to us, in spite of our nominal faith +in the Bible, a blank, empty space from which all spiritual sympathy +and life have fled, but, like the atmosphere with which Raphael has +surrounded the Sistine Madonna, it was full of sympathizing faces, a +great "cloud of witnesses." The holy dead were not gone from earth; +the Church visible and invisible were in close, loving, and constant +sympathy,--still loving, praying, and watching together, though with a +veil between. + +It was at first with no idolatrous intention that the prayers of the +holy dead were invoked in acts of worship. Their prayers were asked +simply because they were felt to be as really present with their former +friends and as truly sympathetic as if no veil of silence had fallen +between. In time this simple belief had its intemperate and idolatrous +exaggerations,--the Italian soil always seeming to have a fiery +and volcanic forcing power, by which religious ideas overblossomed +themselves, and grew wild and ragged with too much enthusiasm; and, as +so often happens with friends on earth, these too much loved and revered +invisible friends became eclipsing screens instead of transmitting +mediums of God's light to the soul. + +Yet we can see in the hymns of Savonarola, who perfectly represented the +attitude of the highest Christian of those times, how perfect might +be the love and veneration for departed saints without lapsing into +idolatry, and with what an atmosphere of warmth and glory the true +belief of the unity of the Church, visible and invisible, could inspire +an elevated soul amid the discouragements of an unbelieving and +gainsaying world. + +Our little Agnes, therefore, when she had spread all her garlands out, +seemed really to feel as if the girlish figure that smiled in sacred +white from the altar-piece was a dear friend who smiled upon her, and +was watching to lead her up the path to heaven. + +Pleasantly passed the hours of that day to the girl, and when at evening +old Elsie called for her, she wondered that the day had gone so fast. + +Old Elsie returned with no inconsiderable triumph from her stand. The +cavalier had been several times during the day past her stall, and once, +stopping in a careless way to buy fruit, commented on the absence of +her young charge. This gave Elsie the highest possible idea of her own +sagacity and shrewdness, and of the promptitude with which she had taken +her measures, so that she was in as good spirits as people commonly are +who think they have performed some stroke of generalship. + +As the old woman and young girl emerged from the dark-vaulted passage +that led them down through the rocks on which the convent stood to the +sea at its base, the light of a most glorious sunset burst upon them, in +all those strange and magical mysteries of light which any one who has +walked that beach of Sorrento at evening will never forget. + +Agnes ran along the shore, and amused herself with picking up little +morsels of red and black coral, and those fragments of mosaic pavements, +blue, red, and green, which the sea is never tired of casting up from +the thousands of ancient temples and palaces which have gone to wreck +all around these shores. + +As she was busy doing this, she suddenly heard the voice of Giulietta +behind her. + +"So ho, Agnes! where have you been all day?" + +"At the Convent," said Agnes, raising herself from her work, and smiling +at Giulietta, in her frank, open way. + +"Oh, then you really did take the ring to Saint Agnes?" + +"To be sure I did," said Agnes. + +"Simple child!" said Giulietta, laughing; "that wasn't what he meant you +to do with it. He meant it for you,--only your grandmother was by. You +never will have any lovers, if she keeps you so tight." + +"I can do without," said Agnes. + +"I could tell you something about this one," said Giulietta. + +"You did tell me something yesterday," said Agnes. + +"But I could tell you some more. I know he wants to see you again." + +"What for?" said Agnes. + +"Simpleton, he's in love with you. You never had a lover;--it's time you +had." + +"I don't want one, Giulietta. I hope I never shall see him again." + +"Oh, nonsense, Agnes! Why, what a girl you are! Why, before I was as old +as you I had half-a-dozen lovers." + +"Agnes," said the sharp voice of Elsie, coming up from behind, "don't +run on ahead of me again;--and you, Mistress Baggage, let my child +alone." + +"Who's touching your child?" said Giulietta, scornfully. "Can't a body +say a civil word to her?" + +"I know what you would be after," said Elsie,--"filling her head with +talk of all the wild, loose gallants; but she is for no such market, I +promise you! Come, Agnes." + +So saying, old Elsie drew Agnes rapidly along with her, leaving +Giulietta rolling her great black eyes after them with an air of +infinite contempt. + +"The old kite!" she said; "I declare he shall get speech of the little +dove, if only to spite her. Let her try her best, and see if we don't +get round her before she knows it. Pietro says his master is certainly +wild after her, and I have promised to help him." + +Meanwhile, just as old Elsie and Agnes were turning into the +orange-orchard which led into the Gorge of Sorrento, they met the +cavalier of the evening before. + +He stopped, and, removing his cap, saluted them with as much deference +as if they had been princesses. Old Elsie frowned, and Agnes blushed +deeply;--both hurried forward. Looking back, the old woman saw that he +was walking slowly behind them, evidently watching them closely, yet not +in a way sufficiently obtrusive to warrant an open rebuff. + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +THE CAVALIER. + + +Nothing can be more striking, in common Italian life, than the contrast +between out-doors and in-doors. Without, all is fragrant and radiant; +within, mouldy, dark, and damp. Except in the well-kept palaces of the +great, houses in Italy are more like dens than habitations, and a sight +of them is a sufficient reason to the mind of any inquirer, why their +vivacious and handsome inhabitants spend their life principally in the +open air. Nothing could be more perfectly paradisiacal than this evening +at Sorrento. The sun had sunk, but left the air full of diffused +radiance, which trembled and vibrated over the thousand many-colored +waves of the sea. The moon was riding in a broad zone of purple, low +in the horizon, her silver forehead somewhat flushed in the general +rosiness that seemed to penetrate and suffuse every object. The +fishermen, who were drawing in their nets, gayly singing, seemed to +be floating on a violet-and-gold-colored flooring that broke into a +thousand gems at every dash of the oar or motion of the boat. The old +stone statue of Saint Antonio looked down in the rosy air, itself tinged +and brightened by the magical colors which floated round it. And the +girls and men of Sorrento gathered in gossiping knots on the old Roman +bridge that spanned the gorge, looked idly down into its dusky shadows, +talking the while, and playing the time-honored game of flirtation which +has gone on in all climes and languages since man and woman began. + +Conspicuous among them all was Giulietta, her blue-black hair recently +braided and polished to a glossy radiance, and all her costume arranged +to show her comely proportions to the best advantage,--her great pearl +ear-rings shaking as she tossed her head, and showing the flash of +the emerald in the middle of them. An Italian peasant-woman may trust +Providence for her gown, but ear-rings she attends to herself,--for what +is life without them? The great pearl ear-rings of the Sorrento women +are accumulated, pearl by pearl, as the price of years of labor. +Giulietta, however, had come into the world, so to speak, with a gold +spoon in her mouth,--since her grandmother, a thriving, stirring, +energetic body, had got together a pair of ear-rings of unmatched size, +which had descended as heirlooms to her, leaving her nothing to do but +display them, which she did with the freest good-will. At present she +was busily occupied in coquetting with a tall and jauntily-dressed +fellow, wearing a plumed hat and a red sash, who seemed to be mesmerized +by the power of her charms, his large dark eyes following every +movement, as she now talked with him gayly and freely, and now pretended +errands to this and that and the other person on the bridge, stationing +herself here and there, that she might have the pleasure of seeing +herself followed. + +"Giulietta," at last said the young man, earnestly, when he found her +accidentally standing alone by the parapet, "I must be going to-morrow." + +"Well, what is that to me?" said Giulietta, looking wickedly from under +her eyelashes. + +"Cruel girl! you know"---- + +"Nonsense, Pietro! I don't know anything about you"; but as Giulietta +said this, her great, soft, dark eyes looked out furtively, and said +just the contrary. + +"You will go with me?" + +"Did I ever hear anything like it? One can't be civil to a fellow but he +asks her to go to the world's end. Pray, how far is it to your dreadful +old den?" + +"Only two days' journey, Giulietta." + +"Two days!" + +"Yes, my life; and you shall ride." + +"Thank you, Sir,--I wasn't thinking of walking. But seriously, Pietro, I +am afraid it's no place for an honest girl to be in." + +"There are lots of honest women there,--all our men have wives; and our +captain has put his eye on one, too, or I'm mistaken." + +"What! little Agnes?" said Giulietta. "He will be bright that gets her. +That old dragon of a grandmother is as tight to her as her skin." + +"Our captain is used to helping himself," said Pietro. "We might carry +them both off some night, and no one the wiser; but he seems to want to +win the girl to come to him of her own accord. At any rate, we are to +be sent back to the mountains while he lingers a day or two more round +here." + +"I declare, Pietro, I think you all little better than Turks or +heathens, to talk in that way about carrying off women; and what if one +should be sick and die among you? What is to become of one's soul, I +wonder?" + +"Pshaw! don't we have priests? Why, Giulietta, we are all very pious, +and never think of going out without saying our prayers. The Madonna is +a kind Mother, and will wink very hard on the sins of such good sons as +we are. There isn't a place in all Italy where she is kept better in +candles, and in rings and bracelets, and everything a woman could want. +We never come home without bringing her something; and then we have lots +left to dress all our women like princesses; and they have nothing to do +from morning till night but play the lady. Come now?" + +At the moment this conversation was going on in the balmy, seductive +evening air at the bridge, another was transpiring in the Albergo della +Torre, one of those dark, musty dens of which we have been speaking. +In a damp, dirty chamber, whose brick floor seemed to have been +unsuspicious of even the existence of brooms for centuries, was sitting +the cavalier whom we have so often named in connection with Agnes. His +easy, high-bred air, his graceful, flexible form and handsome face +formed a singular contrast to the dark and mouldy apartment, at whose +single unglazed window he was sitting. The sight of this splendid man +gave an impression of strangeness, in the general bareness, much as if +some marvellous jewel had been unaccountably found lying on that dusty +brick floor. + +He sat deep in thought, with his elbow resting on a rickety table, his +large, piercing, dark eyes seeming intently to study the pavement. + +The door opened, and a gray-headed old man entered, who approached him +respectfully. + +"Well, Paolo?" said the cavalier, suddenly starting. + +"My Lord, the men are all going back to-night." + +"Let them go, then," said the cavalier, with an impatient movement. "I +can follow in a day or two." + +"Ah, my Lord, if I might make so bold, why should you expose your person +by staying longer? You may be recognized and"---- + +"No danger," said the other, hastily. + +"My Lord, you must forgive me, but I promised my dear lady, your mother, +on her death-bed"---- + +"To be a constant plague to me," said the cavalier, with a vexed smile +and an impatient movement; "but speak on, Paolo,--for when you once get +anything on your mind, one may as well hear it first as last." + +"Well, then, my Lord, this girl,--I have made inquiries, and every one +reports her most modest and pious,--the only grandchild of a poor old +woman. Is it worthy of a great lord of an ancient house to bring her to +shame?" + +"Who thinks of bringing her to shame? 'Lord of an ancient house'!" +added the cavalier, laughing bitterly,--"a landless beggar, cast out of +everything,--titles, estates, all! Am I, then, fallen so low that my +wooing would disgrace a peasant-girl?" + +"My Lord, you cannot mean to woo a peasant-girl in any other way than +one that would disgrace her,--one of the House of Sarelli, that goes +back to the days of the old Roman Empire!" + +"And what of the 'House of Sarelli that goes back to the days of the old +Roman Empire'? It is lying like weeds' roots uppermost in the burning +sun. What is left to me but the mountains and my sword? No, I tell +you, Paolo, Agostino Sarelli, cavalier of fortune, is not thinking of +bringing disgrace on a pious and modest maiden, unless it would disgrace +her to be his wife." + +"Now may the saints above help us! Why, my Lord, our house in days past +has been allied to royal blood. I could tell you how Joachim VI."-- + +"Come, come, my good Paolo, spare me one of your chapters of genealogy. +The fact is, my old boy, the world is all topsy-turvy, and the bottom is +the top, and it isn't much matter what comes next. Here are shoals +of noble families uprooted and lying round like those aloes that the +gardener used to throw over the wall in spring-time; and there is that +great boar of a Caesar Borgia turned in to batten and riot over our +pleasant places." + +"Oh, my Lord," said the old serving-man, with a distressful movement, +"we have fallen on evil times, to be sure, and they say his Holiness has +excommunicated us. Anselmo heard that in Naples yesterday." + +"Excommunicated!" said the young man,--every feature of his fine face, +and every nerve of his graceful form seeming to quiver with the effort +to express supreme contempt. "Excommunicated! I should _hope_ so! One +would hope through Our Lady's grace to act so that Alexander, and his +adulterous, incestuous, filthy, false-swearing, perjured, murderous +crew, _would_ excommunicate us! In these times, one's only hope of +paradise lies in being excommunicated." + +"Oh, my dear master," said the old man, falling on his knees, "what is +to become of us? That I should live to hear you talk like an infidel and +unbeliever!" + +"Why, hear you, poor old fool! Did you never hear in Dante of the Popes +that are burning in hell? Wasn't Dante a Christian, I beg to know?" + +"Oh, my Lord, my Lord! a religion got out of poetry, books, and romances +won't do to die by. We have no business with the affairs of the Head of +the Church,--it's the Lord's appointment. We have only to shut our eyes +and obey. It may all do well enough to talk so when you are young and +fresh; but when sickness and death come, then we _must_ have religion,-- +and if we have gone out of the only true Roman Catholic Apostolic +Church, what becomes of our souls? Ah, I misdoubted about your taking so +much to poetry, though my poor mistress was so proud of it; but these +poets are all heretics, my Lord,--that's my firm belief. But, my Lord, +if you do go to hell, I'm going there with you; I'm sure I never could +show my face among the saints, and you not there." + +"Well, come, then, my poor Paolo," said the cavalier, stretching out his +hand to his serving-man, "don't take it to heart so. Many a better man +than I has been excommunicated and cursed from toe to crown, and been +never a whit the worse for it. There's Jerome Savonarola there in +Florence--a most holy man, they say, who has had revelations straight +from heaven--has been excommunicated; but he preaches and gives the +sacraments all the same, and nobody minds it." + +"Well, it's all a maze to me," said the old serving-man, shaking his +white head. "I can't see into it, I don't dare to open my eyes for fear +I should get to be a heretic; it seems to me that everything is getting +mixed up together. But one must hold on to one's religion; because, +after we have lost everything in this world, it would be too bad to burn +in hell forever at the end of that." + +"Why, Paolo, I am a good Christian. I believe, with all my heart, in the +Christian religion, like the fellow in Boccaccio,--because I think it +must be from God, or else the Popes and Cardinals would have had it out +of the world long ago. Nothing but the Lord Himself could have kept it +against them." + +"There you are, my dear master, with your romances! Well, well, well! I +don't know how it'll end. I say my prayers, and try not to inquire into +what's too high for me. But now, dear master, will you stay lingering +after this girl till some of our enemies hear where you are and pounce +down upon us? Besides, the troop are never so well affected when you are +away; there are quarrels and divisions." + +"Well, well," said the cavalier, with an impatient movement,--"one day +longer. I must get a chance to speak with her once more. I _must_ see +her." + + * * * * * + + +SUN-PAINTING AND SUN-SCULPTURE; + +WITH A STEREOSCOPIC TRIP ACROSS THE ATLANTIC. + + +There is one old fable which Lord Bacon, in his "Wisdom of the +Ancients," has not interpreted. This is the flaying of Marsyas by +Apollo. Everybody remembers the accepted version of it, namely,--that +the young shepherd found Minerva's flute, and was rash enough to enter +into a musical contest with the God of Music. He was vanquished, of +course,--and the story is, that the victor fastened him to a tree and +flayed him alive. + +But the God of Song was also the God of Light, and a moment's reflection +reveals the true significance of this seemingly barbarous story. Apollo +was pleased with his young rival, fixed him in position against an iron +rest, (the _tree_ of the fable,) and took a _photograph_, a sun-picture, +of him. This thin film or _skin_ of light and shade was absurdly +interpreted as being the _cutis_, or untanned leather integument of the +young shepherd. The human discovery of the art of photography enables us +to rectify the error and restore that important article of clothing to +the youth, as well as to vindicate the character of Apollo. There is +one spot less upon the sun since the theft from heaven of Prometheus +Daguerre and his fellow-adventurers has enabled us to understand the +ancient legend. + +We are now flaying our friends and submitting to be flayed ourselves, +every few years or months or days, by the aid of the trenchant sunbeam +which performed the process for Marsyas. All the world has to submit to +it,--kings and queens with the rest. The monuments of Art and the face +of Nature herself are treated in the same way. We lift an impalpable +scale from the surface of the Pyramids. We slip off from the dome of St. +Peter's that other imponderable dome which fitted it so closely that it +betrays every scratch on the original. We skim off a thin, dry cuticle +from the rapids of Niagara, and lay it on our unmoistened paper without +breaking a bubble or losing a speck of foam. We steal a landscape from +its lawful owners, and defy the charge of dishonesty. We skin the flints +by the wayside, and nobody accuses us of meanness. + +These miracles are being worked all around us so easily and so cheaply +that most people have ceased to think of them as marvels. There is a +photographer established in every considerable village,--nay, one may +not unfrequently see a photographic _ambulance_ standing at the wayside +upon some vacant lot where it can squat unchallenged in the midst of +burdock and plantain and apple-Peru, or making a long halt in the middle +of a common by special permission of the "Selectmen." + +We must not forget the inestimable preciousness of the new Promethean +gifts because they have become familiar. Think first of the privilege we +all possess now of preserving the lineaments and looks of those dear to +us. + + "Blest be the art which can immortalize," + +said Cowper. But remember how few painted portraits really give their +subjects. Recollect those wandering Thugs of Art whose murderous doings +with the brush used frequently to involve whole families; who passed +from one country tavern to another, eating and painting their +way,--feeding a week upon the landlord, another week upon the landlady, +and two or three days apiece upon the children; as the walls of those +hospitable edifices too frequently testify even to the present day. Then +see what faithful memorials of those whom we love and would remember are +put into our hands by the new art, with the most trifling expenditure of +time and money. + +This new art is old enough already to have given us the portraits of +infants who are now growing into adolescence. By-and-by it will show +every aspect of life in the same individual, from the earliest week to +the last year of senility. We are beginning to see what it will reveal. +Children grow into beauty and out of it. The first line in the forehead, +the first streak in the hair are chronicled without malice, but without +extenuation. The footprints of thought, of passion, of purpose are all +treasured in these fossilized shadows. Family-traits show themselves in +early infancy, die out, and reappear. Flitting moods which have escaped +one pencil of sunbeams are caught by another. Each new picture gives us +a new aspect of our friend; we find he had not one face, but many. + +It is hardly too much to say, that those whom we love no longer leave us +in dying, as they did of old. They remain with us just as they appeared +in life; they look down upon us from our walls; they lie upon our +tables; they rest upon our bosoms; nay, if we will, we may wear their +portraits, like signet-rings, upon our fingers. Our own eyes lose the +images pictured on them. Parents sometimes forget the faces of their own +children in a separation of a year or two. But the unfading artificial +retina which has looked upon them retains their impress, and a fresh +sunbeam lays this on the living nerve as if it were radiated from the +breathing shape. How these shadows last, and how their originals fade +away! + +What is true of the faces of our friends is still more true of the +places we have seen and loved. No picture produces an impression on the +imagination to compare with a photographic transcript of the home of our +childhood, or any scene with which we have been long familiar. The very +point which the artist omits, in his effort to produce general effect, +may be exactly the one that individualizes the place most strongly to +our memory. There, for instance, is a photographic view of our own +birthplace, and with it of a part of our good old neighbor's dwelling. +An artist would hardly have noticed a slender, dry, leafless stalk which +traces a faint line, as you may see, along the front of our neighbor's +house next the corner. That would be nothing to him,--but to us it marks +the stem of the _honeysuckle-vine_, which we remember, with its pink +and white heavy-scented blossoms, as long as we remember the stars in +heaven. + +To this charm of fidelity in the minutest details the stereoscope adds +its astonishing illusion of solidity, and thus completes the effect +which so entrances the imagination. Perhaps there is also some +half-magnetic effect in the fixing of the eyes on the twin +pictures,--something like Mr. Braid's _hypnotism_, of which many of our +readers have doubtless heard. At least the shutting out of surrounding +objects, and the concentration of the whole attention, which is a +consequence of this, produce a dream-like exaltation of the faculties, a +kind of clairvoyance, in which we seem to leave the body behind us +and sail away into one strange scene after another, like disembodied +spirits. + +"Ah, yes," some unimaginative reader may say; "but there is no color and +no motion in these pictures you think so life-like; and at best they are +but petty miniatures of the objects we see in Nature." + +But color is, after all, a very secondary quality as compared with form. +We like a good crayon portrait better for the most part in black and +white than in tints of pink and blue and brown. Mr. Gibson has never +succeeded in making the world like his flesh-colored statues. The color +of a landscape varies perpetually, with the season, with the hour of the +day, with the weather, and as seen by sunlight or moonlight; yet our +home stirs us with its old associations, seen in any and every light. + +As to motion, though of course it is not present in stereoscopic +pictures, except in those toy-contrivances which have been lately +introduced, yet it is wonderful to see how nearly the effect of motion +is produced by the slight difference of light on the water or on the +leaves of trees as seen by the two eyes in the double-picture. + +And lastly with respect to size, the illusion is on the part of those +who suppose that the eye, unaided, ever sees anything but miniatures +of objects. Here is a new experiment to convince those who have not +reflected on the subject that the stereoscope shows us objects of their +natural size. + +We had a stereoscopic view taken by Mr. Soule out of our parlor-window, +overlooking the town of Cambridge, with the river and the bridge in the +foreground. Now, placing this view in the stereoscope, and looking with +the left eye at the right stereographic picture, while the right eye +looked at the natural landscape, through the window where the view was +taken, it was not difficult so to adjust the photographic and real views +that one overlapped the other, and then it was shown that the two almost +exactly coincided in all their dimensions. + +Another point in which the stereograph differs from every other +delineation is in the character of its evidence. A simple photographic +picture may be tampered with. A lady's portrait has been known to come +out of the finishing-artist's room ten years younger than when it left +the camera. But try to mend a stereograph and you will soon find the +difference. Your marks and patches float above the picture and never +identify themselves with it. We had occasion to put a little cross on +the pavement of a double photograph of Canterbury Cathedral,--copying +another stereoscopic picture where it was thus marked. By careful +management the two crosses were made perfectly to coincide in the field +of vision, but the image seemed suspended above the pavement, and did +not absolutely designate any one stone, as it would have done, if it +had been a part of the original picture. The impossibility of the +stereograph's perjuring itself is a curious illustration of the law of +evidence. "At the mouth of _two witnesses_, or of three, shall he that +is worthy of death be put to death; but at the mouth of one he shall not +be put to death." No woman may be declared youthful on the strength of a +single photograph; but if the stereoscopic twins say she is young, let +her be so acknowledged in the high court of chancery of the God of Love. + +Some two or three years since, we called the attention of the readers +of this magazine to the subject of the stereoscope and the stereograph. +Some of our expressions may have seemed extravagant, as if heated by the +interest which a curious novelty might not unnaturally excite. We have +not lost any of the enthusiasm and delight which that article must have +betrayed. After looking over perhaps a hundred thousand stereographs +and making a collection of about a thousand, we should feel the same +excitement on receiving a new lot to look over and select from as +in those early days of our experience. To make sure that this early +interest has not cooled, let us put on record one or two convictions of +the present moment. + +First, as to the wonderful nature of the invention. If a strange planet +should happen to come within hail, and one of its philosophers were to +ask us, as it passed, to hand him the most remarkable material product +of human skill, we should offer him, without a moment's hesitation, a +stereoscope containing an _instantaneous_ double-view of some great +thoroughfare,--one of Mr. Anthony's views of Broadway, (No. 203,) for +instance. + +Secondly, of all artificial contrivances for the gratification of human +taste, we seriously question whether any offers so much, on the whole, +to the enjoyment of the civilized races as the self-picturing of Art +and Nature,--with three exceptions: namely, dress, the most universal, +architecture, the most imposing, and music, the most exciting, of +factitious sources of pleasure. + +No matter whether this be an extravagance or an over-statement; none +can dispute that we have a new and wonderful source of pleasure in +the sun-picture, and especially in the solid sun-_sculptures_ of the +stereograph. Yet there is a strange indifference to it, even up to the +present moment, among many persons of cultivation and taste. They do not +seem to have waked up to the significance of the miracle which the Lord +of Light is working for them. The cream of the visible creation has been +skimmed off; and the sights which men risk their lives and spend their +money and endure sea-sickness to behold,--the views of Nature and Art +which make exiles of entire families for the sake of a look at them, +and render "bronchitis" and dyspepsia, followed by leave of absence, +endurable dispensations to so many worthy shepherds,--these sights, +gathered from Alps, temples, palaces, pyramids, are offered you for +a trifle, to carry home with you, that you may look at them at your +leisure, by your fireside, with perpetual fair weather, when you are in +the mood, without catching cold, without following a _valet-de-place_, +in any order of succession,--from a glacier to Vesuvius, from Niagara +to Memphis,--as long as you like, and breaking off as suddenly as you +like;--and you, native of this incomparably dull planet, have hardly +troubled yourself to look at this divine gift, which, if an angel had +brought it from some sphere nearer to the central throne, would have +been thought worthy of the celestial messenger to whom it was intrusted! + +It seemed to us that it might possibly awaken an interest in some of our +readers, if we should carry them with us through a brief stereographic +trip,--describing, not from places, but from the photographic pictures +of them which we have in our own collection. Again, those who have +collections may like to compare their own opinions of particular +pictures mentioned with those here expressed, and those who are buying +stereographs may be glad of some guidance in choosing. + +But the reader must remember that this trip gives him only a glimpse of +a few scenes selected out of our gallery of a thousand. To visit them +all, as tourists visit the realities, and report what we saw, with the +usual explanations and historical illustrations, would make a formidable +book of travels. + +Before we set out, we must know something of the sights of our own +country. At least we must see Niagara. The great fall shows infinitely +best on glass. Thomson's "Point View, 28," would be a perfect picture of +the Falls in summer, if a lady in the foreground had not moved her shawl +while the pictures were taking, or in the interval between taking the +two. His winter view, "Terrapin Tower, 37," is perfection itself. Both +he and Evans have taken fine views of the rapids, _instantaneous_, +catching the spray as it leaped and the clouds overhead. Of Blondin on +his rope there are numerous views; standing on one foot, on his head, +carrying a man on his back, and one frightful picture, where he hangs by +one leg, head downward, over the abyss. The best we have seen is Evans's +No. 5, a front view, where every muscle stands out in perfect relief, +and the symmetry of the most unimpressible of mortals is finely shown. +It literally makes the head swim to fix the eyes on some of these +pictures. It is a relief to get away from such fearful sights and look +up at the Old Man of the Mountain. There stands the face, without any +humanizing help from the hand of an artist. Mr. Bierstadt has given it +to us very well. Rather an imbecile old gentleman, one would say, +with his mouth open; a face such as one may see hanging about +railway-stations, and, what is curious, a New-England style of +countenance. Let us flit again, and just take a look at the level sheets +of water and broken falls of Trenton,--at the oblong, almost squared +arch of the Natural Bridge,--at the ruins of the Pemberton Mills, still +smoking,--and so come to Mr. Barnum's "Historical Series." Clark's +Island, with the great rock by which the Pilgrims "rested, according to +the commandment," on the first Sunday, or Sabbath, as they loved to call +it, which they passed in the harbor of Plymouth, is the most interesting +of them all to us. But here are many scenes of historical interest +connected with the great names and events of our past. The Washington +Elm, at Cambridge, (through the branches of which we saw the first +sunset we ever looked upon, from this planet, at least,) is here in all +its magnificent drapery of hanging foliage. Mr. Soule has given another +beautiful view of it, when stripped of its leaves, equally remarkable +for the delicacy of its pendent, hair-like spray. + +We should keep the reader half an hour looking through this series, +if we did not tear ourselves abruptly away from it. We are bound for +Europe, and are to leave _via_ New York immediately. + +Here we are in the main street of the great city. This is Mr. Anthony's +miraculous instantaneous view in Broadway, (No. 203,) before referred +to. It is the Oriental story of the petrified city made real to our +eyes. The character of it is, perhaps, best shown by the use we make of +it in our lectures, to illustrate the physiology of walking. Every foot +is caught in its movement with such suddenness that it shows as clearly +as if quite still. We are surprised to see, in one figure, how long the +stride is,--in another, how much the knee is bent,--in a third, how +curiously the heel strikes the ground before the rest of the foot,--in +all, how singularly the body is accommodated to the action of walking. +The facts which the brothers Weber, laborious German experimenters and +observers, had carefully worked out on the bony frame, are illustrated +by the various individuals comprising this moving throng. But what a +wonder it is, this snatch at the central life of a mighty city as it +rushed by in all its multitudinous complexity of movement! Hundreds of +objects in this picture could be identified in a court of law by their +owners. There stands Car No. 33 of the Astor House and Twenty-Seventh +Street Fourth Avenue line. The old woman would miss an apple from that +pile which you see glistening on her stand. The young man whose back is +to us could swear to the pattern of his shawl. The gentleman between two +others will no doubt remember that he had a headache the next morning, +after this walk he is taking. Notice the caution with which the man +driving the dapple-gray horse in a cart loaded with barrels holds his +reins,--wide apart, one in each hand. See the shop-boys with their +bundles, the young fellow with a lighted cigar in his hand, as you see +by the way he keeps it off from his body, the _gamin_ stooping to +pick up something in the midst of the moving omnibuses, the stout +philosophical carman sitting on his cart-tail, Newman Noggs by the +lamp-post at the corner. Nay, look into Car No. 33 and you may see the +passengers;--is that a young woman's face turned toward you looking +out of the window? See how the faithful sun-print advertises the rival +establishment of "Meade Brothers, Ambrotypes and Photographs." What a +fearfully suggestive picture! It is a leaf torn from the book of God's +recording angel. What if the sky is one great concave mirror, which +reflects the picture of all our doings, and photographs every act on +which it looks upon dead and living surfaces, so that to celestial eyes +the stones on which we tread are written with our deeds, and the leaves +of the forest are but undeveloped negatives where our summers stand +self-recorded for transfer into the imperishable record? And what a +metaphysical puzzle have we here in this simple-looking paradox! Is +motion but a succession of rests? All is still in this picture of +universal movement. Take ten thousand instantaneous photographs of the +great thoroughfare in a day; every one of them will be as still as the +_tableau_ in the "Enchanted Beauty." Yet the hurried day's life of +Broadway will have been made up of just such stillnesses. Motion is as +rigid as marble, if you only take a wink's worth of it at a time. + +We are all ready to embark now. Here is the harbor; and there lies the +Great Eastern at anchor,--the biggest island that ever got adrift. +Stay one moment,--they will ask us about secession and the revolted +States,--it may be as well to take a look at Charleston, for an instant, +before we go. + +These three stereographs were sent us by a lady now residing in +Charleston. The Battery, the famous promenade of the Charlestonians, +since armed with twenty-four-pounders facing Fort Sumter; the interior +of Fort Moultrie, with the guns spiked by Major Anderson; and a more +extensive view of the same interior, with the flag of the seven stars, +(corresponding to the seven deadly sins,)--the free end of it tied to +a gun-carriage, as if to prevent the winds of the angry heaven from +rending it to tatters. In the distance, to the right, Fort Sumter, +looking remote and inaccessible,--the terrible rattle which our foolish +little spoiled sister Caroline has insisted on getting into her +rash hand. How ghostly, yet how real, it looms up out of the dim +atmosphere,--the guns looking over the wall and out through the +embrasures,--meant for a foreign foe,--this very day (April 13th) turned +in self-defence against the children of those who once fought for +liberty at Fort Moultrie! It is a sad thought that there are truths +which can be got out of life only by the _destructive analysis_ of war. +Statesmen deal in _proximate principles_,--unstable compounds; but war +reduces facts to their simple elements in its red-hot crucible, with its +black flux of carbon and sulphur and nitre. Let us turn our back on this +miserable, even though inevitable, fraternal strife, and, closing our +eyes for an instant, open them in London. + +Here we are at the foot of Charing Cross. You remember, of course, how +this fine equestrian statue of Charles I. was condemned to be sold and +broken up by the Parliament, but was buried and saved by the brazier who +purchased it, and so reappeared after the Restoration. To the left, the +familiar words "Morley's Hotel" designate an edifice about half windows, +where the plebeian traveller may sit and contemplate Northumberland +House opposite, and the straight-tailed lion of the Percys surmounting +the lofty battlement which crowns its broad _facade_. We could describe +and criticize the statue as well as if we stood under it, but other +travellers have done that. Where are all the people that ought to be +seen here? Hardly more than three or four figures are to be made out; +the rest were moving, and left no images in this slow, old-fashioned +picture,--how unlike the miraculous "instantaneous" Broadway of Mr. +Anthony we were looking at a little while ago! But there, on one side, +an omnibus has stopped long enough to be caught by the sunbeams. There +is a mark on it. Try it with a magnifier. + + Charing + + Strand + 633. + +Here are the towers of Westminster Abbey. A dead failure, as we well +remember them,--miserable modern excrescences, which shame the noble +edifice. We will hasten on, and perhaps by-and-by come back and enter +the cathedral. + +How natural Temple Bar looks, with the loaded coach and the cab going +through the central arch, and the blur of the hurrying throng darkening +the small lateral ones! A fine old structure,--always reminds a +Bostonian of the old arch over which the mysterious _Boston Library_ was +said still to linger out its existence late into the present century. +But where are the spikes on which the rebels' heads used to grin until +their jaws fell off? They must have been ranged along that ledge which +forms the chord of the arch surmounting the triple-gated structure. To +the left a woman is spreading an awning before a shop;--a man would do +it for her here. Ghost of a boy with bundle,--seen with right eye only. +Other ghosts of passers or loiterers,--one of a pretty woman, as we +fancy at least, by the way she turns her face to us. To the right, +fragments of signs, as follow: + + 22 + PAT + + CO + BR + PR + +What can this be but 229, _Patent Combs and Brushes_, PROUT? At any +rate, we were looking after Front's good old establishment, (229, +Strand,) which we remembered was close to Temple Bar, when we discovered +these fragments, the rest being cut off by the limits of the picture. + +London Bridge! Less imposing than Waterloo Bridge, but a massive pile of +masonry, which looks as if its rounded piers would defy the Thames as +long as those of the Bridge of Sant' Angelo have stemmed the Tiber. +Figures indistinct or invisible, as usual, in the foreground, but +farther on a mingled procession of coaches, cabs, carts, and people. +See the groups in the recesses over the piers. The parapet is +breast-high;--a woman can climb over it, and drop or leap into the dark +stream lying in deep shadow under the arches. Women take this leap +often. The angels hear them like the splash of drops of blood out of the +heart of our humanity. In the distance, wharves, storehouses, stately +edifices, steeples, and rising proudly above them, "like a tall bully," +London Monument. + +Here we are, close to the Monument. Tall, square base, with reliefs, +fluted columns, queer top;--looks like an inverted wineglass with a +shaving-brush standing up on it: representative of flame, probably. +Below this the square _cage_ in which people who have climbed the stairs +are standing; seems to be ten or twelve feet high, and is barred or +wired over. Women used to jump off from the Monument as well as from +London Bridge, before they made the cage safe in this way. + +"Holloa!" said a man standing in the square one day, to his +companion,--"there's the flag coming down from the Monument!" + +"It's no flag," said the other, "it's a woman!" + +Sure enough, and so it was. + +Nobody can mistake the four pepper-boxes, with the four weathercocks on +them, surmounting the corners of a great square castle, a little way +from the river's edge. That is the Tower of London. We see it behind the +masts of sailing-vessels and the chimneys of steamers, gray and misty in +the distance. Let us come nearer to it. Four square towers, crowned by +four Oriental-looking domes, not unlike the lower half of an inverted +balloon: these towers at the angles of a square building with buttressed +and battlemented walls, with two ranges of round-arched windows on the +side towards us. But connected with this building are other towers, +round, square, octagon, walls with embrasures, moats, loop-holes, +turrets, parapets,--looking as if the beef-eaters really meant to hold +out, if a new army of Boulogne should cross over some fine morning. We +can't stop to go in and see the lions this morning, for we have come in +sight of a great dome, and we cannot take our eyes away from it. + +That is St. Paul's, the Boston State-House of London. There is a +resemblance in effect, but there is a difference in dimensions,--to the +disadvantage of the native edifice, as the reader may see in the plate +prefixed to Dr. Bigelow's "Technology." The dome itself looks light +and airy compared to St. Peter's or the Duomo of Florence, not only +absolutely, but comparatively. The colonnade on which it rests divides +the honors with it. It does not brood over the city, as those two others +over their subject towns. Michel Angelo's forehead repeats itself in the +dome of St. Peter's. Sir Christopher had doubtless a less ample frontal +development; indeed, the towers he added to Westminster Abbey would +almost lead us to doubt if he had not a vacancy somewhere in his brain. +But the dome of the London "State-House" is very graceful,--so light +that it looks as if Its lineage had been crossed by a spire. Wait until +we have gilded the dome of our Boston St. Paul's before drawing any +comparisons. + +We have seen the outside of London. What do we care for the Crescent, +and the Horseguards, and Nelson's Monument, and the statue of Achilles, +and the new Houses of Parliament? The Abbey, the Tower, the Bridge, +Temple Bar, the Monument, St. Paul's: these make up the great features +of the London we dream about. Let us go into the Abbey for a few +moments. The "dim religious light" is pretty good, after all. We can +read every letter on that mural tablet to the memory of "the most +illustrious and most benevolent John Paul Howard, Earl of Stafford," +"a Lover of his Country, A _Relation to Relations_" (what a eulogy and +satire in that expression!) and in many ways virtuous and honorable, as +"The Countess Dowager, in Testimony of her great Affection and Respect +to her Lord's Memory," has commemorated on his monument. We can see all +the folds of the Duchess of Suffolk's dress, and the meshes of the net +that confines her hair, as she lies in marble effigy on her sculptured +sarcophagus. It looks old to our eyes,--for she was the mother of Lady +Jane Grey, and died three hundred years ago,--but see those two little +stone heads lying on their stone pillow, just beyond the marble Duchess. +They are children of Edward III.,--the Black Prince's baby-brothers. +They died five hundred years ago,--but what are centuries in Westminster +Abbey? Under this pillared canopy, her head raised on two stone +cushions, her fair, still features bordered with the spreading cap +we know so well in her portraits, lies Mary of Scotland. These fresh +monuments, protected from the wear of the elements, seem to make twenty +generations our contemporaries. Look at this husband warding off the +dart which the grim, draped skeleton is aiming at the breast of his +fainting wife. Most famous, perhaps, of all the statues in the Abbey is +this of Joseph Gascoigne Nightingale and his Lady, by Roubilliac. You +need not cross the ocean to see it. It is here, literally to every +dimple in the back of the falling hand, and every crinkle of the +vermiculated stone-work. What a curious pleasure it is to puzzle out the +inscriptions on the monuments in the background!--for the beauty of your +photograph is, that you may work out minute derails with the microscope, +just as you can with the telescope in a distant landscape in Nature. +There is a lady, for instance, leaning upon an urn,--suggestive, a +little, of Morgiana and the forty thieves. Above is a medallion of one +wearing a full periwig. Now for a half-inch lens to make out the specks +that seem to be letters. "Erected to the Memory of William Pulteney, +Earl of Bath, by his Brother"--That will do,--the inscription operates +as a cold bath to enthusiasm. But here is our own personal namesake, +the once famous Rear Admiral of the White, whose biography we can find +nowhere except in the "Gentleman's Magazine," where he divides the glory +of the capture of Quebec with General Wolfe. A handsome young man with +hyacinthine locks, his arms bare and one hand resting on a cannon. We +remember thinking our namesake's statue one of the most graceful in the +Abbey, and have always fallen back on the memory of that and of Dryden's +Achates of the "Annus Mirabilis," as trophies of the family. + +Enough of these marbles; there is no end to them; the walls and floor of +the great, many-arched, thousand-pillared, sky-lifted cavern are crusted +all over with them, like stalactites and stalagmites. The vast temple is +alive with the images of the dead. Kings and queens, nobles, statesmen, +soldiers, admirals, the great men whose deeds we all know, the great +writers whose words are in all our memories, the brave and the beautiful +whose fame has shrunk into their epitaphs, are all around us. What is +the cry for alms that meets us at the door of the church to the mute +petition of these marble beggars, who ask to warm their cold memories +for a moment in our living hearts? Look up at the mighty arches +overhead, borne up on tall clustered columns,--as if that avenue of +Royal Palms we remember in the West India Islands (photograph) had been +spirited over seas and turned into stone. Make your obeisance to the +august shape of Sir Isaac Newton, reclining like a weary swain in the +niche at the side of the gorgeous screen. Pass through Henry VII.'s +Chapel, a temple cut like a cameo. Look at the shining oaken stalls of +the knights. See the banners overhead. There is no such speaking record +of the lapse of time as these banners,--there is one of them beginning +to drop to pieces; the long day of a century has decay for its +dial-shadow. + +We have had a glimpse of London,--let us make an excursion to +Stratford-on-Avon. + +Here you see the Shakspeare House as it was,--wedged in between, and +joined to, the "Swan and Maidenhead" Tavern and a mean and dilapidated +brick building, not much worse than itself, however. The first +improvement (as you see in No. 2) was to pull down this brick building. +The next (as you see in No. 3)--was to take away the sign and the +bay-window of the "Swan and Maidenhead" and raise two gables out of its +roof, so as to restore something like its ancient aspect. Then a rustic +fence was put up and the outside arrangements were completed. The +cracked and faded sign projects as we remember it of old. In No. 1 you +may read "THE IMMORTAL SHAKES_peare ... Born in This House_" about as +well as if you had been at the trouble and expense of going there. + +But here is the back of the house. Did little Will use to look out at +this window with the bull's-eye panes? Did he use to drink from this old +pump, or the well in which it stands? Did his shoulders rub against this +angle of the old house, built with rounded bricks? It a strange picture, +and sets us dreaming. Let us go in and up-stairs. In this room he was +born. They say so, and we will believe it. Rough walls, rudely boarded +floor, wide window with small panes, small bust of him between two +cactuses in bloom on window-seat. An old table covered with prints and +stereographs, a framed picture, and under it a notice "Copies of this +Portrait" ... the rest, in fine print, can only be conjectured. + +Here is the Church of the Holy Trinity, in which he lies buried. The +trees are bare that surround it; see the rooks' nests in their tops. +The Avon is hard by, dammed just here, with flood-gates, like a canal. +Change the season, if you like,--here are the trees in leaf, and in +their shadow the tombs and graves of the mute, inglorious citizens of +Stratford. + +Ah, how natural this interior, with its great stained window, its mural +monuments, and its slab in the pavement with the awful inscription! That +we cannot see here, but there is the tablet with the bust we know so +well. But this, after all, is Christ's temple, not Shakspeare's. Here +are the worshippers' seats,--mark how the polished wood glistens,--there +is the altar, and there the open prayer-book,--you can almost read the +service from it. Of the many striking things that Henry Ward Beecher +has said, nothing, perhaps, is more impressive than his account of his +partaking of the communion at that altar in the church where Shakspeare +rests. A memory more divine than his overshadowed the place, and he +thought of Shakspeare, "as he thought of ten thousand things, without +the least disturbance of his devotion," though he was kneeling directly +over the poet's dust. + +If you will stroll over to Shottery now with me, we can see the Ann +Hathaway cottage from four different points, which will leave nothing +outside of it to be seen. Better to look at than to live in. A fearful +old place, full of small vertebrates that squeak and smaller articulates +that bite, if its outward promise can be trusted. A thick thatch covers +it like a coarse-haired hide. It is patched together with bricks and +timber, and partly crusted with scaling plaster. One window has the +diamond panes framed in lead, such as we remember seeing of old in one +or two ancient dwellings in the town of Cambridge, hard by. In this view +a young man is sitting, pensive, on the steps which Master William, too +ardent lover, used to climb with hot haste and descend with lingering +delay. Young men die, but youth lives. Life goes on in the cottage just +as it used to three hundred years ago. On the rail before the door sits +the puss of the household, of the fiftieth generation, perhaps, from +that "harmless, necessary cat" which purred round the poet's legs as he +sat talking love with Ann Hathaway. At the foot of the steps is a huge +basin, and over the rail hangs--a dishcloth, drying. In these homely +accidents of the very instant, that cut across our romantic ideals with +the sharp edge of reality, lies one of the ineffable charms of the +sun-picture. It is a little thing that gives life to a scene or a face; +portraits are never absolutely alive, because they do not _wink_. + +Come, we are full of Shakspeare; let us go up among the hills and see +where another poet lived and lies. Here is Rydal Mount, the home of +Wordsworth. Two-storied, ivy-clad, hedge-girdled, dropped into a crease +among the hills that look down dimly from above, as if they were hunting +after it as ancient dames hunt after a dropped thimble. In these walks +he used to go "booing about," as his rustic neighbor had it,--reciting +his own verses. Here is his grave in Grasmere. A plain slab, with +nothing but his name. Next him lies Dora, his daughter, beneath a taller +stone bordered with a tracery of ivy, and bearing in relief a lamb and +a cross. Her husband lies next in the range. The three graves have just +been shorn of their tall grass,--in this other view you may see them +half-hidden by it. A few flowering stems have escaped the scythe in the +first picture, and nestle close against the poet's headstone. Hard by +sleeps poor Hartley Coleridge, with a slab of freestone graven with a +cross and a crown of thorns, and the legend, "By thy Cross and Passion, +Good Lord, deliver us."[A] All around are the graves of those whose +names the world has not known. This view, (302,) from above Rydal Mount, +is so Claude-like, especially in its trees, that one wants the solemn +testimony of the double-picture to believe it an actual transcript of +Nature. Of the other English landscapes we have seen, one of the most +pleasing on the whole is that marked 43,--Sweden Bridge, near Ambleside. +But do not fail to notice St. Mary's Church (101) in the same +mountain-village. It grows out of the ground like a crystal, with +spur-like gables budding out all the way up its spire, as if they were +ready to flower into pinnacles, like such as have sprung up all over the +marble multiflora of Milan. + +[Footnote A: Miss Martineau, who went to his funeral, and may be +supposed to describe after a visit to the churchyard, gives the +inscription incorrectly. See Atlantic Monthly for May, 1861, p. 552. +Tourists cannot be trusted; stereographs can.] + +And as we have been looking at a steeple, let us flit away for a moment +and pay our reverence at the foot of the tallest spire in England,--that +of Salisbury Cathedral. Here we see it from below, looking up,--one of +the most striking pictures ever taken. Look well at it; Chichester has +just fallen, and this is a good deal like it,--some have thought raised +by the same builder. It has bent somewhat (as you may see in these other +views) from the perpendicular; and though it has been strengthened with +clamps and framework, it must crash some day or other, for there has +been a great giant tugging at it day and night for five hundred years, +and it will at last shut up into itself or topple over with a sound and +thrill that will make the dead knights and bishops shake on their stone +couches, and be remembered all their days by year-old children. This is +the first cathedral we ever saw, and none ever so impressed us since. +Vast, simple, awful in dimensions and height, just beginning to grow +tall at the point where our proudest steeples taper out, it fills the +whole soul, pervades the vast landscape over which it reigns, and, like +Niagara and the Alps, abolishes that five- or six-foot personality in +the beholder which is fostered by keeping company with the little life +of the day in its little dwellings. In the Alps your voice is as the +piping of a cricket. Under the sheet of Niagara the beating of your +heart seems to trivial a movement to take reckoning of. In the +buttressed hollow of one of these palaeozoic cathedrals you are ashamed +of your ribs, and blush for the exiguous pillars of bone on which your +breathing structure reposes. Before we leave Salisbury, let us look for +a moment into its cloisters. A green court-yard, with a covered gallery +on its level, opening upon it through a series of Gothic arches. You may +learn more, young American, of the difference between your civilization +and that of the Old World by one look at this than from an average +lyceum-lecture an hour long. Seventy years of life means a great deal to +you; how little, comparatively, to the dweller in these cloisters! You +will have seen a city grow up about you, perhaps; your whole world will +have been changed half a dozen times over. What change for him? The +cloisters are just as when he entered them,--just as they were a hundred +years ago,--just as they will be a hundred years hence. + +These old cathedrals are beyond all comparison what are best worth +seeing, of a man's handiwork, in Europe. How great the delight to be +able to bring them, bodily, as it were, to our own firesides! A hundred +thousand pilgrims a year used to visit Canterbury. Now Canterbury visits +us. See that small white mark on the pavement. That marks the place +where the slice of Thomas a Becket's skull fell when Reginald Fitz Urse +struck it off with a "Ha!" that seems to echo yet through the vaulted +arches. And see the broad stains, worn by the pilgrims' knees as they +climbed to the martyr's shrine. For four hundred years this stream of +worshippers was wearing itself into these stones. But there was the +place where they knelt before the altar called "Beckets's Crown." +No! the story that those deep hollows in the marble were made by the +pilgrims' knees is too much to believe,--but there are the hollows, and +that is the story. + +And now, if you would see a perfect gem of the art of photography, and +at the same time an unquestioned monument of antiquity which no person +can behold without interest, look upon this,--the monument of the Black +Prince. There is hardly a better piece of work to be found. His marble +effigy lies within a railing, with a sounding board. Above this, on a +beam stretched between two pillars, hang the arms he wore at the Battle +of Poitiers,--the tabard, the shield, the helmet, the gauntlets, and +the sheath that held his sword, which weapon it is said that Cromwell +carried off. The outside casing of the shield has broken away, as you +observe, but the lions or lizards, or whatever they were meant for, and +the flower-de-laces or plumes may still be seen. The metallic scales, if +such they were, have partially fallen from the tabard, or frock, and the +leather shows bare in parts of it. + +Here, hard by, is the sarcophagus of Henry IV. and his queen, also +inclosed with a railing like the other. It was opened about thirty years +ago, in presence of the dean of the cathedral. There was a doubt, so +it was said, as to the monarch's body having been really buried there. +Curiosity had nothing to do with it, it is to be presumed. Every +over-ground sarcophagus is opened sooner or later, as a matter of +course. It was hard work to get it open; it had to be sawed. They found +a quantity of hay,--fresh herbage, perhaps, when it was laid upon the +royal body four hundred years ago,--and a cross of twigs. A silken mask +was on the face. They raised it and saw his red beard, his features +well preserved, a gap in the front-teeth, which there was probably no +court-dentist to supply,--the same the citizens looked on four centuries +ago + + "In London streets that coronation-day, + When Bolingbroke rode on roan Barbary"; + +then they covered it up to take another nap of a few centuries, +until another dean has an historical doubt,--at last, perhaps, to be +transported by some future Australian Barnum to the Sidney Museum and +exhibited as the mummy of one of English Pharaohs. Look, too, at the +"Warriors' Chapel," in the same cathedral. It is a very beautiful +stereograph, and may be studied for a long time, for it is full of the +most curious monuments. + +Before leaving these English churches and monuments, let us enter, if +but for a moment, the famous Beauchamp Chapel at Warwick. The finest +of the views (323, 324) recalls that of the Black Prince's tomb, as a +triumph of photography. Thus, while the whole effect of the picture is +brilliant and harmonious, we shall find, on taking a lens, that we can +count every individual bead in the chaplet of the monk who is one of the +more conspicuous reliefs on the sarcophagus. The figure of this monk +itself is about half an inch in height, and its face may be completely +hidden by the head of a pin. The whole chapel is a marvel of workmanship +and beauty. The monument of Richard Beauchamp in the centre, with the +frame of brass over the recumbent figure, intended to support the +drapery thrown upon it to protect the statue,--with the mailed shape of +the warrior, his feet in long-pointed shoes resting against the muzzled +bear and the griffin, his hands raised, but not joined,--this monument, +with the tomb of Dudley, Earl of Leicester,--Elizabeth's Leicester, +--and that of the other Dudley, Earl of Warwick,--all enchased in these +sculptured walls and illuminated through that pictured window, where we +can dimly see the outlines of saints and holy maidens,--form a group of +monumental jewels such as only Henry VII.'s Chapel can equal. For these +two pictures (323 and 324) let the poor student pawn his outside-coat, +if he cannot have them otherwise. + +Of abbeys and castles there is no end, ago No. 4, Tintern Abbey, is the +finest, on the whole, we have ever seen. No. 2 is also very perfect and +interesting. In both, the masses of ivy that clothe the ruins are given +with wonderful truth and effect. Some of these views have the advantage +of being very well colored. Warwick Castle (81) is one of the best and +most the interesting of the series of castles; Caernarvon is another +still more striking. + +We may as well break off here as anywhere, so far as England is +concerned. England is one great burial-ground to an American. As islands +are built up out of the shields of insects, so her soil is made the land +of Burns, and see what one man can do to idealize and glorify the common +life about him! Here is a poor "ten-footer", as we should call it, the +cottage William "Burness" built with his own hands, where he carried his +young bride Agnes, and where the boy Robert, his first-born, was given +to the light and air which he made brighter and freer for mankind. Sit +still and do not speak,--but see that your eyes do not grow dim as these +pictures pass before them: The old hawthorn under which Burns sat with +Highland Mary,--a venerable duenna-like tree, with thin arms and sharp +elbows, and scanty _chevelure_ of leaves; the Auld Brig o' Doon (No. +4),--a daring arch that leaps the sweet stream at a bound, more than +half clad in a mantle of ivy, which has crept with its larva-like +feet beyond the key-stone; the Twa Brigs of Ayr, with the beautiful +reflections in the stream that shines under their eyebrow-arches; and +poor little Alloway Kirk, with its fallen roof and high gables. Lift +your hand to your eyes and draw a long breath,--for what words would +come so near to us as these pictured, nay, real, memories of the dead +poet who made a nation of a province, and the hearts of mankind its +tributaries? + +And so we pass to many-towered and turreted and pinnacled Abbotsford, +and to large-windowed Melrose, and to peaceful Dryburgh, where, under a +plain bevelled slab, lies the great Romancer whom Scotland holds only +second in her affections to her great poet. Here in the foreground of +the Melrose Abbey view (436) is a gravestone which looks as if it might +be deciphered with a lens. Let us draw out this inscription from the +black archives of oblivion. Here it is: + + In Memory of + Francis Cornel, late + Labourer in Greenwell, + Who died 11th July, 1827, + aged 89 years. Also + Margaret Betty, his + Spouse, who died 2'd Dec'r, + 1831, aged 89 years. + +This is one charm, as we have said over and over, of the truth-telling +photograph. We who write in great magazines of course float off from the +wreck of our century, on our life-preserving articles, to immortality. +What a delight it is to snatch at the unknown head that shows for an +instant through the wave, and drag it out to personal recognition and +a share in our own sempiternal buoyancy! Go and be photographed on the +edge of Niagara, O unknown aspirant for human remembrance! Do not throw +yourself, O traveller, into Etna, like Empedocles, but be taken by the +camera standing on the edge of the crater! Who is that lady in the +carriage at the door of Burns's cottage? Who is that gentleman in the +shiny hat on the sidewalk in front of the Shakspeare house? Who are +those two fair youths lying dead on a heap of dead at the trench's side +in the cemetery of Melegnano, in that ghastly glass stereograph in our +friend Dr. Bigelow's collection? Some Austrian mother has perhaps seen +her boy's features in one of those still faces. All these seemingly +accidental figures are not like the shapes put in by artists to fill the +blanks in their landscapes, but real breathing persons, or forms that +have but lately been breathing, not found there by chance, but brought +there with a purpose, fulfilling some real human errand, or at least, as +in the last-mentioned picture, waiting to be buried. + +Before quitting the British Islands, it would be pleasant to wander +through the beautiful Vale of Avoca in Ireland, and to look on those +many exquisite landscapes and old ruins and crosses which have been so +admirably rendered in the stereograph. There is the Giant's Causeway, +too,--not in our own collection, but which our friend Mr. Waterston +has transplanted with all its basaltic columns to his Museum of Art in +Chester Square. Those we cannot stop to look at now, nor these many +objects of historical or poetical interest which lie before us on our +own table. Such are the pictures of Croyland Abbey, where they kept that +jolly drinking-horn of "Witlaf, King of the Saxons", which Longfellow +has made famous; Bedd-Gelert, the grave of the faithful hound +immortalized by--nay, who has immortalized--William Spencer; the stone +that marks the spot where William Rufus fell by Tyrrel's shaft; the +Lion's Head in Dove Dale, fit to be compared with our own Old Man of the +Mountain; the "Bowder Stone," or the great boulder of Borrowdale; and +many others over which we love to dream at idle moments. + +When we began these notes of travel, we meant to take our +fellow-voyagers over the continent of Europe, and perhaps to all the +quarters of the globe. We should make a book, instead of an article, if +we attempted it. Let us, instead of this, devote the remaining space to +an enumeration of a few of the most interesting pictures we have met +with, many of which may be easily obtained by those who will take the +trouble we have taken to find them. + +Views of Paris are everywhere to be had, good and cheap. The finest +illuminated or transparent paper view we have ever seen is one of the +Imperial Throne. There is another illuminated view, the Palace of the +Senate, remarkable for the beauty with which it gives the frescoes on +the cupola. We have a most interesting stereograph of the Amphitheatre +of Nismes, with a _bull-fight_ going on in its arena at the time when +the picture was taken. The contrast of the vast Roman structure, with +its massive arched masonry, and the scattered assembly, which seems +almost lost in the spaces once filled by the crowd of spectators who +thronged to the gladiatorial shows, is one of the most striking we have +ever seen. At Quimperle is a house so like the curious old building +lately removed from Dock Square in Boston, that it is commonly taken for +it at the first view. The Roman tombs at Arles and the quaint streets at +Troyes are the only other French pictures we shall speak of, apart from +the cathedrals to be mentioned. + +Of the views in Switzerland, it may be said that the Glaciers are +perfect, in the glass pictures, at least. Waterfalls are commonly poor: +the water glares and looks like cotton-wool. Staubbach, with the Vale +of Lauterbrunnen, is an exquisite exception. Here are a few signal +specimens of Art. No. 4018, Seelisberg,--unsurpassed by any glass +stereograph we have ever seen, in all the qualities that make a +faultless picture. No. 4119, Mont Blanc from Sta. Rosa,--the finest +view of the mountain for general effect we have met with. No. 4100, +Suspension-Bridge of Fribourg,--very fine, but makes one giddy to look +at it. Three different views of Goldau, where the villages lie buried +under these vast masses of rock, recall the terrible catastrophe of +1806, as if it had happened but yesterday. + +Almost everything from Italy is interesting. The ruins of Rome, the +statues of the Vatican, the great churches, all pass before us but in +a flash, as we are expressed by them on our ideal locomotive. Observe: +next to snow and ice, stone is best rendered in the stereograph. Statues +are given absolutely well, except where there is much foreshortening to +be done, as in this of the Torso, where you see the thigh is unnaturally +lengthened. See the mark on the Dying Gladiator's nose. That is where +Michel Angelo mended it. There is Hawthorne's Marble Faun, (the one +called of Praxiteles,) the Laocooen, the Apollo Belvedere, the Young +Athlete with the Strigil, the Forum, the Cloaca Maxima, the Palace of +the Caesars, the bronze Marcus Aurelius,--those wonders all the world +flocks to see,--the God of Light has multiplied them all for you, and +you have only to give a paltry fee to his servant to own in fee-simple +the best sights that earth has to show. + +But look in at Pisa one moment, not for the Leaning Tower and the other +familiar objects, but for the interior of the Campo Santo, with its +holy earth, its innumerable monuments, and the fading frescoes on its +walls,--see! there are the Three Kings of Andrea Orgagna. And there hang +the broken chains that once, centuries ago, crossed the Arno,--standing +off from the wall, so that it seems as if they might clank, if you +jarred the stereoscope. Tread with us the streets of Pompeii for a +moment: there are the ruts made by the chariots of eighteen hundred +years ago,--it is the same thing as stooping down and looking at the +pavement itself. And here is the amphitheatre out of which the Pompeians +trooped when the ashes began to fall round them from Vesuvius. Behold +the famous gates of the Baptistery at Florence,--but do not overlook the +exquisite iron gates of the railing outside; think of them as you enter +our own Common in Boston from West Street, through those portals which +are fit for the gates of--not paradise. Look at this sugar-temple,--no, +it is of marble, and is the monument of one of the Scalas at Verona. +What a place for ghosts that vast _palazzo_ behind it! Shall we stand in +Venice on the Bridge of Sighs, and then take this stereoscopic gondola +and go through it from St. Mark's to the Arsenal? Not now. We will only +look at the Cathedral,--all the pictures under the arches show in our +glass stereograph,--at the Bronze Horses, the Campanile, the Rialto, +and that glorious old statue of Bartholomew Colleoni,--the very image of +what a partisan leader should be, the broad-shouldered, slender-waisted, +stern-featured old soldier who used to leap into his saddle in full +armor, and whose men would never follow another leader when he died. +Well, but there have been soldiers in Italy since his day. Here are +the encampments of Napoleon's army in the recent campaign. This is the +battle-field of Magenta with its trampled grass and splintered trees, +and the fragments of soldiers' accoutrements lying about. + +And here (leaving our own collection for our friend's before-mentioned) +here is the great trench in the cemetery of Melegnano, and the heap of +dead lying unburied at its edge. Look away, young maiden and tender +child, for this is what war leaves after it. Flung together, like sacks +of grain, some terribly mutilated, some without mark of injury, all +or almost all with a still, calm look on their faces. The two youths, +before referred to, lie in the foreground, so simple-looking, so like +boys who had been overworked and were lying down to sleep, that one can +hardly see the picture for the tears these two fair striplings bring +into the eyes. + +The Pope must bless us before we leave Italy. See, there he stands on +the balcony of St. Peter's, and a vast crowd before him with uncovered +heads as he stretches his arms and pronounces his benediction. + +Before entering Spain we must look at the Circus of Gavarni, a +natural amphitheatre in the Pyrenees. It is the most picturesque of +stereographs, and one of the best. As for the Alhambra, we can show that +in every aspect; and if you do not vote the lions in the court of the +same a set of mechanical h----gs and nursery bugaboos, we have no skill +in entomology. But the Giralda, at Seville, is really a grand tower, +worth looking at. The Seville Boston-folks consider it the linchpin, +at least, of this rolling universe. And what a fountain this is in the +Infanta's garden! what shameful beasts, swine and others, lying about on +their stomachs! the whole surmounted by an unclad gentleman squeezing +another into the convulsions of a galvanized frog! Queer tastes they +have in the Old World. At the Fountain of the Ogre in Berne, the giant, +or large-mouthed private person, upon the top of the column, is eating a +little infant as one eats a radish, and has plenty more,--a whole bunch +of such,--in his hand, or about him. + +A voyage down the Rhine shows us nothing better than St. Goar, (No. +2257,) every house on each bank clean and clear as a crystal. The +Heidelberg views are admirable;--you see a slight streak in the +background of this one: we remember seeing just such a streak from the +castle itself, and being told that it was the Rhine, just visible, afar +off. The man with the geese in the goose-market at Nuremberg gives +stone, iron, and bronze, each in perfection. + +So we come to quaint Holland, where we see windmills, _ponts-levis_, +canals, galiots, houses with gable-ends to the streets and little +mirrors outside the windows, slanted so as to show the frows inside what +is going on. + +We must give up the cathedrals, after all: Santa Maria del Fiore, with +Brunelleschi's dome, which Michel Angelo wouldn't copy and couldn't +beat; Milan, aflame with statues, like a thousand-tapered candelabrum; +Tours, with its embroidered portal, so like the lace of an archbishop's +robe; even Notre Dame of Paris, with its new spire; Rouen, Amiens, +Chartres,--we must give them all up. + +Here we are at Athens, looking at the buttressed Acropolis and the +ruined temples,--the Doric Parthenon, the Ionic Erechtheum, the +Corinthian temple of Jupiter, and the beautiful Caryatides. But see +those steps cut in the natural rock. Up those steps walked the Apostle +Paul, and from that summit, Mars Hill, the Areopagus, he began his noble +address, "Ye men of Athens!" + +The Great Pyramid and the Sphinx! Herodotus saw them a little fresher, +but of unknown antiquity,--far more unknown to him than to us. The +Colossi of the Plain! Mighty monuments of an ancient and proud +civilization standing alone in a desert now. + + My name is Osymandyas, King of Kings; + Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair! + +But nothing equals these vast serene faces of the Pharaohs on the +great rock-temple of Abou Simbel (Ipsambul) (No. 1, F. 307). It Is the +sublimest of stereographs, as the temple of Kardasay, this loveliest of +views on glass, is the most poetical. But here is the crocodile lying in +wait for us on the sandy bank of the Nile, and we must leave Egypt for +Syria. + +Damascus makes but a poor show, with its squalid houses, and glaring +clayed roofs. We always wanted to invest in real estate there in Abraham +Street or Noah Place, or some of its well-established thoroughfares, but +are discouraged since we have had these views of the old town. Baalbec +does better. See the great stones built into the wall there,--the +biggest 64 x 13 x 13! What do you think of that?--a single stone bigger +than both your parlors thrown into one, and this one of three almost +alike, built into a wall as if just because they happened to be lying +round, handy! So, then, we pass on to Bethlehem, looking like a fortress +more than a town, all stone and very little window,--to Nazareth, with +its brick oven-like houses, its tall minaret, its cypresses, and the +black-mouthed, open tombs, with masses of cactus growing at their +edge,--to Jerusalem,--to the Jordan, every drop of whose waters seems +to carry a baptismal blessing,--to the Dead Sea,--and to the Cedars of +Lebanon. Almost everything may have changed in these hallowed places, +except the face of the stream and the lake, and the outlines of hill and +valley. But as we look across the city to the Mount of Olives, we know +that these lines which run in graceful curves along the horizon are the +same that He looked upon as he turned his eyes sadly over Jerusalem. We +know that these long declivities, beyond Nazareth, were pictured in the +eyes of Mary's growing boy just as they are now in ours sitting here by +our own firesides. + +This is no _toy_, which thus carries us into the very presence of all +that is most inspiring to the soul in the scenes which the world's +heroes and martyrs, and more than heroes, more than martyrs, have +hallowed and solemnized by looking upon. It is no toy: it is a divine +gift, placed in our hands nominally by science, really by that +inspiration which is revealing the Almighty through the lips of the +humble students of Nature. Look through it once more before laying it +down, but not at any earthly sight. In these views, taken through the +telescopes of De la Rue of London and of Mr. Rutherford of New York, and +that of the Cambridge Observatory by Mr. Whipple of Boston, we see +the "spotty globe" of the moon with all its mountains and chasms, its +mysterious craters and groove-like valleys. This magnificent stereograph +by Mr. Whipple was taken, the first picture February 7th, the second +April 6th. In this way the change of position gives the solid effect of +the ordinary stereoscopic views, and the sphere rounds itself out so +perfectly to the eye that it seems as if we could grasp it like an +orange. + +If the reader is interested, or like to become interested, in the +subject of sun-sculpture and stereoscopes, he may like to know what the +last two years have taught us as to the particular instruments best +worth owning. We will give a few words to the subject. Of simple +instruments, for looking at one slide at a time, Smith and Beck's is the +most perfect we have seen, but the most expensive. For looking at paper +slides, which are light, an instrument which may be held in the hand +is very convenient. We have had one constructed which is better, as +we think, than any in the shops. Mr. Joseph L. Bates, 129, Washington +Street, has one of them, if any person is curious to see it. In buying +the instruments which hold many slides, we should prefer two that hold +fifty to one that holds a hundred. Becker's small instrument, containing +fifty paper slides, back to back, is the one we like best for these +slides, but the top should be arranged so as to come off,--the first +change we made in our own after procuring it. + +We are allowed to mention the remarkable instrument contrived by our +friend Dr. H.J. Bigelow, for holding fifty glass slides. The spectator +looks in: all is darkness. He turns a crank: the gray dawn of morning +steals over some beautiful scene or the _facade_ of a stately temple. +Still, as he turns, the morning brightens through various tints of rose +and purple, until it reaches the golden richness of high noon. Still +turning, all at once night shuts down upon the picture as at a tropical +sunset, suddenly, without blur or gradual dimness,--the sun of the +picture going down, + + "Not as in Northern climes obscurely bright, + But one unclouded blaze of living light." + +We have not thanked the many friendly dealers in these pictures, who +have sent us heaps and hundreds of stereographs to look over and select +from, only because they are too many to thank. Nor do we place any price +on this advertisement of their most interesting branch of business. But +there are a few stereographs we wish some of them would send us, +with the bill for the same: such as Antwerp and Strasbourg +Cathedrals,--Bologna, with its brick towers,--the Lions of Mycenae, if +they are to be had,--the Walls of Fiesole,--the Golden Candlestick in +the Arch of Titus,--and others which we can mention, if consulted; +some of which we have hunted for a long time in vain. But we write +principally to wake up an interest in a new and inexhaustible source of +pleasure, and only regret that the many pages we have filled can do no +more than hint the infinite resources which the new art has laid open to +us all. + + + + +THE LONDON WORKING-MEN'S COLLEGE. + + +In what is now as near the centre of the Map of London as any house +can properly be said to be is an old-fashioned dwelling-house on +Great-Ormond Street, which is occupied, and densely occupied, by +Frederic Denison Maurice's "Working-Men's College." The house looks, I +suppose, very much as it did in 1784, when Great-Ormond Street bordered +on the country,--when Lord Thurlow, the Chancellor of England, lived in +this house,--when some thieves jumped over his garden-wall, forced +two bars from the kitchen-window, entered a room adjoining the Lord +Chancellor's study, and stole the Great Seal of England, "inclosed in +two bags, one of leather and one of silk." London has grown so much +since, that anything that is stolen from the Working-Men's College +will not be stolen by thieves entering from the fields. I may say, in +passing, that this theft "threw London into consternation"; there being +an impression, that, for want of the Great Seal, all the functions of +the Executive Government must be suspended. The Privy-Council, however, +did not share this impression. They had a new seal made before night; +and though the Government of England has often moved very slowly since, +it has never confessedly stopped, as some Governments nearer home have +done, from that day to this day. + +In view of what is done in Lord Thurlow's old house now, it is worth +while to linger a moment on what it was then and what he was. He was the +Keeper of George III.'s conscience, until he caballed against Mr. Pitt, +and was unceremoniously turned out by him. As Lord High-Chancellor, he +was guardian-in-chief of all the wards in Chancery; and I suppose, for +instance, without looking up the quotation in Boswell, that he was the +particular Lord Chancellor to whom Dr. Johnson said he should like to +intrust the making of all the matches in England. Louis Napoleon has +just now undertaken to make all the friction-matches in France,--but Dr. +Johnson's proposal referred to the matrimonial matches, the _denouemens_ +of the comedies and tragedies of domestic life. To us Americans, Thurlow +is notable for the strong and uncompromising language which he used +against us all through our Revolution, which excessively delighted the +King. As to his faculty for keeping a conscience, it may be said, that, +though he never married, he resided in this Great-Ormond Street house +with his own mistress and his illegitimate children. Lord Campbell, who +mentions this fact, informs us, that, as early as his own youth, the +British Bench had reached such purity that judges were expected to marry +their mistresses when they were appointed to the Bench. He adds, that +it is long since any such condition as that was necessary. In Thurlow's +time this stage of decency had not been attained even by Lord +Chancellors. His humanity may be indicated by his stiff opposition to +every reform ever proposed in the English criminal law, or in the social +order of the time. He battled the bills for suppressing the slave-trade +with all his might. "I desire of you, my Lords, in your humane +frenzy, to show some humanity to the whites as well as to the +negroes",--illustrating this remark by a picture of the sufferings of an +English trader who had risked thirty thousand pounds on the slave-trade +that year. When an entering wedge was attempted for the improvement of +the bloody code of criminal law, Thurlow opposed it with passion. The +particular clause selected by the reformers was one which demanded that +women who had been connected with any treasonable movements should be +burnt alive. It was proposed to reduce their punishment to the same +scale as men's. Thurlow made it his duty to defend the ancient practice. +He was, in short, mixed up with every effort of his time, which we now +consider disgraceful, for arresting the gradual progress of reform. + +Now that Thurlow's wine-cellar is a college-chapel, that young men study +arithmetic in the room the Great Seal was stolen from, that Mr. Ruskin +teaches water-color drawing in Thurlow's bed-chamber, that Tom Brown, +_alias_ Mr. Hughes, presides over a weekly tea-party in the three-pair +back, and drills the awkward squad of the working-men's battalion in the +garden, it seems worth while to show that at least some places in the +world have improved in eighty years, whether the world itself is to +be given up as a mistake or not. We will let Lord Thurlow go, as Lord +Campbell does, with this charitable wish:--"I have not learned," he +says, "any particulars of his end, but I will hope that it was a +good one. I trust, that, conscious of the approaching change, having +sincerely repented of his violence of temper, of the errors into which +he had been led by worldly ambition, and of the irregularities of his +private life, he had seen the worthlessness of the objects by which he +had been allured; that, having gained the frame of mind which his awful +situation required, he received the consolations of religion; and that, +in charity with mankind, he tenderly bade a long and last adieu to the +relations and friends who surrounded him." There is not an atom of fact +known on which to found Lord Campbell's hope. But I, also, will leave +Lord Thurlow with this charitable wish, and I will now ask the readers +of the "Atlantic," who may be enough interested in social reform and a +mutual education, to see what has happened between his wine-cellar and +ridge-pole since the "London Working-Men's College" was established +there. + +The founder of the Working-Men's College, as I have intimated, is the +Rev. Frederic Denison Maurice, the eminent practical theologian. Its +age is now six years,--as it was founded in the autumn of 1854. He says +himself, in a striking speech he made at Manchester not long since, that +the plan originated in that "awful year 1848, which I shall always look +upon as one of the great epochs in history." He says that "a knot of +men, of different professions, lawyers, doctors, parsons, artists, +chemists, and such like," thought they saw, in the convulsions of 1848, +a handwriting on the wall, sent them by God himself, testifying, "that, +if either rank or wealth or knowledge is not held as a trust for men, if +any one of these things is regarded as a possession of our own, it must +perish." In a real desire, then, to "make their own little education of +use to such persons as had less," and, in so doing, to establish a +vital and effective relation between themselves and the men of the +working-classes below them, they looked round for opportunities to work +in the education of _men_. Anybody who remembers "Amyas Leigh" will +remember how earnestly Charles Kingsley there presses the theory that +most of what we learn as children should be left to be learned by men, +as it was in the days of Queen Bess. I suppose that Maurice's "knot of +parsons and such like" shared that view. At all events, they lectured to +Mechanics' Institutes, and did other such wish-wash work, which is not +good for much, except for the motive it shows; and having found that +out, they were all the more willing to join in arrangements more +definite and profitable. According to Mr. Maurice, the formation of the +People's College in Sheffield started them on the plan of a college, +and determined them, as far as they could, to give consistency to +their dreams by carrying out the plan of an English college in their +arrangements for working-men. + +At this point I must beg the accomplished company of readers to +recollect what an English college is. In its organization, and in much +of its consequent _esprit du corps_, it is as different from an American +college as an Odd-Fellows' lodge is from a country academy. The +difference is also of precisely the same sort. The man or the boy who +connects himself with an English college is, in theory, still the +student of a thousand years ago, who came on foot to Oxford or +Cambridge, because he had heard, in the wilds of Mercia or of Wessex, +that there were some books at those places,--and that some Alfred or +Ethelred or Eldred had given some privileges to students coming there. +When he has arrived, he joins one or other of the societies of students +whom he may find there, just as the Mercian Athelstan may have done. +From the moment that the established society has tested him,--and the +tests are very mild,--he is admitted as a member of a fraternity, +sharing the privileges of that fraternity, and, to a certain extent, its +duties. He is at first a junior member, it is true. Among his duties, +therefore, will be obedience to some of the senior members, and respect +to all. But none the less is he a neophyte member of a corporation which +extends back hundreds of years perhaps,--he is a co-proprietor of its +honors and privileges, is responsible for their preservation, and is, +from the first, inoculated with its _esprit du corps_. + +Now in an American college there is _esprit du corps_ enough, and sense +of college dignity enough. But the student's _esprit du corps_ is one +thing, and the government's is another. The Commons Hall, for instance, +has died out of most of our colleges. Why? Why, because it had ceased to +be a _Commons_ Hall. It was not the place where the junior and senior +members of a college, the pupils and all their instructors, met +together. It was the place where the undergraduates were fed,--and where +a few wretched tutors were fed at their sides. But every member of the +governing body who could possibly escape did so. At our Cambridge, +they even went so far as to set apart a Commons Hall for each class of +undergraduates at last,--for fear men should see each other eat; as at +"Separate Prisons" the idea of communion in worship is carried out by +introducing each prisoner into a state-pew or royal-box whose partitions +are so high that he cannot see his neighbors. This was before they gave +the _coup-de-grace_ to the whole thing, and scattered the members of +their college just as widely as they could at meal-times, as at all +other times. The recitation, again, probably the only occasion when an +American student meets his instructor, is conducted according to an +arrangement by which the instructor meets all of a large section or +class together, meeting them for recitation simply. In a word, the +American college differs from any other American school chiefly in +having larger endowments and older pupils. + +In the English college, on the other hand, before a freshman has +been there three months, he may have established his claim to some +"scholarship," which shall be his post and his "foundation" there +for years. From the very beginning, one or another honor or prize +is proposed to him,--which is the first stepping-stone on a line of +promotion of which the last may be his appointment to the highest +dignities in the University or in the Church. From the beginning, +therefore, he has his duties in the college assigned to him, if he have +earned any right to such honors. Thus, it may be his place to read the +Scripture Lesson at prayers, or to read the Latin grace at the end of +dinner,--the President and Vice-President of his college having done the +same at the beginning. + +These arrangements are not to be confounded with the services rendered +by charity students. We have imitated some of these, which are so sadly +described in "Tom Brown at Oxford." But we have no arrangements which +correspond at all to those of the system which in England brings +graduates and undergraduates to a certain extent into a common life, +mutually interested in the honor and popularity of "Our College." + +When Mr. Maurice and his friends spoke of "a college," they meant to +carry to the utmost these social and mutual views of college life. They +wanted to come into closer connection with the working-men of London, +and formed the Working-Men's College that they might do so. + +They had, therefore, something in mind very different from sitting for +an hour in presence of a dozen students, hearing them recite a lesson, +saying then, "_Ite, missa est_," and departing all, every man to his +own way. They foresaw their difficulties, undoubtedly, and they have +undoubtedly met some which they did not foresee. But they meant to +establish, on paper, if nowhere else, a mutual society,--a society, it +is true, in which those who knew the most should teach those who knew +the least, but still a society where the learners and the teachers met +as members of the same fraternity,--equals so far as the laws of that +society went,--and with certain common interests arising from their +connection with it. + +Not only does the necessity for such an undertaking appear in England +as it does not here, but the difficulty of it is, on a moderate +calculation, ten thousand times greater than it is here. Here, in the +first place, if the "working-man" as a boy has felt any particular fancy +for algebra or Greek or Latin, (and those fancies, in a fast country, +are apt to develop before the boy is eighteen,) he has e'en gone to a +high-school, and, if he wanted, to a "college," where, if he had not the +means himself, some State Scholarship or Education Society has floated +him through, and he has gained his fill of algebra, Latin, or Greek, or +is on the way to do so. Or, if he have not done this,--if the appetite +for these things, or for physical science, historical science, or +political science, has developed itself a little later in life, he has +hoarded up books for a few years, and has made himself meanwhile rather +more necessary to his master than he was before, so that, when he says, +some day, "I think we must arrange so that I can leave the shop earlier +in the afternoon," the master has bowed submiss, and the incipient +chemist, historian, or politician has worked his own sweet will. Or, +thirdly, if he wanted instruction from anybody in the category we first +named, who had tried the high-school and college plan, he had only to go +and ask for it. + +Very likely the man is his brother; at all events, he is somebody's +brother: and there is no difference in their social _status_ which makes +any practical difficulty in their meeting together, man-fashion, to +teach and to learn. But in saying all this, we speak of things which +London understands no more than it does the system of society of the +Chinese Empire. To begin: the thriving Oxford-Street retailer will tell +you very frankly, perhaps, that he had rather his son should not learn +to read, if he could only sign his name without learning. Reason: that +the father has observed that his older son read so much more of bad than +good, that he is left to doubt the benefits conferred by letters. I do +not mean, that, practically, the London tradesman's son does not learn +to read; but I do mean that that process meets this sort of prejudice. +Grant, however, that he does learn to read, and has appetite for more; +grant that he gets well through with A B C, and what follows; grant that +he can read well enough to read the translations from French filth which +his father is afraid of; but grant that his father and his mother, +working with the blessing of his God, have kept him pure enough to steer +clear of that temptation; grant that he becomes one-and-twenty, eager +for algebra, for chemistry, for Latin, or for Greek. What are you going +to do about it then? Then comes in the necessity which Mr. Maurice +wanted to meet,--and there comes in, by the same steps, the exceeding +difficulty of his experiment. + +It is the difficulty of caste. I do not know how many castes there are +in England; but I should think there were about thirty-seven. Any member +of either of these finds it as hard to associate with a member of any +other as a Sudra does to associate with a Brahmin, or a Brahmin with a +Sudra. It is not that people are unwilling to condescend to the castes +below them. At least, it is not that chiefly. It is, quite as much or +more, that, with a good, solid, English pride, they do not care to be +snobbish, and do not choose to put themselves upon people who are above +them. They "know their place," they say. And, for a race which has as +good reason as the English for pride in its ability to stand firm, +to "know one's place" is a great thing to boast of. People who have +travelled on the Continent have been amused to see how zealously Sir +John and Lady Jane and Miss Jeanette talked together at the _table +d'hote_ for a week, never by accident speaking to Mr. Williams, Mrs. +Williams, and Miss Williamina, who sat next them. This is not inability +to condescend, however. The Ws are as unwilling to speak to the Js. This +difficulty is the same difficulty which Mr. Litchfield describes in an +account of his "Five Years' Teaching at Working-Men's College." "When a +man first comes to our college," he says, "he is apt to walk into his +class-room in the solemn and discreet manner befitting an entry into a +public institution, and generally for a night or two will persist in +regarding his teacher as a severely official personage, whose dignity is +not to be lightly trifled with. Now nothing, I believe, can really be +done, till this notion is extinguished,--till teacher and students have +got to understand each other, and have agreed to banish the foolish +_mauvaise honte_ which makes every Englishman shy of talking to a +fellow-creature. The freer the colloquial intercourse between teacher +and students, the more is learned in the time. To establish this is not +easy; but harder still is the task of setting the students on a familiar +footing with each other. There seems to be _some impassable obstacle to +the fraternization of a dozen Londoners_, though sitting side by side, +week after week, doing the same work." The truth being, that the dozen +Londoners might belong to twelve different castes. And just as in "the +Rifle Movement" the clerks in the Queen's civil service could not serve +in the same battalion with architects' clerks on the one hand, or +students at law on the other,--you may have, in your algebra class, +a goldsmith who is afraid of being snobbish if he speaks to a +map-engraver, or a tailor who does not presume to address an opinion on +Archimedes' square to a piano-forte maker. + +But the Brahmin and the Sudra may both be converted to Christianity. In +that case, though it seems very odd to both, the distinction of caste +goes to the wall. And the "knot of parsons and such like," spoken of +above, having, very fortunately for the world, been born into the +Christian Church, made it, as we have seen, their business to face the +difficulty because of the necessity,--and the Working-Men's College is +the result of their endeavor. Mr. Maurice himself took the first step. +Before the College itself was opened, he undertook a Bible-class. He +invited whoever would to come. He read a portion of the Scriptures, +explained its meaning as he could,--and invited all possible +questioning. He testifies, in the most public way, that he got more good +than he gave in the intercourse which followed. "I have learned more +myself than I have imparted. Again and again the wish has come into my +mind, when I have left those classes, 'Would to God that anything I have +said to them has been as useful to them as what they have said to me has +been to me!'" + +If now the American reader will free his mind from any comparisons +with an American college, and take, instead, his notion of this +"Bible-class," we can give him some conception of what the Working-Men's +College is. For there is not a clergyman in America who has not +conducted such a class, for the benefit of any who would come. And +such classes are considered as mutual classes. Everybody may ask +questions,--everybody may bring in any contribution he can to the +conversation. Very clearly there is no reason why chemistry, algebra, +Latin, or Greek may not be taught from the same motive, in classes +gathered in much the same way, and with a like feeling of cooperation +among those concerned. This is what the Working-Men's College attempts. +The instructors volunteer their services. They go, for the love of +teaching, or to be of use, or to extend their acquaintance among their +fellow-men. The students go, in great measure, doubtless, to learn. But +they are encouraged to feel themselves members of a great cooeperation +society. So soon as possible, they are commissioned as teachers +themselves, and are put in a position to take preparatory classes in the +College. A majority of the finance-board consists of students. Let us +now see what is the programme which grows out of such a plan. I have not +at hand the schedule of exercises for the current year. I must therefore +give that which was in force in the autumn of 1859, when by paying +half-a-crown I became a member of the Working-Men's College. As I +make this boast, I must confess that I never took any certificate of +proficiency there, nor was I ever "sent up" for any, even the humblest, +degree. For the Working-Men's College may send up students to the +University of London for degrees. + +Remember, then, that to accommodate London working-hours, all the +classes begin as late as seven o'clock in the evening. There are some +Women's Classes in the afternoon, but they are under a wholly different +management. From seven to ten every evening, Lord Thurlow's house is, so +to speak, in full blast. Mr. Ruskin is the earliest professor. He comes +at seven on Thursday, to teach drawing in landscape from seven till +half-past ten. Work begins on other evenings and in other classes at +half-past seven. Four other teachers of drawing are at work with their +pupils on different evenings of the week. Monday and Thursday are the +Latin days, Monday and Wednesday the Greek,--all taught by graduates of +the Universities. The mathematics are Arithmetic, Algebra, Geometry in +two classes, and Trigonometry. There was a class in Geology the winter I +knew the College,--there had been classes in Botany and Chemistry. There +were also classes in French, in German, in English Grammar, in Logic, +in Political Economy, and in Vocal Music, a class on the Structure and +Functions of the Human Body, and some general lectures or studies in +History. There were also "practice classes," where the students worked +with others more advanced than themselves on the subjects of the several +exercises,--there were preparatory classes, and an adult school to teach +men to read. + +Now this is rather a rambling conspectus of a curriculum of study. But +it teaches, I suppose, first, what the right men would volunteer to +teach,--second, what the working-men wanted to learn. It is pretty +clear, that, if the plan succeeds, it will bring up a body of young men +who will know what is the advantage of a systematic line of study a good +deal better than any of them can be expected to know at the beginning. +Meanwhile here is certainly a very remarkable exhibition of instruction +to any man in London for a price merely nominal. After he has once paid +an entrance-fee,--half-a-crown, as I have said,--he may join any +class in the College whenever he wishes, on the payment of a very +insignificant additional fee. For the drawing-classes this fee is five +shillings. For the courses of one hour a week it is two shillings +sixpence, for those of two hours it is four shillings. The +drawing-classes are a trifle more costly, because the room for drawing +is kept open ready for practice-work every evening in the week. There +is also open for everybody every evening a Library, and the Principal's +Bible-class is open to all comers. + +So much for the instruction side. Now to describe the social side, I +had best perhaps give the detail of one or two of my own visits at the +College. Walk into the front room on the lower floor of any house in +Colonnade Row in Boston, where the entry is on the right of the house, +and you see such a room as the present "Library" was when Lord Thurlow +lived there. Here is the office of the College. Here I found Mr. +Shorter, the Secretary, in a corner, at a little desk piled with +catalogues, circulars, "Working-Men's College Magazines," etc. There +was a coal fire in a grate, [_Mem._ Hot-air furnaces hardly known in +England,] a plain suite of book-shelves on one or more sides of the +room, and a suite of narrow tables for readers running across. There +were, perhaps, a dozen young men sitting there to read. This is +virtually a club-room for the College, and serves just the same +purpose that the reading-room of the Christian Union or the Christian +Association does with us, but that they take no newspapers. [_Mem. 2d_. +If you are in England, you say, "They _take in_ none." In America, the +newspapers take in the subscribers.] + +I told Mr. Shorter that I wanted to learn about the practical working +of the College. He informed me very pleasantly of all that I inquired +about. It proved that they published a monthly magazine, "The +Working-Men's College Magazine," which was devoted to their interests. +The subscription is a trifle, and I took the volume for the year. It +proved, again, that I could become a member of the College by paying +half-a-crown; so I paid, was admitted to the privilege of the +reading-room, and sat down to read up, from the Magazine, as to the +working of the College. It appeared, that, after my initiation, I might +join any class, though it were not at the beginning of the term. So I +boldly proposed to Mr. Shorter that I would join Mr. Ruskin's class. +To tell the whole truth, I thought the experiment would be well worth +making, if I only gained by it a single personal interview with the +Oxford graduate, though I was doubtful about the quality of my impromptu +skies. + + "Says Paddy, 'There's few play + This music,--can you play?'-- + Says I, 'I don't know, for I never did try.'" + +I could at least have said this to the distinguished critic, if I found +that his class was more advanced than I. But it proved that their +session was within quarter of an hour of its end,--and with some +lingering remains of native modesty, I waited for another occasion,--a +morrow which never came,--before putting myself under Mr. Ruskin's +volunteer tuition. But I tell the story to illustrate what might have +been. Had I been legitimately a working-man in London, whatever the +character of my work, I had a right to that privilege. + +The Library proved to be one of those miscellaneous collections, such as +all new establishments have, so long as they rely on the books which +are given to them. I took down a volume of the "Reports of the Social +Association,"--an institution which they have in England now, for the +double purpose of giving an additional chance to philanthropists to +talk, and of saving the world from the Devil by drainage, statistics, +statutes, and machinery generally. But I looked over the edge of the +book a good deal to see who drifted in and out. As different classes +finished their work, one and another member came in,--and a few lingered +to read. The aspect of activity and resolute purpose was the striking +thing about the whole. The men were all young,--seemed at home, and +interested in what they were doing. Half-past nine, or thereabouts, +came, and a bell announced that all instruction was over, and that +evening prayers would close the work of the day. Down-stairs I went, +therefore, with those who stayed, into Lord Thurlow's wine-cellar, +which, as I said, is the chapel. + +The arrangements for this religious service, if I understood the matter +rightly, are in the hands of Mr. Hughes, the well-known biographer +of Tom Brown at Rugby and at Oxford. In an amusing speech about his +connection with the College, Mr. Hughes gives an account of the way his +services as a law professor were gradually dispensed with, and says, +"Being a loose hand, they cast round to see what should be done with +me." Then, he says, they gave him the charge of the common room of the +College,--and that he considers it his business to promote, in whatever +way he can, the "common life," or the communion, we may say, of the +members who belong to different classes. In this view, for instance, in +the tea-room, where there is always tea for any one who wants it, he +presides at a social party weekly;--he had charge, when I was there, of +the drill class, and, I think, at other seasons, conducted the cricket +club, the gymnastics, or had an eye to them. In such a relation as that, +such a man would think of the union in worship as an essential feature +in his plans. And here I am tempted to say, that in a thousand things +in England which seem a hopeful improvement on English lethargy, one +catches sight of Dr. Arnold as being, behind all, the power that is +moving. Hodson, in the East-Indian army, seems so different from anybody +else, that you wonder where he came from, till it proves he was one +of Arnold's boys. Price's Candle-Works, in London, and Spottiswoode's +Printing-House have been before us here, in all our studies for the +Christian oversight of great workshops,--and it turns out that it was +Arnold who started the men who set these successes in order. The Bishop +of London would not thank me for intimating that he gained something +from being Arnold's successor; but I am sure Mr. Hughes would be +pleased to think that Arnold's spirit still lives and works in his +cellar-chapel. + +The chapel is but one of the recitation-rooms,--and, like all the +others, is fitted with the plainest unpainted tables and benches. Two +gentlemen read the lessons and a short form of prayer, prepared, I +think, by Mr. Maurice himself,--and so adapted to the place and the +occasion. Thirty or more of the students were present. + +I dare not say that it was a piece of Working-Men's College +good-fellowship,--but, led either by that or by English hospitality, one +of the gentlemen who officiated, to whom I had introduced myself with +no privilege but that of a "fellow-commoner" at the College, not only +showed me every courtesy there, but afterwards offered me every service +which could facilitate my objects in London. This fact is worth +repeating, because it shows, at least, what is possible in such an +institution. + +After an introduction so cordial, it may well be supposed that I often +looked in on the College of an evening. If I were in that part of the +town when evening came on, I made the Library my club-room, to write a +note or to waste an hour. I am sure, that, had it been in my power, I +should have dropped in often,--so pleasant was it to watch the modest +work of the place, and the energy of the crowded rooms,--and so new +to me the aspects of English life it gave. I felt quite sure that the +College was gaining ground, on the whole. I can easily understand that +some classes drag,--perhaps some studies, which the managers would be +most glad to see successful. But, on the whole, there seems spirit and +energy,--and of course success. + +My travelling companion, Chiron, is fond of twitting me as to the +success of one of the "social meetings" to which I dragged him, +promising to show him something of working-men's life. We arrived too +early. But the Secretary told us that the garden was lighted up for +drill, and that the working-men's battalion was drilling there. It was +under the charge of Sergeant Reed, a medal soldier from the Crimea. At +that time England was in one of her periodical fits of expecting an +invasion. For some reason they will not call on every able-bodied man to +serve in a militia;--I thought because they were afraid to arm all their +people,--though no Englishman so explained it to me. They did, however, +call for volunteers from those classes of society which could afford +to buy uniforms and obtain "practice-grounds three hundred yards in +length." This included, I should say, about eleven of the thirty-seven +castes of English society. It intentionally left out those beneath,--as +it did all Ireland. Mr. Hughes, however, seized on it as an admirable +chance for his College,--its common feeling, its gymnastics,--and many +other "good things," looking down the future. In general, the drills +which were going on all over England were sad things to me. This idea +of staking guineas against _sous_, when the contest with Napoleon did +come,--staking an English judge, for instance, with his rifle, against +some wretched conscript whom Napoleon had been drilling thoroughly, with +his, seemed and seems to me wretched policy. But--if it were to be done +this way--of course the best thing possible was to work as widely as you +could in getting your recruits; and,--if England were too conservative +to say, "We are twenty-eight millions, one-fifth fighting men,"--too +conservative to put rifles or muskets into the hands of those five or +six million fighters,--the next best thing was to rank as many as you +could in your handful of upper-class riflemen. However, I offered my +advice liberally to all comers, and explained that at home I was a +soldier when the Government wanted me,--was registered somewhere,--and +could be marched to San Juan, about which General Harney was vaporing +just then, whenever the authorities chose. So it was that I and Chiron +stood superior to see Sergeant Reed drill thirty-nine working-men. Mr. +Hughes was on the terrace, teaching an awkward squad their facings. + +Sergeant Reed paraded his men,--and wanted one or two more. He came and +asked Mr. Hughes for them,--and he in turn told us very civilly, that, +if "we knew our facings," we might fall in. Alas for the theory of the +_Landsturm!_ Alas for the fame of the Massachusetts militia! Here are +two of the "one hundred and fifty-two thousand eight hundred and fifty +non-commissioned officers, musicians, artificers, and privates" whom +Massachusetts that year registered at Washington,--two soldiers for +whom somebody, somewhere, has two cartridge-boxes, two muskets, two +shoulder-straps, and the rest;--here is an opportunity for them to show +the gentlemen of a foreign service how much better we know our facings +than they theirs,--and, alas, the representative two do not know their +facings at all! We declined the invitation as courteously as it was +offered. Perhaps we thus escaped a prosecution under the Act of 1819, +when we came home,--for having entered the service of a foreign power. +Certainly we avoided the guilt of felony, in England; for it is felony +for an alien to take any station of trust or honor under the Queen,--and +when Mr. Bates and Louis Napoleon were sworn in as special constables on +the Chartists' day, they might both have been tried for felony on the +information of Fergus O'Connor, and sent to some Old Bailey or other. +None the less did we regret our ignorance of the facings, and, after a +few minutes, sadly leave the field of glory. + +My last visit to the Working-Men's College was to attend one of Mr. +Maurice's Sunday-evening classes, and this was the only occasion when I +ever appeared as a student. It was held at nine in the evening,--out of +the way, therefore, of any Church-service. There gathered nearly twenty +young men, who seemed in most instances to be personally strangers to +each other. Mr. Maurice is so far an historical person that I have a +right, I believe, to describe his appearance. He must be about fifty +years old now. He looks as if he had done more than fifty years' worth +of work,--and yet does not look older than that, on the whole. His hair +is growing white; his face shows traces of experience of more sorts +than one, but is very gentle and winning in its expression, both in his +welcome, and in the vivid conversation which is called his lecture. He +sat at a large table, and we gathered around it with our Testaments and +note-books. The subject was the fourth chapter of the Epistle to the +Hebrews,--the conversation turning mostly, of course, on the "rest" +which the people of God enter into. This is not the place for a +report of the exposition, at once completely devout and completely +transcendental, by which this distinguished theologian lighted up this +passage for that cluster of young men. But I may say something of the +manner of one so well known and so widely honored among a "present +posterity" in America, for his works. He read the chapter through,--with +a running commentary at first,--blocking out, as it were, his ground +notion of it. This was the first _ebauche_ of his criticism; but you +felt after its details without quite finding them. In a word, the +impression was precisely the uneasy impression you feel after the first +reading of one of his sermons or lectures,--that there is a very grand +general conception, but that you do not see how it is going to "fay in" +in its respective parts. One of the students intimated some such doubt +regarding some of the opening verses,--and there at once appeared enough +to show how frank was the relation, in that class at least, between the +teacher and the pupils. Then began the real work and the real joy of the +evening. Then on the background he had washed in before he began to put +in his middle-distance, and at last his foreground, and, last of all, +to light up the whole by a set of flashes, which he had reserved, +unconsciously, to the close. He dropped his forehead on his hand, worked +it nervously with his fingers, as if he were resolved that what was +within should serve him, went over the whole chapter in much more detail +a second time, held us all charged with his electricity, so that we +threw in this, that, or another question or difficulty,--till he fell +back yet a third time, and again went through it, weaving the whole +together, and making part illustrate part under the light of the comment +and illumination which it had received before,--and so, when we read +it with him for the fourth and last time, it was no longer a string +of beads,--a set of separate verses,--Jewish, antiquated, and +fragmentary,--but one vivid illustration of the "peace which passeth all +understanding" into which the Christian man may enter. + +With this fortunate illustration and exposition of the worth and work of +the Working-Men's College my connection with it closed. It seems to me a +beautiful monument of the love and energy of its founder. Perhaps we are +all best known through our friends, or, as the proverb says, "by the +company we keep." Let the reader know Mr. Maurice, then, by remembering +that he is the godfather of Tennyson's son,-- + + "Come, when no graver cares annoy, + Godfather, come and see your boy,"-- + +that Charles Kingsley has a Frederic Maurice among his children,--and +that Thomas Hughes has a Maurice also. The last was lost, untimely, from +this world, in bathing in the Thames. The magnetism of such a man has +united the group of workers who have formed the Working-Men's College. +We need not wonder that with such a spirit it succeeds. + + + + +EMANCIPATION IN RUSSIA. + + +Two great nations are peculiarly entitled to be considered modern +in their general character, though each is living under ancient +institutions. They are the _United States_ and _Russia_. Neither of +these nations is a century old, regarded as a power that largely affects +affairs by its action, and into the composition of each there enters a +great variety of elements. The United States may be said to date from +1761, just one hundred years ago, when the American debate began on the +question of granting Writs of Assistance to the revenue-officers of the +crown. The struggle between England and America was then commenced in +the chief court of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay, and the Declaration +of Independence was but the logical conclusion of the argument of James +Otis; but that conclusion would not have established anything, had it +not been confirmed by the inexorable logic of cannon. The last resort of +kings was then on the side of the people, and gave them the victory. +The fifteen years that passed between the time when James Otis spoke +in Boston and the time when John Adams spoke in Philadelphia belong +properly to our national history, and should be so regarded. The +grandson and biographer of John Adams says that Mr. Adams "was attending +the court as a member of the bar, and heard, with enthusiastic +admiration, the argument of Otis, the effect of which was to place him +at the head of that race of orators, statesmen, and patriots, by whose +exertions the Revolution of American Independence was achieved. This +cause was unquestionably the incipient struggle for that independence. +It was to Mr. Adams like the oath of Hamilcar administered to Hannibal. +It is doubtful whether Otis himself, or any person of his auditory, +perceived or imagined the consequences which were to flow from the +principles developed in that argument. For although, in substance, +it was nothing more than the question upon the legality of general +warrants,--a question by which, when afterward raised in England, in +Wilkes's case, Lord Camden himself was taken by surprise, and gave at +first an incorrect decision,--yet, in the hands of James Otis, this +question involved the whole system of the relations of authority and +subjection between the British government and their colonies in America. +It involved the principles of the British Constitution, and the whole +theory of the social compact and the natural rights of mankind." + +In the summer of 1762, about seventeen months after Otis had made his +argument, the existence of modern Russia began. Catharine II. then +commenced her wonderful reign, having dethroned and murdered her +husband, Peter III., the last of the sovereigns of Russia who could make +any pretensions to possession of the blood of the Romanoffs. A minor +German princess, who originally had no more prospect of becoming +Empress-Regnant of Russia than she had of becoming Queen-Regnant of +France, Sophia-Augusta of Anhalt-Zerbst was elevated to the throne of +the Czars on the 9th of July, 1762; and a week later her miserable +husband learned how true was the Italian dogma, that the distance +between the prisons of princes and their graves is but short. Catharine +II. founded a new dynasty in Russia, and gave to that country the +peculiar character which it has ever since borne, and which has enabled +it on more than one occasion to decide the fate of Europe, and therefore +of the world. Important as were the labors of Peter the Great, it does +not appear to admit of a doubt that their force was wellnigh spent when +Peter III. ascended the throne; and his conduct indicated the triumph of +the old Russian party and policy, as the necessary consequence of his +violent feeling in behalf of German influences, ideas, and practices. +The Czarina, like those Romans who became more German than the Germans +themselves, affected to be fanatically Russian in her sentiments and +purposes, and so acquired the power to Europeanize the policy of her +empire. She it was who definitely placed the face of Russia to the West, +and prepared the way for the entrance of Russian armies into Italy and +France, and for the partition of Poland, the ultimate effect of which +promises to be the reunion of that country under the sceptre of the +Czar. It was the seizure of so much of Poland by Russia that fixed the +latter's international character; and it was Catharine II. who destroyed +Poland, and added so much of its territory to the dominions of the +Czars. After the first partition had been effected, it was no longer +in Russia's power to refrain from taking a leading part in European +politics; and when her grandson, in 1814, was on the point of making +war on England, France, and Austria, rather than abandon the new Polish +spoil which he had torn from Napoleon I., he was but carrying out the +great policy of the Great Catharine. If we look into the political +literature of the last century, we shall find that Peter I.'s action +had very little effect in the way of increasing the influence of Russia +abroad. His eccentric conduct caused him to be looked upon as a sort of +royal wild man of the woods, rather than as a great reformer whose aim +it was to elevate his country to an equality with kingdoms that had +become old while Russia was ruled by barbarians of the remote East. He +was "a self-made man" on a throne, and displayed all the oddities and +want of breeding that usually mark the demeanor of persons whose youth +has not had the advantages that proceed from good examples and regular +instruction. Of the courtly graces, and of those accomplishments +which are most valued in courts, he had as many as belong to an +ill-conditioned baboon. A railway-car on a cattle-train does not require +more cleaning, at the end of a long journey, than did a room in a palace +after it had been occupied by Peter and his clever spouse. Some of his +best-authenticated acts could not be paralleled outside of a piggery. +The Prussian court, one hundred and sixty years since, was not a very +nice place, and its members were by no means remarkable for refinement; +but they were shocked by the proceedings of the Czar and the Czarina, +some of which greatly resembled those which are not uncommon in a very +wild "wilderness of monkeys." The last of Peter's descendants who +reigned _and ruled_ was his daughter Elizabeth, who died in 1761, and +who was a most admirable representative of her admirable parents. +Neither the manners nor the morals of the Russian court and the Russian +empire had improved during the twenty years that she governed; and as to +policy in government, she had none, and apparently she was incapable of +comprehending a political principle. Had her reign been followed by that +of some Russian prince of kindred character as well as of kindred blood, +and had that reign extended to twenty years' time, Russia would have +fallen back to the position she had held in 1680, and never could have +become a European power. Fortunately or unfortunately,--who shall as yet +undertake to decide which, considering as well European interests as +Russian interests?--the reign of Peter III. was too short to be worth +historical counting, and Elizabeth's real successor was a foreigner, +who not only was capable of comprehending Peter the Great's ideas and +purpose, but who had the advantage of understanding that world the +civilization and vices of which Peter had sought to engraft on the +Russian stock. The grand barbarian himself never could understand more +than one-half of the work to which he devoted his life, as there was +nothing in his nature to which Occidental thought could firmly fasten +itself. He knew little of that the effects of which he so much admired. +His mind was essentially Oriental in its cast, and the creation of his +Northern capital was a piece of work that might have been done by some +Eastern despot; and in the preceding century something like it had +been done by Shah Jehan, when he created the new city of Delhi. In no +European country could such an undertaking have been attempted. It +pleased Catharine II., in after-days, to say of Peter, that "he +introduced European manners and European costumes amongst a European +people"; but this was only a piece of flattery to her subjects, whom +she did so much to Europeanize by making them believe that they were of +Europe, and were destined to rule that continent. She it was who did +what Peter planned, and by making use of Russians as her agents. Her +statesmen, her generals, and her "favorites" were Russians; and it was +after her character and purposes became known that the rulers of Western +Europe were forced to the conclusion that a change of policy was +inevitable. But for the occurrence of the French Revolution, that +Anglo-French Alliance which has been regarded as one of the prodigies of +our prodigy-creating age would have been anticipated by more than sixty +years. By destroying Poland and humiliating Turkey, Catharine forever +settled the character of the Russian Empire; and her successors were +enabled to solidify her work in consequence of the course which events +took after the overthrow of the old French monarchy. Russian support +was highly bidden for by both those parties in Europe which were headed +respectively by France and by England; and it is difficult to decide +from which Russia most profited in those days, the friendship of England +or the enmity of France. One thing was sufficiently clear,--and that +was, that, when the war had been decided in favor of the reactionists, +Russia was the greatest power in the world. In the autumn of 1815, a +Russian army one hundred and sixty thousand strong was reviewed near +Paris, a spectacle that must have caused the sovereigns and statesmen of +the West to have some doubts as to the wisdom of their course in paying +so very high a price for the overthrow of Napoleon. It was certain that +the genie had broken from his confinement, and that, while he towered to +the skies, his shadow lay upon the world. The hegemony which Russia held +for almost forty years after that date justified the fears which then +were expressed by reflecting men. It only remained to be seen whether +the Russian sovereigns, proceeding in the spirit that had moved Peter +and Catharine, would take those measures by which alone a _Russian +People_ could be formed; and to that end, the abolition of serfdom was +absolutely necessary: the masses of their subjects, the very population +from which their victorious armies were conscribed, being in a certain +sense slaves, a state of things that had no parallel in the condition of +any European country.[A] + +[Footnote A: At what precise time Russia's policy began to influence +the action of the European powers it would not be easy to say. +Unquestionably, Peter I.'s conduct was not without its effect, and his +triumph over Charles XII. makes itself felt even to this day, and it +ever will be felt. "Pultowa's day" was one of the grand field-days of +history. Sweden had obtained a high place in Europe, in consequence of +the grand part she played in the Thirty Years' War, to which contest she +contributed the greatest generals, the ablest statesmen, and the best +soldiers; and the successes of Charles XII. in the first half of his +reign promised to increase the power of that country, which had become +great under the rule and direction of Gustavus Adolphus and Oxenstierna. +This fair promise was lost with the Battle of Pultowa; and a country +that might have successfully resisted Russia, and which, had its +greatness continued, could have protected Poland,--if, indeed, +Poland could have been threatened, had Russia been unsuccessful at +Pultowa,--was thrown into the list of third-rate nations. Poland was +virtually given up to Russia through the defeat of Charles XII., just +as, a century later, she failed of revival through the defeat of +Napoleon I. in his Russian expedition. But the effect of Sweden's defeat +was not fully seen until many years after its occurrence. Prussia became +alarmed at the progress of Russia at an early day. The War of the Polish +Succession was decided by Russian intervention, in 1733. In 1741 Maria +Theresa relied on Russia, and in 1746 Russia and the Empress of Germany +formed a defensive alliance. The _Cotillon_ Coalition of the Seven +Years' War, formed for the destruction of Frederic II., and the parties +to which were the Czarina Elizabeth, Maria Theresa, and Madame de +Pompadour,--a drunkard, a prude, and a harlot,--brought Russia famously +forward in Europe. In the Eighty-Seventh Letter of Goldsmith's _Citizen +of the World_, published a century ago, are some very just and +discriminating remarks on "the folly of the Western parts of Europe in +employing the Russians to fight their battles," which show that their +author was far in advance of his time, and that he foresaw the growth +of Russia in importance before she had seized upon Poland. In Catharine +II.'s time, the Russian Empire was the object of much adulation from +Western envoys, and the English sought to obtain the assistance of +the barbarians in the American War, but with not such success as they +desired, though they managed to keep our envoy from the court, and to +make Russia unfriendly to us. Our diplomatic relations with Russia did +not begin until a generation after the Declaration of Independence.] + +Thus the United States and Russia began their careers at the same time, +as nations destined to have influence in the ordering of Western life. +They were then, as they are now, very unlike to each other. In one +respect only was there any resemblance between them: In this country +there were some myriads of slaves, and in Russia there were many +millions of serfs. Now who, of all the sagacious, far-sighted men then +living, could have ventured to predict that at the end of one hundred +years the American nation that was so soon to be should be engaged in a +civil contest having for its object, on the part of those who began +it, the perpetuation and extension of slavery, while Russia should be +threatened with such a contest because her government, an autocracy, +had abolished serfdom? Many years earlier, Berkeley had predicted that +Time's last and noblest offspring would be the nation that was growing +up in North America; and when he died, in 1753, he would not have +admitted that slavery was an institution which his favorite land could +hug to its bosom, or that America would be less benevolent than that +semi-barbarous empire which was rising in the East,--an empire, to use +his own thought, which Europe was breeding in her decay. Franklin was +then at the height of his fame as a philosopher, and his merits as a +statesman were beginning to be acknowledged; but, wise as he was, he +would have smiled, had there been a prophet capable of telling him the +exact truth as to the future of America. Probably there was not a person +then on earth who could have supposed that that would be which was +written in the Book of Fate. That freedom should come to a people from +a despot's throne was almost as hard to understand as that the rankest +kind of despotism should rise up from among a people the most boastful +of their liberty that ever existed. There are, unhappily, but too many +instances of free nations that have behaved oppressively. The first +African slaves that were brought into the territory of the American +nation came under the flag of a people who had most heroically struggled +for their rights, and the recollection of whose efforts has been revived +by the brilliant labors of the most accomplished of living American +historians. The Greeks, who had so much to say about their own liberty, +believed that they had the right to enslave all other men; and the +Romans, who sometimes talked as if they had a Fourth of July of their +own, assumed that it was in the power of society to enslave any race +whose services its members required. The slaves of free peoples have +generally fared worse than the slaves of men themselves despotically +governed. Thus there is nothing so very strange in the conduct of those +Americans who, concerned for their "right" to trade in black humanity, +and to live on the sweat of black humanity's brows. That which is +strange in the condition of the world is the contrast which is furnished +to the action of our Southern population by the action of the rulers of +Russia. Since American democrats have endeavored to show that no such +contrast exists,--that between the enslavement of black men and the +granting of freedom to white men there is a close resemblance,--and that +the two proceedings are one in fact, how much soever they may differ in +name; that it is not because he is an enemy of slavery, as it is here +understood, that the Czar has become an emancipationist, but because he +is hostile to the slavery of white men,--that, were the Russian serfs as +dark as American slaves, his heart would have remained as hard toward +them as that of Pharaoh toward the Israelites when the plague-pressure +was temporarily removed from his people,--that he would as soon have +thought of washing the Ethiopian white with his own imperial hands as of +conferring freedom upon this race. Such is the theory of those of our +democrats who would still maintain their regard for the Czar and their +worship of Czarism. Alexander has not, they aver, been so bad as the +Abolitionists have drawn him. Like another illustrious personage, he +is not half so black as he is painted. Nay, he is not black at all. He +worships the white theory, and might run for the Montgomery Congress in +South Carolina without any danger of being numbered among the victims +of Lynch-law. Other democrats are not so well disposed toward the Czar, +their feelings respecting him having changed as completely as did those +of certain earlier democrats in regard to Mr. O'Connell, when the great +Irishman denounced slavery in America. It is a sore subject with our +pro-slavery people, this faithlessness of Russia to the cause of human +oppression. How they sympathized with her in the war with the Western +powers, and prophesied the defeat of the Allies in the Crimea, is well +remembered; but when the new Czar announced his purpose to abolish +serfdom, they, as Lord Castlereagh would have said, "turned their backs +upon themselves," and could see no good in the great Northern Empire. +Russia as the great revolution-queller, reading the Riot Act to the +liberals of Europe, and sending one hundred and fifty thousand men to +"crush out" the nationality of Hungary, and to revivify the power of +Austria, was to them an object of reverence; but Russia the liberator of +serfs, and the backer of France in the Italian War, became an object of +hate and fear. Nicholas might have patronized our Secessionists, for he +was partial to rebels who supported his opinions; but his son can +have no sympathy with men whose every act is a condemnation of those +principles which govern his conduct as a Russian ruler,--though in his +bearing toward Poland and others of the conquered portions of his empire +he may prove himself no more lenient than Mr. Jefferson Davis would +toward a Northern State that had declared itself independent of Southern +supremacy, could he "subdue" it. + +It would, however, be most unjust so to speak of Russian serfdom as to +convey the impression that it ever was quite so bad as American slavery +is. It is the peculiarity of American slavery, that it has no redeeming +features. Long before it had become so odious as we see it, and before +its existence was found incompatible with the peaceful prevalence of +a constitutional system of government, its character was emphatically +summed up in a few words by a great man, who called it "the sum of +all villanies." Time has not improved its character, but has made the +institution worse, by extending the effect of its operations. The +political character which American slavery has had ever since the +formation of the Constitution has not only stood in the way of every +emancipation project, but it has made slaveholders, and men who have +sought political preferment through working on the prejudices of +slaveholders, supporters of the institution on grounds that have had no +existence in other countries; and the contest in which this country is +now involved is the natural effect of the more rapid growth of the Free +States in everything that leads to political power in modern times. Had +the Slave States in 1860 been found relatively as strong as they were in +1840, the Secession movement could not have occurred; for most of the +men who lead in it would have preferred to rule the United States, and +would have cared little for the defeat of any political party, confident +as they would have been in their capacity to control all American +parties. As slavery is the foundation of political power in this +country, its friends cannot abandon their ideas without abdicating their +position. Hence the fierceness with which they have put forth, and +advocated with all their strength, opinions that never were held by any +other class of man-owners, and which would have been scouted in Barbary +even in those days when religious animosity added additional venom to +the feelings of the Mussulmans toward their Christian captives, and when +Spain and Italy were Africa's Africa. The slave population of the United +Slates are forbidden to hope. They form a doomed race, the physical +peculiarities of which are forever to keep them out of the list of +the elect. They are slaves, they and their ancestors always have been +slaves, and they and their descendants always must be slaves. Such is +the Southern theory, and the practice under it does that theory no +violence. In Russia the condition of the enslaved has never been so +bad as this, nor anything like it. Between the slave and the serf the +difference has been almost as great as that between the serf and the +free citizen. + +Nothing certain is known as to the origin of Russian serfage. Able men +have found the institution existing in very early times; and other men, +of not less ability, and well acquainted with Russian history, are +confident that it is a modern institution. Count Gurowski, whose +authority on such a point he ought to be a very bold man to question, +says,--"In Russia, slavery dates, with the utmost probability, since the +introduction of the Northmen, originating with prisoners of war, and +being established over conquered tribes of no Slavic descent. This was +done when Rurik and his successors descended the Dwina, the Dnieper, and +established there new dominions. In the course of time, the conquerors +cleared the forests, established villages and cities. As, in other +feudal countries, the tower, the _Schloss_, was outside of the village +or of the borough,--so was In Russia the _dwor_ or manor, where the +conqueror or master dwelt,--and from which was derived his name of +_dworianin_. That the genuine Russian of that time, whatever may have +been his social position, was free in his village, is beyond doubt,--as, +according to old records, the boroughs and villages, dependencies of the +manor, were settled principally with prisoners of war and the conquered +population. It was during the centuries of the Tartar dominion that the +people, the peasantry, became nailed to the soil, and deprived of +the right of freely changing their domicile. Then successively every +peasant, that is, every agriculturist tilling the soil with his own +hands, became enslaved. Only in estates owned by monasteries and +convents, which were very numerous and generally very rich, slavery +being judged to be opposed to Christian doctrine, it did not take +root at once. Generally, monks were reluctant to the utmost, and even +directly opposed to the sale of men in the markets, and the dependants +of a monastery were never sold in such a manner." The common view is, +that Borys Gudenoff, who reigned at the beginning of the seventeenth +century, established serfage age in Russia; but though the exact +character of his legislation is yet in dispute, it is obvious that no +Czar, and least of all one situated as was Borys, could have enslaved a +people. His legislation is involved in as much doubt as for a long time +were the Sempronian Laws of Rome. If we could believe that he instituted +the system of serfage, or seriously strengthened it, we should find that +Russian slavery came into existence but a few years before American +slavery; but such a "coincidence" cannot be rigidly insisted upon. It +would, however, we think, be difficult to show that the condition of +the Russian laboring classes was not made worse by the action of the +usurper. + +Peter the Great was so affected by the circumstance that men and women +and children could be sold like cattle, as American slaves now are, that +he sought to put a stop to the infamous traffic, but without success. +Catharine II. was a philosopher, and a patron of that eighteenth-century +philosophy which so largely favored human rights, and she regretted +the existence of serfage; but, in spite of this regret, and of some +sentimental efforts toward emancipation, she strengthened the system of +slavery under which so great a majority of her subjects lived. She gave +peasants to her "favorites," and to others whom she wished to reward +or to bribe. The brothers Orloff are said to have received forty-five +thousand peasants from her, being in part payment for what was done by +their family in setting up the new Russian dynasty founded by the German +princess. Potemkin received myriads of peasants. Some outrageous abuses +were practised by wealthy landholders, in consequence of the Czarina +having proclaimed that the laborers in Little Russia should belong to +the soil on which they were at that date employed. Thousands of persons +were entrapped into serfdom through a measure which the sovereign had +intended should lessen the evils of that institution. Catharine's +authority was never but once seriously disputed at home, and that was +by the rebellion of Pugatscheff, which is sometimes spoken of as an +outbreak against serfdom, which it was not in any proper sense, though +the abuses of the owners of serfs may have contributed to swell the +ranks of the pretender,--Pugatscheff calling himself Peter III. The Czar +Paul would not allow serfs to be sold apart from the soil to which they +belonged. It is a curious incident, that, when Paul restored Kosciusko +to liberty, he offered to give him a number of Russian peasants. The +Polish patriot had no hesitation in refusing to accept the Emperor's +offer, for which, in these times, there are Americans who think he was a +fool; but in 1797 certain lights had not been vouchsafed to the American +mind, that have since led some of our countrymen to become champions of +the cause of darkness. + +Alexander, whose reign began in 1801, was moved by a sincere desire to +get rid of serfdom. Schnitzler says that he "solemnly declared that he +would not endure the habit of making grants of peasants, a practice +hitherto common with the autocrats, and forbade the announcement in +public papers of the sales of human beings,"--and that "he permitted his +nobles to sell to their serfs, together with their personal liberty, +portions of land, which should thus become the _bona fide_ property of +the serf purchaser. This was a most important act; for Alexander thus +laid the basis of a class of free cultivators." A public man having +requested an estate with its serfs as hereditary possessions, the Czar +replied as follows:--"The peasants of Russia are for the most part +_slaves_. I need not expatiate upon the degradation or the misfortune +of such a condition. Accordingly, I have made a vow not to augment the +number; and to this end I have laid down the principle, that I will not +give away peasants as property." The Czar was determined to go farther +than this. Not only would he not increase the number of the serfs, but +he would lessen their number. The serfs of Esthonia were first favored, +their emancipation beginning in 1802, and being completed in 1816, the +year in which Alexander may be regarded as having been at the height of +his greatness, for he had completed the overthrow of Napoleon, and had +seen France saved from partition through his influence and exertions. +The Courland serfs were emancipated in 1817. Two years later, the nobles +of Livonia formed a plan of emancipation in their country, and when they +submitted it to the Czar, his answer was,--"I am delighted to see that +the nobility of Livonia have fulfilled my expectations. You have set an +example that ought to be imitated. You have acted in the spirit of our +age, and have felt that liberal principles alone can form the basis of +the people's happiness." So long as Alexander remained true to liberal +principles himself, there was some hope that he might abolish serfdom +throughout his dominions. He abhorred the "peculiar institution" of his +empire with all the force of a mind that certainly was generous, and +which had a strong bias in the direction of justice. Once he made a +solemn religious vow that he would abolish it. It is probable that +he would have made an attempt at complete emancipation, if the +circumstances of his time and his country had enabled him to concentrate +his thoughts and his labors upon domestic affairs. Unhappily for Russia, +and for the Czar's fame, he was soon drawn into the European vortex, and +became one of the principal actors in the grand drama of that age, so +that Russian interests were sacrificed to ambition, to the love of +military glory, and to the Czar's desire to become Don Quixote with an +imperial crown and sceptre. He wished to reconstruct the map of Europe, +which had been so terribly deranged by those terrible map-destroyers and +map-makers, the French republicans. Catharine II. had had the sense to +keep out of the war that had been waged against France, though no person +in Europe--not even George III. himself--hated the revolutionists more +intensely. She wished to see them subdued, but she preferred that the +work of subjugation should be done by others, so that she might be at +liberty to pursue her designs against Poland and Turkey and Persia. The +destruction of Poland she completed, but she was called away before she +could conquer the followers of Omar and of Ali. Paul was a party to the +second coalition against France, and his armies tore Italy from its +conquerors, and but for the stupidity of Austria there might have been +a Russian restoration of the Bourbons in 1709. Alexander resumed the +policy which his father had adopted only to discard, and though at one +period of his reign he appeared well inclined to Napoleon, there never +was any sincerity in the alliance between the two masters of so many +millions. The Czar was easily induced to favor the strange scheme of +an Italian adventurer for the rehabilitation of Europe, which had been +adopted by his friend and counsellor, the Prince Czartoryski, and +which ultimately furnished the basis, and many of the details, of that +pacification which was effected in 1815. We have seen the treaties of +that memorable year torn to tatters by Napoleon III., but the adoption +of Piatoli's project by Alexander affected the last generation as +intimately as the French Emperor's conduct has affected the men of +to-day. It led the Czar away from his original purpose, and converted +him, from a benevolent ruler, into a harsh, suspicious, unfeeling +despot. There could be nothing done for Russian serfs while their +sovereign was crusading it for the benefit of the Bourbons in particular +and of legitimacy in general. "God is in heaven, and the Czar is afar +off!" words once common with the suffering serfs, were of peculiar force +when the Czar, who believed himself to be the chosen instrument of +Heaven, was at Paris or Vienna, laboring for the settlement of Europe +according to ideas adopted in the early years of his reign. Napoleonism +and Liberalism were the same thing in the mind of Alexander, and he +finally came to regard serfdom itself as something that should not be +touched. It was a stone in that social edifice which he was determined +to maintain at all hazards. The plan of emancipation had worked well in +the outlying Baltic provinces, where there were few or no Russians, but +he discouraged its application to other portions of his dominions. +Some of his greatest nobles were anxious to take the lead as +emancipationists, but he would not allow them to proceed in the only way +that promised success, and so the bondage system was continued with the +approbation of the Czar. In his last years, Alexander, though still +quite a young man,--he was but forty-eight when he died,--was the most +determined enemy of liberty in Europe or Asia. + +The Emperor Nicholas began his remarkable reign with the desire strong +in his mind to emancipate the serfs,--or, if that be too sweeping +an expression, so to improve their condition as to render their +emancipation by his successors a comparatively easy proceeding. Much of +his legislation shows this, and that he was aware that the time must +come when the serfs could no longer be deprived of their freedom. Such +was the effect of his conduct, however, that all that he did in +behalf of the serfs was attributed to a desire on his part to create +ill-feeling between the nobility and the peasants. Then he was so +thoroughly arbitrary in his disposition, that he often neutralized the +good he did by his manner of doing it. But that which mainly prevented +him from doing much for his people was his determination to maintain the +position which Russia had acquired in Europe, and to maintain it, too, +in the interest of despotism, "pure and simple." A succession of events +caused the Czar's attention to be drawn to foreign affairs. The French +Revolution of 1830, the Polish Revolution of the same year, the troubles +in Germany, the Reform contest in England, the change in the order of +the Spanish succession, the outbreaks in Italy,--these things, and +others of a similar character, all of which were protests against +that European system which Russia had established and still favored, +compelled Nicholas to look abroad, and to neglect, measurably, domestic +government. At a later period, he was one of the parties to that +combination of great powers which threatened France with a renewal of +those invasions from which she had suffered so much in 1814 and 1815. +Turkey was the source of perpetual trouble to the Czar; and his eyes +were frequently drawn to India, where one of his envoys half threatened +an English minister that the troops of their two countries might meet, +and was curtly answered by the minister that he cared not how soon the +interview should begin. The extinction of Cracow served to show how +close was the watch which the Czar kept upon the West, and that he was +ready to crush even the smallest of those countries in which the spirit +of liberty should show itself. Had San Marino lain within his reach, he +would have been induced neither by its weakness nor its age to spare +it. The struggle with the Circassians was long, vexatious, and costly. +Finally, the Revolutions of 1848, leading, as they did, to the invasion +of Hungary, in the first place, and then to the war with the Western +Powers, operated to prejudice the Imperial mind against every form of +freedom, and to provide too much occupation for the Emperor and his +ministers to permit them to labor with care and effect in behalf of the +oppressed serfs at home. It would have been a strange spectacle, had +the man who was trampling down the Hungarians employed his leisure in +raising his own serfs from the dust. + +The Emperor Nicholas died in March, 1855, having lived long enough after +the beginning of that great war which he had so rashly provoked to see +his armies everywhere beaten and his fleets everywhere blockaded, while +the Russian leadership of Europe was struck down at a blow, never to be +resumed, unless there should be a radical change effected in Russian +institutions. Nearly thirty years of the most arrogant rule ever known +to the world came to an end in a moment, because the Emperor took "a +slight cold." A breath of the Northern winter served to stop the breath +of the Emperor of the North. He slept with his fathers, and his +son, Alexander II., reigned in his stead. The new Czar, who has the +reputation of being a much milder man than his father, and to bear +considerable resemblance to his uncle, as that uncle was in his best +days, was soon reported to be an emancipationist; but as the same +reports had prevailed respecting both Alexander I. and Nicholas, the +world gave little heed to what was said on the subject. It was not until +he had reigned for almost two years that something definite was done in +relation to it by the Czar; and then as many obstacles were thrown in +the way of the reform as would have served to disgust any man who had +not been in downright earnest. The Czar then took matters into his own +hands, so far as that was possible, and the work was pushed forward +with considerable speed. There was much discussion, and there were many +disappointments, in the course of the business; but through all the Czar +held to his determination, with a pertinacity that was not expected of +him, and which leaves the impression that his character has not been +properly understood. The history of the undertaking is yet to be +written, but, from what little is known of its details, we should say +that Alexander II. experienced more opposition, and that of an extremely +disagreeable character, from the nobility, than Alexander I. would +have encountered from the nobles of his time, had he resolved upon +emancipation in good faith, and adhered to his resolution, as his nephew +has done. Persons who suppose that a Russian Czar cannot be drowned, +because belonging to that select class who are born to be strangled, +would have it that the question would be settled by an application of +the bowstring, or the sash of some guardsman, to the Imperial throat; +and so a successful palace revolution lead to the postponement of the +plan of emancipation for another quarter of a century. But Russian +morality is of a much higher character than it was, and the members +of the reigning house are models of decorum, and know how to defer to +opinion. The nobles, too, are men of a very different stamp from their +predecessors of 1762 and 1801. The Russian polity is no longer a +despotism tempered by the cord. Fighting the good fight with something +of a Puritanical perseverance, the Czar was enabled to triumph over all +opposition to his preliminary project; and on the 3d of March, (N.S.,) +1861, the "Imperial Manifesto" emancipating the serfs was published. + +In the opening paragraph of this document, the Autocrat declares, that, +on ascending the throne, he took a vow in his innermost heart so to +respond to the mission which was intrusted to him as to surround with +his affection and his Imperial solicitude all his faithful subjects of +every rank and of every condition, from the warrior who nobly bears arms +for the defence of the country to the humble artisan devoted to the +works of industry,--from the official in the career of the high offices +of the State to the laborer whose plough furrows the soil; and then +proceeds to say,--"In considering the various classes and conditions +of which the State is composed, we came to the conviction that the +legislation of the empire, having wisely provided for the organization +of the upper and middle classes, and having defined with precision their +obligations, their rights, and their privileges, has not attained the +same degree of efficiency as regards the peasants attached to the soil, +thus designated because either from ancient laws or from custom they +have been hereditarily subjected to the authority of the proprietors, on +whom it was incumbent at the same time to provide for their welfare. +The rights of the proprietors have been hitherto very extended and very +imperfectly defined by the law, which has been supplied by tradition, +custom, and the good pleasure of the proprietors. In the most favorable +cases this state of things has established patriarchal relations founded +upon a solicitude sincerely equitable and benevolent on the part of +the proprietors, and on an affectionate submission on the part of the +peasants; but in proportion as the simplicity of morals diminished, +as the diversity of the mutual relations became complicated, as the +paternal character of the relations between the proprietors and the +peasants became weakened, and, moreover, as the seigneurial authority +fell sometimes into hands exclusively occupied with their personal +interests, those bonds of mutual good-will slackened, and a wide opening +was made for an arbitrary sway which weighed upon the peasants, was +unfavorable to their welfare, and made them indifferent to all progress +under the conditions of their existence. These facts had already +attracted the notice of our predecessors of glorious memory, and they +had taken measures for improving the condition of the peasants; but +among those measures some were not stringent enough, insomuch as they +remained subordinate to the spontaneous initiative of such proprietors +as showed themselves animated with liberal intentions; and others, +called forth by peculiar circumstances, have been restricted to certain +localities, or simply adopted as an experiment. It was thus that +Alexander I. published the regulation for the free cultivators, and that +the late Emperor Nicholas, our beloved father, promulgated that one +which concerns the peasants bound by contract. ... We thus came to the +conviction that the work of a serious improvement of the condition +of the peasants was a sacred inheritance bequeathed to us by our +ancestors,--a mission which, in the course of events, Divine Providence +called upon us to fulfil." + +It will be observed that the Czar goes no farther back than the +beginning of the reign of his uncle, sixty years since, in speaking of +the measures that have been taken for the improvement of the peasants' +condition; and he names only his father and his uncle as reforming +Emperors, though his language is such as to warrant the belief that +all his ancestors, who had reigned, had been friends of the serf, +and anxious to promote their welfare. But Alexander II. is too well +acquainted with the history of his family to venture to speak of the +actions of either the Great Peter or the Grand Catharine toward the +peasants. Gurowski tells us of the effect of one of Peter's acts in very +plain language. "In 1718," he says, "Peter the Great ordered a general +census to be taken all over the empire. The census officials, most +probably through thoughtlessness or caprice, divided the whole rural +population into two sections: First, the free peasants belonging to the +crown or its domains; and, secondly, all the rest of the peasantry, +the _krestianins_, or serfs living on private estates, were inscribed +_khrepostnoie kholopy_, that is, as chattels. The primitive Slavic +communal organization thus survived only on the royal domain, and there +it exists till the present day. The census of Peter having thus fairly +inaugurated chattelhood, it immediately began to develop itself in all +its turpitude. The masters grew more reckless and cruel; they sold +chattels separately from the lands; they brought them singly into +market, disregarding all family-ties and social bonds. Estates were no +more valued according to the area of land they contained, but according +to the number of their chattels, who were now called souls. In short, +all the worst features of chattelism, as it exists at the present day in +the American Slave States, immediately followed the publication of this +accursed census."[B] The same authority states that Nicholas in reality +was the first Emperor who granted estates excepting therefrom the +resident peasantry. + +[Footnote B: _Slavery in History_, pp. 245, 246.] + +Alexander II., in his Manifesto, expresses his confidence in the +nobility of Russia, which compliment is pronounced ironical, inasmuch as +they did not yield their consent to emancipation until they discovered +that the Czar and the serfs had united to extort it. "It is to the +nobles themselves," says the Czar, "conformably to their own wishes, +that we have reserved the task of drawing up the propositions for the +new organization of the peasants,--propositions which make it incumbent +upon them to limit their rights over the peasants, and to accept the +_onus_ of a reform which could not be accomplished without some material +losses. Our confidence has not been deceived. We have seen the nobles +assembled in committees in the districts, through the medium of their +confidential agents, making the voluntary sacrifice of their rights as +regards the personal servitude of the peasants. These committees, +after having collected the necessary _data_, have formulated their +propositions concerning the new organization of the peasants attached +to the soil in their relations with the proprietors. These propositions +having been found very diverse, as was to be expected from the nature +of the question, they have been compared, collated, and reduced to a +regular system, then rectified and completed in the superior committee +instituted for that purpose; and these new dispositions thus formulated +relative to the peasants and domestics of the proprietors have been +examined in the Council of the Empire." Invoking the Divine assistance, +the Czar says that he is resolved to carry this work into execution. In +virtue of the new dispositions, the peasants attached to the soil are to +be invested with all the rights of free cultivators. The proprietors are +to retain their rights of property in all the land belonging to them, +but they are to grant to the peasants for a fixed regulated rental the +full enjoyment of their _close_, or homestead; and, to assure their +livelihood, and to guaranty the fulfilment of their obligations toward +the Government, the quantity of arable land is fixed, as well as other +rural appurtenances. In return for the enjoyment of these territorial +allotments, the peasants are obligated to acquit the rentals fixed +to the profit of the proprietors; but in this state, which must be a +transitory one, the peasants shall be designated as "temporarily bound." +The peasants are granted the right of purchasing their homesteads, and, +with the consent of the proprietors, they may acquire in full property +the arable lands and other appurtenances which are allotted to them as a +permanent holding. By the acquisition in full property of the quantity +of land fixed the peasants will become free from their obligations +toward the proprietors for land thus purchased, and they will enter +definitively into the condition of free peasants, or landholders. A +transitory state is fixed for the domestics, adapted to their callings, +and to the exigencies of their position. At the close of two years, +they are to receive their full enfranchisement, and some temporary +immunities. "It is according to these fundamental principles," says the +Manifesto, "that the dispositions have been formulated which define +the future organization of the peasants and of the domestics, which +establish the order of the general administration of this class, and +specify in all their details the rights given to the peasants and to +the domestics, as well as the obligations imposed upon them toward the +Government and toward the proprietors. Although these dispositions, +general as well as local, and the special supplementary rules for some +particular localities, for the lands of small proprietors, and for +the peasants who work in the manufactories and establishments of the +proprietors, have been, as far as was possible, adapted to economical +necessities and local customs, nevertheless, to preserve the existing +state where it presents reciprocal advantages, we leave it to the +proprietors to come to amicable terms with the peasants, and to conclude +transactions relative to the extent of the territorial allotment, and to +the amount of rental to be fixed in consequence, observing at the +same time the established rules to guaranty the inviolability of such +agreements." The new organization, however, cannot be immediately put in +execution, in consequence of the inevitable complexity of the changes +which it necessitates. Not less than two years, or thereabout, will be +required to perfect the work; and to avoid all misunderstanding, and to +protect public and private interests during this interval, the existing +system will be maintained up to the moment when a new one shall have +been instituted by the completion of the required preparatory measures. +To this end, the Czar has deemed it advisable,-- + +"1. To establish in each district a special court for the question of +the peasants; it will have to investigate the affairs of the rural +communes established on the land of the lords of the soil. + +"2. To appoint in each district justices of the peace to investigate +on the spot all misunderstandings and disputes which may arise on the +occasion of the introduction of the new regulation, and to form district +assemblies with these justices of the peace. + +"3. To organize in the seigneurial properties communal administrations, +and to this end to leave the rural communes in their actual composition, +and to open in the large villages district administrations (provincial +boards) by uniting the small communes under one of these district +administrations. + +"4. To formulate, verify, and confirm in each rural district or estate +a charter of rules, in which shall be enumerated, on the basis of the +local statute, the amount of land reserved to the peasants in permanent +enjoyment, and the extent of the charges which may be exacted from them +for the benefit of the proprietor, as well for the land as for other +advantages granted by him. + +"5. To put these charters of rules into execution as they are gradually +confirmed in each estate, and to introduce their definitive execution +within the term of two years, dating from the day of publication of the +present manifesto. + +"6. Up to the expiration of this term the peasants and domestics are to +remain in the same obedience towards their proprietors, and to fulfil +their former obligations without scruple. + +"7. The proprietors will continue to watch over the maintenance of order +on their estates, with the right of jurisdiction and of police, until +the organization of the districts and of the district tribunals has been +effected." + +In the concluding portion of the Manifesto, the Czar expresses his +confidence in the nobility, and his belief that they will so labor as to +perfect the great work upon which all parties in Russia are engaged; but +there is something in the language he employs that sounds hollow, as +if he were not altogether so certain of support as he claims to be. He +speaks less like a man stating a fact than like one appealing to the +controllers of powerful interests. He also warns those persons who +have misunderstood the Imperial purpose, "individuals more intent upon +liberty than mindful of the duties which it imposes," and whose conduct +was not beyond reproach when the first news of the great reform became +diffused among the rural population. The serfs are called upon, with +much unction, to appreciate and recognize the considerable sacrifices +which the nobility have made on their behalf. They are expected to +understand that the blessings of an existence supported upon the +basis of guarantied property, as well as a greater liberty in the +administration of their goods, entail upon them, with new duties toward +society and themselves, the obligation of justifying the protecting +designs of the law by a loyal and judicious use of the rights which are +now accorded to them. "For," says the Autocrat, "if men do not labor +themselves to insure their own well-being under the shield of the laws, +the best of those laws cannot guaranty it to them." These are "noble +sentiments"; but the shrewder portion of the serfs will probably attach +more importance to the declaration, that, "to render the transactions +between the proprietors and the peasants more easy, in virtue of which +the latter may acquire in full property their homestead and the land +they occupy, the Government will advance assistance, according to +a special regulation, by means of loans, or a transfer of debts +encumbering an estate." + +Such are the principal details of this great measure, the most important +undertaking of modern days, whether we refer only to the measure itself, +or take its probable consequences into consideration. That forty-five +millions of human beings should be lifted out of the slough of slavery, +and placed in a condition to become _men_, would alone be a proceeding +that ought to take first rank among the illustrations of this age. But +we cannot consider it solely by itself. Every deed that is likely to +influence the life of a nation that is endowed with great vitality and +energy must be considered in connection with its probable consequences. +Russia stands in the fore-front rank of the leading nations of the +world. In the European Pentarchy, she is the superior of Austria, the +controller of Prussia, and the equal of France and England. The growth +of the United States in political power having received a check through +the occurrence of the Secession Rebellion, the relations of the great +empires, which our advance had threatened to disturb in an essential +manner, will probably remain unchanged; and so Russia, unless she should +become internally convulsed, will maintain her place. Assuming that the +work of emancipation is to be peacefully and successfully accomplished, +it would be fair to argue that the power of the Russian Empire will +be incalculably increased through the elevation of the masses of its +population. The Czar is doing for his dominions what Tiberius Gracchus +sought to do for the Roman Republic when he began that course of much +misunderstood agrarian legislation which led to his destruction, and to +the overthrow of the constitutional party in his country. As the Roman +Tribune sought to renew the Roman people, and to substitute a nation of +independent cultivators for those slaves who had already begun to eat +out the heart of the republic, so does the Russian Autocrat seek to +create a nation of freemen to take the place of a nation of serfs. If +the Roman had succeeded, the course of history must have been entirely +changed; and if the Russian shall succeed, we may feel assured that his +success will have prodigious results, though different from what are +expected, perhaps, by the Imperial reformer himself. His motives +of action are probably of that mixed character which governs the +proceedings of most men. Undoubtedly he wishes well to the millions for +whose freedom he has labored and is laboring; but then he would improve +their condition in order that he may become more powerful than ever +were his predecessors. He would rule over men rather than over slaves, +because men make better subjects and better soldiers than slaves ever +could be expected to make. The Russian serf has certainly proved himself +to be possessed of high military qualities in the past, but it admits +of a good deal of doubt whether he is equal to the present military +standard; and Russia cannot safely fall behind her neighbors and +contemporaries in the matter of soldiership. The events of all the wars +in which Russia has been engaged since 1815 prove that her armies +have not kept pace with those of most other countries. The first of +Nicholas's wars with Turkey would have ended in his total defeat, if the +Turks had been able to find a leader of ordinary capacity and average +integrity. The Persian War was successful because Persia is weak, and +she had not the means of making a powerful resistance to her old enemy. +The Poles, in 1831, held the Russians at bay for months, and would have +established their independence but for their own dissensions; and even +then Russia was much assisted by Prussia. The invasion of Hungary was a +military promenade, and the failure of the patriots was owing less to +the ability of Paskevitch than to the treason of Goergei. In the contest +between Russia and the Western powers, (1854-6,) the former was beaten +in every battle; and when she had only the Turks on her hands, in 1853, +her every purpose was foiled, and not one victory did her armies in +Europe win over that people. The world saw that a new breed of men had +taken the places of those soldiers who had been so prominent in the work +of overthrowing Napoleon; and even the heroes of 1812-15 were admitted +to be inferior to _their_ predecessors, the soldiers of Zuerich and +Trebbia and Novi. It is the fact, and one upon which military men can +ruminate at their leisure, that the Russian armies showed more real +power and "pluck" a century ago than they have exhibited in any of +the wars of the last sixty years. They fought better at Zorndorf and +Kunersdorf, against the great Frederic, than they did at Austerlitz +and Friedland, against the greater Napoleon, or than we have seen them +fight, at the Alma, and at Inkerman, and at Eupatoria, against Raglan, +and St. Arnaud, and Omar Pacha. There was no falling off in the soldiers +of Suvaroff; but personal character had much to do with his successes, +as he was a man of genius, and the only original soldier that Russia +has ever had; and the men whom he led to victory in Turkey, Poland, +and Italy were trained by officers who had learned their trade of the +warriors who had fought against Frederic. But in the nineteenth Century +the change in the Russian army was perceptible to all men, and in none +could that change have produced more serious feelings than in the +present Czar and his father. Nicholas is supposed to have died of +mortification because his army, the instrument of his power over Europe, +had been cut through by the swords of the West; and Alexander II. +succeeded to a disgraced throne because his troops had proved themselves +unworthy successors of the men of Kulm. Wishing to have better soldiers +than he found in his armies, or than had served his father, Alexander +II. hastened that scheme of emancipation which he had been thinking of, +we may presume, for years, and which, he asserts, is the hereditary +idea of his line. We do not suppose that he is less inclined to rule +despotically than was his father, or that he would be averse to the +recovery of the position which was held by his uncle and his father. We +find not the slightest evidence, in all the proceedings of the Russian +Government, that the _people_ whom the Czar means to create are to +be endowed with political freedom. A more vigorous race of Russians, +morally speaking, is needed, and, except in some parts of the United +States, there are no men to be found capable of arguing that any portion +of the human family is susceptible of improvement through servitude. The +serf is naturally clever, and can "turn his hand" to almost anything. +The inference that freedom would exalt his mind and improve his +condition is one that was logically drawn at St. Petersburg and Moscow, +though they reason differently at Richmond and Montgomery. An army +recruited from slaves could not, in these times, when even bayonets +think and cannon reason much more accurately than they did when Louis +XIV. was a pattern monarch, ever look in the face the intelligent +trained legions of France or England or Germany. A combination of +political circumstances, similar to those of 1840, might give victory to +a grand Russian army, like that laurelless triumph which was then won +in Hungary, when the victors were nothing but the bloodhounds and +gallows-feeders of the House of Austria; but of _military_ glory the +present Russians could hope to have no more. To regain the place they +had held, it was necessary that they should be made personally free. +That they might be the better prepared to enslave others, they were +themselves to be converted into men. The freedom of the individuals +might be the means of supplying soldiers who should equal the fanatics +who followed Suvaroff, or the patriots who followed Kutusoff, or the +avengers who followed the first Alexander to Paris. The experiment, at +all events, was worth trying; and the Czar is trying it on a scale that +most impressively affects both the mind and the imagination of mankind, +who may learn that his works are destined greatly to bear upon their +interests. + +In war, it is not only men that are wanted, and in large numbers, but +money, and in large sums. Always of importance to the military monarch, +money is now the first thing that he must think of and provide, or his +operations will be checked effectually. War is a luxury that no poor +nation or poor king can now long enjoy. It is reserved for wealthy +nations, and for sovereigns who may possess the riches of Solomon +without being endowed with his wisdom. Having impressed so many agents +into its service, and subdued science itself to the condition of a +bondman, war consumes gold almost as rapidly as the searches and labors +of millions can produce it. The only sure, enduring source of wealth +is industry,--industry as enlightened in its modes and processes as +imperfect man will allow to exist. Russia is an empire that abounds with +the means of wealth, rather than with wealth itself. It is a country, or +collection of countries, of which almost anything in the way of +riches may be predicated, should intelligent labor be directed to the +development of its immense and various resources. Russian sovereigns +have frequently sought to do something for the people; but Alexander +II., a wiser man than any of his predecessors, is willing that the +people should do something for themselves, because he knows that all +that they shall gain, each man for himself, will be so much added to the +common stock of the empire. The many must become wealthy, in order that +one, the head of all, may become strong. Time and again has Russia found +her armies paralyzed and her victories barren because she was moneyless; +and but for the gold of foreign nations she must have halted in her +course, and never have become a European power. With a nation of freemen +all this may be, and most probably it will be, changed,--though it is +not so certain that the change will be attended with exactly that +order of results which the Czar may have arranged in his own mind. The +mightiest of monarchs are not exempt from the rule, that, while man +proposes, it is God who disposes the things of this world. Not one of +those reforming kings who broke down the power of the great nobles of +Western Europe, and so created absolute monarchies, appears to have had +any just conception of the business in which he was engaged; but all +were instruments in the hands of that mighty Power which overrules the +ambition of individuals so that it shall promote the welfare of the +world. + +The two years that are set apart for the completion of the plan of +emancipation will be the trial time of Russia. They may expire, and +nothing have been done, and the condition of the peasants be no more +hopeful than it was in those years which followed the "good intentions" +of Alexander I. It is not difficult to see that there are numerous and +powerful disturbing causes to the success of the project. These causes +are of a twofold character. They are to be found in the internal state +of the empire, and in the relations which it holds to foreign +countries. There is still a powerful party in Russia who are opposed to +emancipation, and who, though repulsed for the time, are far from being +disheartened. One-half the nobility are supposed to be enemies of the +Imperial plan, and they will continue to throw every possible obstacle +in the way of its success. There is nothing so pertinacious, so +unrelenting, and so difficult to change, as an aristocratical body. The +best liberals the world has seen have been of aristocratical origin, +or democracy would have made but little advance; but what is true of +individuals is not true of the mass, which is obstinate and unyielding. +There is nothing that men so reluctantly abandon as direct power over +their fellows. The chief of egotists is the slaveholder, unless he +happen to be the wisest and best of men. Man loves his fellow-man--as +a piece of property, as a chattel, above all things. It is a striking +proof of superiority to be able to command men with the certainty of +being as blindly obeyed as was the Roman centurion. The sense of power +that is created by the possession of slaves is sure to render men +arbitrary of disposition and insolent in their conduct. The troubles of +our own country ought to be sufficient to convince every one that there +must be nobles in Russia who would prefer resistance to the Czar to the +elevation of millions whose depression is evidence of the power of the +privileged classes. But for the conviction that the United States could +no longer be ruled in the interest of the slaveholders, the Secession +movement would have been postponed for another generation, and certain +traitors would have gone to their graves with the reputation of having +been honest men. There are Secessionists in Russia, and for the next two +years they may be able to do much to prevent the completion of the work +so well begun by Alexander II. But he appears to be as resolute as they +can be, and even fanatically determined upon having his way. Supported +by one-half the nobles, and by all the serfs, and confident of the +army's loyalty, he ought to be able to triumph over all internal +opposition. What he has already effected has been extorted from a +powerful foe; and that costly step, the first step, having been taken, +the Russian reformers, headed by the Emperor, ought to prove victorious +in so vitally important a contest as that in which they have voluntarily +engaged. + +The greatest danger to the emancipation project proceeds from the side +of foreign countries. As we have seen, both Alexander I. and Nicholas +were led away from the pursuit of a policy that might long since have +converted the Russian serfs into a Russian people, through their desire +to interfere in the affairs of other nations. They could not reform +Russia and crush reformers elsewhere. That they might decide grand +contests in which Russia had no immediate interest, it was necessary +that Russians should remain enslaved. What was it to Russia whether +Bourbons or Bonapartes should reign over France? If she had an interest +in the question, it was rather favorable to the Bonapartes, whom she +overthrew, than to the Bourbons, whom she set up in order that the +French might again overthrow them. The old Bourbons were never friendly +to Russia, and would gladly have headed a coalition to drive her back to +her forests; and the first Bonaparte was very desirous of being on good +terms with the Northern Colossus, as if he were dimly forewarned of his +coming fate at its hands. Led away from the true path, Alexander I. +squandered on foreign affairs the time, the industry, and the money that +should have been devoted to the prosecution of those internal reforms +that were necessary to convert his subjects into men. Nicholas inherited +from his unwise brother that policy which he so vehemently supported, +and which caused him to waste on France and Austria the attention and +the energy which, as a conscientious sovereign, he was bound to bestow +upon Russia. The danger now is that Alexander II. will walk in the same +wrong path that was found to lead only to destruction by his uncle and +his father. The world was never so unsettled as it is now, and wars of +the most extensive character threaten every country that is competent to +put an army into the field. The Italian question is yet to be solved, +and its solution concerns Russia, which is strongly interested in +every movement that threatens to break up the Austrian Empire, or that +promises to create in the Kingdom of Italy a new Mediterranean nation. +The Schleswig-Holstein question is yet to be settled, and Russia has an +immediate interest in its settlement, as Denmark, she expects, will one +day be her own. The Eastern question is as unanswerable as ever it has +been, and it is but a few weeks since the belief was common that Russia +and France were to unite for the purpose of settling it, which could +have meant nothing less than the partition of the Turkish Empire,--the +union of one of the "sick man's" old protectors with his enemy, for the +perfect plundering of his possessions. This arrangement, had it been +completed, would have led to a war between France and Russia, on the one +side, and England and Austria on the other, while half a dozen lesser +nations would have been drawn into the conflict. But if an alliance for +any such purpose was ever thought of by the Autocrat and the Stratocrat, +it is supposed that it fell through in consequence of the occurrence of +troubles in Russian Poland,--the Polish question, after having been kept +entirely out of sight for years, having suddenly forced itself on the +attention of Europe's monarchs, to the no small increase of their +perplexities. Here are four great questions that are intimately +connected with Russia's interests, any one of which, if pressed by +circumstances to a decision, would probably plunge her into a long +and costly war, one of the effects of which would be to postpone the +emancipation of the serfs for many years. No empire could effect an +internal change like that which the Czar has begun, and at the same time +carry on a war that would require immense expenditures and the active +services of a million of men. The Czar is in constant danger of being +"coerced" into a foreign war; and the enemies of emancipation would +throw all their weight on the side of the war faction, even if they +should feel but little interest in the fortunes of either party to +a contest into which Russia might be plunged. Leaving aside all the +questions mentioned but that of Turkey, that alone is ever threatening +to bring Russia into conflict with some of her neighbors. Neither +England nor Austria could allow her to have her will of Turkey, no +matter how excellent an opportunity might be presented by the death of +the Sultan, or some similar event, to strike an effectual blow at that +tottering, doomed empire. So that war ever hangs over the Czar from that +side, unless he should, for the sake of the domestic reform he so much +desiderates, disregard the traditions and abandon the purpose of his +house. Were he to do so, it would be a splendid example of self-denial, +and such as few men who have reigned have ever been capable of affording +either to the admiration or the derision of the world. But could he +safely do it? Then it does not altogether depend either upon the Czar or +upon his subjects whether he or they shall preserve the peace of their +country. Suppose Poland to rise,--and she has been becoming very wakeful +of late,--then war would be forced upon Russia; and that war might be +extended over most of Continental Europe. A Polish war could hardly +fail to draw Prussia and Austria into it, they being almost as much +interested in the maintenance of the partition as Russia; and France +could scarcely be kept out of such a contest, she having been the patron +of Poland ever since the partition was effected. + +Considering the matter in its various bearings, and noting how +inflammable is the condition of the world, and observing that a Russian +war would be fatal to emancipation, we can but say, that the freedom of +the serfs is something that may be hoped for, but which we should not +speak of as assured. Alexander II. wishes to complete his work, but he +is only an instrument in the hands of Fate, and things may so fall +out as to cover the present fair prospect with those clouds and +that darkness in which have been forever enveloped some of the best +undertakings for the promotion of man's welfare. We may hope and pray +for a good ending to the reform that has been commenced, but it is not +without fear and trembling that we do so. + + * * * * * + + +THE HAUNTED SHANTY. + + +As the principal personage of this story is dead, and there is no +likelihood that any of the others will ever see the "Atlantic Monthly," +I feel free to tell it without reservation. + +The mercantile house of which I was until recently an active member +had many business connections throughout the Western States, and I was +therefore in the habit of making an annual journey through them, in the +interest of the firm. In fact, I was always glad to escape from the dirt +and hubbub of Cortland Street, and to exchange the smell of goods and +boxes, cellars and gutters, for that of prairie grass and even of +prairie mud. Although wearing the immaculate linen and golden studs of +the city Valentine, there still remained a good deal of the country +Orson in my blood, and I endured many hard, repulsive, yea, downright +vulgar experiences for the sake of a run at large, and the healthy +animal exaltation which accompanied it. + +Eight or nine years ago, (it is, perhaps, as well not to be very +precise, as yet, with regard to dates,) I found myself at Peoria, in +Illinois, rather late in the season. The business I had on hand was +mostly transacted; but it was still necessary that I should visit +Bloomington and Terre Haute before returning to the East. I had come +from Wisconsin and Northern Illinois, and, as the great railroad spider +of Chicago had then spun but a few threads of his present tremendous +mesh, I had made the greater part of my journey on horseback. By the +time I reached Peoria the month of November was well advanced, and the +weather had become very disagreeable. I was strongly tempted to sell my +horse and take the stage to Bloomington, but the roads were even worse +to a traveller on wheels than to one in the saddle, and the sunny day +which followed my arrival flattered me with the hope that others as fair +might succeed it. + +The distance to Bloomington was forty miles, and the road none of the +best; yet, as my horse "Peck" (an abbreviation of "Pecatonica") had had +two days' rest, I did not leave Peoria until after the usual dinner at +twelve o'clock, trusting that I should reach my destination by eight or +nine in the evening, at the latest. Broad bands of dull, gray, felt-like +clouds crossed the sky, and the wind had a rough edge to it which +predicted that there was rain within a day's march. + +The oaks along the rounded river-bluffs still held on to their leaves, +although the latter were entirely brown and dead, and rattled around me +with an ominous sound, as I climbed to the level of the prairie, leaving +the bed of the muddy Illinois below. Peck's hoofs sank deeply into the +unctuous black soil, which resembled a jetty tallow rather than earth, +and his progress was slow and toilsome. The sky became more and more +obscured: the sun faded to a ghastly moon, then to a white blotch in the +gray vault, and finally retired in disgust. Indeed, there was nothing in +the landscape worth his contemplation. Dead flats of black, bristling +with short corn-stalks, flats of brown grass, a brown belt of low woods +in the distance,--that was all the horizon inclosed: no embossed bowl, +with its rim of sculptured hills, its round of colored pictures, but a +flat earthen pie-dish, over which the sky fell like a pewter cover. + +After riding for an hour or two over the desolate level, I descended +through rattling oaks to the bed of a stream, and then ascended through +rattling oaks to the prairie beyond. Here, however, I took the wrong +road, and found myself, some three miles farther, at a farm-house, where +it terminated. "You kin go out over the perairah yander," said the +farmer, dropping his maul beside a rail he had just split off,--"there's +a plain trail from Sykes's that'll bring you onto the road not fur from +Sugar Crick." With which knowledge I plucked up heart and rode on. + +What with the windings and turnings of the various cart-tracks, the +family resemblance in the groves of oak and hickory, and the heavy, +uniform gray of the sky, I presently lost my compass-needle,--that +natural instinct of direction, on which I had learned to rely. East, +west, north, south,--all were alike, and the very doubt paralyzed the +faculty. The growing darkness of the sky, the _watery_ moaning of +the wind, betokened night and storm; but I pressed on, hap-hazard, +determined, at least, to reach one of the incipient villages on the +Bloomington road. + +After an hour more, I found myself on the brink of another winding +hollow, threaded by a broad, shallow stream. On the opposite side, a +quarter of a mile above, stood a rough shanty, at the foot of the rise +which led to the prairie. After fording the stream, however, I found +that the trail I had followed continued forward in the same direction, +leaving this rude settlement on the left. On the opposite side of the +hollow, the prairie again stretched before me, dark and flat, and +destitute of any sign of habitation. I could scarcely distinguish the +trail any longer; in half an hour, I knew, I should be swallowed up in a +gulf of impenetrable darkness; and there was evidently no choice left +me but to return to the lonely shanty, and there seek shelter for the +night. + +To be thwarted in one's plans, even by wind or weather, is always +vexatious; but in this case, the prospect of spending a night in such +a dismal corner of the world was especially disagreeable. I am--or at +least I consider myself--a thoroughly matter-of-fact man, and my first +thought, I am not ashamed to confess, was of oysters. Visions of a +favorite saloon, and many a pleasant supper with Dunham and Beeson, (my +partners,) all at once popped into my mind, as I turned back over the +brow of the hollow and urged Peck down its rough slope. "Well," thought +I, at last, "this will be one more story for our next meeting. Who knows +what originals I may not find, even in a solitary settler's shanty?" + +I could discover no trail, and the darkness thickened rapidly while I +picked my way across dry gullies, formed by the drainage of the prairie +above, rotten tree-trunks, stumps, and spots of thicket. As I approached +the shanty, a faint gleam through one of its two small windows showed +that it was inhabited. In the rear, a space of a quarter of an acre, +inclosed by a huge worm-fence, was evidently the vegetable patch, at one +corner of which a small stable, roofed and buttressed with corn-fodder, +leaned against the hill. I drew rein in front of the building, and was +about to hail its inmates, when I observed the figure of a man issue +from the stable. Even in the gloom, there was something forlorn and +dispiriting in his walk. He approached with a slow, dragging step, +apparently unaware of my presence. + +"Good evening, friend!" I said. + +He stopped, stood still for half a minute, and finally responded,-- + +"Who air you?" + +The tone of his voice, querulous and lamenting, rather implied, "Why +don't you let me alone?" + +"I am a traveller," I answered, "bound from Peoria to Bloomington, and +have lost my way. It is dark, as you know, and likely to rain, and I +don't see how I can get any farther to-night." + +Another pause. Then he said, slowly, as if speaking to himself,-- + +"There a'n't no other place nearer 'n four or five mile." + +"Then I hope you will let me stay here." + +The answer, to my surprise, was a deep sigh. + +"I am used to roughing it," I urged; "and besides, I will pay for any +trouble I may give you." + +"It a'n't _that_," said he; then added, hesitatingly,--"fact is, we're +lonesome people here,--don't often see strangers; yit I s'pose you can't +go no furder;--well, I'll talk to my wife." + +Therewith he entered the shanty, leaving me a little disconcerted with +so uncertain, not to say suspicious, a reception. I heard the sound of +voices--one of them unmistakable in its nasal shrillness--in what seemed +to be a harsh debate, and distinguished the words, "I didn't bring +it on," followed with, "Tell him, then, if you like, and let him +stay,"--which seemed to settle the matter. The door presently opened, +and the man said,-- + +"I guess we'll have t' accommodate you. Give me your things, an' then +I'll put your horse up." + +I unstrapped my valise, took off the saddle, and, having seen Peck to +his fodder-tent, where I left him with some ears of corn in an +old basket, returned to the shanty. It was a rude specimen of the +article,--a single room of some thirty by fifteen feet, with a large +fireplace of sticks and clay at one end, while a half-partition of +unplaned planks set on end formed a sort of recess for the bed at the +other. A good fire on the hearth, however, made it seem tolerably +cheerful, contrasted with the dismal gloom outside. The furniture +consisted of a table, two or three chairs, a broad bench, and a +kitchen-dresser of boards. Some golden ears of seed-corn, a few sides of +bacon, and ropes of onions hung from the rafters. + +A woman in a blue calico gown, with a tin coffee-pot in one hand and a +stick in the other, was raking out the red coals from under the burning +logs. At my salutation, she partly turned, looked hard at me, nodded, +and muttered some inaudible words. Then, having levelled the +coals properly, she put down the coffee-pot, and, facing about, +exclaimed,--"Jimmy, git off that cheer!" + +Though this phrase, short and snappish enough, was not worded as an +invitation for me to sit down, I accepted it as such, and took the chair +which a lean boy of some nine or ten years old had hurriedly vacated. +In such cases, I had learned by experience, it is not best to be too +forward: wait quietly, and allow the unwilling hosts time to get +accustomed to your presence. I inspected the family for a while, in +silence. The spare, bony form of the woman, her deep-set gray eyes, +and the long, thin nose, which seemed to be merely a scabbard for her +sharp-edged voice, gave me her character at the first glance. As for the +man, he was worn by some constant fret or worry, rather than naturally +spare. His complexion was sallow, his face honest, every line of it, +though the expression was dejected, and there was a helpless patience +in his voice and movements, which I have often seen in women, but never +before in a man. "Henpecked in the first degree," was the verdict I +gave, without leaving my seat. The silence, shyness, and puny appearance +of the boy might be accounted for by the loneliness of his life, and +the usual "shakes"; but there was a wild, frightened look in his eye, a +nervous restlessness about his limbs, which excited my curiosity. I +am no believer in those freaks of fancy called "presentiments," but I +certainly felt that there was something unpleasant, perhaps painful, in +the private relations of the family. + +Meanwhile, the supper gradually took shape. The coffee was boiled, (far +too much, for my taste,) bacon fried, potatoes roasted, and certain +lumps of dough transformed into farinaceous grape-shot, called +"biscuits." Dishes of blue queensware, knives and forks, cups and +saucers of various patterns, and a bowl of molasses were placed upon the +table; and finally the woman said, speaking to, though not looking at, +me,-- + +"I s'pose you ha'n't had your supper." + +I accepted the invitation with a simple "No," and ate enough of the rude +fare (for I was really hungry) to satisfy my hosts that I was not proud. +I attempted no conversation, knowing that such people never talk when +they eat, until the meal was over, and the man, who gladly took one of +my cigars, was seated comfortably before the fire. I then related my +story, told my name and business, and by degrees established a mild flow +of conversation. The woman, as she washed the dishes and cleared up +things for the night, listened to us, and now and then made a remark +to the coffee-pot or frying-pan, evidently intended for our ears. Some +things which she said must have had a meaning hidden from me, for I +could see that the man winced, and at last he ventured to say,-- + +"Mary Ann, what's the use in talkin' about it?" + +"Do as you like," she snapped back; "only I a'n't a-goin' to be blamed +for _your_ doin's. The stranger'll find out, soon enough." + +"You find this life rather lonely, I should think," I remarked, with a +view of giving the conversation a different turn. + +"Lonely!" she repeated, jerking out a fragment of malicious laughter. +"It's lonely enough in the daytime, Goodness knows; but you'll have your +fill o' company afore mornin'." + +With that, she threw a defiant glance at her husband. + +"Fact is," said he, shrinking from her eye, "we're sort o' troubled +with noises at night. P'raps you'll be skeered, but it's no more 'n +noise,--onpleasant, but never hurts nothin'." + +"You don't mean to say this shanty is haunted?" I asked. + +"Well,--yes: some folks 'd call it so. There _is_ noises an' things +goin' on, but you can't see nobody." + +"Oh, if that is all," said I, "you need not be concerned on my account. +Nothing is so strange, but the cause of it can be discovered." + +Again the man heaved a deep sigh. The woman said, in rather a milder +tone,-- + +"What's the good o' knowin' what makes it, when you can't stop it?" + +As I was neither sleepy nor fatigued, this information was rather +welcome than otherwise. I had full confidence in my own courage; and if +anything _should_ happen, it would make a capital story for my first +New-York supper. I saw there was but one bed, and a small straw mattress +on the floor beside it for the boy, and therefore declared that I should +sleep on the bench, wrapped in my cloak. Neither objected to this, and +they presently retired. I determined, however, to keep awake as long as +possible. I threw a fresh log on the fire, lit another cigar, made a few +entries in my note-book, and finally took the "Iron Mask" of Dumas from +my valise, and tried to read by the wavering flashes of the fire. + +In this manner another hour passed away. The deep breathing--not to say +snoring--from the recess indicated that my hosts were sound asleep, and +the monotonous whistle of the wind around the shanty began to exercise a +lulling influence on my own senses. Wrapping myself in my cloak, with my +valise for a pillow, I stretched myself out on the bench, and strove to +keep my mind occupied with conjectures concerning the sleeping family. +Furthermore, I recalled all the stories of ghosts and haunted houses +which I had ever heard, constructed explanations for such as were still +unsolved, and, so far from feeling any alarm, desired nothing so much as +that the supernatural performances might commence. + +My thoughts, however, became gradually less and less coherent, and I +was just sliding over the verge of slumber, when a faint sound in the +distance caught my ear. I listened intently: certainly there _was_ a +far-off, indistinct sound, different from the dull, continuous sweep +of the wind. I rose on the bench, fully awake, yet not excited, for my +first thought was that other travellers might be lost or belated. By +this time the sound was quite distinct, and, to my great surprise, +appeared to proceed from a drum, rapidly beaten. I looked at my watch: +it was half-past ten. Who could be out on the lonely prairie with +a drum, at that time of night? There must have been some military +festival, some political caucus, some celebration of the Sons of Malta, +or jubilation of the Society of the Thousand and One, and a few of the +scattered members were enlivening their dark ride homewards. While I was +busy with these conjectures, the sound advanced nearer and nearer,--and, +what was very singular, without the least pause or variation,--one +steady, regular roll, ringing deep and clear through the night. + +The shanty stood at a point where the stream, leaving its general +southwestern course, bent at a sharp angle to the southeast, and faced +very nearly in the latter direction. As the sound of the drum came from +the east, it seemed the more probable that it was caused by some person +on the road which crossed the creek a quarter of a mile below. Yet, on +approaching nearer, it made directly for the shanty, moving, evidently, +much more rapidly than a person could walk. It then flashed upon my mind +that _this_ was the noise I was to hear, _this_ the company I was to +expect! Louder and louder, deep, strong, and reverberating, rolling +as if for a battle-charge, it came on: it was now but a hundred +yards distant,--now but fifty,--ten,--just outside the rough +clapboard-wall,--but, while I had half risen to open the door, it passed +directly through the wall and sounded at my very ears, inside the +shanty! + +The logs burned brightly on the hearth: every object in the room could +be seen more or less distinctly: nothing was out of its place, nothing +disturbed, yet the rafters almost shook under the roll of an invisible +drum, beaten by invisible hands! The sleepers tossed restlessly, and a +deep groan, as if in semi-dream, came from the man. Utterly confounded +as I was, my sensations were not those of terror. Each moment I doubted +my senses, and each moment the terrific sound convinced me anew. I do +not know how long I sat thus in sheer, stupid amazement. It may have +been one minute, or fifteen, before the drum, passing over my head, +through the boards again, commenced a slow march around the shanty. When +it had finished the first, and was about commencing the second round, I +shook off my stupor, and determined to probe the mystery. Opening the +door, I advanced in an opposite direction to meet it. Again the sound +passed close beside my head, but I could see nothing, touch nothing. +Again it entered the shanty, and I followed. I stirred up the fire, +casting a strong illumination into the darkest corners; I thrust my hand +into the very heart of the sound, I struck through it in all directions +with a stick,--still I saw nothing, touched nothing. + +Of course, I do not expect to be believed by half my readers,--nor can +I blame them for their incredulity. So astounding is the circumstance, +even yet, to myself, that I should doubt its reality, were it not +therefore necessary, for the same reason, to doubt every event of my +life. + +At length the sound moved away in the direction whence it came, becoming +gradually fainter and fainter until it died in the distance. But +immediately afterwards, from the same quarter, came a thin, sharp blast +of wind,--or what seemed to be such. If one could imagine a swift, +intense stream of air, no thicker than a telegraph-wire, producing a +keen, whistling rush in its passage, he would understand the impression +made upon my mind. This wind, or sound, or whatever it was, seemed to +strike an invisible target in the centre of the room, and thereupon +ensued a new and worse confusion. Sounds as of huge planks lifted at +one end and then allowed to fall, slamming upon the floor, hard, wooden +claps, crashes, and noises of splitting and snapping, filled the shanty. +The rough boards of the floor jarred and trembled, and the table and +chairs were jolted off their feet. Instinctively, I jerked away my legs, +whenever the invisible planks fell too near them. + +It never came into my mind to charge the family with being the authors +of these phenomena: their care and distress were too evident. There was +certainly no other human being but myself in or near the shanty. +My senses of sight and touch availed me nothing, and I confined my +attention, at last, to simply noting the manifestations, without +attempting to explain them. I began to experience a feeling, not of +terror, but of disturbing uncertainty. The solid ground was taken from +beneath my feet. + +Still the man and his wife groaned and muttered, as if in a nightmare +sleep, and the boy tossed restlessly on his low bed. I would not disturb +them, since, by their own confession, they were accustomed to the +visitation. Besides, it would not assist me, and, so long as there was +no danger of personal injury, I preferred to watch alone. I recalled, +however, the woman's remarks, remembering the mysterious blame she had +thrown upon her husband, and felt certain that she had adopted some +explanation of the noises, at his expense. + +As the confusion continued, with more or less violence, sometimes +pausing for a few minutes, to begin again with renewed force, I felt an +increasing impression of somebody else being present. Outside the shanty +this feeling ceased, but every time I opened the door I fully expected +to see some one standing in the centre of the room. Yet, looking through +the little windows, when the noises were at their loudest, I could +discover nothing. Two hours had passed away since I first heard the +drum-beat, and I found myself at last completely wearied with my +fruitless exertions and the unusual excitement. By this time the +disturbances had become faint, with more frequent pauses. All at once, +I heard a long, weary sigh, so near me that it could not have proceeded +from the sleepers. A weak moan, expressive of utter wretchedness, +followed, and then came the words, in a woman's voice,--came I know not +whence, for they seemed to be uttered close beside me, and yet far, far +away,--"How great is my trouble! How long shall I suffer? I was married, +in the sight of God, to Eber Nicholson. Have mercy, O Lord, and give him +to me, or release me from him!" + +These were the words, not spoken, but rather moaned forth in a slow, +monotonous wail of utter helplessness and broken-heartedness. I have +heard human grief expressed in many forms, but I never heard or imagined +anything so desolate, so surcharged with the despair of an eternal woe. +It was, indeed, too hopeless for sympathy. It was the utterance of a +sorrow which removed its possessor into some dark, lonely world girdled +with iron walls, against which every throb of a helping or consoling +heart would beat in vain for admittance. So far from being moved or +softened, the words left upon me an impression of stolid apathy. When +they had ceased, I heard another sigh,--and some time afterwards, +far-off, retreating forlornly through the eastern darkness, the wailing +repetition,--"I was married, in the sight of God, to Eber Nicholson. +Have mercy, O Lord!" + +This was the last of those midnight marvels. Nothing further disturbed +the night except the steady sound of the wind. The more I thought of +what I had heard, the more I was convinced that the phenomena were +connected, in some way, with the history of my host. I had heard his +wife call him "Ebe," and did not doubt that he was the Eber Nicholson +who, for some mysterious crime, was haunted by the reproachful ghost. +Could murder, or worse than murder, lurk behind these visitations? It +was useless to conjecture; yet, before giving myself up to sleep, I +determined to know everything that could be known, before leaving the +shanty. + +My rest was disturbed: my hip-bones pressed unpleasantly on the hard +bench; and every now and then I awoke with a start, hearing the +same despairing voice in my dreams. The place was always quiet, +nevertheless,--the disturbances having ceased, as nearly as I could +judge, about one o'clock in the morning. Finally, from sheer weariness, +I fell into a deep slumber, which lasted until daylight. The sound of +pans and kettles aroused me. The woman, in her lank blue gown, was +bending over the fire; the man and boy had already gone out. As I rose, +rubbing my eyes and shaking myself, to find out exactly where and who +I was, the woman straightened herself and looked at me with a keen, +questioning gaze, but said nothing. + +"I must have been very sound asleep," said I. + +"There's no sound sleepin' here. Don't tell me that." + +"Well," I answered, "your shanty is rather noisy; but, as I'm neither +scared nor hurt, there's no harm done. But have you never found out what +occasions the noise?" + +Her reply was a toss of the head and a peculiar snorting interjection, +"Hngh!" (impossible to be represented by letters,) "it's all _her_ +doin'." + +"But who is _she_?" + +"You'd better ask _him_." + +Seeing there was nothing to be got out of her, I went down to the +stream, washed my face, dried it with my pocket-handkerchief, and then +looked after Peck. He gave a shrill whinny of recognition, and, I +thought, seemed to be a little restless. A fresh feed of corn was in the +old basket, and presently the man came into the stable with a bunch of +hay, and commenced rubbing off the marks of Peck's oozy couch which were +left on his flanks. As we went back to the shanty I noticed that he +eyed me furtively, without daring to look me full in the face. As I was +apparently none the worse for the night's experiences, he rallied at +last, and ventured to talk _at_, as well as to, me. + +By this time, breakfast, which was a repetition of supper, was ready, +and we sat down to the table. During the meal, it occurred to me to make +an experimental remark. Turning suddenly to the man, I asked,-- + +"Is your name Eber Nicholson?" + +"There!" exclaimed the woman, "I knowed he'd heerd it!" + +He, however, flushing a moment, and then becoming move sallow than ever, +nodded first, and then--as if that were not sufficient--added, "Yes, +that's my name." + +"Where did you move from?" I continued, falling back on the first plan I +had formed in my mind. + +"The Western Reserve, not fur from Hudson." + +I turned the conversation on the comparative advantages of Ohio and +Illinois, on farming, the price of land, etc., carefully avoiding the +dangerous subject, and by the time breakfast was over had arranged, +that, for a consideration, he should accompany me as far as the +Bloomington road, some five miles distant. + +While he went out to catch an old horse, ranging loose in the +creek-bottom, I saddled Peck, strapped on my valise, and made myself +ready for the journey. The feeling of two silver half-dollars in her +hard palm melted down the woman's aggressive mood, and she said, with a +voice the edge whereof was mightily blunted,-- + +"Thankee! it's too much fur sich as you had." + +"It's the best you can give," I replied. + +"That's so!" said she, jerking my hand up and down with a pumping +movement, as I took leave. + +I felt a sense of relief when we had climbed the rise and had the open +prairie again before us. The sky was overcast and the wind strong, +but some rain had fallen during the night, and the clouds had lifted +themselves again. The air was fresh and damp, but not chill. We rode +slowly, of necessity, for the mud was deeper than ever. + +I deliberated what course I should take, in order to draw from my guide +the explanation of the nightly noises. His evident shrinking, whenever +his wife referred to the subject, convinced me that a gradual approach +would render him shy and uneasy; and, on the whole, it seemed best to +surprise him by a sudden assault. Let me strike to the heart of the +secret, at once,--I thought,--and the details will come of themselves. + +While I was thus reflecting, he rode quietly by my side. Half turning +in the saddle, I looked steadily at his face, and said, in an earnest +voice,-- + +"Eber Nicholson, who was it to whom you were married in the sight of +God?" + +He started as if struck, looked at me imploringly, turned away his eyes, +then looked back, became very pale, and finally said, in a broken, +hesitating voice, as if the words were forced from him against his +will,-- + +"Her name is Rachel Emmons." + +"Why did you murder her?" I asked, in a still sterner tone. + +In an instant his face burned scarlet. He reined up his horse with a +violent pull, straightened his shoulders so that he appeared six inches +taller, looked steadily at me with a strange, mixed expression of anger +and astonishment, and cried out,-- + +"Murder her? _Why, she's livin' now!_" + +My surprise at the answer was scarcely less great than his at the +question. + +"You don't mean to say she's not dead?" I asked. + +"Why, no!" said he, recovering from his sudden excitement, "she's not +dead, or she wouldn't keep on troublin' me. She's been livin' in Toledo, +these ten year." + +"I beg your pardon, my friend," said I; "but I don't know what to think +of what I heard last night, and I suppose I have the old notion in my +head that all ghosts are of persons who have been murdered." + +"Oh, if I had killed her," he groaned, "I'd 'a' been hung long ago, an' +there 'd 'a' been an end of it." + +"Tell me the whole story," said I. "It's hardly likely that I can help +you, but I can understand how you must be troubled, and I'm sure I pity +you from my heart." + +I think he felt relieved at my proposal,--glad, perhaps, after long +silence, to confide to another man the secret of his lonely, wretched +life. + +"After what you've heerd," said he, "there's nothin' that I don't care +to tell. I've been sinful, no doubt,--but, God knows, there never was a +man worse punished. + +"I told you," he continued, after a pause, "that I come from the Western +Reserve. My father was a middlin' well-to-do farmer,--not rich, nor yit +exactly poor. He's dead now. He was always a savin' man,--looked after +money a _leetle_ too sharp, I've often thought sence: howsever, 't isn't +my place to judge him. Well, I was brought up on the farm, to hard work, +like the other boys. Rachel Emmons,--she's the same woman that haunts +me, you understand,--she was the girl o' one of our neighbors, an' poor +enough _he_ was. His wife was always sickly-like,--an' you know it +takes a woman as well as a man to git rich farmin'. So they were always +scrimped, but that didn't hinder Rachel from bein' one o' the likeliest +gals round. We went to the same school in the winter, he an' me, ('t +isn't much schoolin' I ever got, though,) an' I had a sort o' nateral +hankerin' after her, as fur back as I can remember. She was different +lookin' then from, what she is now,--an' me, too, for that matter. + +"Well, you know how boys an' gals somehow git to likin' each other afore +they know it. Me an' Rachel was more an' more together, the more we +growed up, only more secret-like; so by the time I was twenty an' she +was nineteen, we was promised to one another as true as could be. I +didn't keep company with her, though,--leastways, not reg'lar: I was +afeard my father 'd find it out, an' I knowed what _he_ 'd say to it. He +kep' givin' me hints about Mary Ann Jones,--that was my wife's maiden +name. Her father had two hundred acres an' money out at interest, an' +only three children. He'd had ten, but seven of 'em died. I had nothin' +agin Mary Ann, but I never thought of her that way, like I did towards +Rachel. + +"Well, things kep' runnin' on; I was a good deal worried about it, but +a young feller, you know, don't look fur ahead, an' so I got along. One +night, howsever,--'t was jist about as dark as last night was,--I'd been +to the store at the Corners, for a jug o' molasses. Rachel was +there, gittin' a quarter of a pound o' tea, I think it was, an' some +sewin'-thread. I went out a little while after her, an' follered as fast +as I could, for we had the same road nigh to home. + +"It weren't long afore I overtook her. 'T was mighty dark, as I was +sayin', an' so I hooked her arm into mine, an' we went on comfortable +together, talkin' about how we jist suited each other, like we was cut +out o' purpose, an' how long we'd have to wait, an' what folks 'd say. +O Lord! don't I remember every word o' _that_ night? Well, we got quite +tender-like when we come t' Old Emmons's gate, an' I up an' giv' her a +hug and a lot o' kisses, to make up for lost time. Then she went into +the house, an' I turned for home; but I hadn't gone ten steps afore I +come agin somebody stan'in' in the middle o' the road. 'Hullo!' says +I. The next thing he had a holt o' my coat-collar an' shuck me like a +tarrier-dog shakes a rat. I knowed who it was afore he spoke; an' I +couldn't 'a' been more skeered, if the life had all gone out o' me. He'd +been down to the tavern to see a drover, an' comin' home he'd follered +behind us all the way, hearin' every word we said. + +"I don't like to think o' the words he used that night. He was a +professin' member, an' yit he swore the awfullest I ever heerd."--Here +the man involuntarily raised his hands to his ears, as if to stop them +against even the memory of his father's curses.--"I expected every +minute he'd 'a' struck me down. I've wished, sence, he _had_: I don't +think I could 'a' stood _that_. Howsever, he dragged me home, never +lettin' go my collar, till we got into the room where mother was settin' +up for us. Then he told _her_, only makin' it ten times harder 'n it +really was. Mother always kind o' liked Rachel, 'cause she was mighty +handy at sewin' an' quiltin', but she'd no more dared stan' up agin +father than a sheep agin a bull-dog. She looked at me pityin'-like, I +must say, an' jist begun to cry,--an' I couldn't help cryin' nuther, +when I saw how it hurt her. + +"Well, after that, 't wa'n't no use thinkin' o' Rachel any more. I _had_ +to go t' Old Jones's, whether I wanted to or no. I felt mighty mean when +I thought o' Rachel, an' was afeard no good 'd come of it; but father +jist managed things _his_ way, an' I couldn't help myself. Old Jones had +nothin' agin me, for I was a stiddy, hard-workin' feller as there was +round,--an' Mary Ann was always as pleasant as could be, _then_;--well, +I oughtn't to say nothin' agin her now; she's had a hard life of it, +'longside o' me. Afore long we were bespoke, an' the day set. Father +hurried things, when it got that fur. I don't think Rachel knowed +anything about it till the day afore the weddin', or mebby the very day. +Old Mr. Larrabee was the minister, an' there was only the two families +at the house, an' Miss Plankerton,--her that sewed for Mary Ann. I never +felt so oneasy in my life, though I tried hard not to show it. + +"Well, 't was all jist over, an' the kissin' about to begin, when I +heerd the house-door bu'st open, suddent. I felt my heart give one jump +right up to the root o' my tongue, an' then fall back ag'in, sick an' +dead-like. + +"The parlor-door flew open right away, an' in come Rachel without a +bunnet, an' her hair all frowzed by the wind. She was as white as a +sheet, an' her eyes like two burnin' coals. She walked straight through +'em all an' stood right afore me. They was all so taken aback that they +never thought o' stoppin' her. Then she kind o' screeched out,--'Eber +Nicholson, what are you doin'?' Her voice was strange an' +onnatural-like, an' I'd never 'a' knowed it to be hern, if I hadn't 'a' +seen her. I couldn't take my eyes off of her, an' I couldn't speak: I +jist stood there. Then she said ag'in,--'Eber Nicholson, what are you +doin'? You are married to me, in the sight of God. You belong to me an' +I to you, forever an' forever!' Then they begun cryin' out,--'Go 'way!' +'Take her away!' 'What d's she mean?' an' old Mr. Larrabee ketched holt +of her arm. She begun to jerk an' trimble all over; she drawed in her +breath in a sort o' groanin' way, awful to hear, an' then dropped down +on the floor in a fit. I bu'st out in a terrible spell o' cryin';--I +couldn't 'a' helped it, to save my life." + +The man paused, drew his sleeve across his eyes, and then timidly looked +at me. Seeing nothing in my face, doubtless, but an expression of the +profoundest commiseration, he remarked, with a more assured voice, as if +in self-justification,-- + +"It was a pretty hard thing for a man to go through with, now, wasn't +it?" + +"You may well say that," said I. "Your story is not yet finished, +however. This Rachel Emmons,--you say she is still living,--in what way +does she cause the disturbances?" + +"I'll tell you all I know about it," said he,--"an' if you understand +it _then_, you're wiser 'n I am. After they carried her home, she had a +long spell o' sickness,--come near dyin', they said; but they brought +her through, at last, an' she got about ag'in, lookin' ten year older. +I kep' out of her sight, though. I lived awhile at Old Jones's, till I +could find a good farm to rent, or a cheap un to buy. I wanted to git +out o' the neighborhood: I was oneasy all the time, bein' so near +Rachel. Her mother was wuss, an' her father failin'-like, too. Mother +seen 'em often: she was as good a neighbor to 'em as she dared be. Well, +I got sort o' tired, an' went out to Michigan an' bought a likely farm. +Old Jones giv' me a start. I took Mary Ann out, an' we got along well +enough, a matter o' two year. We heerd from home now an' then. Rachel's +father an' mother both died, about the time we had our first boy,--him +that you seen,--an' she went off to Toledo, we heerd, an' hired out to +do sewin'. She was always a mighty good hand at it, an' could cut out as +nice as a born manty-maker. She'd had another fit after the funerals, +an' was older-lookin' an' more serious than ever, they said. + +"Well, Jimmy was six months old, or so, when we begun to be woke up +every night by his cryin'. Nothin' seemed to be the matter with him: +he was only frightened-like, an' couldn't be quieted. I heerd noises +sometimes,--nothin' like what come afterwards,--but sort o' crackin' an' +snappin', sich as you hear in new furnitur', an' it seemed like somebody +was in the room; but I couldn't find nothin'. It got wuss and wuss: Mary +Ann was sure the house was haunted, an' I had to let her go home for a +whole winter. When she was away, it went on the same as ever,--not every +night,--sometimes not more 'n onst a week,--but so loud as to wake me +up, reg'lar. I sent word to Mary Ann to come on, an' I'd sell out an' go +to Illinois. Good perairah land was cheap then, an' I'd ruther go furder +off, for the sake o' quiet. + +"So we pulled up stakes an' come out here: but it weren't long afore the +noise follered us, wuss 'n ever, an' we found out at last what it was. +One night I woke up, with my hair stan'in' on end, an' heerd Rachel +Emmons's voice, jist as you heerd it last night. Mary Ann heerd it too, +an' it's little peace she's giv' me sence that time. An' so it's been +goin' on an' on, these eight or nine year." + +"But," I asked, "are you sure she is alive? Have you seen her since? +Have you asked her to be merciful and not disturb you?" + +"Yes," said he, with a bitterness of tone which seemed quite to +obliterate the softer memories of his love, "I've seen her, an' I've +begged her on my knees to let me alone; but it's no use. When it got to +be so bad I couldn't stan' it, I sent her a letter, but I never got no +answer. Next year, when our second boy died, frightened and worried to +death, I believe, though he _was_ scrawny enough when he was born, I +took some money I'd saved to buy a yoke of oxen, an' went to Toledo o' +purpose to see Rachel. It cut me awful to do it, but I was desprit. I +found her livin' in a little house, with a bit o' garden, she'd bought. +I s'pose she must 'a' had five or six hundred dollars when the farm was +sold, an' she made a good deal by sewin', besides. She was settin' at +her work when I went in, an' knowed me at onst, though I don't believe +I'd ever 'a' knowed _her_. She was old, an' thin, an' hard-lookin'; her +mouth was pale an' sot, like she was bitin' somethin' all the time; an' +her eyes, though they was sunk into her head, seemed to look through an' +through an' away out th' other side o' you. + +"It jist shut me up when she looked at me. She was so corpse-like I was +afraid she'd drop dead, then and there: but I made out at last to say, +'Rachel, I've come all the way from Illinois to see you.' She kep' +lookin' straight at me, never sayin' a word. 'Rachel,' says I, 'I know +I've acted bad towards you. God knows I didn't mean to do it. I don't +blame you for payin' it back to me the way you're doin', but Mary Ann +an' the boy never done you no harm. I've come all the way o' purpose +to ask your forgiveness, hopin' you'll be satisfied with what's _been_ +done, an' leave off bearin' malice agin us.' She looked kind o' +sorrowful-like, but drawed a deep breath, an' shuck her head, 'Oh, +Rachel,' says I,--an' afore I knowed it I was right down on my knees at +her feet,--'Rachel, don't be so hard on me. I'm the onhappiest man that +lives. I can't stan' it no longer. Rachel, you didn't use to be so +cruel, when we was boys an' girls together. Do forgive me, an' leave +off' hauntin' me so.' + +"Then she spoke up, at last, an' says she,-- + +"'Eber Nicholson, I was married to you, in the sight o' God!' + +"'I know it,' says I; 'you say it to me every night; an' it wasn't my +doin's that you're not my wife now: but, Rachel, if I'd 'a' betrayed +you, an' ruined you, an' killed you, God couldn't 'a' punished me wuss +than you're a-punishin' me.' + +"She giv' a kind o' groan, an' two tears run down her white face. 'Eber +Nicholson,' says she, 'ask God to help you, for I can't. There might 'a' +been a time,' says she, 'when I could 'a' done it, but it's too late +now.' + +"'Don't say that, Rachel,' says I; 'it's never too late to be merciful +an' forgivin'.' + +"'It doesn't depend on myself,' says she; 'I'm _sent_ to you. It's th' +only comfort I have in life to be near you; but I'd give up that, if I +could. Pray to God to let me die, for then we shall both have rest.' + +"An' that was all I could git out of her. + +"I come home ag'in, knowin' I'd spent my money for nothin'. Sence then, +it's been jist the same as before,--not reg'lar every night, but sort o' +comes on by spells, an' then stops three or four days, an' then comes +on ag'in. Fact is, what's the use o' livin' in this way? We can't be +neighborly; we're afeard to have anybody come to see us; we've got no +peace, no comfort o' bein' together, an' no heart to work an' git ahead, +like other folks. It's jist killin' me, body an' soul." + +Here the poor wretch fairly broke down, bursting suddenly into an +uncontrollable fit of weeping. I waited quietly until the violence of +his passion had subsided. A misery so strange, so completely out of the +range of human experience, so hopeless apparently, was not to be reached +by the ordinary utterances of consolation. I had seen enough to enable +me fully to understand the fearful nature of the retribution which had +been visited upon him for what was, at worst, a weakness to be pitied, +rather than a sin to be chastised. "Never was a man worse punished," he +had truly said. But I was as far as ever from comprehending the secret +of those nightly visitations. The statement of Rachel Emmons, that they +were now produced without her will, overturned--supposing it to be +true--the conjecture which I might otherwise have adopted. However, it +was now plain that the unhappy victim sobbing at my side could throw no +further light on the mystery. He had told me all he knew. + +"My friend," said I, when he had become calmer, "I do not wonder at your +desperation. Such continual torment as you must have endured is enough +to drive a man to madness. It seems to me to spring from the malice of +some infernal power, rather than the righteous justice of God. Have you +never tried to resist it? Have you never called aloud, in your heart, +for Divine help, and gathered up your strength to meet and defy it, as +you would to meet a man who threatened your life?" + +"Not in the right way, I'm afeard," said he. "Fact is, I always tuck it +as a judgment hangin' over me, an' never thought o' nothin' else than +jist to grin and bear it." + +"Enough of that," I urged,--for a hope of relief had suggested itself to +me,--"you have suffered enough, and more than enough. Now stand up to +meet it like a man. When the noises come again, think of what you have +endured, and let it make you indignant and determined. Decide in your +heart that you _will_ be free from it, and perhaps you may be so. If +not, build another shanty and sleep away from your wife and boy, so +that they may escape, at least. Give yourself this claim to your wife's +gratitude, and she will be kind and forbearing." + +"I don't know but you're more 'n half right, stranger," he replied, in +a more cheerful tone. "Fact is, I never thought on it that way. It's +lightened my heart a heap, tellin' you; an' if I'm not too broke an' +used-up-like, I'll try to foller your advice. I couldn't marry Rachel +now, if Mary Ann _was_ dead, we've been druv so fur apart. I don't know +how it'll be when we're _all_ dead: I s'pose them 'll go together that +belongs together;--leastways, 't ought to be so." + +Here we struck the Bloomington road, and I no longer needed a guide. +When we pulled our horses around, facing each other, I noticed that the +flush of excitement still burned on the man's sallow cheek, and his +eyes, washed by probably the first freshet of feeling which had +moistened them for years, shone with a faint lustre of courage. + +"No, no,--none o' that!" said he, as I was taking out my porte-monnaie; +"you've done me a mighty sight more good than I've done you, let alone +payin' me to boot. Don't forgit the turn to the left, after crossin' +Jackson's Run. Good-bye, stranger! Take good keer o' yourself!" + +And with a strong, clinging, lingering grasp of the hand, in which the +poor fellow expressed the gratitude which he was too shy and awkward +to put into words, we parted. He turned his horse's head, and slowly +plodded back through the mud towards the lonely shanty. + +On my way to Bloomington, I went over and over the man's story, in +memory. The facts were tolerably clear and coherent: his narrative was +simple and credible enough, after my own personal experience of the +mysterious noises, and the secret, whatever it was, must be sought for +in Rachel Emmons. She was still living in Toledo, Ohio, he said, and +earned her living as a seamstress; it would, therefore, not be difficult +to find her. I confess, after his own unsatisfactory interview, I +had little hope of penetrating her singular reserve; but I felt the +strongest desire to see her, at least, and thus test the complete +reality of a story which surpassed the wildest fiction. After visiting +Terre Haute, the next point to which business called me, on the homeward +route, was Cleveland; and by giving an additional day to the journey, I +could easily take Toledo on my way. Between memory and expectation the +time passed rapidly, and a week later I registered my name at the Island +House, Toledo. + +After wandering about for an hour or two, the next morning, I +finally discovered the residence of Rachel Emmons. It was a small +story-and-a-half frame building, on the western edge of the town, with a +locust-tree in front, two lilacs inside the paling, and a wilderness of +cabbage-stalks and currant-bushes in the rear. After much cogitation, I +had not been able to decide upon any plan of action, and the interval +between my knock and the opening of the door was one of considerable +embarrassment to me. A small, plumpish woman of forty, with peaked nose, +black eyes, and but two upper teeth, confronted me. She, certainly, was +not the one I sought. + +"Is your name Rachel Emmons?" I asked, nevertheless. + +"No, I'm not her. This is her house, though." + +"Will you tell her a gentleman wants to see her?" said I, putting my +foot inside the door as I spoke. The room, I saw, was plainly, but +neatly furnished. A rag-carpet covered the floor; green rush-bottomed +chairs, a settee with chintz cover, and a straight-backed rocking-chair +were distributed around the walls; and for ornament there was an +alphabetical sampler in a frame, over the low wooden mantel-piece. + +The woman, however, still held the door-knob in her hand, saying, "Miss +Emmons is busy. She can't well leave her work. Did you want some sewin' +done?" + +"No," said I; "I wish to speak with her. It's on private and particular +business." + +"Well," she answered with some hesitation, "I'll _tell_ her. Take a +cheer." + +She disappeared through a door into a back room, and I sat down. In +another minute the door noiselessly reopened, and Rachel Emmons came +softly into the room. I believe I should have known her anywhere. Though +from Eber Nicholson's narrative she could not have been much over +thirty, she appeared to be at least forty-five. Her hair was streaked +with gray, her face thin and of an unnatural waxy pallor, her lips of a +whitish-blue color and tightly pressed together, and her eyes, seemingly +sunken far back in their orbits, burned with a strange, ghastly--I had +almost said phosphorescent--light. I remember thinking they must shine +like touch-wood in the dark. I have come in contact with too many +persons, passed through too wide a range of experience, to lose my +self-possession easily; but I could not meet the cold, steady gaze of +those eyes without a strong internal trepidation. It would have been the +same, if I had known nothing about her. + +She was probably surprised at seeing a stranger, but I could discern no +trace of it in her face. She advanced but a few steps into the room, and +then stopped, waiting for me to speak. + +"You are Rachel Emmons?" I asked, since a commencement of some sort must +be made. + +"Yes." + +"I come from Eber Nicholson," said I, fixing my eyes on her face. + +Not a muscle moved, not a nerve quivered, but I fancied that a faint +purple flush played for an instant under the white mask. If I were +correct, it was but momentary. She lifted her left hand slowly, pressed +it on her heart, and then let it fall. The motion was so calm that I +should not have noticed it, if I had not been watching her so steadily. + +"Well?" she said, after a pause. + +"Rachel Emmons," said I,--and more than one cause conspired to make my +voice earnest and authoritative,--"I know all. I come to you not to +meddle with the sorrow--let me say the sin--which has blighted your +life; not because Eber Nicholson sent me; not to defend him or to +accuse you; but from that solemn sense of duty which makes every man +responsible to God for what he does or leaves undone. An equal pity +for him and for you forces me to speak. He cannot plead his cause; you +cannot understand his misery. I will not ask by what wonderful power you +continue to torment his life; I will not even doubt that you pity while +you afflict him; but I ask you to reflect whether the selfishness of +your sorrow may not have hardened your heart, and blinded you to that +consolation which God offers to those who humbly seek it. You say that +you are married to Eber Nicholson, in His sight. Think, Rachel Emmons, +think of that moment when you will stand before His awful bar, and the +poor, broken, suffering soul, whom your forgiveness might still make +yours in the holy marriage of heaven, shrinks from you with fear and +pain, as in the remembered persecutions of earth!" + +The words came hot from my very heart, and the ice-crust of years under +which hers lay benumbed gave way before them. She trembled slightly; +and the same sad, hopeless moan which I had heard at midnight in the +Illinois shanty came from her lips. She sank into a chair, letting her +hands fall heavily at her side. There was no movement of her features, +yet I saw that her waxy cheeks were moist, as with the slow ooze of +tears so long unshed that they had forgotten their natural flow. + +"I do pity him," she murmured at last, "and I believe I forgive him; +but, oh! I've become an instrument of wrath for the punishment of both." + +If any feeling of reproof still lingered in my mind, her appearance +disarmed me at once. I felt nothing but pity for her forlorn, helpless +state. It was the apathy of despair, rather than the coldness of +cherished malice, which had so frozen her life. Still, the mystery of +those nightly persecutions! + +"Rachel Emmons," I said, "you certainly know that you still continue to +destroy the peace of Eber Nicholson and his family. Do you mean to say +that you _cannot_ cease to do so, if you would?" + +"It is too late," said she, shaking her head slowly, as she clasped both +hands hard against her breast. "Do you think I would suffer, night after +night, if I could help it? Haven't I stayed awake for days, till my +strength gave way, rather than fall asleep, for _his_ sake? Wouldn't I +give my life to be free?--and would have taken it, long ago, with my own +hands, but for the sin!" + +She spoke in a low voice, but with a wild earnestness which startled me. +She, then, was equally a victim! + +"But," said I, "this thing had a beginning. Why did you visit him in the +first place, when, perhaps, you might have prevented it?" + +"I am afraid that was my sin," she replied, "and this is the punishment. +When father and mother died, and I was layin' sick and weak, with +nothin' to do but think of _him_, and me all alone in the world, and not +knowin' how to live without him, because I had nobody left,--that's when +it begun. When the deadly kind o' sleeps came on--they used to think I +was dead, or faintin', at first--and I could go where my heart drawed +me, and look at him away off where he lived, 't was consolin', and I +didn't try to stop it. I used to long for the night, so I could go and +be near him for an hour or two. I don't know how I went: it seemed to +come of itself. After a while I felt I was troublin' him and doin' no +good to myself, but the sleeps came just the same as ever, and then I +couldn't help myself. They're only a sorrow to me now, but I s'pose I +shall have 'em till I'm laid in my grave." + +This was all the explanation she could give. It was evidently one of +those mysterious cases of spiritual disease which completely baffle our +reason. Although compelled to accept her statement, I felt incapable of +suggesting any remedy. I could only hope that the abnormal condition +into which she had fallen might speedily wear out her vital energies, +already seriously shattered. She informed me, further, that each attack +was succeeded by great exhaustion, and that she felt herself growing +feebler, from year to year. The immediate result, I suspected, was a +disease of the heart, which might give her the blessing of death sooner +than she hoped. Before taking leave of her, I succeeded in procuring +from her a promise that she would write to Eber Nicholson, giving him +that free forgiveness which would at least ease his conscience, and make +his burden somewhat lighter to bear. Then, feeling that it was not in my +power to do more, I rose to depart. Taking her hand, which lay cold and +passive in mine,--so much like a dead hand that it required a strong +effort in me to repress a nervous shudder,--I said, "Farewell, Rachel +Emmons, and remember that they who seek peace in the right spirit will +always find it at last." + +"It won't be many years before I find it", she replied, calmly; and the +weird, supernatural light of her eyes shone upon me for the last time. + +I reached New York in due time, and did not fail, sitting around the +broiled oysters and celery, with my partners, to repeat the story of the +Haunted Shanty. I knew, beforehand, how they would receive it; but the +circumstances had taken such hold of my mind,--so _burned_ me, like a +boy's money, to keep buttoned up in the pocket,--that I could no more +help telling the tale than the man I remember reading about, a great +while ago, in a poem called "The Ancient Mariner". Beeson, who, I +suspect, don't believe much of anything, is always apt to carry +his raillery too far; and thenceforth, whenever the drum of a +target-company, marching down Broadway, passed the head of our street, +he would whisper to me, "There comes Rachel Emmons!" until I finally +became angry, and insisted that the subject should never again be +mentioned. + +But I none the less recalled it to my mind, from time to time, with +a singular interest. It was the one supernatural, or, at least, +inexplicable experience of my life, and I continued to feel a profound +curiosity with regard to the two principal characters. My slight +endeavor to assist them by such counsel as had suggested itself to me +was actuated by the purest human sympathy, and upon further reflection +I could discover no other means of help. A spiritual disease could be +cured only by spiritual medicine,--unless, indeed, the secret of Rachel +Emmons's mysterious condition lay in some permanent dislocation of the +relation between soul and body, which could terminate only with their +final separation. + +With the extension of our business, and the increasing calls upon my +time during my Western journeys, it was three years before I again found +myself in Toledo, with sufficient leisure to repeat my visit. I had +some difficulty in finding the little frame house; for, although it +was unaltered in every respect, a number of stately brick "villas" had +sprung up around it and quite disguised the locality. The door was +opened by the same little black-eyed woman, with the addition of four +artificial teeth, which were altogether too large and loose. They were +attached by plated hooks to her eye-teeth, and moved up and down when +she spoke. + +"Is Rachel Emmons at home?" I asked. + +The woman stared at me in evident surprise. + +"She's dead," said she, at last, and then added,--"let's see,--ain't you +the gentleman that called here, some three or four years ago?" + +"Yes", said I, entering the room; "I should like to hear about her +death." + +"Well,--_'twas_ rather queer. She was failin' when you was here. After +that she got softer and weaker-like, an' didn't have her deathlike +wearin' sleeps so often, but she went just as fast for all that. The +doctor said 'twas heart-disease, and the nerves was gone, too; so he +only giv' her morphy, and sometimes pills, but he knowed she'd no chance +from the first. 'Twas a year ago last May when she died. She'd been +confined to her bed about a week, but I'd no thought of her goin' so +soon. I was settin' up with her, and 'twas a little past midnight, +maybe. She'd been layin' like dead awhile, an' I was thinkin' I could +snatch a nap before she woke. All't onst she riz right up in bed, with +her eyes wide open, an' her face lookin' real happy, an' called out, +loud and strong,--'Farewell, Eber Nicholson! farewell! I've come for the +last time! There's peace for me in heaven, an' peace for you on earth! +Farewell! farewell!' Then she dropped back on the piller, stone-dead. +She'd expected it, 't seems, and got the doctor to write her will. She +left me this house and lot,--I'm her second cousin on the mother's +side,--but all her money in the Savin's Bank, six hundred and +seventy-nine dollars and a half, to Eber Nicholson. The doctor writ +out to Illinois, an' found he'd gone to Kansas, a year before. So the +money's in bank yit; but I s'pose he'll git it, some time or other." + +As I returned to the hotel, conscious of a melancholy pleasure at the +news of her death, I could not help wondering,--"Did he hear that last +farewell, far away in his Kansas cabin? Did he hear it, and fall asleep +with thanksgiving in his heart, and arise in the morning to a liberated +life?" I have never visited Kansas, nor have I ever heard from him +since; but I know that the _living ghost_ which haunted him is laid +forever. + +Reader, you will not believe my story: BUT IT IS TRUE. + + * * * * * + + + RHOTRUDA. + + + In the golden reign of Charlemaign the king, + The three-and-thirtieth year, or thereabout, + Young Eginardus, bred about the court, + (Left mother-naked at a postern-door,) + Had thence by slow degrees ascended up,-- + First page, then pensioner, lastly the king's knight + And secretary; yet held these steps for nought, + Save as they led him to the Princess' feet, + Eldest and loveliest of the regal three, + Most gracious, too, and liable to love: + For Bertha was betrothed; and she, the third, + Giselia, would not look upon a man. + So, bending his whole heart unto this end, + He watched and waited, trusting to stir to fire + The indolent interest in those large eyes, + And feel the languid hands beat in his own, + Ere the new spring. And well he played his part,-- + Slipping no chance to bribe or brush aside + All that would stand between him and the light: + Making fast foes in sooth, but feeble friends. + But what cared he, who had read of ladies' love, + And how young Launcelot gained his Guenovere,-- + A foundling, too, or of uncertain strain? + And when one morning, coming from the bath, + He crossed the Princess on the palace-stair, + And kissed her there in her sweet disarray, + Nor met the death he dreamed of in her eyes, + He knew himself a hero of old romance,-- + Not seconding, but surpassing, what had been. + + And so they loved; if that tumultuous pain + Be love,--disquietude of deep delight, + And sharpest sadness: nor, though he knew her heart + His very own,--gained on the instant, too, + And like a waterfall that at one leap + Plunges from pines to palms, shattered at once + To wreaths of mist and broken spray-bows bright,-- + He loved not less, nor wearied of her smile; + But through the daytime held aloof and strange + His walk; mingling with knightly mirth and game; + Solicitous but to avoid alone + Aught that might make against him in her mind; + Yet strong in this,--that, let the world have end, + He had pledged his own, and held Rhotruda's troth. + + But Love, who had led these lovers thus along, + Played them a trick one windy night and cold: + For Eginardus, as his wont had been, + Crossing the quadrangle, and under dark,-- + No faint moonshine, nor sign of any star,-- + Seeking the Princess' door, such welcome found, + The knight forgot his prudence in his love; + For lying at her feet, her hands in his, + And telling tales of knightship and emprise + And ringing war, while up the smooth white arm + His fingers slid insatiable of touch, + The night grew old: still of the hero-deeds + That he had seen he spoke, and bitter blows + Where all the land seemed driven into dust, + Beneath fair Pavia's wall, where Loup beat down + The Longobard, and Charlemaign laid on, + Cleaving horse and rider; then, for dusty drought + Of the fierce tale, he drew her lips to his, + And silence locked the lovers fast and long, + Till the great bell crashed One into their dream. + + The castle-bell! and Eginard not away! + With tremulous haste she led him to the door, + When, lo! the courtyard white with fallen snow, + While clear the night hung over it with stars! + A dozen steps, scarce that, to his own door: + A dozen steps? a gulf impassable! + What to be done? Their secret must not lie + Bare to the sneering eye with the first light; + She could not have his footsteps at her door! + Discovery and destruction were at hand: + And, with the thought, they kissed, and kissed again; + When suddenly the lady, bending, drew + Her lover towards her half-unwillingly, + And on her shoulders fairly took him there,-- + Who held his breath to lighten all his weight,-- + And lightly carried him the courtyard's length + To his own door; then, like a frightened hare, + Fled back in her own tracks unto her bower, + To pant awhile, and rest that all was safe. + + But Charlemaign the king, who had risen by night + To look upon memorials, or at ease + To read and sign an ordinance of the realm,-- + The Fanolehen or Cunigosteura + For tithing corn, so to confirm the same + And stamp it with the pommel of his sword,-- + Hearing their voices in the court below, + Looked from his window, and beheld the pair. + + Angry the king,--yet laughing-half to view + The strangeness and vagary of the feat: + Laughing indeed! with twenty minds to call + From his inner bed-chamber the Forty forth, + Who watched all night beside their monarch's bed, + With naked swords and torches in their hands, + And test this lover's-knot with steel and fire; + But with a thought, "To-morrow yet will serve + To greet these mummers," softly the window closed, + And so went back to his corn-tax again. + + But, with the morn, the king a meeting called + Of all his lords, courtiers and kindred too, + And squire and dame,--in the great Audience Hall + Gathered; where sat the king, with the high crown + Upon his brow, beneath a drapery + That fell around him like a cataract, + With flecks of color crossed and cancellate; + And over this, like trees about a stream, + Rich carven-work, heavy with wreath and rose, + Palm and palmirah, fruit and frondage, hung. + + And more the high hall held of rare and strange: + For on the king's right hand Leoena bowed + In cloudlike marble, and beside her crouched + The tongueless lioness; on the other side, + And poising this, the second Sappho stood,-- + Young Erexcea, with her head discrowned, + The anadema on the horn of her lyre: + And by the walls there hung in sequence long + Merlin himself, and Uterpendragon, + With all their mighty deeds, down to the day + When all the world seemed lost in wreck and rout, + A wrath of crashing steeds and men; and, in + The broken battle fighting hopelessly, + King Arthur, with the ten wounds on his head. + + But not to gaze on these appeared the peers. + Stern looked the king, and, when the court was met,-- + The lady and her lover in the midst,-- + Spoke to his lords, demanding them of this: + "What merits he, the servant of the king, + Forgetful of his place, his trust, his oath, + Who, for his own bad end, to hide his fault, + Makes use of her, a Princess of the realm, + As of a mule,--a beast of burden!--borne + Upon her shoulders through the winter's night + And wind and snow?" "Death!" said the angry lords; + And knight and squire and minion murmured, "Death!" + Not one discordant voice. But Charlemaign-- + Though to his foes a circulating sword, + Yet, as a king, mild, gracious, exorable, + Blest in his children too, with but one born + To vex his flesh like an ingrowing nail-- + Looked kindly on the trembling pair, and said: + "Yes, Eginardus, well hast thou deserved + Death for this thing; for, hadst thou loved her so, + Thou shouldst have sought her Father's will in this,-- + Protector and disposer of his child,-- + And asked her hand of him, her lord and thine. + Thy life is forfeit here; but take it, thou!-- + Take even two lives for this forfeit one; + And thy fair portress--wed her; honor God, + Love one another, and obey the king." + + Thus far the legend; but of Rhotrude's smile, + Or of the lords' applause, as truly they + Would have applauded their first judgment too, + We nothing learn: yet still the story lives, + Shines like a light across those dark old days, + Wonderful glimpse of woman's wit and love, + And worthy to be chronicled with hers + Who to her lover dear threw down her hair, + When all the garden glanced with angry blades; + Or like a picture framed in battle-pikes + And bristling swords, it hangs before our view,-- + The palace-court white with the fallen snow, + The good king leaning out into the night, + And Rhotrude bearing Eginard on her back. + + + + +GREEK LINES. + + +[Concluded.] + + + "As when a ship, by skilful steersman wrought + Nigh river's mouth or foreland, where the + wind + Veers oft, as oft so steers, and shifts her sail,-- + So varied he, and of his tortuous train + Curl'd many a wanton wreath in sight of + Eve + To lure her eye." + +And Eve, alas! yielded to the blandishments of the wily serpent, as we +moderns, in our Art, have yielded to the licentious, specious life-curve +of Hogarth. When I say Art, I mean that spirit of Art which has made us +rather imitative than creative, has made us hold a too faithful mirror +up to Nature, and has been content to let the great Ideal remain +petrified in the marbles of Greece. + +I have endeavored to show how this Ideal may be concentrated in a +certain abstract line, not only of sensuous, but of intellectual +Beauty,--a line which, while it is as wise and subtle as the serpent, is +as harmless and loving as the sacred dove of Venus. I have endeavored +to prove how this line, the gesture of Attic eloquence, expresses the +civilization of Pericles and Plato, of Euripides and Apelles. It is now +proposed briefly to relate how this line was lost, when the politeness +and philosophy, the literature and the Art of Greece were chained to the +triumphal cars of Roman conquerors,--and how it seems to have been found +again in our own day, after slumbering so long in ruined temples, broken +statues, and cinerary urns. + +The scholar who studies the aesthetical anatomy of Greek Art has +a melancholy pleasure, like a surgeon, in watching its slow, but +inevitable atrophy under the incubus of Rome. The wise, but childlike +serenity and cheerfulness of soul, so tenderly pictured in the white +stones from the quarries of Pentelicus, had, it is true, a certain +sickly, exoteric life in Magna Graecia, as Pompeii and Herculaneum have +proved to us. But the brutal manhood of Rome overshadowed and tainted +the gentle exotic like a Upas-tree. Where, as in these places, +the imported Greek could have some freedom, it grew up into a dim +resemblance of its ancient purity under other skies. It had, I think, +an elegiac plaintiveness in it, like a song of old liberty sung in +captivity. Yet there was added to it a certain fungus-growth, never +permitted by that far-off Ideal whose seeds were indigenous in the +Peloponnesus, but rather springing from the rank ostentation of Rome. In +its more monumental developments, under these new influences, the true +line of Beauty became gradually vulgarized, and, by degrees, less +intellectual and pure, till its spirit of fine and elegant reserve was +quite lost in a coarse splendor. It must be admitted, however, that the +Greek colonies of Italy expressed not a little of the old refinement +in the lamps and candelabra and vases and _bijouterie_ which we have +exhumed from the ashes of Vesuvius. + +But, turning to Rome herself, the most casual examination will impress +us with the fact that there the lovely Greek lines were seized by rude +conquerors, and at once were bent to answer base and brutal uses. To +narrow a broad subject down to an illustration, let us look at a single +feature, the _Cymatium_, as it was understood in Greece and Rome. This +is a moulding of very frequent occurrence in classic entablatures, a +curved surface with a double flexure. Perhaps the type of Greek lines, +as represented in the previous paper on this subject, may be safely +accepted as a fair example of the Greek interpretation of this feature. +The Romans, on the other hand, not being able to understand and +appreciate the delicacy and deep propriety of this line, seized their +compasses, and, without thought or love, mechanically produced a gross +likeness to it by the union of two quarter-circles thus:-- + +[Illustration: + +Greek. + +Roman.] + +Look upon this picture, and on this!--the one, refined, delicate, +sensitive, fastidious, severe, never repeated; the other, thoughtless, +vulgar, mathematical, common-sense, sensuous, reappearing ever with a +stolid monotony. And such is the sentiment pervading all Roman Art. +The conquerors took the _letter_ from the Greeks, but never had the +slightest feeling for its Ideal. But even this _letter_, when they +transcribed it, writhed and was choked beneath hands which knew better +the iron caestus of the gladiator than the subtile and spiritual touch +of the artist. + +We can have no stronger and more convincing proof that Architecture is +the truest record of the various phases of civilization than we find in +this. There was Greek Art, living and beautiful, full of inductive power +and capacities of new expressions; and there were the boundless wealth +and power of Rome. But Rome had her own ideas to enunciate; and so +possessed was she with the impulse to give form to these ideas, to +her ostentatious brutality, her barbarous pride, her licentious +magnificence, that she could not pause to learn calm and serious lessons +from the Greeks who walked her very forums, but, seizing their fair +sanctuaries, she stretched them out to fit her standard; she took the +pure Greek orders to decorate her arches, she piled these orders one +above the other, she bent them around her gigantic circuses, till at +last they had become acclimated and lost all their peculiar refinement, +all their intellectual and dignified humanity. Every moulding, every +capital, every detail was changed. The Romans had neither time nor +inclination to bestow any love or thought on the expressiveness and +tender meaning of subordinate parts. But out of the suggestions and +reminiscences of Greek lines they made a rigid and inflexible grammar of +their own,--a grammar to suit the mailed clang of Roman speech, which, +in its cruel martial strength, sought no refinements, no delicate +inflections from a distant Acropolis. The result was the coarse splendor +of the Empire. How utterly the still Greek Ideal was forgotten in this +noisy splendor, how entirely the chaste spirituality of the Greek line +was lost in the round and lusty curves which are the _inevitable_ +footprints of Sensual Life, scarcely needs further amplification. I +have referred to the Ionic capital of the Erechtheum as containing a +microcosm of Attic Art, as presenting a fair epitome of the thought and +love which Hellenic artists offered in the worship of their gods. Turn +now to the Roman Ionic, as developed in any one of the most familiar +examples of it, in the Temple of Concord, near the Via Sacra, in the +Theatre of Marcellus, or the Colosseum. What a contrast! How formal, +mechanical, pattern-like it has become! The grace of its freedom, the +intellectual reserve of its strength, the secret humanity that thrilled +through all its lines, the divine Art which obtained such sweet repose +there,--all these are gone. Quality has yielded to quantity, and nothing +is left save those external characteristics which he who runs may read, +and he who pauses to study finds cold, vacant, and unsatisfactory. What +the Ionic capital of Rome wants, and what all Roman Art wants, is _the +inward life_, the living soul, which gives a peculiar expressiveness +to every individual work, and raises it infinitely above the dangerous +academic formalism of the schools. + +In view of our own architecture, that which touches our own experience +and is of us and out of us, the danger of this academic formalism +cannot be too emphatically spoken of. When one carefully examines the +transition from Greek to Roman Art, he cannot but be impressed with the +fact, that the spirit which worked in this transition was the spirit of +a vulgar and greedy conqueror. To illustrate his rude magnificence +and to give a finer glory to his triumph, by right of conquest he +appropriated the Greek orders. But the living soul which was in those +orders, and gave them an infinity of meaning, an ever-varying poetry of +expression, could not be enslaved; nor could the worshipful Love which +created them find a home under the helmet of the soldier. So they became +lifeless; they were at once formally systematized and classified, +subjected to strict proportions and rules, and cast, as it were, in +moulds. This arrangement enabled the conqueror, without waste of time in +that long contemplative stillness out of which alone the beauty of the +true Ideal arises, out of which alone man can create like a god, to +avail himself at once of the Greek orders, not as a sensitive and +delicate means of fine aesthetic expression, but as a mechanical +language of contrasts of form to be used according to the exigencies of +design. The service of Greek Art was perfect freedom; enslaved at Rome, +it became academic. Thus systematized, it is true, it awes us by the +superb redundancy and sumptuousness of its use in the temples and forums +reared by that omnipresent power from Britannia to Baalbec. But the Art +which is systematized is degraded. Emerson somewhere remarks that man +descends to meet his fellows,--meaning, I suppose, that he has to +sacrifice some of the higher instincts of his individuality when he +desires to become social, and to meet his fellows on that low level of +society, which, made up as it is of many individualities, has none of +those secret aspirations which arise out of his own isolation. Society +is a systematic aggregation for the benefit of the multitude, but great +men lift themselves above it into a purer atmosphere. As Longfellow +says, "They rise like towers in the city of God." So with Art,--when we +systematize it for the indiscriminate use of thoughtless and unloving +men, we degrade it. And a singular proof of this is found in the fact +that the Roman academical orders never have anything in them reserved +from the common ken. They are superficial. They say all that they have +to say and express all that they have to express at once, and disturb +the mind with no doubt about any hidden meaning. They are at once +understood. All their intention and purpose are patent to the most +casual observer. He does not pause to inquire what motives actuated the +architect in the composition of any Corinthian capital, because he feels +that it is made according to the dictates of a rigid school created for +the convenience of an unartistic age, and there is no individual love or +aspiration in it. + +Virtually, the Roman orders died in the first century of the Christian +era. We all know how, when the authority of the Pagan schools was gone +and the stern Vitruvian laws had become lost in the mists of antiquity, +these orders gradually fell from their strict allegiance, and imbibed a +new and healthy life from that rude but earnest Romanesque spirit, as in +Byzantium and Lombardy. And we know, too, how, in after Gothic times, +the spirit of the forgotten Aphrodite, Ideal Beauty, sometimes +lurked furtively in the image of the Virgin Mary, and inspired the +cathedral-builders with somewhat of the old creative impulse of Love. +But the workings of this impulse are singularly contrasted in the +productions of the Greek and Mediaeval artists. Nature, we have seen, +offered to the former mysterious and oracular Sibylline leaves, +profoundly significant of an indwelling humanity diffused through all +her woods and fields and mountains, all her fountains, streams, and +seas. Those meditative creators sat at her feet, earnest disciples, +but gathering rather the spirit and motive of her gifts than the gifts +themselves, making an Ideal and worshipping it as a deity. But for the +cathedral-builder, Dryads and Hamadryads, Oreads, Fauns, and Naiads did +not exist,--the Oak of Dodona uttered no oracles. + + "A primrose by the river's brim + A yellow primrose was to him, + And it was nothing more." + +To him Nature was an open book, from which he continually quoted with a +loving freedom, not to illustrate his own deep relationships with her, +but to give greater glory to that vast Power which stood behind her +beautiful text and was revealed to him in the new religion from +Palestine. He loved fruits and flowers and leaves because they were +manifestations of the Love of God; and he used them in his Art, not as +motives out of which to create abstract forms, out of which to eliminate +an ideal humanity, but to show his intense appreciation of the Divine +Love which gave them. Had he been a Pantheist, as Orpheus was, it is +probable he would have idealized these things and created Greek lines. +But believing in a distinct God, the supreme Originator of all things, +he was led to a worship of sacrifice and offerings, and needed no Ideal. +So, with a lavish hand, he appropriated the abundant Beauty of Nature, +imitating its external expressions with his careful chisel, and +suffering his sculptured lines to throw their wayward tendrils and +vagrant leaflets outside the strict limits of his spandrels. The life of +Gothic lines was in their sensuous liberty; the life of Greek lines +was in their intellectual reserve. Those arose out of a religion of +emotional ardor; these, out of a religion of philosophical reflection. +Hence, while the former were wild and picturesque, the latter were +serious, chaste, and very human. + +Doubtless the nearest approach to ideal abstractions to be found in +Mediaeval Art is contained in that remarkable and very characteristic +system of foliations and cuspidations in tracery, which were suggested +by the leaf-forms in Nature. In this adaptation, when first it was +initiated in the earliest phases of Gothic, there is something like +Greek Love. The simple trefoil aperture seems a fair architectural +version of the clover-leaves. But the propriety of the use of these +clover-lines was hinted by a constructive exigency, the pointed arch. +The inevitable assimilation of the natural forms of leaves with this +feature was too evident not to be improved by such active and ardent +worshippers as the Freemasons. Thus originated Gothic tracery, which +afterwards branched out into such sumptuous and unrestrained luxury as +we find in the Decorated styles of England, the Flamboyant of France, +the late Geometric of Germany. Thus were the masons true to the zealous +and passionate enthusiasm of their religion. They used foliations, not +on account of their subjective significance, as the Greek artists did, +but on account of their objective and material applicability to the +decoration of their architecture. But no natural form was ever made +use of by a Greek artist merely because suggested by a constructive +exigency. It was the inward life of the thing itself which he saw, and +it was his love for it which made him adopt it. This love refined and +purified its object, and never would have permitted it to grow into any +wild and licentious Flamboyant under the serene and quiet skies of the +Aegean. + +And so the Greek lines slept in patient marble through the long Dark +Ages, and no one came to awaken them into beautiful life again. No one, +consecrated Prince by the chrism of Nature, wandered into the old land +to kiss the Sleeping Beauty into life, and break the deep spell which +was around her kingdom. + +Then came the Renaissance in the fifteenth century. But--alas that we +must say it!--it was fundamentally a Renaissance of error rather than of +truth. It was a revival of Roman Art, and not of Greek. The line which +we call Hogarth's, but which in reality is as old as human life and its +passions, was the key-note of it all. So wanton were the wreaths it +curled in the sight of the great masters of that period, that they all +yielded to its subtle fascinations and sinned,--sinned, inasmuch as they +devoted their vast powers to the revival and refinement of a sensuous +academic formalism, instead of breathing into all the architectural +forms and systems then known (a glorious material to work with) the pure +life of the Ideal. Had such men as Michel Angelo, San Gallo, Palladio, +Scamozzi, Vignola, San Michele, Bernini, been inspired by the highest +principles of Art, and known the thoughtful lines of Greece, so catholic +to all human moods, and so wisely adapted to the true spirit of +reform,--had they known these, all subsequent Art would have felt the +noble impulse, and been developed into that sphere of perfection +which we see rendering illustrious the primitive posts and lintels of +antiquity, and which we picture to ourselves in the imaginary future of +Hope as glorifying a far wider scope of human knowledge and ingenuity. + +The Gothic architecture of the early part of the fifteenth century +was ripe for the spirit of healthy reform. It had been actively +accumulating, during the progress of the age of Christianity, a +boundless wealth of forms, a vast amount of constructive resources, and +material fit for innumerable architectural expressions of human power. +But in the last two centuries of this era the Love which gave life to +this architecture in its earlier developments gradually became swallowed +up in the Pride of the workman; and the luscious and abandoned luxury of +line led it farther and farther astray from the true path, till at last +it became like an unweeded garden run to seed, and there was no health +in it. In the year 1555, at Beauvais, the masonic workmen uttered their +last cry of defiance against the old things made new in Italy. Jean Wast +and Francois Marechal of that town, two cathedral-builders, said,--"that +they had heard of the Church of St. Peter at Rome, and would maintain +that their Gothic could be built as high and on as grand a scale as the +antique orders of this Michel Angelo." And with this spirit they built a +wonderful pyramid over the cross of their cathedral. But, alas! it fell +in the fifth year of its arrogant pride, and this is the last we hear of +Gothic architecture in those times. Over the wild and picturesque ruins +the spirits of the old conquerors of Gaul once more strode with measured +tread, and began to set up their prevailing standards in the very +strongholds of Gothic supremacy. These conquerors trampled down the true +as well as the false in the Mediaeval _regime_, and utterly extinguished +that sole lamp of knowledge which had given light to the Ages of +Darkness and had kindled into life and beauty the cathedrals of Europe. + +This was the error of the Renaissance. Its apostles would not recognize +the capacities existing in the great architecture they displaced, +for opening into a new life under the careful culture of a revived +knowledge. But they rooted it out bodily, and planted instead an exotic +of the schools. It was the re-birth of an Art _system_, which in its +former existence had developed in an atmosphere of conquest. It taught +them to kill, burn, and destroy all that opposed the progress of its +triumph. It was eminently revolutionary in its character, and its reign, +to all those multitudinous expressions of life and thought which had +arisen under the intermediate and more liberal dynasty, was one of +terror. Truly, it was a fierce and desolating instrument of reform. + +It would be a tempting theme of speculation to follow in the imagination +the probable progress of a Greek, instead of a Roman Renaissance, into +such active, but misguided schools as those of Rouen and Tours in the +latter part of the fifteenth century,--of Rouen, with its Roger Arge, +its brothers Leroux, who built the old and famous Hotel Bourgtheroulde +there, its Pierre de Saulbeaux, and all that legion of architects and +builders who were employed by the Cardinal Amboise in his castle of +Gaillon,--of Tours, with its Pierre Valence, its Francois Marchant, its +Viart and Colin Byart, out of whose rich and picturesque craft-spirit +arose the quaint fancies of the palaces of Blois and Chambord, and the +playfulness of many an old Flemish house-front. Such a Renaissance +would not have come among these venial sins of _naivete_, this sportive +affluence of invention, to overturn ruthlessly and annihilate. Its +mission would inevitably have been, not to destroy, but to fulfil,--to +invest these strange results of human frailty and human power with that +grave ideal beauty which nineteen centuries before had done a good work +with the simple columns and architraves on the banks of the Ilissus, and +which, under the guidance of Love, would have made the arches and vaults +and buttresses and pinnacles of a later civilization illustrious with +even more eloquent expressions of refinement. For Greek lines do not +stand apart from the sympathies of men by any spirit of ceremonious and +exclusive rigor, as is undeniably the case with those which were adopted +from Rome. They are not a _system_, but a _sentiment_, which, wisely +directed, might creep into the heart of any condition of society, and +leaven all its architecture with a purifying and pervading power without +destroying its independence, where an inflexible system could assume a +position only by tyrannous oppression. + +Yet when we examine the works of the Renaissance, after the system had +become more manageable and acclimated under later Italian and French +hands, we cannot but admire the skill with which the lightest fancies +and the most various expressions of human contrivance were reconciled to +the formal rules and proportions of the Roman orders. The Renaissance +palaces and civil buildings of the South and West of Europe are so full +of ingenuity, and the irrepressible inventive power of the artist moves +with so much freedom and grace among the stubborn lines of that revived +architecture, that we cannot but regard the results with a sort of +scholastic pride and pleasure. We cannot but ask ourselves, If the +spirit of those architects could obtain so much liberty under the +restrictions of such an unnatural and unnecessary despotism, what would +have been the result, if they had been put in possession of the very +principles of Hellenic Art, instead of these dangerous and complex +models of Rome, which were so far removed from the purity and simplicity +of their origin? Up to a late day, the great aim of the Renaissance has +been to interpret an advanced civilization with the sensuous line; and +_so far as this line is capable of such expression_, the result has been +satisfactory. + +Thus four more weary centuries were added to the fruitless slumbers +of Ideal Beauty among the temples of Greece. Meanwhile, in turn, the +Byzantine, the Northman, the Frank, the Turk, and finally the bombarding +Venetian, left their rude invading footprints among her most cherished +haunts, and defiled her very sanctuary with the brutal touch of +barbarous conquest. But the kiss which was to dissolve this enchantment +was one of Love; and not Love, but cold indifference, or even scorn, +was in the hearts of the rude warriors. So she slept on undisturbed in +spirit, though broken and shattered in the external type, and it was +reserved for a distant future to be made beautiful by her disenchantment +and awakening. + +In 1672, a pupil of the artist Lebrun, Jacques Carrey, accompanied the +Marquis Ollier de Nointee, ambassador of Louis XIV., to Constantinople. +On his way he spent two months at Athens, making drawings of the +Parthenon, then in an excellent state of preservation. These drawings, +more useful in an archaeological than an artistic point of view, are +now preserved in the Bibliotheque Imperiale of Paris. In 1676, two +distinguished travellers, one a Frenchman, Dr. Spon, the other an +Englishman, Sir George Wheler, tarried at Athens, and gave valuable +testimony, in terms of boundless admiration, to the beauty and splendor +of the temples of the Acropolis and its neighborhood, then quite unknown +to the world. Other travellers followed these pioneers in the traces of +that old civilization. But in 1687 Koenigsmark and his Venetian forces +threw their hideous bombshells among the exquisite temples of the +Acropolis, and, igniting thereby the powder-magazine with which the +Turks had desecrated the Parthenon, tore into ruins that loveliest of +the lovely creations of Hellas. It was not until the publishing of the +famous work of Stuart and Revett on "The Antiquities of Athens," in +1762, that the world was made familiar with the external expressions +of Greek Architecture. This publication at once created a curious +revolution in the practice of architecture,--a revolution extending in +its effects throughout Europe. A fever arose to reproduce Greek temples; +and to such an extent was this vacant and thoughtless reproduction +carried out, that at one time it bid fair to supplant the older +Renaissance. The spirit of the new Renaissance, however, was one of mere +imitation, and had not the elements of life and power to insure its +ultimate success. No attempt was made to acclimate the exotic to suit +the new conditions it was thus suddenly called upon to fulfil; for the +_sentiment_ which actuated it, and the Love with which it was created, +were not understood. It was the mere setting up of old forms in new +places; and the Grecian porticos and pediments and columns, which were +multiplied everywhere from the models supplied by Stuart and Revett, +and found their way profusely into this New World, still stare upon us +gravely with strange alien looks. The impetuous current of modern life +beats impatiently against that cumbrous solidity of peristyle which +sheltered well in its day the serene philosophers of the Agora, but +which is now the merest impediment in the way of modern traffic and +modern necessities. But presently the spirit of formalism, engendered by +the old Renaissance, took hold of the revived Greek lines, and +stiffened them into acquiescence with a base mathematical system, which +effectually deprived them of that life and reproductive power which +belong only to a state of artistic freedom. They were reduced to rule +and deadened in the very process of their revival. + +So the Greek Ideal, though strangely transplanted thus into the noise of +modern streets, was not awakened from its long repose by the clatter and +roaring of our new civilization. As regarded the uses of life, it still +slept in petrifactions of Pentelic marble. And when those petrifactions +were repeated in modern quarries, it was merely the shell they gave; the +spirit within had not yet broken through. + +Greek lines, therefore, owed their earliest revival to the vagaries of a +capricious taste, and the desire to give zest to the architecture of the +day by their novelty. It was not for the sake of the new life there was +in them, and of that pliable spirit of refinement so suited to the wise +re-birth of ancient Love in Art. It is not surprising that some of the +more modern masters of the old Renaissance, with whom that system had +become venerable, from its universal use as the vehicle by which +the greatest artists of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries had +expressed their thoughts and inspirations, regarded with peculiar +distrust these outlandish innovations on the exclusive walks of their +own architecture. For they saw only a few external forms which the +beautiful principles of Hellenic Art had developed to fit an old +civilization; the applicability of these primary principles to the +refinement of the architectural expressions of a modern state of society +they could not of course comprehend. About the year 1786, we find Sir +William Chambers, the leading architect of his day in England, in his +famous treatise on "The Decorative Part of Civil Architecture," giving +elaborate and emphatic expression to his contempt of that Greek Art, +which had presented itself to him in a guise well suited to cause +misapprehension and error. "It must candidly be confessed," he says, +"that the Grecians have been far excelled by other nations, not only in +the magnitude and grandeur of their structures, but likewise in point of +fancy, ingenuity, variety, and elegant selection." A heresy, indeed! + +Two distinguished German artists--the one, Schinkel of Berlin, born in +1781,--the other, Klenze of Munich, born in 1784--were children when +Chambers uttered these treasonable sentiments concerning Greek Art. +Later, at separate times, these artists visited Greece, and so filled +themselves with the feeling and sentiment of the Art there, so +consecrated their souls with the appreciative study of its divine Love, +that the patient Ideal at last awoke from its long slumbers, entered +into the breathing human temples thus prepared for it by the pure rites +of Aphrodite, _and once more lived_. Thus in the opening years of the +nineteenth century was a new and reasonable Renaissance, not of an +antique type, but of a spirit which had the gift of immortal youth, and +uttered oracles of prophecy to these chosen Pythians of Art. + +Through Schinkel, the pure Hellenic style, only hinted at previously in +the attempts of less inspired Germans, such as Langhaus, who embodied +his crude conceptions in the once celebrated Brandenburg Gate, was +fairly and grandly revived in the Hauptwache Theatre and the beautiful +Museum and the Bauschule and Observatory of Berlin. He competed with +Klenze in a series of designs for the new palace at Athens, rich with a +truly royal array of courts, corridors, saloons, and colonnades. But the +evil fate which ever hangs over the competitions of genius was baleful +even here, and the barrack-like edifice of Guetner was preferred. His +latest conception was a design of a summer palace at Orianda, in the +Crimea, for the Empress of Russia, where the purity of the old Greek +lines was developed into the poetry of terraces and hanging-gardens and +towers, far-looking over the Black Sea. Schinkel was called the Luther +of Architecture; and the spiritual serenity which he breathed into the +pomp and ceremonious luxury of the Art of his day seems to give him some +title to this distinction. Yet, with all the freedom and originality +with which he wrought out the new advent, he was perhaps rather too +timid than too bold in his reforms,--adhering too strictly to the +original letter of Greek examples, especially with regard to the orders. +He could not entirely shake off the old incubus of Rome. + +And so, though in a less degree, with Klenze. When, in 1825, Louis of +Bavaria came to the throne, he was appointed Government Architect, and +in this capacity gave shape to the noble dreams of that monarch, in the +famous Glyptotheque, the Pinacotheque, the palace, and those civil and +ecclesiastical buildings which render Munich one of the most monumental +cities of Europe. It was his confessed aim to take up the work of the +Renaissance artists, having regard to our increased knowledge of that +antique civilization of which the masters of the sixteenth century could +study only the most complex developments, and those models of Rome which +were farthest removed from the pure fountain-head of Greece. "To-day," +he said, "put in possession of the very principles of Hellenic Art, +we can apply them to all our actual needs,--learning from the Greeks +themselves to preserve our independence, and at the same time to be duly +novel and unrestrained according to circumstances." These are certainly +noble sentiments; and one cannot but wish, that, when, in 1830, Klenze +was called upon to prepare plans for the grand Walhalla of Bavaria, he +had remembered his sublime theory and worked up to its spirit, instead +of recalling the Parthenon in his exterior and the Olympian temple of +Agrigentum in his interior. The last effort of this distinguished artist +was the building of three superb palaces for the museum of the Emperor +at St. Petersburg, finished in 1851. + +The seed thus planted fell upon good ground and brought forth a +hundred-fold. Then, throughout Germany, the scholastic formalism of the +old Renaissance began to fall into disrepute, and a finer feeling for +the eloquence of pure lines began to show itself. The strict limitations +of the classic orders were no longer recognized as impassable; a +sentiment of artistic freedom, a consciousness of enlarged resources, +a far wider range of form and expression, were evident in town and +country, in civil and ecclesiastical structures; and with all this +delightful and refreshing liberty was mingled that peculiar refinement +of line which was revived from Greece and was the secret of this change. +It was not over monumental edifices alone that this calm and thoughtful +spirit was breathed, but the most playful fancies of domestic +architecture derived from it an increased grace and purity, and the +study of Love moved over them, elegant and light-footed as Camilla. + + "The flower she touched on dipped and rose, + And turned to look at her." + +This revival of Hellenic principles is now infusing life into modern +German designs; and so well are these principles beginning to be +understood, that architects do not content themselves with the mere +reproduction of that narrow range of motives which was uttered in the +temples of heroic Greece, but, under these new impulses, they gather in +for their use all that has been done in ancient or modern Italy, in the +Romanesque of Europe, in the Gothic period, in Saracenic or Arabic Art, +in all the expressions of the old Renaissance. By the very necessity +of the Greek line, they are rendered catholic and unexcluding in their +choice of forms, but fastidious and hesitating in their interpretation +of them into this new language of Art. Thus the good work is going on in +Germany, and architecture _lives_ there, thanks to those two illustrious +pilgrims who brought back from the land of epics, not only the +scallop-shells upon their shoulders, but in their hearts the +consecration of Ideal Beauty. + +According to the usual custom, in the year 1827, a scholar of the Ecole +des Beaux Arts in Paris, having achieved the distinguished honor of +being named _Grand Pensionnaire_ of Architecture for that year,--was +sent to the Academie Francaise in the Villa Medici at Rome, to pursue +his studies there for five years at the expense of the Government. This +scholar was Henri Labrouste. While in Italy, his attention was directed +to the Greek temples of Paestum. Trained, as he had been, in the +strictest academic architecture of the Renaissance, he was struck by +many points of difference between these temples and the Palladian +formulae which had hitherto held despotic sway over his studies. In +grand and minor proportions, in the disposition of triglyphs in the +frieze, in mouldings and general sentiment, he perceived a remarkable +freedom from the restraints of his school,--a freedom which, so far from +detracting from the grandeur of the architecture, gave to it a degree of +life and refinement which his appreciative eye now sought for in vain +among the approved models of the Academy. Studying these new revelations +with love and veneration, it was not long before the pure Hellenic +spirit, confined in the severe peristyles and cellas of the Paestum +temples, entered into his heart, with all its elastic capacities, all +its secret and mysterious sympathies for the new life which had sprung +up during its long imprisonment in those stained and shattered marbles. +Labrouste, on his return to Paris, in 1830, surprised the grave +professors of the Academy, Le Bas, Baltard, and the rest, by presenting +to them, as the result of his studies, carefully elaborated drawings +of the temples at Paestum. Witnessing, with pious horror, the grave +departures from their rules contained in the drawings of their former +favorite, they charged him with error, even as a copyist. True to their +prejudices, their eyes did not penetrate beyond the outward type, and +they at once began to find technical objections. They told him, never +did such an absurdity occur in classic architecture as a triglyph on a +corner! Palladio and the Italian masters never committed such an obvious +crime against propriety, nor could an instance of it be found in all +Roman antiquities. It was in vain that poor Labrouste upheld the +accuracy of his work, and reminded the Academy that among the Roman +models no instance had been found of a Doric corner,--that this order +occurred only so ruined that no corner was left for examination, or in +the grand circumferences of the Colosseum and the Theatre of Marcellus, +where, from the nature of the case, no corner could be. The professors +still maintained the integrity of their long-established ordinances, +and, to disprove the assertions of the young pretender, even sent +a commission to examine the temples in question. The result was a +confirmation of the fact, the ridicule of Paris, the consequent branding +of the young artist as an architectural heretic, and a continued +persecution of him by the Ecole des Beaux Arts. Undaunted, however, +Labrouste established an _atelier_ in Paris, to which flocked many +intelligent students, sympathizing with the courage which could be +so strong in the conviction of truth as to brave in its defence the +displeasure of the powerful hierarchy of the School. + +Thus was founded the new Renaissance in France; and, in this genial +atmosphere, Greek lines began to exercise an influence far more thorough +and healthy than had hitherto been experienced in the whole history of +Art. To the lithe and elegant fancy of the French this Revelation was +especially grateful. For the youth of this nation soon learned that +in these newly opened paths, their invention and sentiment, so long +straitened and confined within the severe limits of the old system, +could move with the utmost freedom, and at the same time be preserved +from licentious excess by the delicate spirit of the new lines. Thus +natural fervor, grace, and fecundity of thought found here a most +welcome outlet. + +For some time the designs of the new school were not recognized in the +competitions of the Ecole des Beaux Arts; but when, in the course of +Nature, some two or three of the more strenuous and bigoted professors +of Palladio's golden rules were removed from the scene of contest, the +_Romantique_ (for so the new system had been named) was received at +length into the bosom of the architectural church, and now it may be +justly deemed _the distinctive architectural expression of French Art_. + +Labrouste was not alone in his efforts; but Duban and Constant Dufeux +seconded him with genius and energy. Most of the important buildings +which have been erected in France within the last six or eight years +have either been unreservedly and frankly in the new style, or been +refined by more limited applications of Hellenic principles. Even the +revived Mediaeval school, which, under the distinguished leadership of +M. Viollet le Duc and the lamented M. J.B.A. Lassus, has lately been +strengthened to a remarkable degree in France, and which shared with +the _Romantique_ the displeasure of the Academy,--even this has tacitly +acknowledged the power of Greek lines, and instinctively suffered them +to purify, to a certain degree, the old grotesque Gothic license. Most +of the modern buildings of Paris along the new Boulevards, around the +tower of St. Jacques, and wherever else the activity of the Emperor +has made itself felt in the improvements of the French capital, are by +masters or pupils of the _Romantique_ persuasion, and, in their design, +are distinguished by that tenderness of Love and earnestness of Thought +which are the fountains of living Art. One of the most remarkable +peculiarities of this school is, that it brings out of every mind which +studies and builds in it strong traits of individuality; so that every +work appears as if its author had something particular to express in +it,--something to say with especial grace and emphasis. The ordinary +decorations of windows and doors are not made in conventional shapes, +as of yore, but are highly idiosyncratic. The designer had a distinct +thought about this window or that door,--and when he would use his +thought to ornament these features, he idealized it with his Greek lines +to make it architectural, just as a poet attunes his thought to the +harmony and rhythm of verse. Antique prejudices, bent into rigid +conformity with antique rubrics, are often shocked at the strange +innovations of these new Dissenters from the faith of Palladio and +Philibert Delorme,--shocked at the naked humanity in the new works, +and would cover it with the conventional fig-leaves prescribed in the +homilies of Vignola. Laymen, accustomed to the cold architectural +proprieties of the old Renaissance, and habituated to the formalities +of the five orders, the prudish decorum of Italian window-dressings and +pediments and pilasters and scrolls, are apt to be surprised at such +strange dispositions of unprecedented and heretical features, that the +intention of the building in which they occur is at once patent to the +most casual observer, and the story of its destination told with the +eloquence of a poetical and monumental language. All great revolutions +have proved how hard it is to break through the crust of custom, and +this has been no exception to the rule; yet in justice it must be said +that every intelligent mind, every eye possessing the "gifted simplicity +of vision", to use a happy phrase of Hawthorne's, recognizes the truth +and wisdom there are in the blessed renovations of the _Romantique_, +and looks upon them as the sweeps of a besom clearing away the dust +and cobwebs which ages of prejudice have spread thickly around the +magnificent art of architecture. + +Unlike the unwieldy and ponderous classic or Italian systems, whose +pride cannot stoop to anything beneath the haughtiest uses of life +without being broken into the whims of the grotesque and _Rococo_, the +_Romantique_ has already exhibited the graceful ease with which it may +be applied to the most playful as well as the most serious employments +of Art. It has decorated the perfumer's shop on the Boulevards with the +most delicate fancies woven out of the odor of flowers and the finest +fabrics of Nature, and, in the hands of Labrouste, has built the great +Bibliotheque Ste. Genevieve, the most important work with pure Greek +lines, and perhaps the most exquisite, while it is one of the most +serious, of modern buildings. The lore of the classics and the knowledge +of the natural world, idealized and harmonized by affectionate study, +are built up in its walls, and, internally and externally, it is a work +of the highest Art. The _Romantique_ has also been used with especial +success in funereal monuments. Structures of this character, demanding +earnestly in their composition the expression of human sentiment, have +hitherto been in most cases unsatisfactory, as they have been built +out of a narrow range of Renaissance, Egyptian and Gothic _motives_, +originally invented for far different purposes, and, since then, +_classified_, as it were, for use, and reduced to that inflexible system +out of which have come the formal restrictions of modern architecture. +Hence these _motives_ have never come near enough to human life, in its +individual characteristics, to be plastic for the expression of those +emotions to which we desire to give the immortality of stone in memory +of departed friends. The _Romantique_, however, confined to no rigid +types of external form, out of its noble freedom is capable of giving +"a local habitation and a name" to a thousand affections which hitherto +have wandered unseen from heart to heart, or been palpable only in words +and gestures which disturb our sympathies for a while and then die. +Probably the most remarkable indication of this capacity, as yet shown, +is contained in a tomb erected by Constant Dufeux in the Cimetiere du +Sud, near Paris, for the late Admiral Dumont d'Urville. This structure +contains in its outlines a symbolic expression of human life, death, +and immortality, and in its details an architectural version of the +character and public services of the distinguished deceased. The finest +and most eloquent resources of color and the chisel are brought to bear +on the work; and the whole, combined by a very sensitive and delicate +feeling for proportion, thus embodies one of the most expressive elegies +ever written. The tomb of Madame Delaroche, _nee_ Vernet, in the +Cimetiere Montmartre, by Duban, is another remarkable instance of this +elastic capacity of Greek lines; and though taken frankly, in its +general form, from a common Gothic type, its chaste and graceful +freedom from Gothic restrictions in detail gives it a life and poetic +expressiveness which must be exceedingly grateful to the Love which +commanded its erection. + +Paris thus affords us, in its modern architecture, a happy proof of the +inevitable reforming and refining tendencies of the abstract lines +of Greece, when properly understood and fairly applied. Under their +influence old things have been made new, and the coldness and hardness +of Academic Art have been warmed and softened into life. Through the +agency of the _Romantique_ school, perhaps more new and directly +symbolic architectural expressions have been uttered within the last +four years than within the last four centuries combined. Like the +gestures of pantomime, which constitute an instinctive and universal +language, these abstract lines, coming out of our humanity and rendered +elegant by the idealization of study, are restoring to architecture its +highest capacity of conveying thought in a monumental manner. One of the +most dangerous results of that eclecticism which the advanced state of +our archaeological knowledge has made the principal characteristic +of modern design consists in the fatal facility thus afforded us +of availing ourselves of vast resources of forms and combinations +ready-made to suit almost all the exigencies of composition, as we have +understood it. The public has thus been made so familiar with the set +variations of classic orders and Palladian windows and cornices, with +all manner of Gothic chamfers and cuspidations and foliations, and the +other conventional symbols of architecture, which undeniably have more +of _knowledge_ than _love_ in them,--so accustomed have the people +become to these things, that the great art of which these have been the +only language now almost invariably fails to strike any responsive chord +in the human heart or to do any of that work which it is the peculiar +province of the fine arts to accomplish. Instead of leading the age, it +seems to lag behind it, and to content itself with reflecting into our +eyes the splendor of the sun which has set, instead of facing the east +and foretelling the glory which is coming. Architecture, properly +conceived, should always contain within itself a direct appeal to the +sense of fitness and propriety, the common-sense of mankind, which is +ever ready to recognize reason, whether conveyed by the natural motions +of the mute or the no less natural motions of lines. Now history has +proved to us, as has been shown, how, when the eloquence of these +simple, instinctive lines has been used as the primary element of +design, great eras of Art have arisen, full of the sympathies of +humanity, immortal records of their age. It cannot be denied, on the +other hand, that our eclectic architecture, popularly speaking, is not +comprehended, even by the most intelligent of cultivated people; and +this is plainly because it is based on learning and archeology, +instead of that natural love which scorns the limitations of any other +_authorities and precedents_ than those which can be found in the human +heart, where the true architecture of our time is lying unsuspected, +save in those half-conscious Ideals which yearn for free expression in +Art. + +Let our artists turn to Greece, and learn how, in the meditative repose +of that antiquity, these Ideals arose to life beneficent with the +baptism of grace, and became visible in the loveliness of a hundred +temples. Let them there learn how in our own humanity is the essence of +form as a language, and that _to create_, as true artists, we must +know ourselves and our own distinctive capacities for the utterance of +monumental history. After this sublime knowledge comes the necessity +of the knowledge of precedent. The great Past supplies us with the raw +material, with orders, colonnades and arcades, pediments, consoles, +cornices, friezes and architraves, buttresses, battlements, vaults, +pinnacles, arches, lintels, rustications, balustrades, piers, pilasters, +trefoils, and all the innumerable conventionalities of architecture. It +is plainly our duty not to revive and combine these in those cold and +weary changes which constitute modern design, but to make them live and +speak intelligibly to the people through the eloquent modifications of +our own instinctive lines of Life and Beauty. + +The riddle of the modern Sphinx is, How to create a new architecture? +and we find the Oedipus who shall solve it concealed in our own hearts. + + + * * * * * + + +THE ORDEAL BY BATTLE. + + +Virginia, which began by volunteering as peacemaker in our civil +troubles, seems likely to end by being their battleground; as Mr. +Pickwick, interfering between the belligerent rival editors, only +brought upon his own head the united concussion of their carpet-bags. +And as Dickens declares that the warriors engaged far more eagerly in +that mimic strife, on discovering that all blows were to be received +by deputy, so there is evidently an increased willingness to deal hard +knocks on both sides, in the present case, so long as it is clear that +only Virginia will take them. Maryland, under protection of our army, +adroitly contrives to shift the scene of action farther South. The Gulf +States, with profuse courtesies for the Old Dominion, consent to shift +it farther North. The Southern Confederacy has talked about +paying Richmond the "compliment" of selecting it for the seat of +government;--as if a bully, about to be lynched in his own house by the +crowd, should compliment his next-door neighbor by climbing in at his +window. It is very pleasant to have a hospitable friend; but it is +counting on his hospitality rather too strongly, when you make choice of +his apartments to be tarred and feathered in. + +Thus fades the fancy of an "independent neutrality" for the Old +Dominion. It ought to fade;--for neutrality is a crime, where one's +mother's life is at stake; and the Border theory of independence only +reminds one of Pitt's definition of an independent statesman, "a +statesman not to be depended on". How sad has been the decline of +Virginia! How strange, that in 1790, of the ten American post-offices +yielding more than a thousand dollars annually, that stately old +commonwealth held five! Now "a poverty-stricken State", by confession of +her own newspapers,--beleaguered, blockaded,--with no imports but +hungry and moneyless soldiers, and no exports save fugitives of all +colors,--what has she to hope from the present warfare? Elsewhere riches +have wings; in Virginia they are yet more transitory, having legs. Two +hundred million dollars' worth of her property has become unsalable, if +not worthless, within two months. She has but two great staples: tobacco +to send North, and slaves to send South. The slaves at present go only +to the wrong point of the compass, at rates remunerative to themselves +alone; and the tobacco-trade, for this season, will not even end in +smoke. + +But that which is now the condition of Virginia must ultimately be +the condition of the other seceding States. The tide of Secession has +already turned, and such tides never turn twice. The conspirators in +Maryland and Missouri had but one opportunity, and it was lost; with it +also went the whole cause of the Secessionists. For one week the North +shuddered, knowing the defenceless condition of Washington. Now no +Northern man shudders, except those whose Southern female cousins have +not yet found a refuge with the household gods of the eminent Senator +from Texas. + +The man who ever doubted that the first gun fired by the insurgents +would instantly unite the nation against them knew as little of the +American people as if he were editor of the London "Times." There is no +chemical solvent like gunpowder. Even the Mexican War, utterly opposed +to the moral convictions of the majority of Northern men, swept them +away in such a current that the very party which opposed it could find +no path to the Presidency but for its chief hero. Had the present +outbreak occurred far less favorably than it has, had the discretion of +President Lincoln been much less, or that of Mr. Davis much greater, +still the unanimity would have been merely a question of time, and +the danger of Washington would have reconciled all minor feuds. The +Democratic party would inevitably have embraced the war, when once +declared; Douglas would have made speeches for it, Buchanan subscribed +money for it, and Butler joined in it; Bennett would still have floated +triumphant on the tide of zeal, and Caleb Cushing still have offered to +the Government his cavalry company of one. It is a grace not given to +any American party, to stand out long against the enthusiasm of a war. + +No doubt the Secession leaders have treated us very handsomely, as to +amount of provocation. It is rare that any great contest begins by a +blow so unequivocal as the bombardment of Fort Sumter; and rare in +recent days for any set of belligerents to risk the ignominy of +privateering. But, after all, it is the startling social theories +announced by the new "government" which form the chief strength of its +enemies. Either slavery is essential to a community, or it must be fatal +to it,--there is no middle ground; and the Secessionists have taken one +horn of the dilemma with so delightful a frankness as to leave us no +possible escape from taking the other. Never, in modern days, has there +been a conflict in which the contending principles were so clearly +antagonistic. The most bigoted royal house in Europe never dreamed of +throwing down the gauntlet for the actual ownership of man by man. Even +Russia never fought for serfdom, and Austria has only enslaved nations, +not individuals. In civil wars, especially, all historic divergences +have been trivial compared to ours, so far as concerned the avowed +principles of strife. In the French wars of the Fronde, the only +available motto for anybody was the _Tout arrive en France_, "Anything +may happen in France," which gayly recognized the absurd chaos of the +conflict. In the English civil wars, the contending factions first +disagreed upon a shade more or less of royal prerogative, and it took +years to stereotype the hostility into the solid forms with which we now +associate it. Even at the end of that contest, no one had ventured to +claim such a freedom as our Declaration of Independence asserts, on +the one side,--nor to recognize the possibility of such a barbarism +as Jefferson Davis glorifies, on the other. The more strongly the +Secessionists state their cause, the more glaringly it is seen to differ +from any cause for which any sane person has taken up arms since the +Roman servile wars. Their leaders may be exhibiting very sublime +qualities; all we can say is, as Richardson said of Fielding's heroes, +that their virtues are the vices of a decent man. + +We are now going through not merely the severest, but the only danger +which has ever seriously clouded our horizon. The perils which harass +other nations are mostly traditional for us. Apart from slavery, +democratic government is long since _un fait accompli_, a fixed fact, +and the Anglo-American race can no more revert in the direction of +monarchy than of the Saurian epoch. Our geographical position frees us +from foreign disturbance, and there is no really formidable internal +trouble, slavery alone excepted. Let us come out of this conflict +victorious in the field, escaping also the more serious danger of +conquering ourselves by compromise, and the case of free government is +settled past cavil. History may put up her spy-glass, like Wellington at +Waterloo, saying, "The field is won. Let the whole line advance." + +There has been a foolish suspicion that the North was strong in +diplomacy and weak in war. The contrary is the case. We are proving +ourselves formidable enough in war to cover our shortcomings in +diplomacy. How narrowly we escaped demoralizing ourselves, at the last +moment before Congress adjourned, by some concession which would have +destroyed our consistency without strengthening our position! If we +could even now bind our generals to imitate our Cabinet in its admirable +and novel policy of silence,--to eschew pen and ink as carefully as if +they were in training for the Presidency! The country is safe so long as +they shut their mouths and open their batteries. + +The ordeal by battle is a stern test of the solid power of a nation. +There must always be some great quality to produce great military +superiority,--skill, or daring, or endurance, or numbers, or wealth, +or all together. Except the first two, neither of these special +qualifications has been even claimed by the Secessionists; and these two +have been taken for granted with such superfluous boastfulness as to +yield strong internal evidence against the claim. Certainly their +general strategy, up to this moment, has yielded not a single evidence +of far-sighted judgment or conscious power, while it has shown decided +glimpses of weakness and indecision. Indeed, how can an army like theirs +be strong? Its members mostly unaccustomed to steady exertion or precise +organization; without mechanic skill or invention; without cash or +credit; fettered in their movements by the limited rolling stock of +their scanty railways; tethered to their own homes by the fear of +insurrection;--what element of solid strength have they, to set against +these things? In the present state of the world, strong in peace is +strong in war. In modern times an army of heroes is useless without +facilities for arming, transporting, and feeding it, to say nothing of +the more ignoble circumstance of pay. Considerations of simple political +economy render it almost impossible for a slaveholding army to be strong +collectively, nor do the habits of Southern life usually fit its members +to be strong singly. + +In remembering the Battle of New Orleans, we forget that the Southwest +was then a region of hardy pioneers, such as are now rather to be sought +for in Kansas and California. The famous Tennessee riflemen of that day +were not necessarily slaveholders, and their legitimate descendants are +yet to be found among the brave men who rally round the nearest approach +to Andrew Jackson whom the State now boasts,--a tolerable fac-simile +both as to character and etymology,--Andrew Johnson. There is no need of +disparaging the personal courage of any man, and the Southern army has +some good officers,--too good, probably, in spite of themselves, to +bring to bear their clearest judgment and their best energies in +striking down the flag they have all sworn to die for. They have +eminent foreign advisers also, or one at least; for Mr. W.H. Russell, +self-appointed plenipotentiary near the Court of St. Jefferson, is +said to have lent the aid of his valuable military experience to that +commanding officer so appropriately named Captain Bragg. But, Bragg or +no brag, it is almost a moral impossibility that a slaveholding army +should be strong. + +The Secessionists have suggested to us a fatal argument. "The superior +race must control the inferior." Very well; if they insist on invoking +the ordeal by battle to decide which is the superior, let it be so. It +will be found that they have made the common mistake of confounding +barbarism with strength. Because the Southern masses are as ignorant of +letters and of arts as the Scottish Highlanders, they infer themselves +to be as warlike. But even the brave and hardy Highlanders proved +powerless against the imperfect military resources of England, a century +ago, and it is not easy to see why those who now parody them should +fare better. The absence of the alphabet does not necessarily prove the +presence of strength, nor is the ignorance of all useful arts the best +preparation for the elaborate warfare of modern times. The nation is +grown well weary of this sham "chivalry," that would sell Bayard or Du +Gueselin at auction, if it could be shown that the mother of either had +a drop of marketable blood in her veins. It had always been charitably +fancied that in South Carolina at least there was some remnant of more +knightly honor, until a kind Providence sent Preston S. Brooks to dispel +the illusion. It may be possible that even a brave man, in some moment +of insane inconsistency, may commit some act which is the consummation +of all cowardice; but it is utterly and absolutely impossible that any +brave community should approve it. Time has long since carried the +perpetrator of that dastardly outrage to a higher tribunal, but nothing +can ever redeem the State of his birth from the crowning shame of its +indorsement. + +It is not recorded whether the proverbial English army in Flanders lied +as terribly as they swore; the genius of the nation did not take that +direction. But if they did, they have now met their match in audacity of +falsehood. Captain Bobadil in the play, who submitted a plan of killing +off an army of forty thousand men by the prowess of twenty, each man to +do his twenty _per diem_ in successive single combats, might have raised +his proposed score of heroes among any handful of Secessionists. There +seems to be no one to stop these prodigious fellows as a party of +Buford's men were once checked by their commander, in the writer's +hearing, on their way down the Missouri River, in 1856. "Boys," quoth +the contemptuous official, "you had better shut up. Whenever we came in +sight of the enemy, you always took a vote whether to fight or run, +and you always voted to run." Then the astounding tales they have told +respecting our people, down to the last infamous fabrication of "Booty +and Beauty," as the supposed war-cry for the placid Pennsylvanians! +Booty, forsooth! In the words of the "Richmond Whig," "there is more +rich spoil within a square mile of New York and Philadelphia than can be +found in the whole of the poverty-stricken State of Virginia"; and the +imaginary war-cry suggests Wilkes's joke about the immense plunder +carried off by some freebooter from the complete pillage of seven Scotch +isles: he reembarked with three-and-sixpence. + +It might not be wise to claim that the probable lease of life for our +soldiers is any longer than for the Secessionists, but it certainly +looks as if ours would have the credit of dying more modestly. Indeed, +the men of the Free States, as was the wont of their ancestors, have +made up their minds to this fight with a slow reluctance which would +have been almost provoking but for the astonishing promptness which +marked their action when once begun. It is interesting to notice how +clearly the future is sometimes foreseen by foreigners, while still +veiled from the persons most concerned. Thus, twelve years before the +Battle of Bunker's Hill, the Duc de Choiseul predicted and prepared for +the separation of the American colonies from England. One month after +that, the Continental Congress still clung to the belief that they +should escape a division. And so, some seven years ago, the veteran +French advocate Guepin, in a most able essay suggested by the "Burns +affair" in Boston, prophesied civil war in America within ten years. +"_Une grande lutte s'apprete donc_," he wrote; "A great contest is at +hand." + +Thus things looked to foreigners, both in 1775 and in 1854, while in +both cases our people were yielding only step by step to the inevitable +current which swept events along. It is the penalty of caution, that it +sometimes appears, even to itself, like irresolution, or timidity. Not a +foolish charge has been brought against Northern energy in this contest, +that was not urged equally in the time of the Revolution. The royal +troops thought Massachusetts as easy to subdue as the South +Carolinians affect to think, and expressed it in almost the same +language:--"Whenever it comes to blows, he that can run the fastest will +think himself best off." The revolutionists admitted that "the people +abroad have too generally got the idea that the Americans are all +cowards and poltroons." A single regiment, it was generally asserted, +could march triumphant through New England. The people took no pains to +deny it. The guard in Boston captured thirteen thousand cartridges at +a stroke. The people did not prevent it. A citizen was tarred and +feathered in the streets by the royal soldiery, while the band played +"Yankee Doodle." The people did not interfere. "John Adams writes, there +is a great spirit in the Congress, and that we must furnish ourselves +with artillery and arms and ammunition, but avoid war, if possible,--if +possible." At last, one day, these deliberate people finally made up +their minds that it was time to rise,--and when they rose, everything +else fell. In less than a year afterwards, Boston being finally +evacuated, one of General Howe's mortified officers wrote home to +England, in words which might form a Complete Letter-Writer for every +army-officer who has turned traitor, from Beauregard downward,--"Bad +times, my dear friend. The displeasure I feel in the small share I have +in our present insignificancy is so great, that I do not know the thing +so desperate I would not undertake, in order to change our situation." + +It is fortunate that the impending general contest has also been +recently preceded by a local one, which, though waged under +circumstances far less favorable to the North, yet afforded important +hints by its results. It was worth all the cost of Kansas to have +the lesson she taught, in passing through her ordeal. It was not the +Emigrant Aid Society which gave peace at last to her borders, nor was it +her shifting panorama of evanescent governors; it was the sheer physical +superiority of her Free-State emigrants, after they took up arms. Kansas +afforded the important discovery, as some Southern officers once naively +owned at Lecompton, that "Yankees _would_ fight." Patient to the verge +of humiliation, the settlers rose at last only to achieve a victory so +absurdly rapid that it was almost a new disappointment; the contest was +not so much a series of battles as a succession of steeplechases, of +efforts to get within shot,--Missouri, Virginia, and South Carolina +invariably disappearing over one prairie-swell, precisely as the +Sharp's rifles of the emigrants appeared on the verge of the next. The +slaveholders had immense advantages: many of the settlers were in league +with them to drive out the remainder; they had the General Government +always aiding them, more or less openly, with money, arms, provisions, +horses, men, and leaders; they had always the Missouri border to retreat +upon, and the Missouri River to blockade. Yet they failed so miserably, +that every Kansas boy at last had his story to tell of the company of +ruffians whom he had set scampering by the casual hint that Brown or +Lane was lurking in the bushes. The terror became such a superstition, +that the largest army which ever entered Kansas--three thousand men, by +the admission of both sides--turned back before a redoubt at Lawrence +garrisoned by only two hundred, and retreated over the border without +risking an engagement. + +It is idle to say that these wore not fair specimens of Southern +companies. They were composed of precisely the same material as the +flower of the Secession army,--if flower it have. They were members of +the first families, planters' sons and embryo Wigfalls. South Carolina +sent them forth, like the present troops, with toasts and boasts and +everything but money. They had officers of some repute; and they had +enthusiasm with no limit except the supply of whiskey. Slavery was +divine, and Colonel Buford was its prophet. The city of Atchison was +before the dose of 1857 to be made the capital of a Southern republic. +Kansas was to be conquered: "We will make her a Slave State, or form a +chain of locked arms and hearts together, and die in the attempt." Yet +in the end there were no chains, either of flesh or iron,--no chains, +and little dying, but very liberal running away. Thus ended the war in +Kansas. It seems impossible that Slavery should not make in this case a +rather better fight, where all is at stake. But it is well to remember +that no Border Ruffian of Secession can now threaten more loudly, swear +more fiercely, or retreat more rapidly, than his predecessors did then. + +One does not hear much lately of that pleasant fiction, so abundant a +year or two ago, that North and South really only needed to visit each +other and become better acquainted. How cordially these endearing words +sounded, to be sure, from the lips of Southern gentlemen, as they sat at +Northern banquets and partook unreluctantly of Northern wine! Can those +be the gay cavaliers who are now uplifting their war-whoops with such a +modest grace at Richmond and Montgomery? Can the privations of the +camp so instantaneously dethrone Bacchus and set up Mars? It is to be +regretted; they appeared more creditably in their cups, and one would +gladly appeal from Philip sober to Philip drunk. Intimate intercourse +has lost its charm. New York merchants more than ever desire an +increased acquaintance with the coffers of their repudiating debtors; +but so far as the knowledge of their peculiar moral traits is concerned, +enough is as good as a feast. No Abolitionist has ever dared to pillory +the slave-propagandists so conspicuously as they are doing it for +themselves every day. Sumner's "Barbarism of Slavery" seemed tolerably +graphic in its time, but how tamely it reads beside the "New Orleans +Delta"! + +A Scotchman once asked Dr. Johnson what opinion he would form of +Scotland from what strangers had said of it. + +"Sir," said the Doctor, "I should think it a region of the earth to be +avoided, so far as convenient." + +"But how," persisted the patriot, "if you listened to what its natives +say of it?" + +"Then, Sir," roared Old Obstinacy, "I should avoid it altogether." + +Take the seceded States upon their own showing, and it is absurd to +suppose that they can ever resume their former standing in the nation. +Are there any stronger oaths than their generals have broken, any closer +ties to honesty than their financiers have spurned, any deeds more +damning than their legislatures have voted thanks for? No one supposes +that the individual traitors can be restored to confidence, that Twiggs +can re-dye his reputation, or any deep-sea-soundings fish up Maury's +drowned honor. But the influence of the States is gone with that of +their representatives. They may worship the graven image of President +Lincoln in Mobile; they may do homage to the ample stuffed regimentals +of General Butler in Charleston; but it will not make the nation forget. +Could their whole delegation resume its seat in Congress to-morrow, with +the three-fifths representation intact, it would not help them. Can we +ever trust them to build a ship or construct a rifle again? No time, +no formal act can restore the past relations, so long as slavery shall +live. It is easy for the Executive to pardon some convict from the +penitentiary; but who can pardon him out of that sterner prison of +public distrust which closes its disembodied walls around him, moves +with his motions, and never suffers him to walk unconscious of it +again? Henceforth he dwells as under the shadow of swords, and holds +intercourse with men only by courtesy, not confidence. And so will they. + +Not that the United States Government is yet prepared to avow itself +anti-slavery, in the sense in which the South is pro-slavery. We +conscientiously strain at gnats of Constitutional clauses, while they +gulp down whole camels of treason. We still look after their legal +safeguards long after they have hoisted them with their own petards. But +both sides have trusted themselves to the logic of events, and there is +no mistaking the direction in which that tends. In times like these, men +care more for facts than for phrases, and reason quite as rapidly as +they act. It is impossible to blink the fact that Slavery is the root +of the rebellion; and so War is proving itself an Abolitionist, whoever +else is. Practically speaking, the verdict is already entered, and the +doom of the destructive institution pronounced, in the popular mind. +Either the Secessionists will show fight handsomely, or they will fail +to do so. If they fail to do it, they are the derision of the world +forever,--since no one ever spares a beaten bully,--and thenceforward +their social system must go down of itself. If, on the other hand, they +make a resistance which proves formidable and costly, then the adoption +of the John-Quincy-Adams policy of military emancipation is an ultimate +necessity, and there is nobody more likely to put it in effective +operation than a certain gentleman who lately wrote an eloquent +letter to his Governor on the horrors of slave-insurrection. No doubt +insurrection is a terrible thing, but so is all war, and every man of +humanity approaches either with a shudder. But if the truth were told, +it would be that the Anglo-Saxon habitually despises the negro because +he is _not_ an insurgent, for the Anglo-Saxon would certainly be one in +his place. Our race does not take naturally to non-resistance, and has +far more spontaneous sympathy with Nat Turner than with Uncle Tom. But +be it as it may with our desires, the rising of the slaves, in case of +continued war, is a mere destiny. We must take facts as they are. + +Insurrection is one of the risks voluntarily assumed by Slavery,--and +the greatest of them. The slaves know it, and so do the masters. When +they seriously assert that they feel safe on this point, there is really +no answer to be made but that by which Traddles in "David Copperfield" +puts down Uriah Heep's wild hypothesis of believing himself an innocent +man. "But you don't, you know," quoth the straightforward Traddles; +"therefore, if you please, we won't suppose any such thing." They cannot +deceive us, for they do not deceive themselves. Every traveller who has +seen the faces of a household suddenly grow pale, in a Southern +city, when some street tumult struck to their hearts the fear of +insurrection,--every one who has seen the heavy negro face brighten +unguardedly at the name of John Brown, though a thousand miles away +from Harper's Ferry,--has penetrated the final secret of the military +weakness which saved Washington for us and lost the war for them. + +It is time to expose this mad inconsistency which paralyzes common sense +on all Southern tongues, so soon as Slavery becomes the topic. These +same negroes, whom we hear claimed, at one moment, as petted darlings +whom no allurements can seduce, are denounced, next instant, as fiends +whom a whisper can madden. Northern sympathizers are first ridiculed +as imbecile, then lynched as destructive. Either position is in itself +intelligible, but the combination is an absurdity. We can understand +why the proprietor of a powder-house trembles at the sight of flint +and steel; and we can also understand why some new journeyman, being +inexperienced, may regard the peril without due concern. But we should +decide either to be a lunatic, if he in one breath proclaimed his +gunpowder to be incombustible, and at the next moment assassinated a +visitor for lighting a cigar on the premises. A slave population is +either contented and safe, or discontented and unsafe; it cannot at the +same time be friendly and hostile, blissful and desperate. + +The result described is inevitable, should the Secessionists dare to +tempt the ordeal by battle long enough. If it stop short of this, it +will be because the prestige of Southern military power is so easily +broken down that there is no temptation to declare the Adams policy. +But even this consummation must have the most momentous results, and +entirely modify the whole anti-slavery movement of the nation. Should +the war cease to-morrow, it has inaugurated a new era in our nation's +history. The folly of the Gulf States, in throwing away a political +condition where the conservative sentiment stood by them only too well, +must inevitably recoil on their own heads, whether the strife last a day +or a generation. No man can estimate the new measures and combinations +to which it is destined to give rise. There stands the Constitution, +with all its severe conditions,--severe or weak, however, according to +its interpretations;--which interpretations, again, will always prove +plastic before the popular will. The popular will is plainly destined +to a change; and who dare predict the results of its changing? The +scrupulous may still hold by the letter of the bond; but since the +South has confessedly prized all legal guaranties only for the sake of +Slavery, the North, once free to act, will long to construe them, up to +the very verge of faith, in the interest of Liberty. Was the original +compromise, a Shylock bond?--the war has been our Portia. Slavery long +ruled the nation politically. The nation rose and conquered it with +votes. With desperate disloyalty, Slavery struck down all political +safeguards, and appealed to arms. The nation has risen again, ready to +meet it with any weapons, sure to conquer with any Twice conquered, what +further claim will this defeated desperado have? If it was a disturbing +element before, and so put under restriction, shall it be spared when it +has openly proclaimed itself a destroying element also? Is this to be +the last of American civil wars, or only the first one? These are the +questions which will haunt men's minds, when the cannon are all bushed, +and the bells are pealing peace, and the sons of our hearth-stones come +home. The watchword "Irrepressible Conflict" only gave the key, but War +has flung the door wide open, and four million slaves stand ready to +file through. It is merely a question of time, circumstance, and method. +There is not a statesman so wise but this war has given him new light, +nor an Abolitionist so self-confident but must own its promise better +than his foresight. Henceforth, the first duty of an American legislator +must be, by the use of all legitimate means, to weaken Slavery. _Delenda +est Servitudo_. What the peace which the South has broken was not doing, +the war which she has instituted must secure. + + * * * * * + + +THE UNITED STATES AND EUROPE. + + +The modern world differs from the world of antiquity in nothing more +than in the existence of a brotherhood of nations, which was unknown to +the ancients, who seem to have been incapable of understanding that it +was impossible for either good or evil to be confined within certain +limits. The attempts of the Persians to extend their dominion into +Europe did for a time cause some faint approach to ideas and practices +that are common to the moderns; but, as a general rule, every monarchy +or people had its own system, to which it adhered until it was worn out +by internal decay, or was overthrown by foreign conquest. It was owing +to this exclusiveness, and to the inability of ancient statesmen to work +out an international system, that the Romans were enabled to extend +their dominion until it comprehended the best parts of the world. Had +the rulers and peoples of Carthage, Macedonia, Greece, and Syria been +capable of forming an alliance for common defence, the conquests of Rome +in the East might have been early checked, and her efforts have been +necessarily confined to the North and the West. But no international +system then existed, and the rude attempts at mutual assistance that +were occasionally made, as the conquering race strode forward, were of +no avail; and the swords of the legionaries reaped the whole field. It +is singular that what is so well known to the moderns, and was known +to them at times when they were far inferior to the best races of +antiquity, should have remained unknown to the latter. The chief reason +of this want of combining power in men who have never been surpassed in +ability is to be found in the then prevailing idea, that every stranger +was an enemy. There was a total want of confidence in one another among +the peoples of the ante-Christian period. Differences of race were +augmented by differences in religion, and by the absence of strong +business interests. Christianity had not been vouchsafed to man, and +commerce had very imperfectly done its work, while war was carried on in +the most ruthless and destructive manner. + +The modern world differs in this matter entirely from the ancient world; +and though the change is perfect only in Christendom, the effect of it +is felt in countries where the Christian religion does not prevail, but +into which Christian armies and Christian merchants have penetrated. +Christendom is the leading portion of the world, and is fast giving +law to lands in which Christianity is still hated. It is the policy of +Christendom that orders the world. A Christian race rules over the whole +of that immense country, or collection of countries, which is known as +India. Another Christian race threatens to seize upon Persia. Christians +from the extreme West of Europe have dictated the terms of treaties to +the Tartar lords of China; and Christians from America have led the way +in breaking through the exclusive system of Japan. Christian soldiers +have for a year past acted as the police of Syria, Christianity's early +home, but now held by the most bigoted and cruel of Mussulmans; and it +is only the circumstance that they cannot agree upon a division of the +spoil that prevents the five great powers of Europe--the representatives +of the leading branches of the Christian religion--from partitioning +the vast, but feeble Ottoman Empire. The Christian idea of man's +brotherhood, so powerful in itself, is supported by material forces so +vast, and by ingenuity and industry so comprehensive and so various in +themselves and their results, that it must supersede all others, and +be accepted in every country where there are people capable of +understanding it. From the time of the first Crusade there has been a +steady tendency to the unity of Christian countries; and notwithstanding +all their conflicts with one another, and partly as one of the effects +of those conflicts, they have "fraternized," until now there exists a +mighty Christian Commonwealth, the members of which ought to be able to +govern the world in accordance with the principles of a religion that is +in itself peace. Under the influence of these principles, the Christian +nations, though not in equal degrees, have developed their resources, +and a commercial system has been created which has enlisted the material +interests of men on the same side with the highest teachings of the +purest religion. Selfishness and self-denial march under the same +banner, and men are taught to do unto others as they would that others +should do unto them, because the rule is as golden economically as it is +morally. This teaching, however, it must be allowed, is very imperfectly +done, and it encounters so many disturbing forces to its proper +development that an observer of the course of Christian nations might be +pardoned, if he were at times to suppose there is little of the spirit +of Christianity in the ordering of the policy of Christendom, and also +that the true nature of material interests is frequently misunderstood. +Still, it is undeniable that there is a general bond of union in +Christendom, and that no part of that division of the world can be +injured or improved without all the other parts of it being thereby +affected. What is known as "the business world" exists everywhere, but +it is in Christendom that it has its principal seats, and in which its +mightiest works are done. It forms one community of mankind; and what +depresses or exalts one nation is felt by its effects in all nations. +There cannot be a Russian war, or a Sepoy mutiny, or an Anglo-French +invasion of China, or an emancipation of the serfs of Russia, without +the effect thereof being sensibly experienced on the shores of Superior +or on the banks of the Sacramento; and the civil war that is raging in +the United States promises to produce permanent consequences to the +inhabitants of Central India and of Central Africa. The wars, floods, +plagues, and famines of the farthest East bear upon the people of the +remotest West. The Oregon flows in sympathy with the Ganges; and a very +mild winter in New England might give additional value to the ice-crop +of the Neva. So closely identified are all nations at this time, that +the hope that there may be no serious difficulties between the United +States and the Western powers of Europe, as a consequence of the Federal +Government's blockade of the Southern ports of the Union, is based as +much upon the prospect of the European food-crops being small this year +as upon the sense of justice that may exist in the bosoms of the rulers +of France and England. If those crops should prove to be of limited +amount, peace could be counted upon; if abundant, we might as well make +ample preparation for a foreign war. Nations threatened with scarcity +cannot afford to begin war, though they may find themselves compelled +to wage it. A cold season in Europe would be the best security that we +could have that we shall not be vexed with European intervention in +our troubles; for then Europeans would desire to have the privilege +of securing that portion of our food which should not be needed for +home-consumption. This is the fair side of the picture that is presented +by the bond of nations. There is another side to the picture, which is +far from being so agreeable to us, and which may be called the Cotton +side; and it is because England, and to a lesser degree France, is +of opinion that American cotton must be had, that our civil troubles +threaten to bring upon us, if not a foreign war, at least grave disputes +and difficulties with those European nations with which we are most +desirous of remaining on the best of terms, and to secure the friendship +of which all Americans are disposed to make every sacrifice that is +compatible with the preservation of national honor. + +From the beginning of the troubles in this country that have led to +civil war, the desire to know what course would be pursued by the +principal nations of Europe toward the contending parties has been very +strongly felt on both sides; but the feeling has been greater on the +side of the rebels than on that of the nation, because the rebellion has +depended even for the merest chance of success upon the favorable view +of European governments, and the nation has got beyond the point of +caring much for the opinions or the actions of those governments. The +Union's existence depends not upon European friendship or enmity; but +without the aid of the Old World, the new Confederacy could not look for +success, had it received twice the assistance it did from the Buchanan +administration, and were it formed of every Slaveholding State, with +not a Union man in it to wound the susceptible minds of traitors by his +presence. The belief among the friends of order was, that Europe would +maintain a rigid neutrality, not so much from regard to this country as +from disgust at the character of the Confederacy's polity, and at the +opinions avowed by its officers, its orators, and its journals, opinions +which had been most forcibly illustrated in advance by acts of the +grossest robbery. That any civilized nation should be willing to afford +any countenance, and exclusively on grounds of interest, to a band of +ruffians who avowed opinions that could not now find open supporters +in Bokhara or Barbary, was what the American people could not believe. +Conscious that the Southern rebellion was utterly without provocation, +and that it had been brought about by the arts of disappointed +politicians, most of us were convinced that the rebels would be +discountenanced by the rulers of every European state to whom their +commissioners should apply either for recognition or for assistance. +We knew the power of King Cotton was great, though much exaggerated in +words by his servile subjects; but we did not, because we could not, +believe that he was able to control the policy of old empires, to +subvert the principle of honor upon which aristocracies profess to rely +as their chief support, and to turn whole nations from the roads in +which they had been accustomed to travel. That Cotton has done this we +do not assert; but it has done not a little to show how feeble; the +regard of certain classes in Europe for morality, when adherence to +principle may possibly cause them some trouble, and perhaps lead to some +loss. If the Southern plant has not become the tyrant of Europe, as for +a long time it was of America, it has certainly done much in a brief +time to unsettle English opinion, and to convert the Abolitionists of +Great Britain, the men who could tax the whites of their empire in the +annual interest of one hundred million dollars in order that the slavery +of the blacks in that empire might come to an end, into the supporters +of American slavery, and of its extension over this continent, which +might be made into a Cotton paradise, if the supply of negroes from +Africa should not be interrupted; and the logical conclusion from the +position laid down by Lord John Russell is, that the slave-trade must +be revived, as that is what his "belligerent" friends of the Southern +Confederacy are contending for. The American people had long been +taunted by the English with their subserviency to the slaveholding +interest, and with their readiness to sacrifice the welfare of a weak +and wronged race on the altars of Mammon. Whether these taunts were +well deserved by us, we shall not stop to inquire; but it is the most +melancholy of facts, that, no sooner have we given the best evidence +which it is in our power to give of our determination to confine slavery +within its present limits, and to put an end to the abuse of our +Government's power by the slaveholders, than the Government of Great +Britain, acting as the agent and representative of the British nation, +places itself directly across our path, and prepares to tell us to +stay our hand, and not dare to meddle with the institution of slavery, +because from the success of that institution proceeds cotton, and upon +the supply of cotton not being interfered with depend the welfare and +the strength of the liberty-and-order loving and morality-and-religion +worshipping race! So far as they have dared to do it, the British +ministers have placed their country on the side of those men who have +revolted in America because they saw that they could no longer make use +of slavery to misgovern the Union; and we must wait to see how far they +are to be supported by the opinion of that country, before a distinction +can be made between the ministers and the people. Left to themselves, +and unbiased by any of those selfish motives that go to make up the sum +of politics, we have not the slightest doubt that the English people, in +the proportion of ten to one, would decide in behalf of the supporters +of freedom in this country; but we are by no means so sure that the +ministers would not be sustained, were they to plunge their country into +a third American War, and sustained, too, in sending fleets to raise +our blockade of the American coast of Africa, and armies to fight the +battles of Slavery in Virginia and the Carolinas, where British officers +stole negroes eighty years ago, and sent them to the West India markets, +and found that that kind of commerce flourished well in war. A war for +the maintenance of American slavery, and to secure for slaveholders +the full and perfect enjoyment of all the "rights" of their "peculiar" +property, would be no worse than was the war which was waged against our +ancestors of the Revolution, or than those wars which were carried on +against Republican and Imperial France, ostensibly for the preservation +of order, but really for the restoration of a despotism which cannot now +find a single apologist on earth. There is often a wide distinction to +be made between a nation and its government, as our own recent history +but too deplorably proves; and the men who govern England may be enabled +to do that now which has more than once been done by their predecessors, +array their country in support of evil against that country's sense and +wishes. We should be prepared for this, and should look the evil that +threatens us fairly in the face, as the first thing to be done to +prevent it from getting beyond the threatening-point. The words of Sir +Boyle Roche, that the best way to avoid danger is to meet it plump, are +strikingly applicable to our condition. If we would not have a foreign +war on our hands before we shall have settled with the rebels, we should +make it very clear to foreigners that to fight with us would be a sort +of business that would be sure not to pay. + +That war may follow from the course which England has elected to pursue +toward the parties to our civil conflict will not appear a strange view +of affairs to those who know something of the history of Great Britain +and the United States in the early part of this century. That which the +British Government is now doing bears strong resemblance to the course +which the same Government, with different ministers, pursued toward the +United States during the war with Napoleon I., and which led to the +contest of 1812,--a contest which Franklin had predicted, and which he +said would be our War of _Independence_, as that of 1775-83 had been +our War of _Revolution_. The same ignorance of America, and the same +disposition to insult, to annoy, and to injure Americans, that were so +common under the ministries of Pitt, Portland, and Perceval, and which +move both our mirth and our indignation when we read of them long after +the tormentors and the tormented have gone to their last repose, are +exhibited by the Palmerston Ministry,--though it is but justice to Lord +Palmerston to say, that he has borne himself more manfully toward us +than have his associates. England treats us as she would not dare to +treat any European power, making an exception in our case to her +general policy, which has been, since 1815, to truckle before her +contemporaries. She has crouched before France repeatedly, when she +had much better ground for fighting her than she now has for taking +preliminary steps to fight us. We are not entitled to the same treatment +that she thinks is due to the nations of the continent of Europe. She +cannot rid herself of the feeling that we still are colonists, and that +the rules which apply to her intercourse with old nations cannot apply +to her intercourse with us, the United States having been a portion of +the British Empire within the recollection of persons yet living. No +sooner, therefore, had a state of things arisen here that seemed to +warrant a renewal of the insulting treatment that was a thing of course +in 1807, than we were made to see how hollow were those professions of +friendship for America that were not uncommon in the mouths of British +statesmen during the ten or twelve years that preceded the advent of +Secession. So long as we were deemed powerful, we received assurances of +"the most distinguished consideration"; but we have at last ascertained +that those assurances were as false as they are when they are appended +to the letter of some diplomatist who is engaged in the work of cheating +some one who is neither better nor worse than himself. It is positively +mortifying to think how shockingly we have been taken in, and that the +"cordial understanding" that had, apparently, been growing up between +the two nations was a misunderstanding throughout, though we were +sincere in desiring its existence. Perhaps, when the evidences of the +strength that we possess, in spite of Secession, shall have all been +placed before the rulers of England, they will be found less ready to +quarrel with the American people than they were a month ago. A nation +that is capable of placing a quarter of a million of men in the field in +sixty days, and of giving to that immense force a respectable degree of +consistency and organization, is worth being conciliated after having +been insulted. But would any amount of conciliation suffice to restore +the feeling that existed here when the Prince of Wales was our guest? We +fear that it would not, and that for some years to come the sentiment +in America toward England will be as hostile as it was in the last +generation, when it was in the power of any politician to make political +capital by assailing the mother-land. The belief is created that England +in her heart hates us as profoundly as ever she did, that the forty-six +years' peace has produced no change in her feeling with respect to us, +and that she is watching ever for an opportunity to gratify the grudge +of which we are the object. Practically it will matter very little +whether this belief shall be well founded or not, so long as English +ministers, whether from want of judgment or from any other cause, shall +omit no occasion for the insulting and annoying of the United States. An +opinion that is sincerely held by the people of a powerful nation is in +itself a fact of the first importance, no matter whether it be founded +in truth or not; and if the blundering of another powerful nation shall +help to maintain that opinion, that nation would have no right to +complain of any consequences that should follow from its inability to +comprehend the condition of its neighbor. This country will not submit +to the degradation which England would inflict upon it, and which no +other European nation appears inclined to aid the insular empire in +inflicting. Even Spain, proverbially foolish in her foreign policy, and +seemingly unable to get within a hundred years of the present time, +observes a decorum in the premises to which Great Britain is a stranger. + +The manner of proceeding on the part of the British Government, and +the arguments which have been put forward in justification of its +pro-slavery policy, are serious aggravations of its original offence. +The first declaration of Lord John Russell, Secretary of State for +Foreign Affairs, was to the effect that England would not show any favor +to the Secessionists. His subordinate (Lord Wodehouse, Under-Secretary +of State for Foreign Affairs) was even more emphatic than his chief in +speaking to the same purpose. Suddenly, the Foreign Secretary turned +about, with a facility and promptness for which men had not been +prepared even by his rapid changes on the questions of the Russian War +and Italian Nationality, and said that the Southern Confederacy would be +recognized as a belligerent, which is, to all intents and purposes of a +practical character, the same thing as acknowledging it to be a nation. +What was the cause of this sudden change? We have only to look at the +dates of the events that, followed the fall of Fort Sumter to find an +answer. Lord John Russell believed that the capital of the United States +had fallen into the hands of the rebels, and he was anxious to please +the masters of the cotton-fields by showing them that he had not waited +to hear of their victory to behold their virtues. There was some excuse +for his belief that the raid upon Washington had succeeded; for down to +the 27th of April there was but too much reason for supposing that that +city was in serious danger of becoming the prey of the Confederates, +who might have taken it, if they had been half as forward in their +preparations for war as they were supposed to have been by the chiefs of +the British Government. But this belief that the rebels had delivered +an effective blow at the Union only places the meanness of Lord John +Russell and his associates in a worse light than we could view it in, +if they had acted solely upon principle. Their political opinions had +pledged them to oppose the principles of the Secessionists; but they +were in a hurry to give all the support they could to those principles, +because they had come to the conclusion that victory was to be with the +Secessionists. They desired to appropriate the merit of being the first +of European statesmen to welcome the destroyers of the American Union +into the family of nations. Had the event justified their expectations, +they would have gained much by their action, and would have enjoyed +whatever of glory the European world might have been disposed to accord +to the allies of American pirates. + +The Royal Proclamation of May 13th, in which the neutrality of England +is peremptorily laid down, and all British subjects are forbidden to +take any part in the war "between the Government of the United States of +America and certain States calling themselves the Confederate States of +America," is a paper in many respects most offensive to the people of +this country, though probably it was better in its intention than it +is in its execution. That part of it which most concerns us is the +recognition of "any blockade lawfully and actually established by or on +behalf of either of the said contending parties." It is important to us +that the British Government has admitted our right to blockade the ports +of the rebels, provided we shall do so in force; and though Lord Derby +has exhibited his ignorance of our naval power by saying that we cannot +enforce the blockade we have declared and instituted, we shall show to +the world, before the next cotton-crop shall be ready for exportation, +that we are fully up to the work that is demanded of us, by having at +least one hundred vessels, strongly armed and well manned, employed in +watching every part of the Southern coast to which any foreign ship +would think of going with a cargo or for the purpose of receiving one. +The naval strength of the Union is as capable of vast and effective +development as its military strength; and there is no reason why we +should not have afloat, and ready for action, by the beginning of +autumn, fleets sufficient to close up the Confederate ports as +thoroughly as the Allies closed those of Russia in 1854-6, and the +advanced guard of other fleets to be made ready to contend with the +forces that insolent foreign nations may send into the waters of America +for the purpose of fighting the battles of the slaveholders. + +With the single exception of the admission of the right of blockade, the +Royal Proclamation is unfriendly to the United States. It admits the +right of the Confederacy's Government to issue letters of marque, from +which it follows that American ships captured by cruisers of the rebels +could be taken into English ports, and there sold, after having been +condemned by prize courts sitting at any one of the places belonging +to the Confederacy. This is no light aid to the pirates; for there are +English ports on every sea, and on almost every one of the ocean's +tributaries. Vessels belonging to America, and captured by the +Confederacy's privateers in the Mediterranean, could be taken into +Gibraltar, into Valetta, and into Corfu, all of which are English ports. +Those captured in the Mexican Gulf and the Caribbean could be sent into +any one of the many ports that belong to England in the West Indies. +If captured in the North Atlantic, or the Baltic, or any other of the +waters of Northern Europe, they could be sent into the ports of England, +Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. In the South Atlantic are St. Helena and +Cape Town, which would afford shelter to Mr. Davis's privateers and +their prizes. In the East Indies British ports are numerous, from Aden +to the last places wrested from the Chinese, and they would be all open +to the enterprise of the Confederacy's cruisers. In the Pacific are +the English harbors on the Northwest Coast; and in Australia there are +British ports that ought, considering their origin, to be particularly +friendly to men who should enter the navy of the Secessionists. England +has in advance provided places for the transaction of all the business +that shall be necessary to render privateering profitable to the +"lawless brood" of the whole world. Into all of her thousand seaports +could the lucky Confederates go, and dispose of their captures, just as +the old Buccaneers used to sell their prizes in the ports of the English +colonies. Nor could all the efforts of all the navies of the world +prevent privateers from preying upon our commerce, as they are to be +commissioned in foreign countries, and will sail from the ports of those +countries. The East Indian seas, the Levant, and the Caribbean are the +old homes and haunts of pirates; and under the encouragement which +England is disposed to afford to piracy, for the especial benefit +of Slavery, the buccaneering business could not fail to flourish +exceedingly. True, our Government would not allow privateers to be +fitted out in our ports, during the Russian War, to prey upon the +commerce of France and England; but what of that? One good turn does +_not_ deserve another, according to the public morality of nations so +orderly and pious as are England and France. + +According to the Royal Proclamation, the blockade of any one of the +Northern ports by one of the ships of the Secessionists would be as +lawful an act as the blockade of Charleston by a dozen of the Union's +cruisers; and England allows that a privateer from Pensacola could seize +an English ship that should be engaged in bringing arras to New York or +Philadelphia. Thus are the two "parties" to the war placed on the same +footing by the decision of the English Government, though the one party +is a nation having treaties with England, and engaged in maintaining the +cause of order, and the other is only a band of conspirators, who have +established their power through the institution of a system of terror, +much after the fashion of Monsieur Robespierre and his associates, whose +conduct was so offensive to all Britons seven-and-sixty years ago. But +Montgomery is much farther from England than Paris, and the French had +no cotton to tempt the British statesmen of 1793-4 to strike an account +between manufacturing and morality. Distance and time appear to have +united their powers to make things appear fair in the eyes of Russell +that inexpressibly horrible to those of "the monster Pitt." + +The Royal Proclamation forbids Englishmen affording the Union assistance +in any way. No British gunmaker can sell us a weapon, no English +merchant can use one of his ships to send us the cannon and rifles we +have purchased in his country, and no English subject of any degree can +lawfully carry a despatch for our Government. Never was there--a +more forbidding state-paper put forth; and the arid language of the +Proclamation is rendered doubly disagreeable by the purpose for which +it is employed. We are placed by its terms on the level of the men of +Montgomery, who must be vastly pleased to see that they are held in as +much esteem in England as are the constitutional authorities of the +United States. If we were to seek for a contrast to this extraordinary +document, we should find it in the proclamation put forth by our own +Government at the time of the "Canadian Rebellion," and in which it was +_not_ sought to convey the impression that we had the right to regard +rebels and loyalists as men entitled to the same treatment at our hands. +It is a source of pride to Americans, that nothing in their own history +can be quoted in justification of the cold-blooded conduct of the +British Government. + +It has been sought to defend the action of England by referring to +precedents. We are reminded by Lord John Russell of the acknowledgment +of the Greeks as belligerents by England; and others have pointed to her +acknowledgment of the Belgians, and of those Spanish--Americans who had +revolted against the rule of Old Spain. We cannot go into an extended +examination of these precedents, for the purpose of showing that they do +not apply to the present case; but we may say, and an examination into +the facts will be found to justify our assertion, that England was in +no such hurry to acknowledge the Greeks, the Belgians, and the +Spanish-Americans as she has been to acknowledge the Secessionists. +Years elapsed after the beginning of the struggle in Greece before the +English Government professed to regard the parties to that memorable +conflict even with indifference. The British historian of the Greek +Revolution, writing of the year 1821, says,--"Among the European +Governments, England was probably, next to Austria, the one most hostile +to Greece at that period, when her foreign policy was guided by a spirit +akin to that of Metternich; the hired organs of Ministry were loud in +defence of Islam, and gall dropped from their pens on the Christian +cause." And when, some years later, England did profess neutrality +between the "parties" to the war, it was less to prevent the Greeks +from falling into the hands of the Turks than to prevent the Turks from +falling into the hands of the Russians. Another object she had in view +was the suppression of that horrible piracy which then raged in the +Hellenic seas. She was then as anxious to suppress piracy because it was +injurious to her commerce, as, apparently, she is now anxious to promote +it because its existence would be injurious to our commerce. The famous +Treaty of London, made in 1827, the parties to which were Russia, +France, and England, was justified on the ground of "the necessity of +putting an end to the sanguinary contest which, by delivering up the +Greek provinces and the isles of the Archipelago to the disorders +of anarchy, produces daily fresh impediments to the commerce of the +European states, and gives occasion to piracies which not only expose +the subjects of the contracting powers to considerable losses, but +render necessary burdensome measures of suppression and protection." +In the autumn of the same year, an Order in Council decreed that "the +British ships in the Mediterranean should seize every vessel they saw +under the Greek flag, or armed and fitted out at a Greek port, except +such as were under the immediate orders of the Greek Government." The +object of this strong measure was the suppression of piracy. Thus +England had to interfere to put down the Greek pirates; and if she means +to insist upon there being any resemblance between the case of the +Greeks and that of the Secessionists, (President Lincoln to appear as +the Grand Turk, or Sultan Mahmoud II., the destroyer of the Janizaries,) +we should not object, so far as relates to the finale of the piece, +which is very likely, through her most injudicious action, to produce +a large crop of Selims and Abdallahs, by whom any amount of sea-roving +will be done, but as much at Britain's expense as at ours. + +The case of Belgium is not at all to the point, the Dutch being by no +means anxious that the foolish arrangement made at Vienna, by which +Holland and Belgium had been formally united, should be continued, +though the House of Orange was averse to the loss of so much of its +dominions. The disputes that followed the expulsion of the Dutch from +Belgium were about details, and the whole matter was finally settled by +the action of the Great Powers, and England was not then in a condition +to decide it, had it been left for her decision. The makers of the +Kingdom of the Netherlands destroyed their own work, after it had been +found to be a bad job, and had had fifteen years and upward of fair +trial. England had no choice in the matter,--especially as the effect +of determined opposition on her part would have thrown Belgium into the +arms of France, and have brought about a French war, which would have +extended to the whole of Europe, with the revolutionists in every +country for the allies of France. Louis Philippe either would have been +overthrown very speedily after his elevation, or he would have been +enabled to wear his new crown only by placing the old _bonnet rouge_ +above it. + +That England recognized the Spanish-Americans is true; but why did +she recognize them? Because she had to choose between doing that and +allowing the Holy Alliance to enter upon the reconquest of the Spanish +colonies. Mr. Canning declared that he had called a new world into +existence to redress the balance of the old,--and that, if France, as +the tool of the Holy Alliance, should have Spain, it should not be +"Spain--with the Indies." This was in 1823, though it was not until 1826 +that Mr. Canning made use of the language quoted; and so serious was the +matter, that our country was prepared to make common cause with England +in resisting the interference of the Allies and their dependants in the +affairs of Spanish-America. The question was one which did not relate to +English interests alone, but concerned those of the whole world; and it +was not decided with reference to the interests of any one country, +but after it had been ascertained that its decision would closely and +immediately affect the welfare of Christendom. England had to choose +between diplomatic resistance to the Continental Powers and the support +of a policy which she could not adopt without degrading herself. +Naturally she elected to resist, and she did so with success. The +Spanish-American countries, however, were freed from the rule of Spain +long before she recognized them, and Spain had not the means of subduing +them. England, therefore, did not acknowledge them as against Spain, but +as against France, and in opposition to the Holy Alliance, the decrees +of which France was engaged in enforcing at the expense of the Spanish +Constitutionalists, and which process of enforcement the French +Government was prepared to extend to Peru and Mexico, and to the whole +of that part of America which had belonged to the Spanish Bourbons. Mr. +Canning's conduct was statesmanlike, but it was also spiteful; and had +England been in the condition to send sixty thousand men to Spain, +probably the recognition of the independence of Spanish-America would +have been much longer delayed. He had to strike a blow at a mighty +enemy, and he delivered it skilfully at that enemy's only exposed point, +where it told at once, and where it is telling to this day. But his +action affords no precedent to the present rulers of England for the +treatment of our case, for he moved not until after the colonies had +achieved their independence. Now the British Government proclaims its +purpose to acknowledge the Southern Confederacy in less than a month +after the beginning of the attack on Fort Sumter, and in about a week +after it had heard of the fall of that ill-used fortress! Is there not +some difference between the two cases? + +England did not admit the Poles to the honors she has allowed to the +American Secessionists, after their revolt from the Czar, in 1830-31, +though their cause was popular in that country, and they had achieved +such successes over the Russian armies as the Secessionists have not +won over the armies of the Union. Neither did she acknowledge the +Hungarians, in 1849, though they had actually won their independence, +which they would have preserved but for the intervention of Russia. It +was not for her interest that Austria should be weakened. Is it for her +interest that the United States should be weakened? Is it the purpose of +her Government to give our rebels encouragement, step by step, in order +that the American nation may be thrown back to the place it held twenty +years ago? + +The Cottonocracy of England, and those who for reasons of political +interest support them, proceed erroneously, we think, when they assume +that American cotton is the chief necessary of English life, and that +without a full supply of it there must ensue great suffering throughout +the British Empire. That it would be better for England to receive her +cotton without interruption may be admitted, without its following that +she must be ruined if there should be a discontinuance of the American +cotton-trade. Men are so accustomed to think that that which is must +ever continue to be, or all will be lost, that it is not surprising that +British manufacturers should suppose change in this instance to be ruin. +They are quite ready to innovate on the British Constitution, because in +that way they hope to obtain political power, and to injure the landed +aristocracy; but the idea of change in modes of business strikes them +with terror, and hence all their wonted sagacity is now at fault. +Lancashire is to become a Sahara, because President Lincoln, in +accordance with the demands of twenty million Americans, proclaims the +ports of the rebels under blockade, and enforces that blockade with a +fleet quite sufficient to satisfy even Lord John Russell's notions as to +effectiveness. We have never believed, and we do not now believe, that +it is in the power of any part of America thus to control the condition +of England. We would not have it so, if we could, as we are sure that +the power would be abused. If America really possessed the ability to +rule England that her cotton-manufacturers assert she possesses, all +Englishmen should rejoice that events have occurred here that promise to +work out their country's deliverance from so degrading a vassalage. But +it is not so, and England will survive the event of our conflict, no +matter what that event may be. The nation that triumphed over the +Continental System of Napoleon, and which was not injured by our Embargo +Acts of fifty years ago, should be ashamed to lay so much stress upon +the value of our cotton-crop, when it has its choice of the lands of the +tropics from which to draw the raw material it requires. As to France, +it would be most impolitic in her to seek our destruction, unless she +wishes to see the restoration of England's maritime supremacy. The +French navy, great and powerful as it now is, can be regarded only as +the result of a skilful and most costly forcing process, carried on by +Bourbons, Orleanists, Republicans, and Imperialists, during forty-six +years of maritime peace. It could not be maintained against the attacks +of England, which is a naval country by position and interest. We never +could be the rival of France, but we could always be relied upon to +throw our weight on her side in a maritime war; and while our policy +would never allow of our having a very large navy in time of peace, we +have in abundance all the elements of naval power. Nor should England +be indifferent to the aid which we could afford her, were she to be +assailed by the principal nations of Continental Europe. Strike the +American Union out of the list of the nations, or cause it to be +sensibly weakened, or treat it so as to revive in force the old American +hatred of England, and it is possible that the predictions of those who +see in Napoleon III. only the Avenger of Napoleon I. may be justified by +the event. + + * * * * * + + +WASHINGTON AS A CAMP. + + +OUR BARRACKS AT THE CAPITOL. + + +We marched up the hill, and when the dust opened there was our Big Tent +ready pitched. + +It was an enormous tent,--the Sibley pattern modified. A simple soul in +our ranks looked up and said,--"Tent! canvas! I don't see it: that's +marble!" Whereupon a simpler soul informed us,--"Boys, that's the +Capitol." + +And so it was the Capitol,--as glad to see the New York Seventh Regiment +as they to see it. The Capitol was to be our quarters, and I was pleased +to notice that the top of the dome had been left off for ventilation. + +The Seventh had had a wearisome and anxious progress from New York, as I +have chronicled in the June "Atlantic." We had marched from Annapolis, +while "rumors to right of us, rumors to left of us, volleyed and +thundered." We had not expected that the attack upon us would be merely +verbal. The truculent citizens of Maryland notified us that we were to +find every barn a Concord and every hedge a Lexington. Our Southern +brethren at present repudiate their debts; but we fancied they would +keep their warlike promises. At least, everybody thought, "They will +fire over our heads, or bang blank cartridges at us." Every nose was +sniffing for the smell of powder. Vapor instead of valor nobody looked +for. So the march had been on the _qui vive_. We were happy enough that +it was over, and successful. + +Successful, because Mumbo Jumbo was not installed in the White House. It +is safe to call Jeff. Davis Mumbo Jumbo now. But there is no doubt that +the luckless man had visions of himself receiving guests, repudiating +debts, and distributing embassies in Washington, May 1, 1861. And as to +La' Davis, there seems to be documentary evidence that she meant to be +"At Home" in the capital, bringing the first strawberries with her from +Montgomery for her May-day _soiree_. Bah! one does not like to sneer at +people who have their necks in the halter; but one happy result of this +disturbance is that the disturbers have sent themselves to Coventry. The +Lincoln party may be wanting in finish. Finish comes with use. A little +roughness of manner, the genuine simplicity of a true soul like Lincoln, +is attractive. But what man of breeding could ever stand the type +Southern Senator? But let him rest in such peace as he can find! He and +his peers will not soon be seen where we of the New York Seventh were +now entering. + +They gave us the Representatives Chamber for quarters. Without running +the gauntlet of caucus primary and election, every one of us attained +that sacred shrine. + +In we marched, tramp, tramp. Bayonets took the place of buncombe. The +frowzy creatures in ill-made dress-coats, shimmering satin waistcoats, +and hats of the tile model, who lounge, spit, and vociferate there, and +name themselves M.C., were off. Our neat uniforms and bright barrels +showed to great advantage, compared with the usual costumes of the usual +_dramatis personae_ of the scene. + +It was dramatic business, our entrance there. The new Chamber is +gorgeous, but ineffective. Its ceiling is flat, and panelled with +transparencies. Each panel is the coat-of-arms of a State, painted on +glass. I could not see that the impartial sunbeams, tempered by this +skylight, had burned away the insignia of the malecontent States. Nor +had any rampant Secessionist thought to punch any of the seven lost +Pleiads out from that firmament with a long pole. Crimson and gold are +the prevailing hues of the decorations. There is no unity and breadth of +coloring. The desks of the members radiate in double files from a white +marble tribune at the centre of the semicircle. + +In came the new actors on this scene. Our presence here was the +inevitable sequel of past events. We appeared with bayonets and bullets +because of the bosh uttered on this floor; because of the bills--with +treasonable stump-speeches in their bellies--passed here; because of +the cowardice of the poltroons, the imbecility of the dodgers, and the +arrogance of the bullies, who had here cooperated to blind and corrupt +the minds of the people. Talk had made a miserable mess of it. The +_ultima ratio_ was now appealed to. + +Some of our companies were marched up-stairs into the galleries. The +sofas were to be their beds. With their white cross-belts and bright +breastplates, they made a very picturesque body of spectators for +whatever happened in the Hall, and never failed to applaud in the right +or the wrong place at will. + +Most of us were bestowed in the amphitheatre. Each desk received its +man. He was to scribble on it by day, and sleep under it by night. When +the desks were all taken, the companies overflowed into the corners and +into the lobbies. The staff took committee-rooms. The Colonel reigned in +the Speaker's parlor. + +Once in, firstly, we washed. + +Such a wash merits a special paragraph. I compliment the M.C.s, our +hosts, upon their water-privileges. How we welcomed this chief luxury +after our march! And thenceforth how we prized it! For the clean face +is an institution which requires perpetual renovation at Washington. +"Constant vigilance is the price" of neatness. When the sky here is not +travelling earthward in rain, earth is mounting skyward in dust. So much +dirt must have an immoral effect. + +After the wash we showed ourselves to the eyes of Washington, marching +by companies, each to a different hotel, to dinner. This became one of +the ceremonies of our barrack-life. We liked it. The Washingtonians were +amused and encouraged by it. Three times a day, with marked punctuality, +our lines formed and tramped down the hill to scuffle with awkward +squads of waiters for fare more or less tolerable. In these little +marches, we encountered by-and-by the other regiments, and, most +soldierly of all, the Rhode Island men, in blue flannel blouses and +_bersagliere_ hats. But of them hereafter. + +It was a most attractive post of ours at the Capitol. Spring was at its +freshest and fairest. Every day was more exquisite than its forerunner. +We drilled morning, noon, and evening, almost hourly, in the pretty +square east of the building. Old soldiers found that they rattled +through the manual twice as alert as ever before. Recruits became old +soldiers in a trice. And as to awkward squads, men that would have been +the veriest louts and lubbers in the piping times of peace now learned +to toe the mark, to whisk their eyes right and their eyes left, to drop +the butts of their muskets without crushing their corns, and all the +mysteries of flank and file,--and so became full-fledged heroes before +they knew it. + +In the rests between our drills we lay under the young shade on the +sweet young grass, with the odors of snowballs and horse-chestnut blooms +drifting to us with every whiff of breeze, and amused ourselves with +watching the evolutions of our friends of the Massachusetts Eighth, and +other less experienced soldiers, as they appeared upon the field. They, +too, like ourselves, were going through the transformations. These +sturdy fellows were then in a rough enough chrysalis of uniform. That +shed, they would look worthy of themselves. + +But the best of the entertainment was within the Capitol. Some three +thousand or more of us were now quartered there. The Massachusetts +Eighth were under the dome. No fear of want of air for them. The +Massachusetts Sixth were eloquent for their State in the Senate Chamber. +It was singularly fitting, among the many coincidences in the history of +this regiment, that they should be there, tacitly avenging the assault +upon Sumner and the attempts to bully the impregnable Wilson. + +In the recesses, caves, and crypts of the Capitol what other legions +were bestowed I do not know. I daily lost myself, and sometimes when +out of my reckoning was put on the way by sentries of strange corps, a +Reading Light Infantry man, or some other. We all fraternized. There was +a fine enthusiasm among us: not the soldierly rivalry in discipline that +may grow up in future between men of different States acting together, +but the brotherhood of ardent fellows first in the field and earnest in +the cause. + +All our life in the Capitol was most dramatic and sensational. + +Before it was fairly light in the dim interior of the Representatives +Chamber, the _reveilles_ of the different regiments came rattling +through the corridors. Every snorer's trumpet suddenly paused. The +impressive sound of the hushed breathing of a thousand sleepers, marking +off the fleet moments of the night, gave way to a most vociferous +uproar. The boy element is large in the Seventh Regiment. Its slang +dictionary is peculiar and unabridged. As soon as we woke, the pit began +to chaff the galleries, and the galleries the pit. We were allowed noise +nearly _ad libitum_. Our riotous tendencies, if they existed, escaped +by the safety-valve of the larynx. We joked, we shouted, we sang, we +mounted the Speaker's desk and made speeches,--always to the point; for +if any but a wit ventured to give tongue, he was coughed down without +ceremony. Let the M.C.s adopt this plan and silence their dunces. + +With all our jollity we preserved very tolerable decorum. The regiment +is _assez bien compose_. Many of its privates are distinctly gentlemen +of breeding and character. The tone is mainly good, and the _esprit de +corps_ high. If the Colonel should say, "Up, boys, and at 'em!" I know +that the Seventh would do brilliantly in the field. I speak now of its +behavior in-doors. This certainly did it credit. Our thousand did the +Capitol little harm that a corporal's guard of Biddies with mops and +tubs could not repair in a forenoon's campaign. + +Perhaps we should have served our country better by a little Vandalism. +The decorations of the Capitol have a slight flavor of the Southwestern +steamboat saloon. The pictures (now, by the way, carefully covered) +would most of them be the better, if the figures were bayoneted and the +backgrounds sabred out. Both--pictures and decorations--belong to that +bygone epoch of our country when men shaved the moustache, dressed like +parsons, said "Sir," and chewed tobacco,--a transition epoch, now become +an historic blank. + +The home-correspondence of our legion of young heroes was illimitable. +Every one had his little tale of active service to relate. A decimation +of the regiment, more or less, had profited by the tender moment of +departure to pop the question and to receive the dulcet "Yes." These +lucky fellows were of course writing to Dulcinea regularly, three meals +of love a day. Mr. Van Wyck, M.C., and a brace of colleagues were kept +hard at work all day giving franks and saving threepennies to the ardent +scribes. Uncle Sam lost certainly three thousand cents a day in this +manner. + +What crypts and dens, caves and cellars there are under that great +structure! And barrels of flour in every one of them this month of May, +1861. Do civilians eat in this proportion? Or does long standing in the +"Position of a Soldier" (_vide_ "Tactics" for a view of that graceful +_pose_) increase a man's capacity for bread and beef so enormously? + +It was infinitely picturesque in these dim vaults by night. Sentries +were posted at every turn. Their guns gleamed in the gaslight. Sleepers +were lying in their blankets wherever the stones were softest. Then in +the guard-room the guard were waiting their turn. We have not had much +of this scenery in America, and the physiognomy of volunteer military +life is quite distinct from anything one sees in European service. The +People have never had occasion until now to occupy their Palace with +armed men. + + +THE FOLLOWING IS THE OATH. + + +We were to be sworn into the service of the United States the afternoon +of April 26th. All the Seventh, raw men and ripe men, marched out +into the sweet spring sunshine. Every fellow had whitened his belts, +burnished his arms, curled his moustache, and was scowling his manliest +for Uncle Sam's approval. + +We were drawn up by companies in the Capitol Square for mustering in. + +Presently before us appeared a gorgeous officer, in full fig. "Major +McDowell!" somebody whispered, as we presented arms. He is a General, +or perhaps a Field Marshal, now. Promotions come with a hop, skip, and +jump, in these times, when demerit resigns and merit stands ready to +step to the front. + +Major-Colonel-General McDowell, in a soldierly voice, now called the +roll, and we all answered, "Here!" in voices more or less soldierly. He +entertained himself with this ceremony for an hour. The roll over, we +were marched and formed in three sides of a square along the turf. Again +the handsome officer stepped forward, and recited to us the conditions +of our service. "In accordance with a special arrangement, made with the +Governor of New York," says the Major, "you are now mustered into the +service of the United States, to serve for thirty days, unless sooner +discharged"; and continues he, "The oath will now be read to you by the +magistrate." + +Hereupon a gentleman _en mufti_, but wearing a military cap with an +oil-skin cover, was revealed. Until now he had seemed an impassive +supernumerary. But he was biding his time, and--with due respect be it +said--saving his wind, and now in a Stentorian voice he ejaculated,-- + +"_The following is the oath!_" + +_Per se_ this remark was not comic. But there was something in the +dignitary's manner which tickled the regiment. As one man the thousand +smiled, and immediately adopted this new epigram among its private +countersigns. + +But the good-natured smile passed away as we listened to the impressive +oath, following its title. + +We raised our right hands, and, clause by clause, repeated the solemn +obligation, in the name of God, to be faithful soldiers of our country. +It was not quite so comprehensive as the beautiful knightly pledge +administered by King Arthur to his comrades, and transmitted to our time +by Major-General Tennyson of the Parnassus Division. We did not swear, +as they did of yore, to be true lovers as well as loyal soldiers. _Ca va +sans dire_ in 1861,--particularly when you were engaged to your Amanda +the evening before you started, as was the case with many a stalwart +brave and many a mighty man of a corporal or sergeant in our ranks. + +We were thrilled and solemnized by the stately ceremony of the oath. +This again was most dramatic. A grand public recognition of a duty. A +reavowal of the fundamental belief that our system was worthy of the +support, and our Government of the confidence, of all loyal men. And +there was danger in the middle distance of our view into the future, +--danger of attack, or dangerous duty of advance, just enough to keep +any trifler from feeling that his pledge was mere holiday business. + +So, under the cloudless blue sky, we echoed in unison the sentences of +the oath. A little low murmur of rattling arms, shaken with the hearty +utterance, made itself heard in the pauses. Then the band crashed in +magnificently. + +We were now miserable mercenaries, serving for low pay and rough +rations. Read the Southern papers and you will see us described. +"Mudsills,"--that, I believe, is the technical word. By repeating a form +of words after a gentleman in a glazed cap and black raiment, we had +suffered change into base assassins, the offscouring of society, +starving for want of employment, and willing to "imbrue our coarse fists +in fraternal blood" for the sum of eleven dollars a month, besides hard +tack, salt junk, and the hope of a Confederate States bond apiece for +bounty, or free loot in the treasuries of Florida, Mississippi, and +Arkansas, after the war. How carefully from that day we watched the +rise and fall of United States stocks! If they should go low among +the nineties, we felt that our eleven dollars _per mensem_ would be +imperilled. + +We stayed in our palace for a week or so after April 26th, the day of +the oath. That was the most original part of our duty thus far. New York +never had so unanimous a deputation on the floor of the Representatives +Chamber before, and never a more patriotic one. Take care, Gentlemen +Members of Congress! look to your words and your Acts honestly and +wisely in future! don't palter with Liberty again! it is not well that +soldiers should get into the habit of thinking they are always to +unravel the snarls and cut the knots twisted and tied by clumsy or +crafty fingers. The traitor States already need the _main de fer_,--yes, +and without the _gant de velours_. Let us beware, and keep ourselves +worthy of the boon of self-government, man by man! I do not wish to +hear, "Order arms!" and "Charge bayonets!" in the Capitol. But this +present defence of Free Speech and Free Thought ends, let us hope, that +danger forever. + +When we had been ten days in our showy barracks we began to quarrel with +luxury. What had private soldiers to do with the desks of law-givers? +Why should we be allowed to revel longer in the dining-rooms of +Washington hotels, partaking the admirable dainties there? + +The May sunshine, the birds and the breezes of May, invited us to +Camp,--the genuine thing, under canvas. Besides, Uncles Sam and Abe +wanted our room for other company. Washington was filling up fast with +uniforms. It seemed as if all the able-bodied men in the country were +moving, on the first of May, with all their property on their backs, to +agreeable, but dusty lodgings on the Potomac. + +We also made our May move. One afternoon, my company, the Ninth, and the +Engineers, the Tenth, were detailed to follow Captain Viele, and lay out +a camp on Meridian Hill. + + +CAMP CAMERON. + + +As we had the first choice, we got, on the whole, the best site for a +camp. We occupy the villa and farm of Dr. Stone, two miles due north of +Willard's Hotel. I assume that hotel as a peculiarly American point of +departure, and also because it is the hub of Washington,--the centre of +an eccentric, having the White House at the end of its shorter, and the +Capitol at the end of its longer radius,--moral, so they say, as well +as geometrical. + +Sundry dignitaries, Presidents and what not, have lived here in times +gone by. Whoever chose the site ought to be kindly remembered for his +good taste. The house stands upon the pretty terrace commanding the +plain of Washington. From the upper windows we can see the Potomac +opening southward like a lake, and between us and the water ambitious +Washington stretching itself along and along, like the shackly files of +an army of recruits. + +Oaks love the soil of this terrace. There are some noble ones on the +undulations before the house. It may be permitted even for one who is +supposed to think of nothing but powder and ball to notice one of these +grand trees. Let the ivy-covered stem of the Big Oak of Camp Cameron +take its place in literature! And now enough of scenery. The landscape +will stay, but the troops will not. There are trees and slopes of +green-sward elsewhere, and shrubbery begins to blossom in these bright +days of May before a thousand pretty homes. The tents and the tent-life +are more interesting for the moment than objects which cannot decamp. + +The old villa serves us for head-quarters. It is a respectable place, +not without its pretensions. Four granite pillars, as true grit as if +the two Presidents Adams had lugged them on their shoulders all the way +from Quincy, Mass., make a carriage-porch. Here is the Colonel in the +big west parlor, the Quartermaster and Commissary in the rooms with +sliding-doors on the east, the Hospital upstairs, and so on. Other +rooms, numerous as the cells in a monastery, serve as quarters for the +Engineer Company. These dens are not monastic in aspect. The house is, +of course, a Certosa, so far as the gentler sex are concerned; but no +anchorites dwell here at present. If the Seventh disdained everything +but soldiers' fare,--which it does not,--common civility would require +that it should do violence to its disinclination for comfort and luxury, +and consume the stores sent down by ardent patriots in New York. The +cellars of the villa overflow with edibles, and in the greenhouse is a +most appetizing array of barrels, boxes, cans, and bottles, shipped here +that our Sybarites might not sigh for the flesh-pots of home. Such trash +may do very well to amuse the palate in these times of half-peace, +half-hostility; but when + + "war, which for a space does fail, + Shall doubly thundering swell the gale," + +then every soldier should drop gracefully to the simple ration, and +cease to dabble with frying-pans. Cooks to their aprons, and soldiers to +their guns! + +Our tents are pitched on a level clover-field sloping to the front +for our parade-ground. We use the old wall tent without a fly. It is +necessary to live in one of these awhile to know the vast superiority of +the Sibley pattern. Sibley's tent is a wrinkle taken from savage life. +It is the Sioux buffalo-skin, lodge, or _Tepee_, improved,--a cone +truncated at the top and fitted with a movable apex for ventilation. A +single tent-pole, supported upon a hinged tripod of iron, sustains the +structure. It is compacter, more commodious, healthier, and handsomer +than the ancient models. None other should be used in permanent +encampments. For marching troops, the French _Tente d'abri_ is a capital +shelter. + +Still our fellows manage to be at home as they are. Some of our +model tents are types of the best style of temporary cottages. Young +housekeepers of limited incomes would do well to visit and take heed. A +whole elysium of household comfort can be had out of a teapot,--tin; a +brace of cups,--tin; a brace of plates,--tin; and a frying-pan. + +In these days of war everybody can see a camp. Every one who stays at +home has a brother or a son or a lover quartered in one of the myriad +tents that have blossomed with the daffodil-season all over our green +fields of the North. I need not, then, describe our encampment in +detail,--its guard-tent in advance,--its guns in battery,--its +flagstaff,--its companies quartered in streets with droll and fanciful +names,--its officers' tents in the rear, at right angles to the lines of +company-tents,--its kitchens, armed with Captain Viele's capital army +cooking-stoves,--its big marquees, "The White House" and "Fort Pickens," +for the lodging and messing of the new artillery company,--its barbers' +shops,--its offices. The same, more or less well arranged, can be seen +in all the rendezvous where the armies are now assembling. Instead of +such description, then, let me give the log of a single day at our camp. + + +JOURNAL OF A DAY AT CAMP CAMERON, BY PRIVATE W., COMPANY I. + + +BOOM! + +I would rather not believe it; but it is--yes, it is--the morning gun, +uttering its surly "Hullo!" to sunrise. + +Yes,--and, to confirm my suspicions, here rattle in the drums and pipe +in the fifes, wooing us to get up, _get up_, with music too peremptory +to be harmonious. + +I rise up _sur mon seant_ and glance about me. I, Private W., chance, by +reason of sundry chances, to be a member of a company recently largely +recruited and bestowed all together in a big marquee. As I lift myself +up, I see others lift themselves up on those straw bags we kindly call +our mattresses. The tallest man of the regiment, Sergeant K., is on one +side of me. On the other side I am separated from two of the fattest men +of the regiment by Sergeant M., another excellent fellow, prime cook and +prime forager. + +We are all presently on our pins,--K. on those lengthy continuations of +his, and the two stout gentlemen on their stout supporters. The deep +sleepers are pulled up from those abysses of slumber where they had been +choking, gurgling, strangling, death-rattling all night. There is for a +moment a sound of legs rushing into pantaloons and arms plunging into +jackets. + +Then, as the drums and fifes whine and clatter their last notes, at the +flap of our tent appears our orderly, and fierce in the morning sunshine +gleams his moustache,--one month's growth this blessed day. "Fall in, +for roll-call!" he cries, in a ringing voice. The orderly can speak +sharp, if need be. + +We obey. Not "Walk in!" "March in!" "Stand in!" is the order; but "Fall +in!" as sleepy men must. Then the orderly calls off our hundred. There +are several boyish voices which reply, several comic voices, a few +mean voices, and some so earnest and manly and alert that one says to +himself, "Those are the men for me, when work is to be done!" I read the +character of my comrades every morning in each fellow's monosyllable +"Here!" + +When the orderly is satisfied that not one of us has run away and +accepted a Colonelcy from the Confederate States since last roll-call, +he notifies those unfortunates who are to be on guard for the next +twenty-four hours of the honor and responsibility placed upon their +shoulders. Next he tells us what are to be the drills of the day. Then, +"Right face! Dismissed! Break ranks! March!" + +With ardor we instantly seize tin basins, soap, and towels, and invade a +lovely oak-grove at the rear and left of our camp. Here is a delicious +spring into which we have fitted a pump. The sylvan scene becomes +peopled with "National Guards Washing,"--a scene meriting the notice of +Art as much as any "Diana and her Nymphs." But we have no Poussin +to paint us in the dewy sunlit grove. Few of us, indeed, know how +picturesque we are at all times and seasons. + +After this _beau ideal_ of a morning toilet comes the ante-prandial +drill. Lieutenant W. arrives, and gives us a little appetizing exercise +in "Carry arms!" "Support arms!" "By the right flank, march!" "Double +quick!" + +Breakfast follows. My company messes somewhat helter-skelter in a big +tent. We have very tolerable rations. Sometimes luxuries appear of +potted meats and hermetical vegetables, sent us by the fond New +Yorkers. Each little knot of fellows, too, cooks something savory. Our +table-furniture is not elegant, our plates are tin, there is no silver +in our forks; but _a la guerre, comme a la guerre_. Let the scrubs +growl! Lucky fellows, if they suffer no worse hardships than this! + +By-and-by, after breakfast, come company-drills, bayonet-practice, +battalion-drills, and the heavy work of the day. Our handsome Colonel, +on a nice black nag, manoeuvres his thousand men of the line-companies +on the parade for two or three hours. Two thousand legs step off +accurately together. Two thousand pipe-clayed cross-belts--whitened with +infinite pains and waste of time, and offering a most inviting mark to +a foe--restrain the beating bosoms of a thousand braves, as they--the +braves, not the belts--go through the most intricate evolutions +unerringly. Watching these battalion movements, Private W., perhaps, +goes off and inscribes in his journal,--"Any clever, prompt man, with a +mechanical turn, an eye for distance, a notion of time, and a voice +of command, can be a tactician. It is pure pedantry to claim that the +manoeuvring of troops is difficult: it is not difficult, if the troops +are quick and steady. But to be a general, with patience and purpose and +initiative,--ah!" thinks Private W., "for that you must have the man of +genius; and already in this war he begins to appear out of Massachusetts +and elsewhere." + +Private W. avows without fear that about noon, at Camp Cameron, he takes +a hearty dinner, and with satisfaction. Private W. has had his feasts +in cot and chateau in Old World and New. It is the conviction of said +private that nowhere and no-when has he expected his ration with more +interest, and remembered it with more affection, than here. + +In the middle hours of the day it is in order to get a pass to go to +Washington, or to visit some of the camps, which now, in the middle +of May, begin to form a cordon around the city. Some of these I may +criticize before the end of this paper. Our capital seems arranged by +Nature to be protected by fortified camps on the circuit of its hills. +It may be made almost a Verona, if need be. Our brother regiments have +posts nearly as charming as our own in these fair groves and on these +fair slopes on either side of us. + +In the afternoon, comes target-practice, skirmishing-drill, more +company- or recruit-drill, and, at half-past five, our evening parade. +Let me not forget tent-inspection, at four, by the officer of the day, +when our band plays deliciously. + +At evening parade all Washington appears. A regiment of ladies, +rather indisposed to beauty, observe us. Sometimes the Dons +arrive,--Secretaries of State, of War, of Navy,--or military Dons, +bestriding prancing steeds, but bestriding them as if "'twas _not_ their +habit often of an afternoon." All which,--the bad teeth, pallid skins, +and rustic toilets of the fair, and the very moderate horsemanship of +the brave,--privates, standing at ease in the ranks, take note of, not +cynically, but as men of the world. + +Wondrous gymnasts are some of the Seventh, and after evening parade they +often give exhibitions of their prowess to circles of admirers. Muscle +has not gone out, nor nerve, nor activity, if these athletes are to be +taken as the types or even as the leaders of the young city-bred men of +our time. All the feats of strength and grace of the gymnasiums are to +be seen here, and show to double advantage in the open air. + +Then comes sweet evening. The moon rises. It seems always full moon +at Camp Cameron. Every tent becomes a little illuminated pyramid. +Cooking-fires burn bright along the alleys. The boys lark, sing, shout, +do all those merry things that make the entertainment of volunteer +service. The gentle moon looks on, mild and amused, the fairest lady of +all that visit us. + +At last, when the songs have been sung and the hundred rumors of the day +discussed, at ten the intrusive drums and scolding fifes get together +and stir up a concert, always premature, called tattoo. The Seventh +Regiment begins to peel for bed: at all events, Private W. does; for +said W. takes, when he can, precious good care of his cuticle, and never +yields to the lazy and unwholesome habit of soldiers,--sleeping in the +clothes. At taps--half-past ten--out go the lights. If they do not, +presently comes the sentry's peremptory command to put them out. Then, +and until the dawn of another day, a cordon of snorers inside of a +cordon of sentries surrounds our national capital. The outer cordon +sounds its "All's well"; and the inner cordon, slumbering, echoes it. + +And that is the history of any day at Camp Cameron. It is monotonous, it +is not monotonous, it is laborious, it is lazy, it is a bore, it is a +lark, it is half war, half peace, and totally attractive, and not to be +dispensed with from one's experience in the nineteenth century. + + +OUR ADVANCE INTO VIRGINIA. + + +Meantime the weeks went on. May 23d arrived. Lovely creatures with their +taper fingers had been brewing a flag for us. Shall I say that its red +stripes were celestial rosy as their cheeks, its white stripes virgin +white as their brows, its blue field cerulean as their eyes, and its +stars scintillating as the beams of the said peepers? Shall I say this? +If I were a poet, like Jeff. Davis and each and every editor of each +and every newspaper in our misbehaving States, I might say it. And +involuntarily I have said it. + +So the young ladies of New York--including, I hope, her who made my +sandwiches for the march hither--had been making us a flag, as they +have made us havelocks, pots of jelly, bundles of lint, flannel +dressing-gowns, embroidered slippers for a rainy day in camp, and other +necessaries of the soldier's life. + +May 23d was the day we were to get this sweet symbol of good-will. At +evening parade appeared General Thomas, as the agent of the ladies, the +donors, with a neat speech on a clean sheet of paper. He read it with +feeling; and Private W., who has his sentimental moments, avows that he +was touched by the General's earnest manner and patriotic words. Our +Colonel responded with his neat speech, very _apropos_. The regiment +then made its neat speech, nine cheers and a roar of tigers,--very brief +and pointed. + +There had been a note of preparation in General Thomas's remarks,--a +"_Virginia, cave canem!_" And before parade was dismissed, we saw our +officers holding parley with the Colonel. + +Something in the wind! As I was strolling off to see the sunset and the +ladies on parade, I began to hear great irrepressible cheers bursting +from the streets of the different companies. + +"Orders to be ready to march at a moment's notice!"--so I learned +presently from dozens of overjoyed fellows. "Harper's Ferry!" says one. +"Alexandria!" shouts a second. "Richmond!" only Richmond will content +a third. And some could hardly be satisfied short of the hope of a +breakfast in Montgomery. + +What a happy thousand were the line-companies! How their suppressed +ardors stirred! No want of fight in these lads! They may be rather +luxurious in their habits, for camp-life. They may be a little impatient +of restraint. They may have--as the type regiment of militia--the type +faults of militia on service. But a desire to dodge a fight is not one +of these faults. + +Every man in camp was merry, except two hundred who were grim. These +were the two artillery companies, ordered to remain in guard of our +camp. They swore as if Camp Cameron were Flanders. + +I by rights belonged with these malecontent and objurgating gentlemen; +but a chronicler has privileges, and I got leave to count myself into +the Eighth Company, my old friend Captain Shumway's. We were to move, +about midnight, in light marching order, with one day's rations. + +It has been always full moon at our camp. This night was full moon at +its fullest,--a night more perfect than all perfection, mild, dewy, +refulgent. At one o'clock the drum beat; we fell into ranks, and marched +quietly off through the shadowy trees of the lane, into the highway. + + +ACROSS THE LONG BRIDGE. + + +I have heretofore been proud of my individuality, and resisted, so +far as one may, all the world's attempts to merge me in the mass. +_In pluribus unum_ has been my motto. But whenever I march with the +regiment, my pride is that I lose my individuality, that I am merged, +that I become a part of a machine, a mere walking gentleman, a No. 1 +or a No. 2, front rank or rear rank, file-leader or file-closer. The +machine is so steady and so mighty, it moves with such musical cadence +and such brilliant show, that I enjoy it entirely as the _unum_ and lose +myself gladly as a _pluribus_. + +Night increases this fascination. The outer world is vague in the +moonlight. Objects out of our ranks are lost. I see only glimmering +steel and glittering buttons and the light-stepping forms of my +comrades. Our array and our step connect us. We move as one man. A +man made up of a thousand members and each member a man is a grand +creature,--particularly when you consider that he is self-made. And the +object of this self-made giant, men-man, is to destroy another like +himself, or the separate pigmy members of another such giant. We have +failed to put ourselves--heads, arms, legs, and wills--together as a +unit for any purpose so thoroughly as to snuff out a similar unit. Up to +1861, it seems that the business of war compacts men best. + +Well, the Seventh, a compact projectile, was now flinging itself along +the road to Washington. Just a month ago, "in such a night as this," +we made our first promenade through the enemy's country. The moon of +Annapolis,--why should we not have our ominous moon, as those other +fellows had their sun of Austerlitz?--the moon of Annapolis shone over +us. No epithets are too fine or too complimentary for such a luminary, +and there was no dust under her rays. + +So we pegged along to Washington and across Washington,--which at that +point consists of Willard's Hotel, few other buildings being in sight. A +hag in a nightcap reviewed us from an upper window as we tramped by. + +Opposite that bald block, the Washington Monument, and opposite what was +of more importance to us, a drove of beeves putting beef on their bones +in the seedy grounds of the Smithsonian Institution, we were halted +while the New Jersey brigade--some three thousand of them--trudged by, +receiving the complimentary fire of our line as they passed. New Jersey +is not so far from New York but that the dialects of the two can +understand each other. Their respective slangs, though peculiar, are of +the same genus. By the end of this war, I trust that these distinctions +of locality will be quite annulled. + +We began to feel like an army as these thousands thronged by us. This +was evidently a movement in force. We rested an hour or more by the +road. Mounted officers galloping along down the lines kept up the +excitement. + +At last we had the word to fall in again and march. It is part of the +simple perfection of the machine, a regiment, that, though it drops to +pieces for a rest, it comes together instantly for a start, and nobody +is confused or delayed. We moved half a mile farther, and presently a +broad pathway of reflected moonlight shone up at us from the Potomac. + +No orders, at this, came from the Colonel, "Attention, battalion! Be +sentimental!" Perhaps privates have no right to perceive the beautiful. +But the sections in my neighborhood murmured admiration. The utter +serenity of the night was most impressive. Cool and quiet and tender the +moon shone upon our ranks. She does not change her visage, whether it be +lovers or burglars or soldiers who use her as a lantern to their feet. + +The Long Bridge thus far has been merely a shabby causeway with +waterways and draws. Shabby,--let me here pause to say that in Virginia +shabbiness is the grand universal law, and neatness the spasmodic +exception, attained in rare spots, an _aeon_ beyond their Old Dominion +age. + +The Long Bridge has thus far been a totally unhistoric and prosaic +bridge. Roads and bridges are making themselves of importance and +shining up into sudden renown in these times. The Long Bridge has done +nothing hitherto except carry passengers on its back across the Potomac. +Hucksters, planters, dry-goods drummers, Members of Congress, _et ea +genera omnia_, have here gone and come on their several mercenary +errands, and, as it now appears, some sour little imp--the very reverse +of a "sweet little cherub"--took toll of every man as he passed,--a +heavy toll, namely, every man's whole store of Patriotism and Loyalty. +Every man--so it seems--who passed the Long Bridge was stripped of his +last dollar of _Amor Patriae_, and came to Washington, or went home, +with a waistcoat-pocket full of bogus in change. It was our business now +to open the bridge and see it clear, and leave sentries along to keep it +permanently free for Freedom. + +There is a mile of this Long Bridge. We seemed to occupy the whole +length of it, with our files opened to diffuse the weight of our column. +We were not now the tired and sleepy squad which just a moon ago had +trudged along the railroad to the Annapolis Junction, looking up a +Capital and a Government, perhaps lost. + +By the time we touched ground across the bridge, dawn was breaking,--a +good omen for poor old sleepy Virginia. The moon, as bright and handsome +as a new twenty-dollar piece, carried herself straight before us,--a +splendid oriflamme. + +Lucky is the private who marches with the van! It may be the post of +more danger, but it is also the post of less dust. My throat, therefore, +and my eyes and beard, wore the less Southern soil when we halted half a +mile beyond the bridge, and let sunrise overtake us. + +Nothing men can do--except picnics, with ladies in straw flats with +feathers--is so picturesque as soldiering. As soon as the Seventh halt +anywhere, or move anywhere, or camp anywhere, they resolve themselves +into a grand _tableau_. + +Their own ranks should supply their own Horace Vernet. Our groups +were never more entertaining than at this halt by the roadside on the +Alexandria road. Stacks of guns make a capital framework for drapery, +and red blankets dot in the lights most artistically. The fellows lined +the road with their gay array, asleep, on the rampage, on the lounge, +and nibbling at their rations. + +By-and-by, when my brain had taken in as much of the picturesque as it +could stand, it suffered the brief congestion known as a nap. I was +suddenly awaked by the rattle of a horse's hoofs. Before I had rubbed +my eyes the rider was gone. His sharp tidings had stayed behind him. +Ellsworth was dead,--so he said hurriedly, and rode on. Poor Ellsworth! +a fellow of genius and initiative! He had still so much of the boy in +him, that he rattled forward boyishly, and so died. _Si monumentum +requiris_, look at his regiment. It was a brilliant stroke to levy it; +and if it does worthily, its young Colonel will not have lived in vain. + +As the morning hours passed, we learned that we were the rear-guard of +the left wing of the army advancing into Virginia. The Seventh, as the +best organized body, acted as reserve to this force. It didn't wish +to be in the rear; but such is the penalty of being reliable for an +emergency. Fellow-soldier, be a scalawag, be a bashi-bazouk, be a +Billy-Wilsoneer, if you wish to see the fun in the van! + +When the road grew too hot for us, on account of the fire of sunshine +in our rear, we jumped over the fence into the Race-Course, a big field +beside us, and there became squatter sovereigns all day. I shall be +a bore, if I say again what a pretty figure we cut in this military +picnic, with two long lines of blankets draped on bayonets for parasols. + +The New Jersey brigade were meanwhile doing workie work on the ridge +just beyond us. The road and railroad to Alexandria follow the general +course of the river southward along the level. This ridge to be +fortified is at the point where the highway bends from west to south. +The works were intended to serve as an advanced _tete du pont_,--a +bridge-head, with a very long neck connecting it with the bridge. That +fine old Fabius, General Scott, had no idea of flinging an army out +broadcast into Virginia, and, in the insupposable case that it turned +tail, leaving it no defended passage to run away by. + +This was my first view of a field-work in construction,--also, my first +hand as a laborer at a field-work. I knew glacis and counterscarp on +paper; also, on paper, superior slope, banquette, and the other dirty +parts of a redoubt. Here they were, not on paper. A slight wooden +scaffolding determined the shape of the simple work; and when I arrived, +a thousand Jerseymen were working, not at all like Jerseymen,--with +picks, spades, and shovels, cutting into Virginia, digging into +Virginia, shovelling up Virginia, for Virginia's protection against +pseudo-Virginians. + +I swarmed in for a little while with our Paymaster, picked a little, +spaded a little, shovelled a little, took a hand to my great +satisfaction at earth-works, and for my efforts I venture to suggest +that Jersey City owes me its freedom in a box, and Jersey State a basket +of its finest Clicquot. + +Is my gentle reader tired of the short marches and frequent halts of +the Seventh? Remember, gentle reader, that you must be schooled by such +alphabetical exercises to spell bigger words--skirmish, battle, defeat, +rout, massacre--by-and-by. + +Well,--to be Xenophontic,--from the Race-Course that evening we marched +one stadium, one parasang, to a cedar-grove up the road. In the grove +is a spring worthy to be called a fountain, and what I determined by +infallible indications to be a _lager-bier_ saloon. Saloon no more! War +is no respecter of localities. Be it Arlington House, the seedy palace +of a Virginia Don,--be it the humbler, but seedy, pavilion where the +tired Teuton washes the dust of Washington away from his tonsils,--each +must surrender to the bold soldier-boy. Exit Champagne and its goblet; +exit _lager_ and its mug; enter whiskey-and-water in a tin pot. Such are +the horrors of civil war! + +And now I must cut short my story, for graver matters press. As to +the residence of the Seventh in the cedar-grove for two days and two +nights,--how they endured the hardship of a bivouac on soft earth and +the starvation of coffee _sans_ milk,--how they digged manfully in the +trenches by gangs all these two laborious days,--with what supreme +artistic finish their work was achieved,--how they chopped off their +corns with axes, as they cleared the brushwood from the glacis,--how +they blistered their hands,--how they chafed that they were not +lunging with battailous steel at the breasts of the minions of the +oligarchs,--how Washington, seeing the smoke of burning rubbish, and +hearing dropping shots of target-practice, or of novices with the musket +shooting each other by accident,--how Washington, alarmed, imagined a +battle, and went into panic accordingly,--all this, is it not written +in the daily papers? + +On the evening of the 26th, the Seventh travelled back to Camp Cameron +in a smart shower. Its service was over. Its month was expired. The +troops ordered to relieve it had arrived. It had given the other +volunteers the benefit of a month's education at its drills and parades. +It had enriched poor Washington to the tune of fifty thousand dollars. +Ah, Washington! that we, under Providence and after General Butler, +saved from the heel of Secession! Ah, Washington, why did you charge us +so much for our milk and butter and strawberries? The Seventh, then, +after a month of delightful duty, was to be mustered out of service, and +take new measures, if it would, to have a longer and a larger share in +the war. + + +ARLINGTON HEIGHTS. + + +I took advantage of the day of rest after our return to have a gallop +about the outposts. Arlington Heights had been the spot whence the +alarmists threatened us daily with big thunder and bursting bombs. I was +curious to see the region that had had Washington under its thumb. + +So Private W., tired of his foot-soldiering, got a quadruped under him, +and felt like a cavalier again. The horse took me along the tow-path of +the Cumberland Canal, as far as the redoubts where we had worked our +task. Then I turned up the hill, took a look at the camp of the New York +Twenty-Fifth at the left, and rode along for Arlington House. + +Grand name! and the domain is really quite grand, but ill-kept. Fine +oaks make beauty without asking favors. Fine oaks and a fair view make +all the beauty of Arlington. It seems that this old establishment, like +many another old Virginian, had claimed its respectability for its +antiquity, and failed to keep up to the level of the time. The road +winds along through the trees, climbing to fairer and fairer reaches of +view over the plain of Washington. I had not fancied that there was any +such lovely site near the capital. But we have not yet appreciated what +Nature has done for us there. When civilization once makes up its mind +to colonize Washington, all this amphitheatre of hills will blossom with +structures of the sublimest gingerbread. + +Arlington House is the antipodes of gingerbread, except that it is +yellow, and disposed to crumble. It has a pompous propylon of enormous +stuccoed columns. Any house smaller than Blenheim would tail on +insignificantly after such a frontispiece. The interior has a certain +careless, romantic, decayed-gentleman effect, wholly Virginian. It was +enlivened by the uniforms of staff-officers just now, and as they rode +through the trees of the approach and by the tents of the New York +Eighth, encamped in the grove to the rear, the _tableau_ was brilliantly +warlike. Here, by the way, let me pause to ask, as a horseman, though a +foot-soldier, why generals and other gorgeous fellows make such guys of +their horses with trappings. If the horse is a screw, cover him thick +with saddle-cloths, girths, cruppers, breast-bands, and as much brass +and tinsel as your pay will enable you to buy; but if not a screw, let +his fair proportions be seen as much as may be, and don't bother a lover +of good horseflesh to eliminate so much uniform before he can see what +is beneath. + +From Arlington I rode to the other encampments,--the Sixty-Ninth, Fifth, +and Twenty-Eighth, all of New York,--and heard their several stories +of alarms and adventures. This completed the circuit of the new +fortification of the Great Camp. Washington was now a fortress. The +capital was out of danger, and therefore of no further interest to +anybody. The time had come for myself and my regiment to leave it by +different ways. + + +"PARTANT POUR LA SYRIE." + + +I should have been glad to stay and see my comrades through to their +departure; but there was a Massachusetts man down at Fortress Monroe, +Butler by name,--has any one heard of him?--and to this gentleman it +chanced that I was to report myself. So I packed my knapsack, got my +furlough, shook hands with my fellows, said good-bye to Camp Cameron, +and was off, two days after our month's service was done. + + +FAREWELL TO THE SEVENTH. + + +Under Providence, Washington owes its safety, 1st, To General Butler, +whose genius devised the circumvention of Baltimore and its rascal rout, +and whose utter bravery executed the plan;--he is the Grand Yankee of +this little period of the war. 2d, To the other Most Worshipful Grand +Yankees of the Massachusetts regiment who followed their leader, as he +knew they would, discovered a forgotten colony called Annapolis, and +dashed in there, asking no questions. 3d, And while I gladly yield the +first places to this General and his men, I put the Seventh in, as +last, but not least, in saving the capital. Character always tells. The +Seventh, by good, hard, faithful work at drill, had established its fame +as the most thorough militia regiment in existence. Its military and +moral character were excellent. The mere name of the regiment carried +weight. It took the field as if the field were a ball-room. There were +myriads eager to march; but they had not made ready beforehand. Yes, +the Seventh had its important share in the rescue. Without our support, +whether our leaders tendered it eagerly or hesitatingly, General +Butler's position at Annapolis would have been critical, and his forced +march to the capital a forlorn hope,--heroic, but desperate. + +So, honor to whom honor is due. + +Here I must cut short my story. So good-bye to the Seventh, and thanks +for the fascinating month I have passed in their society. In this pause +of the war our camp-life has been to me as brilliant as a permanent +picnic. + +Good-bye to Company I, and all the fine fellows, rough and smooth, cool +old hands and recruits verdant but ardent! Good-bye to our Lieutenants, +to whom I owe much kindness! Good-bye, the Orderly, so peremptory on +parade, so indulgent off! Good-bye, everybody! + +And so in haste I close. + + + + +BETWEEN SPRING AND SUMMER. + +(A BIRTHDAY POEM, WITH ROSES.) + + + To her whose birth and being + Touch summer out of spring, + These roses, reaching forward + From May to June, I bring. + + To her whose fragrant friendship + Sweetens the life I live, + These flowers, Love's message hinting + With perfumed breath, I give. + + The violet and the lily + Shall stand for these and those; + But give her roses only + Whose soul suggests the rose,-- + + Whose Life's idea ranges + Through all of sweet and bright, + A vernal flow of feeling, + A summer day of light. + + I bless the child whose coming + Sheds grace around us, where + Her voice falls soft as music, + Her step drops light as air: + + Fair grace, to good related + In her, sweet sisters twin; + As in this House of Roses + The fruits and flowers are kin. + + * * * * * + + +ELLSWORTH. + + +The beginnings of great periods have often been marked and made +memorable by striking events. Out of the cloud that hangs around the +vague inceptions of revolutions, a startling incident will sometimes +flash like lightning, to show that the warring elements have begun their +work. The scenes that attended the birth of American nationality formed +a not inaccurate type of those that have opened the crusade for its +perpetuation. The consolidation of public sentiment which followed the +magnificent defeat at Bunker's Hill, in which the spirit of indignant +resistance was tempered by the pathetic interest surrounding the fate +of Warren, was but a foreshadowing of the instant rally to arms which +followed the fall of the beleaguered fort in Charleston harbor, and of +the intensity of tragic pathos which has been added to the stern purpose +of avenging justice by the murder of Colonel Ellsworth. + +Ephraim Elmer Ellsworth was born in the little village of +Mechanicsville, on the left bank of the Hudson, on the 23d day of April, +1837. When he was very young, his father, through no fault of his own, +lost irretrievably his entire fortune, in the tornado of financial ruin +that in those years swept from the sea to the mountains. From this +disaster he never recovered. Misfortune seems to have followed him +through life, with the insatiable pertinacity of the Nemesis of a Greek +tragedy. And now in his old age, when for a moment there seemed to shine +upon his path the sunshine that promised better days, he finds that +suddenly withdrawn, and stands desolate, "stabbed through the heart's +affections, to the heart." His younger son died some years ago, of +small-pox, in Chicago, and the murder at Alexandria leaves him with his +sorrowing wife, lonely, amid the sympathy of the world. + +The days of Elmer's childhood and early youth--were passed at Troy +and in the city of New York, in pursuits various, but energetic and +laborious. There is little of interest in the story of these years. He +was a proud, affectionate, sensitive, and generous boy, hampered by +circumstance, but conscious of great capabilities,--not morbidly +addicted to day-dreaming, but always working heartily for something +beyond. He was still very young--when he went to Chicago, and associated +himself in business with Mr. Devereux of Massachusetts.[A] They managed +for a little while, with much success, an agency for securing patents to +inventors. Through the treachery of one in whom they had reposed great +confidence they suffered severe losses which obliged them to close +their business, and Devereux went back to the East. The next year of +Ellsworth's life was a miracle of endurance and uncomplaining fortitude. +He read law with great assiduity, and supported himself by copying, +in the hours that should have been devoted to recreation. He had no +pastimes and very few friends. Not a soul beside himself and the baker +who gave him his daily loaf knew how he was living. During all that +time, he never slept in a bed, never ate with friends at a social board. +So acute was his sense of honor, so delicate his ideas of propriety, +that, although himself the most generous of men, he never would accept +from acquaintances the slightest favors or courtesies which he was +unable to return. He told me once of a severe struggle between +inclination and a sense of honor. At a period of extreme hunger, he +met a friend in the street who was just starting from the city. He +accompanied his friend into a restaurant, wishing to converse with him, +but declined taking any refreshment. He represented the savory fragrance +of his friend's dinner as almost maddening to his famished senses, +while he sat there pleasantly chatting, and deprecating his friend's +entreaties to join him in his repast, on the plea that he had just +dined. + +[Footnote A: Arthur F. Devereux, Esq., now in command of the Salem +Zouave Corps, Eighth Massachusetts Regiment, distinguished for the +gallant part borne by it in opening the route to Washington through +Annapolis, and in the rescue of the frigate Constitution, "Old +Ironsides," from the hands of the rebels.] + +What would have killed an ordinary man did not injure Ellsworth. His +iron frame seemed incapable of dissolution or waste. Circumstance had no +power to conquer his spirit. His hearty good-humor never gave way. His +sense of honor, which was sometimes even fantastic in its delicacy, +freed him from the very temptation to wrong. He knew there was a better +time coming for him. Conscious of great mental and bodily strength, with +that bright outlook that industry and honor always give a man, he was +perfectly secure of ultimate success. His plans mingled in a singular +manner the bright enthusiasm of the youthful dreamer and the eminent +practicality of the man of affairs. At one time, his mind was fixed +on Mexico,--not with the licentious dreams that excited the ragged +_Condottieri_ who followed the fated footsteps of the "gray-eyed man of +Destiny," in the wild hope of plunder and power,--nor with the vague +reverie in which fanatical theorists construct impossible Utopias on +the absurd framework of Icarias or Phalansteries. His clear, bold, and +thoroughly executive mind planned a magnificent scheme of commercial +enterprise, which, having its centre of operations at Guaymas, should +ramify through the golden wastes that stretch in silence and solitude +along the tortuous banks of the Rio San Jose. This was to be the +beginning and the ostensible end of the enterprise. Then he dreamed of +the influence of American arts and American energy penetrating into the +twilight of that decaying nationality, and saw the natural course of +events leading on, first, Emigration, then Protection, and at last +Annexation. Yet there was no thought of conquest or rapine. The idea was +essentially American and Northern. He never wholly lost that dream. +One day last winter, when some one was discussing the propriety of an +amputation of the States that seemed thoroughly diseased, Ellsworth +swept his hand energetically over the map of Mexico that hung upon the +wall, and exclaimed,--"_There_ is an unanswerable argument against the +recognition of the Southern Confederacy." + +But the central idea of Ellsworth's short life was the thorough +reorganization of the militia of the United States. He had studied with +great success the theory of national defence, and, from his observation +of the condition of the militia of the several States, he was convinced +that there was much of well-directed effort yet lacking to its entire +efficiency. In fact, as he expressed it, a well-disciplined body of five +thousand troops could land anywhere on our coast and ravage two or three +States before an adequate force could get into the field to oppose them. +To reform this defective organization, he resolved to devote whatever +of talent or energy was his. This was very large undertaking for a boy, +whose majority and moustache were still of the substance of things hoped +for. But nothing that he could propose to himself ever seemed absurd. He +attacked his work with his usual promptness and decision. + +The conception of a great idea is no proof of a great mind; a man's +calibre is shown by the way in which he attempts to realize his idea. A +great design planted in a little mind frequently bursts it, and nothing +is more pitiable than the spectacle of a man staggering into insanity +under a thought too large for him. Ellsworth chose to begin his work +simply and practically. He did not write a memorial to the President, to +be sent to the Secretary of War, to be referred to the Chief Clerk, to +be handed over to File-Clerk No. 99, to be glanced at and quietly thrust +into a pigeon-hole labelled "Crazy and trashy." He did not haunt the +anteroom of Congressman Somebody, who would promise to bring his plan +before the House, and then, bowing him out, give general orders to his +footman, "Not at home, hereafter, to that man." He did not float, as +some theorists do, ghastly and seedy, around the _Adyta_ of popular +editors, begging for space and countenance. He wisely determined to +keep his theories to himself until he could illustrate them by living +examples. He first put himself in thorough training. He practised the +manual of arms in his own room, until his dexterous precision was +something akin to the sleight of a juggler. He investigated the theory +of every movement in an anatomical view, and made several most valuable +improvements on Hardee. He rearranged the manual so that every movement +formed the logical groundwork of the succeeding one. He studied the +science of fence, so that he could hold a rapier with De Villiers, the +most dashing of the Algerine swordsmen. He always had a hand as true as +steel, and an eye like a gerfalcon. He used to amuse himself by shooting +ventilation-holes through his window-panes. Standing ten paces from the +window, he could fire the seven shots from his revolver and not shiver +the glass beyond the circumference of a half-dollar. + +I have seen a photograph of his arm taken at this time. The knotted coil +of thews and sinews looks like the magnificent exaggerations of antique +sculpture. + +His person was strikingly prepossessing. His form, though +slight,--exactly the Napoleonic size,--was very compact and commanding; +the head statuesquely poised, and crowned with a luxuriance of curling +black hair; a hazel eye, bright, though serene, the eye of a gentleman +as well as a soldier; a nose such as you see on Roman medals; a light +moustache just shading the lips, that were continually curving into +the sunniest smiles. His voice, deep and musical, instantly attracted +attention; and his address, though not without soldierly brusqueness, +was sincere and courteous. There was one thing his backwoods detractors +could never forgive: he always dressed well; and sometimes wore the +military insignia presented to him by different organizations. One of +these, a gold circle, inscribed with the legend, NON NOBIS, SED PRO +PATRIA, was driven into his heart by the slug of the Virginian assassin. + +He had great tact and executive talent, was a good mathematician, +possessed a fine artistic eye, sketched well and rapidly, and in short +bore a deft and skilful hand in all gentlemanly exercise. + +No one ever possessed greater power of enforcing the respect and +fastening the affections of men. Strangers soon recognized and +acknowledged this power; while to his friends he always seemed like a +Paladin or Cavalier of the dead days of romance and beauty. He was so +generous and loyal, so stainless and brave, that Bayard himself would +have been proud of him. The grand bead-roll of the virtues of the Flower +of Kings contains the principles that guided his life; he used to read +with exquisite appreciation these lines:-- + + "To reverence the King as if he were + Their conscience, and their conscience as + their King,-- + To break the heathen and uphold the + Christ,-- + To ride abroad redressing human wrongs,-- + To speak no slander, no, nor listen to it,-- + To lead sweet lives in purest chastity,-- + To love one maiden only, cleave to her, + And worship her by years of noble deeds, + Until they won her"; + +and the rest,-- + + "high thoughts, and amiable words, + And courtliness, and the desire of fame, + And love of truth, and all that makes a man." + +Such, in person and character, was Ellsworth, when he organized, on the +4th day of May, 1859, the United States Zouave Cadets of Chicago. + +This company was the machine upon which he was to experiment. +Disregarding all extant works upon tactics, he drew up a simpler system +for the use of his men. Throwing aside the old ideas of soldierly +bearing, he taught them to use vigor, promptness, and ease. Discarding +the stiff buckram strut of martial tradition, he educated them to move +with the loafing _insouciance_ of the Indian, or the graceful ease of +the panther. He tore off their choking collars and binding coats, and +invented a uniform which, though too flashy and conspicuous for actual +service, was very bright and dashing for holiday occasions, and left the +wearer perfectly free to fight, strike, kick, jump, or run. + +He drilled these young men for about a year at short intervals. His +discipline was very severe and rigid. Added to the punctilio of the +martinet was the rigor of the moralist. The slightest exhibition of +intemperance or licentiousness was punished by instant degradation and +expulsion. He struck from the rolls at one time twelve of his best men +for breaking the rule of total abstinence. His moral power over them was +perfect and absolute. I believe anyone of them would have died for him. + +In two or three principal towns of Illinois and Wisconsin he drilled +other companies: in Springfield, where he made the friends who best +appreciated what was best in him; and in Rockford, where he formed an +attachment which imparted a coloring of tender romance to all the days +of his busy life that remained. This tragedy would not have been perfect +without the plaintive minor strain of Love in Death. + +His company took the Premium Colors at the United States Agricultural +Pair, and Ellsworth thought it was time to show to the people some fruit +of his drill. They issued their soldierly _defi_ and started on their +_Marche de Triomphe_. It is useless to recall to those who read +newspapers the clustering glories of that bloodless campaign. Hardly had +they left the suburbs of Chicago when the murmur of applause began. New +York, secure in the championship of half a century, listened with quiet +metropolitan scorn to the noise of the shouting provinces; but when the +crimson phantasms marched out of the Park, on the evening of the 15th of +July, New York, with metropolitan magnanimity, confessed herself utterly +vanquished by the good thing that had come out of Nazareth. There was no +resisting the Zouaves. As the erring Knight of the Round Table said,-- + + "men went down before his spear at a touch, + But knowing he was Lancelot; his great name conquered." + +There were one or two Southern companies that issued insulting +defiances, but, after a little expenditure of epistolary valor, +prudently, though ingloriously, stayed afar,--as is usual in New +Gascony. With these exceptions, the heart of the nation went warmly out +to these young men. Their endurance, their discipline, their alertness, +their _elan_, surprised the sleepy drill-masters out of their propriety, +and waked up the people to intense and cordial admiration. Chicago +welcomed them home proudly, covered with tan and dust and glory. + +Ellsworth found himself for his brief hour the most talked-of man in +the country. His pictures sold like wildfire in every city of the land. +School-girls dreamed over the graceful wave of his curls, and shop-boys +tried to reproduce the _Grand Seigneur_ air of his attitude. Zouave +corps, brilliant in crimson and gold, sprang up, phosphorescently, in +his wake, making bright the track of his journey. The leading journals +spoke editorially of him, and the comic papers caricatured his drill. + +So one thing was accomplished. He had gained a name that would entitle +him hereafter to respectful attention, and had demonstrated the +efficiency of his system of drill. The public did not, of course, +comprehend the resistless moral power which he exercised,--imperiously +moulding every mind as he willed,--inspiring every soul with his own +unresting energy. But the public recognized success, and that for the +present was enough. + +He quietly formed a regiment in the upper counties of Illinois, and made +his best men the officers of it. He tendered its services to Governor +Yates immediately on his inauguration, "for any service consistent with +honor." This was the first positive tender made of an organized force in +defence of the Constitution. He seemed to recognize more clearly than +others the certainty of the coming struggle. It was the soldierly +instinct that heard "the battle afar off, the thunder of the captains, +and the shouting." + +Still intent upon the great plan of militia reform, he came to +Springfield. He hoped, in case of the success of Mr. Lincoln in the +canvass then pending, to be able to establish in the War Department a +Bureau of Militia, which would prove a most valuable auxiliary to his +work. His ideas were never vague or indefinite. Means always presented +themselves to him, when he contemplated ends. The following were the +duties of the proposed bureau, which may serve as a guide to some future +reformer: I copy from his own exquisitely neat and clear memorandum, +which lies before me:-- + +"First. The gradual concentration of all business pertaining to the +militia now conducted by the several bureaus of this Department. + +"Second. The collection and systematizing of accurate information of the +number, arm, and condition of the militia of all classes of the several +States, and the compilation of yearly reports of the same for the +information of this Department. + +"Third. The compilation of a report of the actual condition of the +militia and the working of the present systems of the General Government +and the various States. + +"Fourth. The publication and distribution of such information as is +important to the militia, and the conduct of all correspondence relating +to militia affairs. + +"Fifth. The compilation of a system of instruction for light troops for +distribution to the several States, including everything pertaining to +the instruction of the militia in the school of the soldier,--company +and battalion, skirmishing, bayonet, and gymnastic drill, adapted for +self-instruction. + +"Sixth. The arrangement of a system of organization, with a view to the +establishment of a uniform system of drill, discipline, equipment, and +dress, throughout the United States." + +His plan for this purpose was very complete and symmetrical. Though +enthusiastic, he was never dreamy. His idea always went forth fully +armed and equipped. + +Nominally, he was a student of law in the office of Lincoln and Herndon, +but in effect he passed his time in completing his plans of militia +reform. He made in October many stirring and earnest speeches for the +Republican candidates. He was very popular among the country people. +His voice was magnificent in melody and volume, his command of language +wonderful in view of the deficiencies of his early education, his humor +inexhaustible and hearty, and his manner deliberate and impressive, +reminding his audiences in Central Illinois of the earliest and best +days of Senator Douglas. + +When the Legislature met, he prepared an elaborate military bill, the +adoption of which would have placed the State in an enviable attitude +of defence. The stupid jealousy of colonels and majors who had won +bloodless glory, on both sides, in the Mormon War, and the malignant +prejudice instigated by the covert treason that lurked in Southern +Illinois, succeeded in staving off the passage of the bill, until it was +lost by the expiration of the term. Many of these men are now in the +ranks, shouting the name of Ellsworth as a battle-cry. + +He came to Washington in the escort of the President elect. Hitherto he +had been utterly independent of external aid. The time was come when he +must wait for the cooperation of others, for the accomplishment of his +life's great purpose. He wished a position in the War Department, which +would give him an opportunity for the establishment of the Militia +Bureau. He was a strange anomaly at the capital. He did not care for +money or luxury. Though sensitive in regard to his reputation, for the +honor of his work, his motto always was that of the sage Merlin,--"I +follow use, not fame." An office-seeker of this kind was an eccentric +and suspicious personage. The hungry thousands that crowded and pushed +at Willard's thought him one of them, only deeper and slier. The +simplicity and directness of his character, his quick sympathy and +thoughtless generosity, and his delicate sense of honor unfitted him for +such a scramble as that which degrades the quadrennial rotations of our +Departments. He withdrew from the contest for the position he desired, +and the President, who loved him like a younger brother, made him a +lieutenant in the army, intending to detail him for special service. + +The jealousy of the staff-officers of the regular army, who always +discover in any effective scheme of militia reform the overthrow of +their power, and who saw in the young Zouave the promise of brilliant +and successful innovation, was productive of very serious annoyance +and impediment to Ellsworth. In the midst of this, he fell sick at +Willard's. While he lay there, the news from the South began to show +that the rebels were determined upon war, and the rumors on the street +said that a wholesome North-westerly breeze was blowing from the +Executive Mansion. These indications were more salutary to Ellsworth +than any medicine. We were talking one night of coming probabilities, +and I spoke of the doubt so widely existing as to the loyalty of the +people. He rejoined, earnestly,--"I can only speak for myself. You know +I have a great work to do, to which my life is pledged; I am the only +earthly stay of my parents; there is a young woman whose happiness I +regard as dearer than my own: yet I could ask no better death than to +fall next week before Sumter. I am not better than other men. You will +find that patriotism is not dead, even if it sleeps." + +Sumter fell, and the sleeping awoke. The spirit of Ellsworth, cramped by +a few weeks' intercourse with politicians, sprang up full-statured +in the Northern gale. He cut at once the meshes of red tape that had +hampered and held him, threw up his commission, and started for New York +without orders, without assistance, without authority, but with the +consciousness that the President would sustain him. The rest the world +knows. I will be brief in recalling it. + +In an incredibly short space of time he enlisted and organized a +regiment, eleven hundred strong, of the best fighting material that ever +went to war. He divided it, according to an idea of his own, into +groups of four comrades each, for the campaign. He exercised a personal +supervision over the most important and the most trivial minutiae of the +regimental business. The quick sympathy of the public still followed +him. He became the idol of the Bowery and the pet of the Avenue. Yet not +one instant did he waste in recreation or lionizing. Indulgent to all +others, he was merciless to himself. He worked day and night, like an +incarnation of Energy. When he arrived with his men in Washington, he +was thin, hoarse, flushed, but entirely contented and happy, because +busy and useful. + +Of the bright enthusiasm and the quenchless industry of the next few +weeks what need to speak? Every day, by his unceasing toil and care, by +his vigor, alertness, activity, by his generosity, and by his relentless +rigor when duty commanded, he grew into the hearts of his robust and +manly followers, until every man in the regiment feared him as a Colonel +should be feared, and loved him as a brother should be loved. + +On the night of the twenty-third of May, he called his men together, +and made a brief, stirring speech to them, announcing their orders to +advance on Alexandria. "Now, boys, go to bed, and wake up at two o'clock +for a sail and a skirmish." When the camp was silent, he began to work. +He wrote many hours, arranging the business of the regiment. He finished +his labor as the midnight stars were crossing the zenith. As he sat in +his tent by the shore, it seems as if the mystical gales from the near +eternity must have breathed for a moment over his soul, freighted with +the odor of amaranths and asphodels. For he wrote two strange letters: +one to her who mourns him faithful in death; one to his parents. There +is nothing braver or more pathetic. With the prophetic instinct of love, +he assumed the office of consoler for the stroke that impended. + +In the dewy light of the early dawn he occupied the first rebel town. +With his own hand he tore down the first rebel flag. He added to the +glories of that morning the seal of his blood. + +The poor wretch who stumbled upon an immortality of infamy by murdering +him died at the same instant. The two stand in the light of that +event--clearly revealed--types of the two systems in conflict to-day: +the one, brave, refined, courtly, generous, tender, and true; the other, +not lacking in brute courage, reckless, besotted, ignorant, and cruel. + +Let the two systems, Freedom and Slavery, stand thus typified forever, +in the red light of that dawn, as on a Mount of Transfiguration. I +believe that may solve the dark mystery why Ellsworth died. + + + + +REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES. + + +_Chambers's Encyclopaedia: A Dictionary of Universal Knowledge for +the People; on the Basis of the Latest Edition of the German +Conversations-Lexicon_. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott & Co. Vols. I. and +II. + +An Encyclopaedia is both a luxury and a necessity. Few readers now +collect a library, however scant, without including one of some sort. +Many of them, even in the absence of all other books, of themselves +constitute a complete library. The Britannica, Edinburgh, Metropolitana, +English, Penny, London, Oxford, and that of Kees, are most elaborate +works, extending respectively to about a score of heavy volumes, +averaging eight or nine hundred pages each. Such publications must +necessarily be expensive. They are, moreover, to be regarded rather as a +collection of exhaustive treatises,--great prominence being given to +the physical and mathematical sciences, and to general history. For +instance, in the Britannica, the publication of the eighth edition +of which is just completed, the length of some of the articles is as +follows: Astronomy, 155 quarto pages; Chemistry, 88; Electricity, 104; +Hydrodynamics, 119; Optics, 176; Mammalia, 120; Ichthyology, 151; +Entomology, 265; Britain, 300; England, 136; France, 284. Each one of +these papers is equal to a large octavo volume; some of them would +occupy several volumes; and the entire work, containing a collection of +such articles, can be regarded in no other light than as an attempted +exhibition of the sum of human knowledge, commending itself, of course, +to professional and highly educated minds, but far transcending, in +extent and costliness, the requirements and the means of the great class +of general readers. For the wants of this latter class a different sort +of work is desirable, which shall be cheaper in price, less exhaustive +in its method, and more diversified in its range. In these particulars +the Germans seem to have hit upon the happy medium in their famous +"Conversations-Lexicon," which has passed through a great many editions, +and been translated into the principal languages of Europe. This is +taken as the type, and in some respects as the basis, of the present +publication,--there being engrafted upon it new contributions from +leading authors of this and other countries, together with such +extensive improvements, revisals, rewritings, additions, and +modifications throughout, as to constitute a substantially new work, +exhibiting in combination the results of the best labors of the German, +English, and American mind. In the departments of statistics, geography, +history, and science, the articles are all within readable limits, +accurate, and up to the times; while in the biographical and literary +articles there is a freshness and originality of criticism, and a +vivacity of style, seldom met with in this class of publications. + +The peculiar merit of this Encyclopaedia is its convenient adaptedness +to popular use. The subjects treated of are broken up and distributed +alphabetically under their proper heads, so as to facilitate reference. +We are thus furnished with a dictionary of facts and events, where we +may readily find whatever properly appertains to any particular point, +without being compelled to explore an entire treatise. This, by the +way, makes it a sort of hand-book even for those who possess the more +voluminous works. As a necessary result of such a method of treatment, +it will be found, upon an actual count and comparison, to contain more +separate titles than any other Encyclopaedia ever published. Although +the articles are generally brief, it must not be supposed that they are +meagre, for they will be found to present a clear and comprehensive view +of the existing information upon the particular topic, with a mastery +which arises only from familiarity. Montesquieu said that Tacitus +abridged all because he knew all; and no reader can peruse a number of +this Encyclopaedia without being convinced that the success in preparing +the perspicuous abridgments it contains is due to thorough knowledge. +Its excellence is not confined, however, to the letter-press; for we are +furnished with a series of colored maps, embodying the results of +the most recent explorations, and also with a profusion of admirable +woodcuts, illustrating the subject wherever pictorial exposition may aid +the verbal. It will be recollected that no other Encyclopaedia published +in this country has the advantage of illustrations. + +The character of Messrs. William and Robert Chambers of itself gives +ample assurance that the work is prepared and executed in a superior +manner; but when we superadd to this the fact that they have spared no +labor or expense, but have devoted to it all the resources of their +experience, enterprise, and skill, in order to make the work, in all its +departments, their crowning contribution to the cause of knowledge, we +are the more ready to believe that it actually is all that it claims to +be. The American edition by J.B. Lippincott & Co., of Philadelphia, +is published in numbers simultaneously with the Edinburgh and London +edition, and in an unexceptionable style of typography. Its low price +brings it within the reach of almost every reader. Indeed, when we +consider the size of the volumes, the number of illustrations and maps, +the mechanical execution, and the compensation to the writers, we are +at a loss to conceive how it can be profitably furnished at so cheap a +rate. + + +_The Recreations of a Country Parson_. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 12mo. + +The essays of which this volume is made up were originally contributed +to "Fraser's Magazine." The "Recreations" they record are therefore +those of an English, and not an American "Parson"; but there is nothing +in them which a parson of any church or denomination would feel inclined +to repudiate, on the score either of their fineness of mental perception +or healthiness of moral sense. The author tells us, that, in writing +these essays, he has not been rapt away into heroic times and distant +scenes, but has written of daily work and worry amid daily work and +worry: and herein lies the charm of his discourses. He has one of those +sensible, elastic, cheerful natures whose ideal qualities are not +perverted by fretfulness and discontent. That most wicked of Byronisms, +which consists in depreciating the duties of common life in order to +exalt the claims of a kind of spiritualized sensuality and poetic +self-importance, he instinctively avoids. The thirteen shrewd, +suggestive, and practical essays which compose the present volume are +transcripts of his own experience and meditations, and teem with facts +and observations such as might be expected from the clear insight of a +man who has mingled with his fellow-men, and who is curiously critical +of the non-romantic phenomena of their daily life. The essays on the Art +of Putting Things, on Petty Malignity and Petty Trickery, on Tidiness, +on Nervous Fears, on Hurry and Leisure, on Work and Play, on Dulness, +and on Growing Old, are full of fresh and delicate perceptions of the +ordinary facts of human experience. His best and brightest remarks +surprise us with the unexpectedness of homely common sense, as flashed +on a world of organized illusions. The entire absence of rhetoric in the +author's mode of "putting things" adds to its effectiveness. He attempts +to reveal the common,--one of the rarest of revelations; and shows what +heroic qualities are needed to overcome the superficial circumstances +of our life, and transmute them into occasions for that humble, obscure +heroism which God alone apprehends and rewards. The freedom of the +writer from all the stereotyped phraseology of sanctity in doing this +work, and his innocent sympathy with everything cheerful, pleasurable, +and lovable in Nature and human nature, only add to the power of his +teachings. These "Recreations" of the "Parson" will, to the generality +of readers, produce more beneficent results than could have been +produced, had he given us his most carefully prepared sermons,--for they +connect religion with life. Nobody can read the volume without feeling +the moral and religious purpose which underlies its graceful and genial +exhibition of human character and manners. The common objection to +clergymen is, that they are ignorant of the world. No sagacious reader +of the present book can doubt that this parson, at least, is an +exception to the general rule; for he palpably knows more of the world +than most men who have made it a special study. + + + + +RECENT AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS + +RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS OF THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + + +Afloat and Ashore. By J. Fenimore Cooper. Illustrated by Darley. New +York. W.A. Townsend & Co. 12mo. pp. 549. $1.50. + +Silas Marner, the Weaver of Raveloe. By the Author of "Adam Bede." New +York. Harper & Brothers. 12mo. pp. 265. 75 cts. + +The Works of Francis Bacon, Baron of Verulam. Collected and edited by +James Spedding, M.A., Robert Leslie Ellis, M.A., and Douglas Denon +Heath. Volume I. Boston. Brown & Taggard. 12mo. pp. 539. $1.50. + +History of Latin Christianity, including that of the Popes to the +Pontificate of Nicolas V. By Henry Hart Milman, D.D., Dean of St. +Paul's. Volume VIII. New York. Sheldon & Co. 12mo. pp. 561. $1.50. + +Chambers's Encyclopedia: A Dictionary of Universal Knowledge for +the People, on the Basis of the Latest Edition of the German +Conversations--Lexicon. Illustrated. Parts XXIX., XXX. Philadelphia. +J.B. Lippincott & Co. 8vo. paper, pp. 55, 65. 15 cts. each. + +The New American Cyclopedia: A Popular Dictionary of General Knowledge. +Edited by George Ripley and Charles A. Dana. Vol. XII. New York. D. +Appleton & Co. 8vo. pp. 788. $3.00. + +The Life of George Washington. By Washington Irving. In Five Volumes. +Vol. V. Illustrated. New York. G.P. Putnam & Co. 12mo. pp. 434. $1.50. + +The Crayon Miscellany. By Washington Irving. New Illustrated Edition. +Complete in One Volume. New York. G.P. Putnam. 12mo. pp. 379. $1.50. + +Another Letter to a Young Physician; to which are appended some other +Medical Papers. By James Jackson, II. D. Boston. Ticknor and Fields. +13mo. pp. 179. 80 cts. + +The Partisan Leader: A Key to the Disunion Conspiracy. By Beverly +Tucker, of Virginia. Secretly published in Washington in the Year 1836, +but afterwards suppressed. New York. Rudd & Carleton. 18mo. paper, pp. +l95. 50 cts. + +Exercises at the Consecration of the Flag of the Union, by the Old South +Society in Boston, May 1st. 1861. Boston. Alfred Mudge & Son. 8vo. +paper, pp. 16. 20 cts. + +The Life and Military and Civic Services of Lieutenant-General Winfield +Scott. Complete up to the Present Period. By 0.J. Victor. New York. +Beadle & Co. 18mo. pp. 118. 25 cts. + +The Zouave Drill. Being a Complete Manual of Arms for the Use of the +Rifled Musket; containing also the Complete Manual of the Sword and +Sabre. By Colonel E.E. Ellsworth. With a Biography of his Life. +Philadelphia. T.E. Peterson & Brothers. 16mo. paper, pp. 62. 25 cts. + +The Soldier's Guide. A Complete Manual and Drill-Book for the Use +of Volunteers and Militia. Revised, corrected, and adapted to the +Discipline of the Soldier of the Present Day. By an Officer in the +United States Army. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & Brothers. 16mo. pp. +63. paper, 25 cts. boards, 40 cts. + +The Soldier's Companion, for the Use of all Officers, Volunteers, and +Militia in the United States, in the Camp, Field, or on the March. +Compiled from the Latest Authorities. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & +Brothers. 16mo. paper, pp. 77. 25 cts. + +The Volunteer's Text-Book. Containing the whole of "The Soldier's +Guide," as well as all of "The Soldier's Companion," with Valuable +Information for the Use of Officers of all Grades, compiled from the +Latest Authorities, issued under Orders of Simon Cameron, Secretary of +War, and Lieutenant-General Winfield Scott. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson +& Brothers. 16mo. paper, pp. 154. 50 cts. + +United States Infantry Tactics, for the Instruction, Exercise, and +Manoeuvres of the United States Infantry, including Infantry of the +Line, Light Infantry, and Riflemen. Prepared under the Direction of the +War Department, and authorized and adopted by the Secretary of War, May +1,1861. Philadelphia. J.B. Lippincott & Co. 32mo. pp. 450. $1.25. + +A Manual of Military Surgery; or, Hints on the Emergencies of Field, +Camp, and Hospital Practice. Illustrated with Woodcuts. By S.D. +Gross, M.D., Professor of Surgery in the Jefferson Medical College of +Philadelphia. Philadelphia. J.B. Lippincott & Co. 24mo. pp. 186. 50 cts. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY, VOLUME 8, ISSUE +45, JULY, 1861*** + + +******* This file should be named 11154.txt or 11154.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/1/1/1/5/11154 + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +https://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS,' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at https://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +https://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at https://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit https://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including including checks, online payments and credit card +donations. To donate, please visit: https://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Each eBook is in a subdirectory of the same number as the eBook's +eBook number, often in several formats including plain vanilla ASCII, +compressed (zipped), HTML and others. + +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks replace the old file and take over +the old filename and etext number. The replaced older file is renamed. +VERSIONS based on separate sources are treated as new eBooks receiving +new filenames and etext numbers. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + +https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + +EBooks posted prior to November 2003, with eBook numbers BELOW #10000, +are filed in directories based on their release date. If you want to +download any of these eBooks directly, rather than using the regular +search system you may utilize the following addresses and just +download by the etext year. + +http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext06 + + (Or /etext 05, 04, 03, 02, 01, 00, 99, + 98, 97, 96, 95, 94, 93, 92, 92, 91 or 90) + +EBooks posted since November 2003, with etext numbers OVER #10000, are +filed in a different way. The year of a release date is no longer part +of the directory path. The path is based on the etext number (which is +identical to the filename). The path to the file is made up of single +digits corresponding to all but the last digit in the filename. For +example an eBook of filename 10234 would be found at: + +https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/2/3/10234 + +or filename 24689 would be found at: +https://www.gutenberg.org/2/4/6/8/24689 + +An alternative method of locating eBooks: +https://www.gutenberg.org/GUTINDEX.ALL + +*** END: FULL LICENSE *** diff --git a/old/11154.zip b/old/11154.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a36f23c --- /dev/null +++ b/old/11154.zip |