diff options
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 3 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 12097-0.txt | 8935 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/12097-8.txt | 9358 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/12097-8.zip | bin | 0 -> 209375 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/12097.txt | 9358 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/12097.zip | bin | 0 -> 209214 bytes |
8 files changed, 27667 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/12097-0.txt b/12097-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5c5fc13 --- /dev/null +++ b/12097-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8935 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12097 *** + +THE + +ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + +A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS. + +VOL. IX.--APRIL, 1862.--NO. LIV. + + + + +LETTER TO A YOUNG CONTRIBUTOR. + + +My dear young gentleman or young lady,--for many are the Cecil Dreemes +of literature who superscribe their offered manuscripts with very +masculine names in very feminine handwriting,--it seems wrong not to +meet your accumulated and urgent epistles with one comprehensive reply, +thus condensing many private letters into a printed one. And so large a +proportion of "Atlantic" readers either might, would, could, or should +be "Atlantic" contributors also, that this epistle will be sure of +perusal, though Mrs. Stowe remain uncut and the Autocrat go for an hour +without readers. + +Far from me be the wild expectation that every author will not +habitually measure the merits of a periodical by its appreciation of +his or her last manuscript. I should as soon ask a young lady not to +estimate the management of a ball by her own private luck in respect +to partners. But it is worth while at least to point out that in the +treatment of every contribution the real interests of editor and writer +are absolutely the same, and any antagonism is merely traditional, like +the supposed hostility between France and England, or between England +and Slavery. No editor can ever afford the rejection of a good thing, +and no author the publication of a bad one. The only difficulty lies in +drawing the line. Were all offered manuscripts unequivocally good or +bad, there would be no great trouble; it is the vast range of mediocrity +which perplexes: the majority are too bad for blessing and too good for +banning; so that no conceivable reason can be given for either fate, +save that upon the destiny of any single one may hang that of a hundred +others just like it. But whatever be the standard fixed, it is equally +for the interest of all concerned that it be enforced without flinching. + +Nor is there the slightest foundation for the supposed editorial +prejudice against new or obscure contributors. On the contrary, every +editor is always hungering and thirsting after novelties. To take the +lead in bringing forward a new genius is as fascinating a privilege as +that of the physician who boasted to Sir Henry Halford of having been +the first man to discover the Asiatic cholera and to communicate it to +the public. It is only stern necessity which compels the magazine to +fall back so constantly on the regular old staff of contributors, whose +average product has been gauged already; just as every country-lyceum +attempts annually to arrange an entirely new list of lecturers, and ends +with no bolder experiment than to substitute Chapin and Beecher in place +of last year's Beecher and Chapin. + +Of course no editor is infallible, and the best magazine contains an +occasional poor article. Do not blame the unfortunate conductor. He +knows it as well as you do,--after the deed is done. The newspapers +kindly pass it over, still preparing their accustomed opiate of sweet +praises, so much for each contributor, so much for the magazine +collectively,--like a hostess with her tea-making, a spoonful for each +person and one for the pot. But I can tell you that there is an official +person who meditates and groans, meanwhile, in the night-watches, to +think that in some atrocious moment of good-nature or sleepiness he left +the door open and let that ungainly intruder in. Do you expect him to +acknowledge the blunder, when you tax him with it? Never,--he feels it +too keenly. He rather stands up stoutly for the surpassing merits of the +misshapen thing, as a mother for her deformed child; and as the mother +is nevertheless inwardly imploring that there may never be such another +born to her, so be sure that it is not by reminding the editor of this +calamity that you can allure him into risking a repetition of it. + +An editor thus shows himself to be but human; and it is well enough to +remember this fact, when you approach him. He is not a gloomy despot, +no Nemesis or Rhadamanthus, but a bland and virtuous man, exceedingly +anxious to secure plenty of good subscribers and contributors, and very +ready to perform any acts of kindness not inconsistent with this +grand design. Draw near him, therefore, with soft approaches and mild +persuasions. Do not treat him like an enemy, and insist on reading your +whole manuscript aloud to him, with appropriate gestures. His time has +some value, if yours has not; and he has therefore educated his eye till +it has become microscopic, like a naturalist's, and can classify nine +out of ten specimens by one glance at a scale or a feather. Fancy an +ambitious echinoderm claiming a private interview with Agassiz, to +demonstrate by verbal arguments that he is a mollusk! Besides, do +you expect to administer the thing orally to each of the two hundred +thousand, more or less, who turn the leaves of the "Atlantic"? You are +writing for the average eye, and must submit to its verdict. "Do not +trouble yourself about the light on your statue; it is the light of the +public square which must test its value." + +Do not despise any honest propitiation, however small, in dealing with +your editor. Look to the physical aspect of your manuscript, and prepare +your page so neatly that it shall allure instead of repelling. Use good +pens, black ink, nice white paper and plenty of it. Do not emulate +"paper-sparing Pope," whose chaotic manuscript of the "Iliad," written +chiefly on the backs of old letters, still remains in the British +Museum. If your document be slovenly, the presumption is that its +literary execution is the same, Pope to the contrary notwithstanding. +An editor's eye becomes carnal, and is easily attracted by a comely +outside. If you really wish to obtain his good-will for your production, +do not first tax his time for deciphering it, any more than in visiting +a millionnaire to solicit a loan you would begin by asking him to pay +for the hire of the carriage which takes you to his door. + +On the same principle, send your composition in such a shape that it +shall not need the slightest literary revision before printing. Many a +bright production dies discarded which might have been made thoroughly +presentable by a single day's labor of a competent scholar, in shaping, +smoothing, dovetailing, and retrenching. The revision seems so slight +an affair that the aspirant cannot conceive why there should be so much +fuss about it. + + "The piece, you think, is incorrect; why, take it; + I'm all submission; what you'd have it, make it." + +But to discharge that friendly office no universal genius is salaried; +and for intellect in the rough there is no market. + +Rules for style, as for manners, must be chiefly negative: a positively +good style indicates certain natural powers in the individual, but an +unexceptionable style is merely a matter of culture and good models. Dr. +Channing established in New England a standard of style which really +attained almost the perfection of the pure and the colorless, and the +disciplinary value of such a literary influence, in a raw and crude +nation, has been very great; but the defect of this standard is that it +ends in utterly renouncing all the great traditions of literature, and +ignoring the magnificent mystery of words. Human language may be polite +and powerless in itself, uplifted with difficulty into expression by the +high thoughts it utters, or it may in itself become so saturated with +warm life and delicious association that every sentence shall palpitate +and thrill with the mere fascination of the syllables. The statue is +not more surely included in the block of marble than is all conceivable +splendor of utterance in "Worcester's Unabridged." And as Ruskin says of +painting that it is in the perfection and precision of the instantaneous +line that the claim to immortality is made, so it is easy to see that a +phrase may outweigh a library. Keats heads the catalogue of things real +with "sun, moon, and passages of Shakspeare"; and Keats himself has +left behind him winged wonders of expression which are not surpassed by +Shakspeare, or by any one else who ever dared touch the English tongue. +There may be phrases which shall be palaces to dwell in, treasure-houses +to explore; a single word may be a window from which one may perceive +all the kingdoms of the earth and the glory of them. Oftentimes a word +shall speak what accumulated volumes have labored in vain to utter: +there may be years of crowded passion in a word, and half a life in a +sentence. + +Such being the majesty of the art you seek to practise, you can at least +take time and deliberation before dishonoring it. Disabuse yourself +especially of the belief that any grace or flow of style can come from +writing rapidly. Haste can make you slipshod, but it can never make +you graceful. With what dismay one reads of the wonderful fellows in +fashionable novels, who can easily dash off a brilliant essay in a +single night! When I think how slowly my poor thoughts come in, how +tardily they connect themselves, what a delicious prolonged perplexity +it is to cut and contrive a decent clothing of words for them, as a +little girl does for her doll,--nay, how many new outfits a single +sentence sometimes costs before it is presentable, till it seems at +last, like our army on the Potomac, as if it never could be thoroughly +clothed,--I certainly should never dare to venture into print, but for +the confirmed suspicion that the greatest writers have done even so. I +can hardly believe that there is any autograph in the world so precious +or instructive as that scrap of paper, still preserved at Ferrara, on +which Ariosto wrote in sixteen different revisions one of his most +famous stanzas. Do you know, my dear neophyte, how Balzac used to +compose? As a specimen of the labor that sometimes goes to make an +effective style, the process is worth recording. When Balzac had a new +work in view, he first spent weeks in studying from real life for it, +haunting the streets of Paris by day and night, note-book in hand. His +materials gained, he shut himself up till the book was written, perhaps +two months, absolutely excluding everybody but his publisher. He emerged +pale and thin, with the complete manuscript in his hand,--not only +written, but almost rewritten, so thoroughly was the original copy +altered, interlined, and rearranged. This strange production, almost +illegible, was sent to the unfortunate printers; with infinite +difficulty a proof-sheet was obtained, which, being sent to the author, +was presently returned in almost as hopeless a chaos of corrections as +the manuscript first submitted. Whole sentences were erased, others +transposed, everything modified. A second and a third followed, alike +torn to pieces by the ravenous pen of Balzac. The despairing printers +labored by turns, only the picked men of the office being equal to the +task, and they relieving each other at hourly intervals, as beyond +that time no one could endure the fatigue. At last, by the fourth +proof-sheet, the author too was wearied out, though not contented. "I +work ten hours out of the twenty-four," said he, "over the elaboration +of my unhappy style, and I am never satisfied, myself, when all is +done." + +Do not complain that this scrupulousness is probably wasted, after all, +and that nobody knows. The public knows. People criticize higher than +they attain. When the Athenian audience hissed a public speaker for a +mispronunciation, it did not follow that any one of the malcontents +could pronounce as well as the orator. In our own lyceum-audiences there +may not be a man who does not yield to his own private eccentricities of +dialect, but see if they do not appreciate elegant English from Phillips +or Everett! Men talk of writing down to the public taste who have never +yet written up to that standard. "There never yet was a good tongue," +said old Fuller, "that wanted ears to hear it." If one were expecting to +be judged by a few scholars only, one might hope somehow to cajole them; +but it is this vast, unimpassioned, unconscious tribunal, this average +judgment of intelligent minds, which is truly formidable,--something +more undying than senates and more omnipotent than courts, something +which rapidly cancels all transitory reputations, and at last becomes +the organ of eternal justice and infallibly awards posthumous fame. + +The first demand made by the public upon every composition is, of +course, that it should be attractive. In addressing a miscellaneous +audience, whether through eye or ear, it is certain that no man living +has a right to be tedious. Every editor is therefore compelled to insist +that his contributors should make themselves agreeable, whatever else +they may do. To be agreeable, it is not necessary to be amusing; an +essay may be thoroughly delightful without a single witticism, while a +monotone of jokes soon grows tedious. Charge your style with life, +and the public will not ask for conundrums. But the profounder your +discourse, the greater must necessarily be the effort to refresh and +diversify. I have observed, in addressing audiences of children in +schools and elsewhere, that there is no fact so grave, no thought so +abstract, but you can make it very interesting to the small people, if +you will only put in plenty of detail and illustration; and I have not +observed that in this respect grown men are so very different. If, +therefore, in writing, you find it your mission to be abstruse, fight to +render your statement clear and attractive, as if your life depended on +it: your literary life does depend on it, and, if you fail, relapses +into a dead language, and becomes, like that of Coleridge, only a +_Biographia Literaria_. Labor, therefore, not in thought alone, but in +utterance; clothe and reclothe your grand conception twenty times, until +you find some phrase that with its grandeur shall be lucid also. It is +this unwearied literary patience that has enabled Emerson not merely to +introduce, but even to popularize, thoughts of such a quality as never +reached the popular mind before. And when such a writer, thus laborious +to do his utmost for his disciples, becomes after all incomprehensible, +we can try to believe that it is only that inevitable obscurity of vast +thought which Coleridge said was a compliment to the reader. + +In learning to write availably, a newspaper-office is a capital +preparatory school. Nothing is so good to teach the use of materials, +and to compel to pungency of style. Being always at close quarters with +his readers, a journalist must shorten and sharpen his sentences, or he +is doomed. Yet this mental alertness is bought at a severe price; such +living from hand to mouth cheapens the whole mode of intellectual +existence, and it would seem that no successful journalist could ever +get the newspaper out of his blood, or achieve any high literary +success. + +For purposes of illustration and elucidation, and even for amplitude of +vocabulary, wealth of accumulated materials is essential; and whether +this wealth be won by reading or by experience makes no great +difference. Coleridge attended Davy's chemical lectures to acquire new +metaphors, and it is of no consequence whether one comes to literature +from a library, a machine-shop, or a forecastle, provided he has learned +to work with thoroughness the soil he knows. After all is said and done, +however, books remain the chief quarries. Johnson declared, putting the +thing perhaps too mechanically, "The greater part of an author's time is +spent in reading in order to write; a man will turn over half a library +to make one book." Addison collected three folios of materials before +publishing the first number of the "Spectator." Remember, however, that +copious preparation has its perils also, in the crude display to which +it tempts. The object of high culture is not to exhibit culture, but +its results. You do not put guano on your garden that your garden may +blossom guano. Indeed, even for the proper subordination of one's own +thoughts the same self-control is needed; and there is no severer test +of literary training than in the power to prune out one's most cherished +sentence, when it grows obvious that the sacrifice will help the +symmetry or vigor of the whole. + +Be noble both in the affluence and the economy of your diction; spare +no wealth that you can put in, and tolerate no superfluity that can be +struck out. Remember the Lacedemonian who was fined for saying that in +three words which might as well have been expressed in two. Do not throw +a dozen vague epithets at a thing, in the hope that some one of them +will fit; but study each phrase so carefully that the most ingenious +critic cannot alter it without spoiling the whole passage for everybody +but himself. For the same reason do not take refuge, as was the +practice a few years since, in German combinations, heart-utterances, +soul-sentiments, and hyphenized phrases generally; but roll your thought +into one good English word. There is no fault which seems so hopeless as +commonplaceness, but it is really easier to elevate the commonplace +than to reduce the turgid. How few men in all the pride of culture can +emulate the easy grace of a bright woman's letter! + +Have faith enough in your own individuality to keep it resolutely down +for a year or two. A man has not much intellectual capital who cannot +treat himself to a brief interval of modesty. Premature individualism +commonly ends either in a reaction against the original whims, or in a +mannerism which perpetuates them. For mannerism no one is great enough, +because, though in the hands of a strong man it imprisons us in novel +fascination, yet we soon grow weary, and then hate our prison forever. +How sparkling was Reade's crisp brilliancy in "Peg Woffington"!--but +into what disagreeable affectations it has since degenerated! Carlyle +was a boon to the human race, amid the lameness into which English style +was declining; but who is not tired of him and his catchwords now? He +was the Jenner of our modern style, inoculating and saving us all by his +quaint frank Germanism, then dying of his own disease. Now the age has +outgrown him, and is approaching a mode of writing which unites the +smoothness of the eighteenth century with the vital vigor of the +seventeenth, so that Sir Thomas Browne and Andrew Marvell seem quite as +near to us as Pope or Addison,--a style penetrated with the best spirit +of Carlyle, without a trace of Carlylism. + +Be neither too lax nor too precise in your use of language: the one +fault ends in stiffness, the other in slang. Some one told the Emperor +Tiberius that he might give citizenship to men, but not to words. To be +sure, Louis XIV. in childhood, wishing for a carriage, called for _mon +carrosse_, and made the former feminine a masculine to all future +Frenchmen. But do not undertake to exercise these prerogatives of +royalty until you are quite sure of being crowned. The only thing I +remember of our college text-book of Rhetoric is one admirable verse of +caution which it quoted:-- + + "In words, as fashions, the same rule will hold, + Alike fantastic, if too new or old; + Be not the first by whom the new are tried, + Nor yet the last to lay the old aside." + +Especially do not indulge any fantastic preference for either Latin or +Anglo-Saxon, the two great wings on which our magnificent English soars +and sings; we can spare neither. The combination gives an affluence of +synonymes and a delicacy of discrimination such as no unmixed idiom can +show. + +While you utterly shun slang, whether native-or foreign-born,--(at +present, by the way, our popular writers use far less slang than the +English,)--yet do not shrink from Americanisms, so they be good ones. +American literature is now thoroughly out of leading-strings; and the +nation which supplied the first appreciative audience for Carlyle, +Tennyson, and the Brownings, can certainly trust its own literary +instincts to create the new words it needs. To be sure, the inelegancies +with which we are chiefly reproached are not distinctively American: +Burke uses "pretty considerable"; Miss Burney says, "I trembled a +few"; the English Bible says "reckon," Locke has "guess," and Southey +"realize," in the exact senses in which one sometimes hears them used +colloquially here. Nevertheless such improprieties are of course to be +avoided; but whatever good Americanisms exist, let us hold to them by +all means. The diction of Emerson alone is a sufficient proof, by its +unequalled range and precision, that no people in the world ever had +access to a vocabulary so rich and copious as we are acquiring. To +the previous traditions and associations of the English tongue we add +resources of contemporary life such as England cannot rival. Political +freedom makes every man an individual; a vast industrial activity makes +every man an inventor, not merely of labor-saving machines, but of +labor-saving words; universal schooling popularizes all thought and +sharpens the edge of all language. We unconsciously demand of our +writers the same dash and the same accuracy which we demand in +railroading or dry-goods-jobbing. The mixture of nationalities is +constantly coining and exchanging new felicities of dialect: Ireland, +Scotland, Germany, Africa are present everywhere with their various +contributions of wit and shrewdness, thought and geniality; in New York +and elsewhere one finds whole thoroughfares of France, Italy, Spain, +Portugal; on our Western railways there are placards printed in Swedish; +even China is creeping in. The colonies of England are too far and too +provincial to have had much reflex influence on her literature, but +how our phraseology is already amplified by our relations with +Spanish-America! The life-blood of Mexico flowed into our newspapers +while the war was in progress; and the gold of California glitters in +our primer: Many foreign cities may show a greater variety of mere +national costumes, but the representative value of our immigrant tribes +is far greater from the very fact that they merge their mental costume +in ours. Thus the American writer finds himself among his phrases like +an American sea-captain amid his crew: a medley of all nations, waiting +for the strong organizing New-England mind to mould them into a unit of +force. + +There are certain minor matters, subsidiary to elegance, if not +elegancies, and therefore worth attention. Do not habitually prop your +sentences on crutches, such as Italics and exclamation-points, but make +them stand without aid; if they cannot emphasize themselves, these +devices are commonly but a confession of helplessness. Do not leave +loose ends as you go on, straggling things, to be caught up and dragged +along uneasily in foot-notes, but work them all in neatly, as Biddy at +her bread-pan gradually kneads in all the outlying bits of dough, till +she has one round and comely mass. + +Reduce yourself to short allowance of parentheses and dashes; if you +employ them merely from clumsiness, they will lose all their proper +power in your hands. Economize quotation-marks also, clear that dust +from your pages, assume your readers to be acquainted with the current +jokes and the stock epithets: all persons like the compliment of having +it presumed that they know something, and prefer to discover the wit or +beauty of your allusion without a guide-board. + +The same principle applies to learned citations and the results of +study. Knead these thoroughly in, supplying the maximum of desired +information with a minimum of visible schoolmaster. It requires no +pedantic mention of Euclid to indicate a mathematical mind, but only the +habitual use of clear terms and close connections. To employ in argument +the forms of Whately's Logic would render it probable that you are +juvenile and certain that you are tedious; wreathe the chain with roses. +The more you have studied foreign languages, the more you will be +disposed to keep Ollendorff in the background: the proper result of such +acquirements is visible in a finer ear for words; so that Goethe said, +the man who had studied but one language could not know that one. But +spare the raw material; deal as cautiously in Latin as did General +Jackson when Jack Downing was out of the way; and avoid French as some +fashionable novelists avoid English. + +Thus far, these are elementary and rather technical suggestions, fitted +for the very opening of your literary career. Supposing you fairly in +print, there are needed some further counsels. + +Do not waste a minute, not a second, in trying to demonstrate to others +the merit of your own performance. If your work does not vindicate +itself, you cannot vindicate it, but you can labor steadily on to +something which needs no advocate but itself. It was said of Haydon, +the English artist, that, if he had taken half the pains to paint great +pictures that he took to persuade the public he had painted them, his +fame would have been secure. Similar was the career of poor Horne, who +wrote the farthing epic of "Orion" with one grand line in it, and a +prose work without any, on "The False Medium excluding Men of Genius +from the Public." He spent years in ineffectually trying to repeal the +exclusion in his own case, and has since manfully gone to the grazing +regions in Australia, hoping there at least to find the sheep and the +goats better discriminated. Do not emulate these tragedies. Remember how +many great writers have created the taste by which they were enjoyed, +and do not be in a hurry. Toughen yourself a little, and perform +something better. Inscribe above your desk the words of Rivarol, "Genius +is only great patience." It takes less time to build an avenue of +shingle palaces than to hide away unseen, block by block, the vast +foundation-stones of an observatory. Most by-gone literary fames have +been very short-lived in America, because they have lasted no longer +than they deserved. Happening the other day to recur to a list of +Cambridge lyceum-lecturers in my boyish days, I find with dismay that +the only name now popularly remembered is that of Emerson: death, +oblivion, or a professorship has closed over all the rest, while the +whole standard of American literature has been vastly raised meanwhile, +and no doubt partly through their labors. To this day, some of our most +gifted writers are being dwarfed by the unkind friendliness of too early +praise. It was Keats, the most precocious of all great poets, the stock +victim of critical assassination,--though the charge does him utter +injustice,--who declared that "nothing is finer for purposes of +production than a very gradual ripening of the intellectual powers." + +Yet do not be made conceited by obscurity, any more than by notoriety. +Many fine geniuses have been long neglected; but what would become +of us, if all the neglected were to turn out geniuses? It is unsafe +reasoning from either extreme. You are not necessarily writing like +Holmes because your reputation for talent began in college, nor like +Hawthorne because you have been before the public ten years without an +admirer. Above all, do not seek to encourage yourself by dwelling on +the defects of your rivals: strength comes only from what is above you. +Northcote, the painter, said, that, in observing an inferior picture, +he always felt his spirits droop, with the suspicion that perhaps he +deceived himself and his own paintings were no better; but the works of +the mighty masters always gave him renewed strength, in the hope that +perhaps his own had in their smaller way something of the same divine +quality. + +Do not complacently imagine, because your first literary attempt proved +good and successful, that your second will doubtless improve upon it. +The very contrary sometimes happens. A man dreams for years over +one projected composition, all his reading converges to it, all his +experience stands related to it, it is the net result of his existence +up to a certain time, it is the cistern into which he pours his +accumulated life. Emboldened by success, he mistakes the cistern for a +fountain, and instantly taps his brain again. The second production, +as compared with the first, costs but half the pains and attains but +a quarter part of the merit; a little more of fluency and facility +perhaps,--but the vigor, the wealth, the originality, the head of water, +in short, are wanting. One would think that almost any intelligent man +might write one good thing in a lifetime, by reserving himself long +enough: it is the effort after quantity which proves destructive. The +greatest man has passed his zenith, when he once begins to cheapen +his style of work and sink into a book-maker: after that, though the +newspapers may never hint at it, nor his admirers own it, the decline of +his career is begun. + +Yet the author is not alone to blame for this, but also the world which +first tempts and then reproves him. Goethe says, that, if a person once +does a good thing, society forms a league to prevent his doing another. +His seclusion is gone, and therefore his unconsciousness and his +leisure; luxuries tempt him from his frugality, and soon he must toil +for luxuries; then, because he has done one thing well, he is urged +to squander himself and do a thousand things badly. In this country +especially, if one can learn languages, he must go to Congress; if he +can argue a case, he must become agent of a factory: out of this comes +a variety of training which is very valuable, but a wise man must +have strength to call in his resources before middle-life, prune off +divergent activities, and concentrate himself on the main work, be it +what it may. It is shameful to see the indeterminate lives of many of +our gifted men, unable to resist the temptations of a busy land, and so +losing themselves in an aimless and miscellaneous career. + +Yet it is unjust and unworthy in Marsh to disfigure his fine work on the +English language by traducing all who now write that tongue. "None seek +the audience, fit, though few, which contented the ambition of Milton, +and all writers for the press now measure their glory by their gains," +and so indefinitely onward,--which is simply cant. Does Sylvanus Cobb, +Jr., who honestly earns his annual five thousand dollars from the "New +York Ledger," take rank as head of American literature by virtue of his +salary? Because the profits of true literature are rising,--trivial as +they still are beside those of commerce or the professions,--its merits +do not necessarily decrease, but the contrary is more likely to happen; +for in this pursuit, as in all others, cheap work is usually poor work. +None but gentlemen of fortune can enjoy the bliss of writing for nothing +and paying their own printer. Nor does the practice of compensation by +the page work the injury that has often been ignorantly predicted. No +contributor need hope to cover two pages of a periodical with what might +be adequately said in one, unless he assumes his editor to be as foolish +as himself. The Spartans exiled Ctesiphon for bragging that he could +speak the whole day on any subject selected; and a modern magazine is of +little value, unless it has a Spartan at its head. + +Strive always to remember--though it does not seem intended that we +should quite bring it home to ourselves--that "To-Day is a king in +disguise," and that this American literature of ours will be just as +classic a thing, if we do our part, as any which the past has treasured. +There is a mirage over all literary associations. Keats and Lamb seem to +our young people to be existences as remote and legendary as Homer, yet +it is not an old man's life since Keats was an awkward boy at the +door of Hazlitt's lecture-room, and Lamb was introducing Talfourd to +Wordsworth as his own only admirer. In reading Spence's "Anecdotes," +Pope and Addison appear no farther off; and wherever I open Bacon's +"Essays," I am sure to end at last with that one magical sentence, +annihilating centuries, "When I was a child, and Queen Elizabeth was in +the flower of her years." + +And this imperceptible transformation of the commonplace present into +the storied past applies equally to the pursuits of war and to the +serenest works of peace. Be not misled by the excitements of the moment +into overrating the charms of military life. In this chaos of uniforms, +we seem to be approaching times such as existed in England after +Waterloo, when the splenetic Byron declared that the only distinction +was to be a little undistinguished. No doubt, war brings out grand +and unexpected qualities, and there is a perennial fascination in the +Elizabethan Raleighs and Sidneys, alike heroes of pen and sword. But the +fact is patent, that there is scarcely any art whose rudiments are +so easy to acquire as the military; the manuals of tactics have +no difficulties comparable to those of the ordinary professional +text-books; and any one who can drill a boat's crew or a ball-club can +learn in a very few weeks to drill a company or even a regiment. Given +in addition the power to command, to organize, and to execute,--high +qualities, though not rare in this community,--and you have a man +needing but time and experience to make a general. More than this can be +acquired only by an exclusive absorption in this one art; as Napoleon +said, that, to have good soldiers, a nation must be always at war. + +If, therefore, duty and opportunity call, count it a privilege to obtain +your share in the new career; throw yourself into it as resolutely and +joyously as if it were a summer-campaign in the Adirondack, but never +fancy for a moment that you have discovered any grander or manlier life +than you might be leading every day at home. It is not needful here to +decide which is intrinsically the better thing, a column of a newspaper +or a column of attack, Wordsworth's "Lines on Immortality" or +Wellington's Lines of Torres Vedras; each is noble, if nobly done, +though posterity seems to remember literature the longest. The writer +is not celebrated for having been the favorite of the conqueror, but +sometimes the conqueror only for having favored or even for having +spurned the writer. "When the great Sultan died, his power and glory +departed from him, and nothing remained but this one fact, that he knew +not the worth of Ferdousi." There is a slight delusion in this dazzling +glory. What a fantastic whim the young lieutenants thought it, when +General Wolfe, on the eve of battle, said of Gray's "Elegy," "Gentlemen, +I would rather have written that poem than have taken Quebec." Yet, +no doubt, it is by the memory of that remark that Wolfe will live the +longest,--aided by the stray line of another poet, still reminding us, +not needlessly, that "Wolfe's great name's cotemporal with our own." + +Once the poets and the sages were held to be pleasing triflers, fit for +hours of relaxation in the lulls of war. Now the pursuits of peace are +recognized as the real, and war as the accidental. It interrupts +all higher avocations, as does the cry of fire: when the fire is +extinguished, the important affairs of life are resumed. Six years ago +the London "Times" was bewailing that all thought and culture in England +were suspended by the Crimean War. "We want no more books. Give us good +recruits, at least five feet seven, a good model for a floating-battery, +and a gun to take effect at five thousand yards,--and Whigs and Tories, +High and Low Church, the poets, astronomers, and critics, may settle it +among themselves." How remote seems that epoch now! and how remote will +the present soon appear! while art and science will resume their sway +serene, beneath skies eternal. Yesterday I turned from treatises on +gunnery and fortification to open Milton's Latin Poems, which I had +never read, and there, in the "Sylvarum Liber," I came upon a passage +as grand as anything in "Paradise Lost,"--his description of Plato's +archetypal man, the vast ideal of the human race, eternal, incorrupt, +coeval with the stars, dwelling either in the sidereal spaces, or among +the Lethean mansions of souls unborn, or pacing the unexplored confines +of the habitable globe. There stood the majestic image, veiled in a dead +language, yet still visible; and it was as if one of the poet's own +sylvan groves had been suddenly cut down, and opened a view of Olympus. +Then all these present fascinating trivialities of war and diplomacy +ebbed away, like Greece and Rome before them, and there seemed nothing +real in the universe but Plato's archetypal man. + +Indeed, it is the same with all contemporary notorieties. In all free +governments, especially, it is the habit to overrate the _dramatis +personae_ of the hour. How empty to us are now the names of the great +politicians of the last generation, as Crawford and Lowndes!--yet it +is but a few years since these men filled in the public ear as large a +space as Clay or Calhoun afterwards, and when they died, the race of the +giants was thought ended. The path to oblivion of these later idols +is just as sure; even Webster will be to the next age but a mighty +tradition, and all that he has left will seem no more commensurate with +his fame than will his statue by Powers. If anything preserves the +statesmen of to-day, it will be only because we are coming to a contest +of more vital principles, which may better embalm the men. Of all gifts, +eloquence is the most short-lived. The most accomplished orator fades +forgotten, and his laurels pass to some hoarse, inaudible Burke, +accounted rather a bore during his lifetime, and possessed of a faculty +of scattering, not convincing, the members of the House. "After all," +said the brilliant Choate, with melancholy foreboding, "a book is the +only immortality." + +So few men in any age are born with a marked gift for literary +expression, so few of this number have access to high culture, so few +even of these have the personal nobleness to use their powers well, +and this small band is finally so decimated by disease and manifold +disaster, that it makes one shudder to observe how little of the +embodied intellect of any age is left behind. Literature is attar of +roses, one distilled drop from a million blossoms. Think how Spain and +Portugal once divided the globe between them in a treaty, when England +was a petty kingdom of illiterate tribes!--and now all Spain is +condensed for us into Cervantes, and all Portugal into the fading fame +of the unread Camoens. The long magnificence of Italian culture has +left us only _I Quattro Poeti_, the Four Poets. The difference between +Shakspeare and his contemporaries is not that he is read twice, ten +times, a hundred times as much as they: it is an absolute difference; he +is read, and they are only printed. + +Yet, if our life be immortal, this temporary distinction is of little +moment, and we may learn humility, without learning despair, from +earth's evanescent glories. Who cannot bear a few disappointments, if +the vista be so wide that the mute inglorious Miltons of this sphere +may in some other sing their Paradise as Found? War or peace, fame or +forgetfulness, can bring no real injury to one who has formed the fixed +purpose to live nobly day by day. I fancy that in some other realm of +existence we may look back with some kind interest on this scene of our +earlier life, and say to one another,--"Do you remember yonder planet, +where once we went to school?" And whether our elective study here lay +chiefly in the fields of action or of thought will matter little to us +then, when other schools shall have led us through other disciplines. + + * * * * * + + +JOHN LAMAR. + + +The guard-house was, in fact, nothing but a shed in the middle of a +stubble-field. It had been built for a cider-press last summer; but +since Captain Dorr had gone into the army, his regiment had camped over +half his plantation, and the shed was boarded up, with heavy wickets at +either end, to hold whatever prisoners might fall into their hands +from Floyd's forces. It was a strong point for the Federal troops, his +farm,--a sort of wedge in the Rebel Cheat counties of Western Virginia. +Only one prisoner was in the guard-house now. The sentry, a raw +boat-hand from Illinois, gaped incessantly at him through the bars, not +sure if the "Secesh" were limbed and headed like other men; but the +November fog was so thick that he could discern nothing but a short, +squat man, in brown clothes and white hat, heavily striding to and fro. +A negro was crouching outside, his knees cuddled in his arms to keep +warm: a field-hand, you could be sure from the face, a grisly patch of +flabby black, with a dull eluding word of something, you could not tell +what, in the points of eyes,--treachery or gloom. The prisoner stopped, +cursing him about something: the only answer was a lazy rub of the +heels. + +"Got any 'baccy, Mars' John?" he whined, in the middle of the hottest +oath. + +The man stopped abruptly, turning his pockets inside out. + +"That's all, Ben," he said, kindly enough. "Now begone, you black +devil!" + +"Dem's um, Mars'! Goin' 'mediate,"--catching the tobacco, and lolling +down full length as his master turned off again. + +Dave Hall, the sentry, stared reflectively, and sat down. + +"Ben? Who air you next?"--nursing his musket across his knees, +baby-fashion. + +Ben measured him with one eye, polished the quid in his greasy hand, and +looked at it. + +"Pris'ner o' war," he mumbled, finally,--contemptuously; for Dave's +trousers were in rags like his own, and his chilblained toes stuck +through the shoe-tops. Cheap white trash, clearly. + +"Yer master's some at swearin'. Heow many, neow, hes he like you, down +to Georgy?" + +The boatman's bony face was gathering a woful pity. He had enlisted to +free the Uncle Toms, and carry God's vengeance to the Legrees. Here they +were, a pair of them. + +Ben squinted another critical survey of the "miss'able Linkinite." + +"How many wells hev _yer_ poisoned since yer set out?" he muttered. + +The sentry stopped. + +"How many 'longin' to de Lamars? 'Bout as many as der's dam' Yankees in +Richmond 'baccy-houses!" + +Something in Dave's shrewd, whitish eye warned him off. + +"Ki yi! yer white nigger, yer!" he chuckled, shuffling down the stubble. + +Dave clicked his musket,--then, choking down an oath into a grim +Methodist psalm, resumed his walk, looking askance at the coarse-moulded +face of the prisoner peering through the bars, and the diamond studs in +his shirt,--bought with human blood, doubtless. The man was the black +curse of slavery itself in the flesh, in his thought somehow, and he +hated him accordingly. Our men of the Northwest have enough brawny +Covenanter muscle in their religion to make them good haters for +opinion's sake. + +Lamar, the prisoner, watched him with a lazy drollery in his sluggish +black eyes. It died out into sternness, as he looked beyond the sentry. +He had seen this Cheat country before; this very plantation was his +grandfather's a year ago, when he had come up from Georgia here, and +loitered out the summer months with his Virginia cousins, hunting. That +was a pleasant summer! Something in the remembrance of it flashed into +his eyes, dewy, genial; the man's leather-covered face reddened like a +child's. Only a year ago,--and now----The plantation was Charley Dorr's +now, who had married Ruth. This very shed he and Dorr had planned last +spring, and now Charley held him a prisoner in it. The very thought of +Charley Dorr warmed his heart. Why, he could thank God there were such +men. True grit, every inch of his little body! There, last summer, how +he had avoided Ruth until the day when he (Lamar) was going away!--then +he told him he meant to try and win her. "She cared most for you +always," Lamar had said, bitterly; "why have you waited so long?" "You +loved her first, John, you know." That was like a man! He remembered +that even that day, when his pain was breathless and sharp, the words +made him know that Dorr was fit to be her husband. + +Dorr was his friend. The word meant much to John Lamar. He thought less +meanly of himself, when he remembered it. Charley's prisoner! An odd +chance! Better that than to have met in battle. He thrust back the +thought, the sweat oozing out on his face,--something within him +muttering, "For Liberty! I would have killed him, so help me God!" + +He had brought despatches to General Lee, that he might see Charley, and +the old place, and--Ruth again; there was a gnawing hunger in his heart +to see them. Fool! what was he to them? The man's face grew slowly +pale, as that of a savage or an animal does, when the wound is deep and +inward. + +The November day was dead, sunless: since morning the sky had had only +enough life in it to sweat out a few muddy drops, that froze as they +fell: the cold numbed his mouth as he breathed it. This stubbly slope +was where he and his grandfather had headed the deer: it was covered +with hundreds of dirty, yellow tents now. Around there were hills like +uncouth monsters, swathed in ice, holding up the soggy sky; shivering +pine-forests; unmeaning, dreary flats; and the Cheat, coiled about the +frozen sinews of the hills, limp and cold, like a cord tying a dead +man's jaws. Whatever outlook of joy or worship this region had borne on +its face in time gone, it turned to him to-day nothing but stagnation, +a great death. He wondered idly, looking at it, (for the old Huguenot +brain of the man was full of morbid fancies,) if it were winter alone +that had deadened color and pulse out of these full-blooded hills, or if +they could know the colder horror crossing their threshold, and forgot +to praise God as it came. + +Over that farthest ridge the house had stood. The guard (he had been +taken by a band of Snake-hunters, back in the hills) had brought him +past it. It was a heap of charred rafters. "Burned in the night," they +said, "when the old Colonel was alone." They were very willing to +show him this, as it was done by his own party, the Secession +"Bush-whackers"; took him to the wood-pile to show him where his +grandfather had been murdered, (there was a red mark,) and buried, his +old hands above the ground. "Colonel said 't was a job fur us to pay up; +so we went to the village an' hed a scrimmage,"--pointing to gaps in +the hedges where the dead Bush-whackers yet lay unburied. He looked at +them, and at the besotted faces about him, coolly. + +Snake-hunters and Bush-whackers, he knew, both armies used in Virginia +as tools for rapine and murder: the sooner the Devil called home his +own, the better. And yet, it was not God's fault, surely, that there +were such tools in the North, any more than that in the South Ben +was--Ben. Something was rotten in freer States than Denmark, he thought. + +One of the men went into the hedge, and brought out a child's golden +ringlet as a trophy. Lamar glanced in, and saw the small face in its +woollen hood, dimpled yet, though dead for days. He remembered it. Jessy +Birt, the ferryman's little girl. She used to come up to the house every +day for milk. He wondered for which flag _she_ died. Ruth was teaching +her to write. _Ruth!_ Some old pain hurt him just then, nearer than even +the blood of the old man or the girl crying to God from the ground. The +sergeant mistook the look. "They'll be buried," he said, gruffly. "Ye +brought it on yerselves." And so led him to the Federal camp. + +The afternoon grew colder, as he stood looking out of the guard-house. +Snow began to whiten through the gray. He thrust out his arm through the +wicket, his face kindling with childish pleasure, as he looked closer at +the fairy stars and crowns on his shaggy sleeve. If Floy were here! She +never had seen snow. When the flakes had melted off, he took a case out +of his pocket to look at Floy. His sister,--a little girl who had no +mother, nor father, nor lover, but Lamar. The man among his brother +officers in Richmond was coarse, arrogant, of dogged courage, keen +palate at the table, as keen eye on the turf. Sickly little Floy, down +at home, knew the way to something below all this: just as they of the +Rommany blood see below the muddy boulders of the streets the enchanted +land of Boabdil bare beneath. Lamar polished the ivory painting with his +breath, remembering that he had drunk nothing for days. A child's face, +of about twelve, delicate,--a breath of fever or cold would shatter such +weak beauty; big, dark eyes, (her mother was pure Castilian,) out of +which her little life looked irresolute into the world, uncertain what +to do there. The painter, with an unapt fancy, had clustered about the +Southern face the Southern emblem, buds of the magnolia, unstained, as +yet, as pearl. It angered Lamar, remembering how the creamy whiteness of +the full-blown flower exhaled passion of which the crimsonest rose knew +nothing,--a content, ecstasy, in animal life. Would Floy----Well, God +help them both! they needed help. Three hundred souls was a heavy weight +for those thin little hands to hold sway over,--to lead to hell or +heaven. Up North they could have worked for her, and gained only her +money. So Lamar reasoned, like a Georgian: scribbling a letter to +"My Baby" on the wrapper of a newspaper,--drawing the shapes of the +snowflakes,--telling her he had reached their grandfather's plantation, +but "have not seen our Cousin Ruth yet, of whom you may remember I have +told you, Floy. When you grow up, I should like you to be just such a +woman; so remember, my darling, if I"----He scratched the last words +out: why should he hint to her that he could die? Holding his life loose +in his hand, though, had brought things closer to him lately,--God and +death, this war, the meaning of it all. But he would keep his brawny +body between these terrible realities and Floy, yet awhile. "I want +you," he wrote, "to leave the plantation, and go with your old maumer to +the village. It will be safer there." He was sure the letter would reach +her. He had a plan to escape to-night, and he could put it into a post +inside the lines. Ben was to get a small hand-saw that would open the +wicket; the guards were not hard to elude. Glancing up, he saw the negro +stretched by a camp-fire, listening to the gaunt boatman, who was off +duty. Preaching Abolitionism, doubtless: he could hear Ben's derisive +shouts of laughter. "And so, good bye, Baby Florence!" he scrawled. "I +wish I could send you some of this snow, to show you what the floor of +heaven is like." + +While the snow fell faster--without, he stopped writing, and began idly +drawing a map of Georgia on the tan-bark with a stick. Here the Federal +troops could effect a landing: he knew the defences at that point. If +they did? He thought of these Snake-hunters who had found in the war a +peculiar road for themselves downward with no gallows to stumble over, +fancied he saw them skulking through the fields at Cedar Creek, closing +around the house, and behind them a mass of black faces and bloody +bayonets. Floy alone, and he here,--like a rat in a trap! "God keep my +little girl!" he wrote, unsteadily. "God bless you, Floy!" He gasped for +breath, as if he had been writing with his heart's blood. Folding up the +paper, he hid it inside his shirt and began his dogged walk, calculating +the chances of escape. Once out of this shed, he could baffle a +blood-hound, he knew the hills so well. + +His head bent down, he did not see a man who stood looking at him over +the wicket. Captain Dorr. A puny little man, with thin yellow hair, and +womanish face: but not the less the hero of his men,--they having found +out, somehow, that muscle was not the solidest thing to travel on in +war-times. Our regiments of "roughs" were not altogether crowned with +laurel at Manassas! So the men built more on the old Greatheart soul +in the man's blue eyes: one of those souls born and bred pure, sent to +teach, that can find breath only in the free North. His hearty "Hillo!" +startled Lamar. + +"How are you, old fellow?" he said, unlocking the gate and coming in. + +Lamar threw off his wretched thoughts, glad to do it. What need to +borrow trouble? He liked a laugh,--had a lazy, jolly humor of his own. +Dorr had finished drill, and come up, as he did every day, to freshen +himself with an hour's talk to this warm, blundering fellow. In this +dismal war-work, (though his whole soul was in that, too,) it was +like putting your hands to a big blaze. Dorr had no near relations; +Lamar--they had played marbles together--stood to him where a younger +brother might have stood. Yet, as they talked, he could not help his +keen eye seeing him just as he was. + +Poor John! he thought: the same uncouth-looking effort of humanity that +he had been at Yale. No wonder the Northern boys jeered him, with his +sloth-ways, his mouthed English, torpid eyes, and brain shut up in that +worst of mud-moulds,--belief in caste. Even now, going up and down the +tan-bark, his step was dead, sodden, like that of a man in whose life +God had not yet wakened the full live soul. It was wakening, though, +Dorr thought. Some pain or passion was bringing the man in him out of +the flesh, vigilant, alert, aspirant. A different man from Dorr. + +In fact, Lamar was just beginning to think for himself, and of course +his thoughts were defiant, intolerant. He did not comprehend how his +companion could give his heresies such quiet welcome, and pronounce +sentence of death on them so coolly. Because Dorr had gone farther up +the mountain, had he the right to make him follow in the same steps? +The right,--that was it. By brute force, too? Human freedom, eh? +Consequently, their talks were stormy enough. To-day, however, they were +on trivial matters. + +"I've brought the General's order for your release at last, John. It +confines you to this district, however." + +Lamar shook his head. + +"No parole for me! My stake outside is too heavy for me to remain a +prisoner on anything but compulsion. I mean to escape, if I can. Floy +has nobody but me, you know, Charley." + +There was a moment's silence. + +"I wish," said Dorr, half to himself, "the child was with her cousin +Ruth. If she could make her a woman like herself!" + +"You are kind," Lamar forced out, thinking of what might have been a +year ago. + +Dorr had forgotten. He had just kissed little Ruth at the door-step, +coming away: thinking, as he walked up to camp, how her clear thought, +narrow as it was, was making his own higher, more just; wondering if +the tears on her face last night, when she got up from her knees after +prayer, might not help as much in the great cause of truth as the life +he was ready to give. He was so used to his little wife now, that he +could look to no hour of his past life, nor of the future coming ages +of event and work, where she was not present,--very flesh of his flesh, +heart of his heart. A gulf lay between them and the rest of the world. +It was hardly probable he could see her as a woman towards whom another +man looked across the gulf, dumb, hopeless, defrauded of his right. + +"She sent you some flowers, by the way, John,--the last in the +yard,--and bade me be sure and bring you down with me. Your own colors, +you see?--to put you in mind of home,"--pointing to the crimson asters +flaked with snow. + +The man smiled faintly: the smell of the flowers choked him: he laid +them aside. God knows he was trying to wring out this bitter old +thought: he could not look in Dorr's frank eyes while it was there. +He must escape to-night: he never would come near them again, in this +world, or beyond death,--never! He thought of that like a man going to +drag through eternity with half his soul gone. Very well: there was man +enough left in him to work honestly and bravely, and to thank God for +that good pure love he yet had. He turned to Dorr with a flushed face, +and began talking of Floy in hearty earnest,--glancing at Ben coming up +the hill, thinking that escape depended on him. + +"I ordered your man up," said Captain Dorr. "Some canting Abolitionist +had him open-mouthed down there." + +The negro came in, and stood in the corner, listening while they talked. +A gigantic fellow, with a gladiator's muscles. Stronger than that Yankee +captain, he thought,--than either of them: better breathed,--drawing the +air into his brawny chest. "A man and a brother." Did the fool think he +didn't know that before? He had a contempt for Dave and his like. Lamar +would have told you Dave's words were true, but despised the man as a +crude, unlicked bigot. Ben did the same, with no words for the idea. The +negro instinct in him recognized gentle blood by any of its signs,--the +transparent animal life, the reticent eye, the mastered voice: he +had better men than Lamar at home to learn it from. It is a trait of +serfdom, the keen eye to measure the inherent rights of a man to be +master. A negro or a Catholic Irishman does not need "Sartor Resartus" +to help him to see through any clothes. Ben leaned, half-asleep, against +the wall, some old thoughts creeping out of their hiding-places through +the torpor, like rats to the sunshine: the boatman's slang had been hot +and true enough to rouse them in his brain. + +"So, Ben," said his master, as he passed once, "your friend has been +persuading you to exchange the cotton-fields at Cedar Creek for New-York +alleys, eh?" + +"Ki!" laughed Ben, "white darkey. Mind ole dad, Mars' John, as took off +in der swamp? Um asked dat Linkinite ef him saw dad up Norf. Guess him's +free now. Ki! ole dad!" + +"The swamp was the place for him," said Lamar. "I remember." + +"Dunno," said the negro, surlily: "him's dad, af'er all: tink him's free +now,"--and mumbled down into a monotonous drone about + + "Oh yo, bredern, is yer gwine ober Jordern?" + +Half-asleep, they thought,--but with dull questionings at work in his +brain, some queer notions about freedom, of that unknown North, mostly +mixed with his remembrance of his father, a vicious old negro, that in +Pennsylvania would have worked out his salvation in the under cell of +the penitentiary, but in Georgia, whipped into heroism, had betaken +himself into the swamp, and never returned. Tradition among the Lamar +slaves said he had got off to Ohio, of which they had as clear an idea +as most of us have of heaven. At any rate, old Kite became a mystery, to +be mentioned with awe at fish-bakes and barbecues. He was this uncouth +wretch's father,--do you understand? The flabby-faced boy, flogged in +the cotton-field for whining after his dad, or hiding away part of his +flitch and molasses for months in hopes the old man would come back, was +rather a comical object, you would have thought. Very different his, +from the feeling with which you left your mother's grave,--though as yet +we have not invented names for the emotions of those people. We'll grant +that it hurt Ben a little, however. Even the young polypus, when it is +torn from the old one, bleeds a drop or two, they say. As he grew up, +the great North glimmered through his thought, a sort of big field,--a +paradise of no work, no flogging, and white bread every day, where the +old man sat and ate his fill. + +The second point in Ben's history was that he fell in love. Just as +you did,--with the difference, of course: though the hot sun, or the +perpetual foot upon his breast, does not make our black Prometheus less +fierce in his agony of hope or jealousy than you, I am afraid. It was +Nan, a pale mulatto house-servant, that the field-hand took into his +dull, lonesome heart to make life of, with true-love defiance of caste. +I think Nan liked him very truly. She was lame and sickly, and if Ben +was black and a picker, and stayed in the quarters, he was strong, like +a master to her in some ways: the only thing she could call hers in the +world was the love the clumsy boy gave her. White women feel in that +way sometimes, and it makes them very tender to men not their equals. +However, old Mrs. Lamar, before she died, gave her house-servants their +free papers, and Nan was among them. So she set off, with all the finery +little Floy could give her: went up into that great, dim North. She +never came again. + +The North swallowed up all Ben knew or felt outside of his hot, hated +work, his dread of a lashing on Saturday night. All the pleasure left +him was 'possum and hominy for Sunday's dinner. It did not content him. +The spasmodic religion of the field-negro does not teach endurance. So +it came, that the slow tide of discontent ebbing in everybody's heart +towards some unreached sea set in his ignorant brooding towards that +vague country which the only two who cared for him had found. If he +forgot it through the dogged, sultry days, he remembered it when the +overseer scourged the dull tiger-look into his eyes, or when, husking +corn with the others at night, the smothered negro-soul, into which +their masters dared not look, broke out in their wild, melancholy songs. +Aimless, unappealing, yet no prayer goes up to God more keen in its +pathos. You find, perhaps, in Beethoven's seventh symphony the secrets +of your heart made manifest, and suddenly think of a Somewhere to come, +where your hope waits for you with late fulfilment. Do not laugh at Ben, +then, if he dully told in his song the story of all he had lost, or gave +to his heaven a local habitation and a name. + +From the place where he stood now, as his master and Dorr walked up and +down, he could see the purplish haze beyond which the sentry had told +him lay the North. The North! Just beyond the ridge. There was a pain +in his head, looking at it; his nerves grew cold and rigid, as yours do +when something wrings your heart sharply: for there are nerves in these +black carcasses, thicker, more quickly stung to madness than yours. Yet +if any savage longing, smouldering for years, was heating to madness now +in his brain, there was no sign of it in his face. Vapid, with sordid +content, the huge jaws munching tobacco slowly, only now and then the +beady eye shot a sharp glance after Dorr. The sentry had told him the +Northern army had come to set the slaves free; he watched the Federal +officer keenly. + +"What ails you, Ben?" said his master. "Thinking over your friend's +sermon?" + +Ben's stolid laugh was ready. + +"Done forgot dat, Mars'. Wouldn't go, nohow. Since Mars' sold dat cussed +Joe, gorry good times 't home. Dam' Abolitioner say we ums all goin' +Norf,"--with a stealthy glance at Dorr. + +"That's more than your philanthropy bargains for, Charley," laughed +Lamar. + +The men stopped; the negro skulked nearer, his whole senses sharpened +into hearing. Dorr's clear face was clouded. + +"This slave question must be kept out of the war. It puts a false face +on it." + +"I thought one face was what it needed," said Lamar. "You have too many +slogans. Strong government, tariff, Sumter, a bit of bunting, eleven +dollars a month. It ought to be a vital truth that would give soul and +_vim_ to a body with the differing members of your army. You, with your +ideal theory, and Billy Wilson with his 'Blood and Baltimore!' Try human +freedom. That's high and sharp and broad." + +Ben drew a step closer. + +"You are shrewd, Lamar. I am to go below all constitutions or expediency +or existing rights, and tell Ben here that he is free? When once the +Government accepts that doctrine, you, as a Rebel, must be let alone." + +The slave was hid back in the shade. + +"Dorr," said Lamar, "you know I'm a groping, ignorant fellow, but it +seems to me that prating of constitutions and existing rights is surface +talk; there is a broad common-sense underneath, by whose laws the world +is governed, which your statesmen don't touch often. You in the North, +in your dream of what shall be, shut your eyes to what is. You want a +republic where every man's voice shall be heard in the council, and the +majority shall rule. Granting that the free population are educated to a +fitness for this,--(God forbid I should grant it with the Snake-hunters +before my eyes!)--look here!" + +He turned round, and drew the slave out into the light: he crouched +down, gaping vacantly at them. + +"There is Ben. What, in God's name, will you do with him? Keep him a +slave, and chatter about self-government? Pah! The country is paying in +blood for the lie, to-day. Educate him for freedom, by putting a musket +in his hands? We have this mass of heathendom drifted on our shores by +your will as well as mine. Try to bring them to a level with the whites +by a wrench, and you'll waken out of your dream to a sharp reality. Your +Northern philosophy ought to be old enough to teach you that spasms in +the body-politic shake off no atom of disease,--that reform, to be +enduring, must be patient, gradual, inflexible as the Great Reformer. +'The mills of God,' the old proverb says, 'grind surely.' But, Dorr, +they grind exceeding slow!" + +Dorr watched Lamar with an amused smile. It pleased him to see his brain +waking up, eager, vehement. As for Ben, crouching there, if they talked +of him like a clod, heedless that his face deepened in stupor, that his +eyes had caught a strange, gloomy treachery,--we all do the same, you +know. + +"What is your remedy, Lamar? You have no belief in the right of +Secession, I know," said Dorr. + +"It's a bad instrument for a good end. Let the white Georgian come out +of his sloth, and the black will rise with him. Jefferson Davis may not +intend it, but God does. When we have our Lowell, our New York, when we +are a self-sustaining people instead of lazy land-princes, Ben here will +have climbed the second of the great steps of Humanity. Do you laugh at +us?" said Lamar, with a quiet self-reliance. "Charley, it needs only +work and ambition to cut the brute away from my face, and it will leave +traits very like your own. Ben's father was a Guinea fetich-worshipper; +when we stand where New England does, Ben's son will be ready for his +freedom." + +"And while you theorize," laughed Dorr, "I hold you a prisoner, John, +and Ben knows it is his right to be free. He will not wait for the +grinding of the mill, I fancy." + +Lamar did not smile. It was womanish in the man, when the life of great +nations hung in doubt before them, to go back so constantly to little +Floy sitting in the lap of her old black maumer. But he did it,--with +the quick thought that to-night he must escape, that death lay in delay. + +While Dorr talked, Lamar glanced significantly at Ben. The negro was not +slow to understand,--with a broad grin, touching his pocket, from which +projected the dull end of a hand-saw. I wonder what sudden pain made the +negro rise just then, and come close to his master, touching him with a +strange affection and remorse in his tired face, as though he had done +him some deadly wrong. + +"What is it, old fellow?" said Lamar, in his boyish way. "Homesick, eh? +There's a little girl in Georgia that will be glad to see you and your +master, and take precious good care of us when she gets us safe again. +That's true, Ben!" laying his hand kindly on the man's shoulder, while +his eyes went wandering off to the hills lying South. + +"Yes, Mars'," said Ben, in a low voice, suddenly bringing a +blacking-brush, and beginning to polish his master's shoes,--thinking, +while he did it, of how often Mars' John had interfered with the +overseers to save him from a flogging,--(Lamar, in his lazy way, +was kind to his slaves,)--thinking of little Mist' Floy with an odd +tenderness and awe, as a gorilla might of a white dove: trying to think +thus,--the simple, kindly nature of the negro struggling madly with +something beneath, new and horrible. He understood enough of the talk of +the white men to know that there was no help for him,--none. Always a +slave. Neither you nor I can ever know what those words meant to him. +The pale purple mist where the North lay was never to be passed. His +dull eyes turned to it constantly,--with a strange look, such as the +lost women might have turned to the door, when Jesus shut it: they +forever outside. There was a way to help himself? The stubby black +fingers holding the brush grew cold and clammy,--noting withal, the poor +wretch in his slavish way, that his master's clothes were finer than the +Northern captain's, his hands whiter, and proud that it was so,--holding +Lamar's foot daintily, trying to see himself in the shoe, smoothing down +the trousers with a boorish, affectionate touch,--with the same fierce +whisper in his ear, Would the shoes ever be cleaned again? would the +foot move to-morrow? + +It grew late. Lamar's supper was brought up from Captain Dorr's, and +placed on the bench. He poured out a goblet of water. + +"Come, Charley, let's drink. To Liberty! It is a war-cry for Satan or +Michael." + +They drank, laughing, while Ben stood watching. Dorr turned to go, but +Lamar called him back,--stood resting his hand on his shoulder: he never +thought to see him again, you know. + +"Look at Ruth, yonder," said Dorr, his face lighting. "She is coming to +meet us. She thought you would be with me." + +Lamar looked gravely down at the low field-house and the figure at the +gate. He thought he could see the small face and earnest eyes, though it +was far off, and night was closing. + +"She is waiting for you, Charley. Go down. Good night, old chum!" + +If it cost any effort to say it, Dorr saw nothing of it. + +"Good night, Lamar! I'll see you in the morning." + +He lingered. His old comrade looked strangely alone and desolate. + +"John!" + +"What is it, Dorr?" + +"If I could tell the Colonel you would take the oath? For Floy's sake." + +The man's rough face reddened. + +"You should know me better. Good bye." + +"Well, well, you are mad. Have you no message for Ruth?" + +There was a moment's silence. + +"Tell her I say, God bless her!" + +Dorr stopped and looked keenly in his face,--then, coming back, shook +hands again, in a different way from before, speaking in a lower +voice,-- + +"God help us all, John! Good night!"--and went slowly down the hill. + +It was nearly night, and bitter cold. Lamar stood where the snow drifted +in on him, looking out through the horizon-less gray. + +"Come out o' dem cold, Mars' John," whined Ben, pulling at his coat. + +As the night gathered, the negro was haunted with a terrified wish to be +kind to his master. Something told him that the time was short. Here and +there through the far night some tent-fire glowed in a cone of ruddy +haze, through which the thick-falling snow shivered like flakes of +light. Lamar watched only the square block of shadow where Dorr's house +stood. The door opened at last, and a broad, cheerful gleam shot out +red darts across the white waste without; then he saw two figures go +in together. They paused a moment; he put his head against the bars, +straining his eyes, and saw that the woman turned, shading her eyes +with her hand, and looked up to the side of the mountain where the +guard-house lay,--with a kindly look, perhaps, for the prisoner out in +the cold. A kind look: that was all. The door shut on them. Forever: so, +good night, Ruth! + +He stool there for an hour or two, leaning his head against the muddy +planks, smoking. Perhaps, in his coarse fashion, he took the trouble of +his manhood back to the same God he used to pray to long ago. When he +turned at last, and spoke, it was with a quiet, strong voice, like one +who would fight through life in a manly way. There was a grating sound +at the back of the shed: it was Ben, sawing through the wicket, the +guard having lounged off to supper. Lamar watched him, noticing that the +negro was unusually silent. The plank splintered, and hung loose. + +"Done gone, Mars' John, now,"--leaving it, and beginning to replenish +the fire. + +"That's right, Ben. We'll start in the morning. That sentry at two +o'clock sleeps regularly." + +Ben chuckled, heaping up the sticks. + +"Go on down to the camp, as usual. At two, Ben, remember! We will be +free to-night, old boy!" + +The black face looked up from the clogging smoke with a curious stare. + +"Ki! we'll be free to-night, Mars'!"--gulping his breath. + +Soon after, the sentry unlocked the gate, and he shambled off out into +the night. Lamar, left alone, went closer to the fire, and worked busily +at some papers he drew from his pocket: maps and schedules. He intended +to write until two o'clock; but the blaze dying down, he wrapped his +blanket about him, and lay down on the heaped straw, going on sleepily, +in his brain, with his calculations. + +The negro, in the shadow of the shed, watched him. A vague fear beset +him,--of the vast, white cold,--the glowering mountains,--of himself; +he clung to the familiar face, like a man drifting out into an unknown +sea, clutching some relic of the shore. When Lamar fell asleep, he +wandered uncertainly towards the tents. The world had grown new, +strange; was he Ben, picking cotton in the swamp-edge?--plunging his +fingers with a shudder in the icy drifts. Down in the glowing torpor of +the Santilla flats, where the Lamar plantations lay, Ben had slept off +as maddening hunger for life and freedom as this of to-day; but here, +with the winter air stinging every nerve to life, with the perpetual +mystery of the mountains terrifying his bestial nature down, the +strength of the man stood up: groping, blind, malignant, it may be; but +whose fault was that? He was half-frozen: the physical pain sharpened +the keen doubt conquering his thought. He sat down in the crusted snow, +looking vacantly about him, a man, at last,--but wakening, like a +new-born soul, into a world of unutterable solitude. Wakened dully, +slowly; sitting there far into the night, pondering stupidly on his old +life; crushing down and out the old parasite affection for his master, +the old fears, the old weight threatening to press out his thin life; +the muddy blood heating, firing with the same heroic dream that bade +Tell and Garibaldi lift up their hands to God, and cry aloud that they +were men and free: the same,--God-given, burning in the imbruted veins +of a Guinea slave. To what end? May God be merciful to America while +she answers the question! He sat, rubbing his cracked, bleeding feet, +glancing stealthily at the southern hills. Beyond them lay all that was +past; in an hour he would follow Lamar back to--what? He lifted his +hands up to the sky, in his silly way sobbing hot tears. "Gor-a'mighty, +Mars' Lord, I'se tired," was all the prayer he made. The pale purple +mist was gone from the North; the ridge behind which love, freedom +waited, struck black across the sky, a wall of iron. He looked at it +drearily. Utterly alone: he had always been alone. He got up at last, +with a sigh. + +"It's a big world,"--with a bitter chuckle,--"but der's no room in it +fur poor Ben." + +He dragged himself through the snow to a light in a tent where a +voice in a wild drone, like that he had heard at negro camp-meetings, +attracted him. He did not go in: stood at the tent-door, listening. Two +or three of the guard stood around, leaning on their muskets; in the +vivid fire-light rose the gaunt figure of the Illinois boatman, swaying +to and fro as he preached. For the men were honest, God-fearing souls, +members of the same church, and Dave, in all integrity of purpose, read +aloud to them,--the cry of Jeremiah against the foul splendors of the +doomed city,--waving, as he spoke, his bony arm to the South. The shrill +voice was that of a man wrestling with his Maker. The negro's fired +brain caught the terrible meaning of the words,--found speech in it: +the wide, dark night, the solemn silence of the men, were only fitting +audience. + +The man caught sight of the slave, and, laying down his book, began one +of those strange exhortations in the manner of his sect. Slow at first, +full of unutterable pity. There was room for pity. Pointing to the human +brute crouching there, made once in the image of God,--the saddest +wreck on His green foot-stool: to the great stealthy body, the +revengeful jaws, the foreboding eyes. Soul, brains,--a man, wifeless, +homeless, nationless, hawked, flung from trader to trader for a handful +of dirty shinplasters. "Lord God of hosts," cried the man, lifting up +his trembling hands, "lay not this sin to our charge!" There was a scar +on Ben's back where the lash had buried itself: it stung now in the +cold. He pulled his clothes tighter, that they should not see it; the +scar and the words burned into his heart: the childish nature of the man +was gone; the vague darkness in it took a shape and name. The boatman +had been praying for him; the low words seemed to shake the night:-- + +"Hear the prayer of Thy servant, and his supplications! Is not this what +Thou hast chosen: to loose the bands, to undo the heavy burdens, and let +the oppressed go free? O Lord, hear! O Lord, hearken and do! Defer not +for Thine own sake, O my God!" + +"What shall I do?" said the slave, standing up. + +The boatman paced slowly to and fro, his voice chording in its dull +monotone with the smothered savage muttering in the negro's brain. + +"The day of the Lord cometh; it is nigh at hand. Who can abide it? What +saith the prophet Jeremiah? 'Take up a burden against the South. Cry +aloud, spare not. Woe unto Babylon, for the day of her vengeance is +come, the day of her visitation! Call together the archers against +Babylon; camp against it round about; let none thereof escape. +Recompense her: as she hath done unto my people, be it done unto her. +A sword is upon Babylon: it shall break in pieces the shepherd and his +flock, the man and the woman, the young man and the maid. I will render +unto her the evil she hath done in my sight, saith the Lord.'" + +It was the voice of God: the scar burned fiercer; the slave came forward +boldly,-- + +"Mars'er, what shall I do?" + +"Give the poor devil a musket," said one of the men. "Let him come with +us, and strike a blow for freedom." + +He took a knife from his belt, and threw it to him, then sauntered off +to his tent. + +"A blow for freedom?" mumbled Ben, taking it up. + +"Let us sing to the praise of God," said the boatman, "the sixty-eighth +psalm," lining it out while they sang,--the scattered men joining, +partly to keep themselves awake. In old times David's harp charmed away +the demon from a human heart. It roused one now, never to be laid again. +A dull, droning chant, telling how the God of Vengeance rode upon the +wind, swift to loose the fetters of the chained, to make desert the +rebellious land; with a chorus, or refrain, in which Ben's wild, +melancholy cry sounded like the wail of an avenging spirit:-- + + "That in the blood of enemies + Thy foot imbrued may be: + And of thy dogs dipped in the same + The tongues thou mayest see." + +The meaning of that was plain; he sang it lower and more steadily each +time, his body swaying in cadence, the glitter in his eye more steely. + +Lamar, asleep in his prison, was wakened by the far-off plaintive song: +he roused himself, leaning on one elbow, listening with a half-smile. It +was Naomi they sang, he thought,--an old-fashioned Methodist air that +Floy had caught from the negroes, and used to sing to him sometimes. +Every night, down at home, she would come to his parlor-door to say +good-night: he thought he could see the little figure now in its white +nightgown, and hear the bare feet pattering on the matting. When he was +alone, she would come in, and sit on his lap awhile, and kneel down +before she went away, her head on his knee, to say her prayers, as she +called it. Only God knew how many times he had remained alone after +hearing those prayers, saved from nights of drunken debauch. He thought +he felt Floy's pure little hand on his forehead now, as if she were +saying her usual "Good night, Bud." He lay down to sleep again, with a +genial smile on his face, listening to the hymn. + +"It's the same God," he said,--"Floy's and theirs." + +Outside, as he slept, a dark figure watched him. The song of the men +ceased. Midnight, white and silent, covered the earth. He could hear +only the slow breathing of the sleeper. Ben's black face grew ashy pale, +but he did not tremble, as he crept, cat-like, up to the wicket, his +blubber lips apart, the white teeth clenched. + +"It's for Freedom, Mars' Lord!" he gasped, looking up to the sky, as if +he expected an answer. "Gor-a'mighty, it's for Freedom!" And went in. + +A belated bird swooped through the cold moonlight into the valley, and +vanished in the far mountain-cliffs with a low, fearing cry, as though +it had passed through Hades. + +They had broken down the wicket: he saw them lay the heavy body on the +lumber outside, the black figures hurrying over the snow. He laughed +low, savagely, watching them. Free now! The best of them despised him; +the years past of cruelty and oppression turned back, fused in a slow, +deadly current of revenge and hate, against the race that had trodden +him down. He felt the iron muscles of his fingers, looked close at the +glittering knife he held, chuckling at the strange smell it bore. Would +the Illinois boatman blame him, if it maddened him? And if Ben took the +fancy to put it to his throat, what right has he to complain? Has not he +also been a dweller in Babylon? He hesitated a moment in the cleft of +the hill, choosing his way, exultantly. He did not watch the North now; +the quiet old dream of content was gone; his thick blood throbbed and +surged with passions of which you and I know nothing: he had a lost life +to avenge. His native air, torrid, heavy with latent impurity, drew him +back: a fitter breath than this cold snow for the animal in his body, +the demon in his soul, to triumph and wallow in. He panted, thinking of +the saffron hues of the Santilla flats, of the white, stately dwellings, +the men that went in and out from them, quiet, dominant,--feeling the +edge of his knife. It was his turn to be master now! He ploughed his way +doggedly through the snow,--panting, as he went,--a hotter glow in his +gloomy eyes. It was his turn for pleasure now: he would have his fill! +Their wine and their gardens and----He did not need to choose a wife +from his own color now. He stopped, thinking of little Floy, with her +curls and great listening eyes, watching at the door for her brother. +He had watched her climb up into his arms and kiss his cheek. She never +would do that again! He laughed aloud, shrilly. By God! she should keep +the kiss for other lips! Why should he not say it? + +Up on the hill the night-air throbbed colder and holier. The guards +stood about in the snow, silent, troubled. This was not like a death in +battle: it put them in mind of home, somehow. All that the dying man +said was, "Water," now and then. He had been sleeping, when struck, +and never had thoroughly wakened from his dream. Captain Poole, of the +Snake-hunters, had wrapped him in his own blanket, finding nothing more +could be done. He went off to have the Colonel summoned now, muttering +that it was "a damned shame." They put snow to Lamar's lips constantly, +being hot and parched; a woman, Dorr's wife, was crouching on the ground +beside him, chafing his hands, keeping down her sobs for fear they would +disturb him. He opened his eyes at last, and knew Dorr, who held his +head. + +"Unfasten my coat, Charley. What makes it so close here?" + +Dorr could not speak. + +"Shall I lift you up, Captain Lamar?" asked Dave Hall, who stood leaning +on his rifle. + +He spoke in a subdued tone, Babylon being far off for the moment. Lamar +dozed again before he could answer. + +"Don't try to move him,--it is too late," said Dorr, sharply. + +The moonlight steeped mountain and sky in a fresh whiteness. Lamar's +face, paling every moment, hardening, looked in it like some solemn work +of an untaught sculptor. There was a breathless silence. Ruth, kneeling +beside him, felt his hand grow slowly colder than the snow. He moaned, +his voice going fast,-- + +"At two, Ben, old fellow! We'll be free to-night!" + +Dave, stooping to wrap the blanket, felt his hand wet: he wiped it with +a shudder. + +"As he hath done unto My people, be it done unto him!" he muttered, but +the words did not comfort him. + +Lamar moved, half-smiling. + +"That's right, Floy. What is it she says? 'Now I lay me down'----I +forget. Good night. Kiss me, Floy." + +He waited,--looked up uneasily. Dorr looked at his wife: she stooped, +and kissed his lips. Charley smoothed back the hair from the damp face +with as tender a touch as a woman's. Was he dead? The white moonlight +was not more still than the calm face. + +Suddenly the night-air was shattered by a wild, revengeful laugh from +the hill. The departing soul rushed back, at the sound, to life, full +consciousness. Lamar started from their hold,--sat up. + +"It was Ben," he said, slowly. + +In that dying flash of comprehension, it may be, the wrongs of the white +man and the black stood clearer to his eyes than ours: the two lives +trampled down. The stern face of the boatman bent over him: he was +trying to stanch the flowing blood. Lamar looked at him: Hall saw no +bitterness in the look,--a quiet, sad question rather, before which his +soul lay bare. He felt the cold hand touch his shoulder, saw the pale +lips move. + +"Was this well done?" they said. + +Before Lamar's eyes the rounded arch of gray receded, faded into dark; +the negro's fierce laugh filled his ear: some woful thought at the sound +wrung his soul, as it halted at the gate. It caught at the simple faith +his mother taught him. + +"Yea," he said aloud, "though I walk through the valley of the shadow of +death, I will fear no evil; for Thou art with me." + +Dorr gently drew down the uplifted hand. He was dead. + +"It was a manly soul," said the Northern captain, his voice choking, as +he straightened the limp hair. + +"He trusted in God? A strange delusion!" muttered the boatman. + +Yet he did not like that they should leave him alone with Lamar, as +they did, going down for help. He paced to and fro, his rifle on his +shoulder, arming his heart with strength to accomplish the vengeance +of the Lord against Babylon. Yet he could not forget the murdered man +sitting there in the calm moonlight, the dead face turned towards the +North,--the dead face, whereon little Floy's tears should never fall. +The grave, unmoving eyes seemed to the boatman to turn to him with the +same awful question. "Was this well done?" they said. He thought in +eternity they would rise before him, sad, unanswered. The earth, he +fancied, lay whiter, colder,--the heaven farther off; the war, which had +become a daily business, stood suddenly before him in all its terrible +meaning. God, he thought, had met in judgment with His people. Yet he +uttered no cry of vengeance against the doomed city. With the dead face +before him, he bent his eyes to the ground, humble, uncertain,--speaking +out of the ignorance of his own weak, human soul. + +"The day of the Lord is nigh," he said; "it is at hand; and who can +abide it?" + + + + +MOUNTAIN PICTURES. + + +II. + +MONADNOCK FROM WACHUSET. + + + I would I were a painter, for the sake + Of a sweet picture, and of her who led, + A fitting guide, with light, but reverent tread, + Into that mountain mystery! First a lake + Tinted with sunset; next the wavy lines + Of far receding hills; and yet more far, + Monadnock lifting from his night of pines + His rosy forehead to the evening star. + Beside us, purple-zoned, Wachuset laid + His head against the West, whose warm light made + His aureole; and o'er him, sharp and clear, + Like a shaft of lightning in mid launching stayed, + A single level cloud-line, shone upon + By the fierce glances of the sunken sun, + Menaced the darkness with its golden spear! + + So twilight deepened round us. Still and black + The great woods climbed the mountain at our back; + And on their skirts, where yet the lingering day + On the shorn greenness of the clearing lay, + The brown old farm-house like a bird's nest hung. + With home-life sounds the desert air was stirred: + The bleat of sheep along the hill we heard, + The bucket plashing in the cool, sweet well, + The pasture-bars that clattered as they fell; + Dogs barked, fowls fluttered, cattle lowed; the gate + Of the barn-yard creaked beneath the merry weight + Of sun-brown children, listening, while they swung, + The welcome sound of supper-call to hear; + And down the shadowy lane, in tinklings clear, + The pastoral curfew of the cow-bell rung. + Thus soothed and pleased, our backward path we took, + Praising the farmer's home. He only spake, + Looking into the sunset o'er the lake, + Like one to whom the far-off is most near: + "Yes, most folks think it has a pleasant look; + I love it for my good old mother's sake, + Who lived and died here in the peace of God!" + The lesson of his words we pondered o'er, + As silently we turned the eastern flank + Of the mountain, where its shadow deepest sank, + Doubling the night along our rugged road: + We felt that man was more than his abode,-- + The inward life than Nature's raiment more; + And the warm sky, the sundown-tinted hill, + The forest and the lake, seemed dwarfed and dim + Before the saintly soul, whose human will + Meekly in the Eternal footsteps trod, + Making her homely toil and household ways + An earthly echo of the song of praise + Swelling from angel lips and harps of seraphim! + + + + +INDIVIDUALITY. + + +At a certain depth, as has already been intimated in our literature, +all bosoms communicate, all hearts are one. Hector and Ajax, in Homer's +great picture, stand face to face, each with advanced foot, with +levelled spear, and turgid sinew, eager to kill, while on either side +ten thousand slaughterous wishes poise themselves in hot breasts, +waiting to fly with the flying weapons; yet, though the combatants +seem to surrender themselves wholly to this action, there is in each a +profound element that is no party to these hostilities. It is the pure +nature of man. Ajax is not all Greek, nor is Hector wholly Trojan: both +are also men; and to the extent of their mutual participation in this +pure and perpetual element of Manhood, they are more than friends, +more than relatives,--they are of identical spirit. For there is an +imperishable nature of Man, ever and everywhere the same, of which each +particular man is a testimony and representation. As the solid earth +underruns the "dissociating sea"--_Oceano dissociabili_--and joins in +one all sundered lands, so does this nature dip beneath the dividing +parts of our being, and make of all men one simple and inseparable +humanity. In love, in friendship, in true conversation, in all happiness +of communion between men, it is this unchangeable substratum or +substance of man's being that is efficient and supreme: out of +divers bosoms, Same calls, and replies to Same with a great joy +of self-recognition. It is only in virtue of this nature that men +understand, appreciate, admire, trust each other,--that books of the +earliest times remain true in the latest,--that society is possible; and +he in whom the virtue of it dwells divinely is admitted to the secret +confidence of all bosoms, lives in all times, and converses with each +soul and age in its own vernacular. Socrates looked beyond the gates of +death for happy communion with Homer and all the great; but already we +interchange words with these, whenever we are so sweetly prospered as to +become, in some good degree, identical with the absolute nature of man. + +Not only, moreover, is this immortal substance of man's being common and +social, but it is so great and venerable that no one can match it +with an equal report. All the epithets by which we would extol it +are disgraced by it, as the most brilliant artificial lights become +blackness when placed between the eye and the noonday sun. It is older, +it is earlier in existence than the earliest star that shone in heaven; +and it will outlive the fixed stars that now in heaven seem fixed +forever. There is nothing in the created universe of which it was not +the prophecy in its primal conception; there is nothing of which it is +not the interpretation and ultimatum in its final form. The laws which +rule the world as forces are, in it, thoughts and liberties. All the +grand imaginations of men, all the glorified shapes, the Olympian gods, +cherubic and seraphic forms, are but symbols and adumbrations of what it +contains. As the sun, having set, still leaves its golden impress on the +clouds, so does the absolute nature of man throw up and paint, as it +were, on the sky testimonies of its power, remaining itself unseen. +Only, therefore, is one a poet, as he can cause particular traits and +events, without violation of their special character, or concealment +of their peculiar interest, to bear the deep, sweet, and infinite +suggestion of this. All princeliness and imperial worth, all that is +regal, beautiful, pure in men, comes from this nature; and the words +by which we express reverence, admiration, love, borrow from it their +entire force: since reverence, admiration, love, and all other grand +sentiments, are but modes or forms of _noble unification_ between men, +and are therefore shown to spring from that spiritual unity of which +persons are exponents; while, on the other hand, all evil epithets +suggest division and separation. Of this nature all titles of honor, all +symbols that command homage and obedience on earth, are pensioners. How +could the claims of kings survive successions of Stuarts and Georges, +but for a royalty in each peasant's bosom that pleads for its poor image +on the throne? + +In the high sense, no man is great save he that is a large continent of +this absolute humanity. The common nature of man it is; yet those are +ever, and in the happiest sense, uncommon men, in whom it is liberally +present. + +But every man, besides the nature which constitutes him man, has, so to +speak, another nature, which constitutes him a particular individual. He +is not only like all others of his kind, but, at the same time, unlike +all others. By physical and mental feature he is distinguished, +insulated; he is endowed with a quality so purely in contrast with the +common nature of man, that in virtue of it he can be singled out from +hundreds of millions, from all the myriads of his race. So far, now, as +one is representative of absolute humanity, he is a Person; so far +as, by an element peculiar to himself, he is contrasted with absolute +humanity, he is an Individual. And having duly chanted our _Credo_ +concerning man's pure and public nature, let us now inquire respecting +this dividing element of Individuality,--which, with all the force it +has, strives to cut off communication, to destroy unity, and to make of +humanity a chaos or dust of biped atoms. + +Not for a moment must we make this surface nature of equal estimation +with the other. It is secondary, _very_ secondary, to the pure substance +of man. The Person first in order of importance; the Individual next,-- + + "Proximus huic, longo sed proximus intervallo,"-- + + "next with an exceeding wide remove." + +Take from Epaminondas or Luther all that makes him man, and the +rest will not be worth selling to the Jews. Individuality is an +accompaniment, an accessory, a red line on the map, a fence about the +field, a copyright on the book. It is like the particular flavors of +fruits,--of no account but in relation to their saccharine, acid, and +other staple elements. It must therefore keep its place, or become +an impertinence. If it grow forward, officious, and begin to push in +between the pure nature and its divine ends, at once it is a meddling +Peter, for whom there is no due greeting but "Get thee behind me, +Satan." If the fruit have a special flavor of such ambitious pungency +that the sweets and acids cannot appear through it, be sure that to come +at this fruit no young Wilhelm Meister will purloin keys. If one be so +much an Individual that he wellnigh ceases to be a Man, we shall not +admire him. It is the same in mental as in physical feature. Let there, +by all means, be slight divergence from the common type; but by all +means let it be no more than a slight divergence. Too much is monstrous: +even a very slight excess is what we call _ugliness_. Gladly I perceive +in my neighbor's face, voice, gait, manner, a certain charm of +peculiarity; but if in any the peculiarity be so great as to suggest +a doubt whether he be not some other creature than man, may he not be +neighbor of mine! + +A little of this surface nature suffices; yet that little cannot be +spared. Its first office is to guard frontiers. We must not lie quite +open to the inspection or invasion of others: yet, were there no medium +of unlikeness interposed between one and another, privacy would be +impossible, and one's own bosom would not be sacred to himself. But +Nature has secured us against these profanations; and as we have locks +to our doors, curtains to our windows, and, upon occasion, a passport +system on our borders, so has she cast around each spirit this veil to +guard it from intruding eyes, this barrier to keep away the feet of +strangers. Homer represents the divinities as coming invisibly to +admonish their favored heroes; but Nature was beforehand with the poet, +and every one of us is, in like manner, a celestial nature walking +concealed. Who sees _you_, when you walk the street? Who would walk the +street, did be not feel himself fortressed in a privacy that no foreign +eyes can enter? But for this, no cities would be built. Society, +therefore, would be impossible, save for this element, which seems to +hinder society. Each of us, wrapt in his opaque individuality, like +Apollo or Athene in a blue mist, remains hidden, if he will; and +therefore do men dare to come together. + +But this superficial element, while securing privacy to the pure nature, +also aids it to expression. It emphasizes the outlines of Personality by +gentle contrast. It is like the shadow in the landscape, without which +all the sunbeams of heaven could not reveal with precision a single +object. Assured lovers resort to happy banter and light oppositions, to +give themselves a sweeter sense of unity of heart. The child, with a +cunning which only Nature has taught, will sometimes put a little honey +of refusal into its kisses before giving them; the maiden adds to her +virgin blooms the further attraction of virgin coyness and reserve; the +civilizing dinner-table would lose all its dignity in losing its delays; +and so everywhere, delicate denial, withholding reserve have an inverse +force, and add a charm of emphasis to gift, assent, attraction, and +sympathy. How is the word Immortality emphasized to our hearts by the +perpetual spectacle of death! The joy and suggestion of it could, +indeed, never visit us, had not this momentary loud denial been uttered +in our ears. Such, therefore, as have learned to interpret these +oppositions in Nature, hear in the jarring note of Death only a jubilant +proclamation of life eternal; while all are thus taught the longing for +immortality, though only by their fear of the contrary. And so is the +pure universal nature of man affirmed by these provocations of contrast +and insulation on the surface. We feel the personality far more, and far +more sweetly, for its being thus divided from our own. From behind this +veil the pure nature comes to us with a kind of surprise, as out of +another heaven. The joy of truth and delight of beauty are born anew for +us from each pair of chanting lips and beholding eyes; and each new soul +that comes promises another gift of the universe. Whoever, in any time +or under any sky, sees the worth and wonder of existence, sees it for +me; whatever language he speak, whatever star he inhabit, we shall +one day meet, and through the confession of his heart all my ancient +possessions will become a new gain; he shall make for me a natal day of +creation, showing the producing breath, as it goes forth from the lips +of God, and spreads into the blue purity of sky, or rounds into the +luminance of suns; the hills and their pines, the vales and their +blooms, and heroic men and beauteous women, all that I have loved or +reverenced, shall come again, appearing and trooping out of skies never +visible before. Because of these dividing lines between souls, each new +soul is to all the others a possible factor of heaven. + +Such uses does individuality subserve. Yet it is capable of these +ministries only as it does indeed _minister_. All its uses are lost with +the loss of its humility and subordinance. It is the porter at the +gate, furthering the access of lawful, and forbidding the intrusion of +unlawful visitors to the mansion; who becomes worse than useless, if in +surly excess of zeal he bar the gate against all, or if in the excess of +self-importance he receive for himself what is meant for his master, +and turn visitors aside into the porter's lodge. Beautiful is virgin +reserve, and true it is that delicate half-denial reinforces attraction; +yet the maiden who carries only _No_ upon her tongue, and only refusal +in her ways, shall never wake before dawn on the day of espousal, nor +blush beneath her bridal veil, like Morning behind her clouds. This +surface element, we must remember, is not income and resource, but +an item of needful, and, so far as needful, graceful and economical +expenditure. Excess of it is wasteful, by causing Life to pay for +that which he does not need, by increase of social fiction, and by +obstruction of social flow with the fructifications which this brings, +not to be spared by any mortal. Nay, by extreme excess, it may so cut +off and sequester a man, that no word or aspect of another soul can +reach him; he shall see in mankind only himself, he shall hear in the +voices of others only his own echoes. Many and many a man is there, so +housed in his individuality, that it goes, like an impenetrable wall, +over eye and ear; and even in the tramp of the centuries he can find +hint of nothing save the sound of his own feet. It is a frequent +tragedy,--but profound as frequent. + +One great task, indeed _the_ great task of good-breeding is, +accordingly, to induce in this element a delicacy, a translucency, +which, without robbing any action or sentiment of the hue it imparts, +shall still allow the pure human quality perfectly and perpetually to +shine through. The world has always been charmed with fine manners; and +why should it not? For what are fine manners but this: to carry your +soul on your lip, in your eye, in the palm of your hand, and yet to +stand not naked, but clothed upon by your individual quality,--visible, +yet inscrutable,--given to the hearts of others, yet contained in your +own bosom,--nobly and humanly open, yet duly reticent and secured from +invasion? _Polished_ manners often disappoint us; _good_ manners never. + +The former may be taken on by indigent souls: the latter imply a noble +and opulent nature. And wait you not for death, according to the counsel +of Solon, to be named happy, if you are permitted fellowship with a man +of rich mind, whose individual savor you always finely perceive, +and never more than finely,--who yields you the perpetual sense of +community, and never of confusion, with your own spirit. The happiness +is all the greater, if the fellowship be accorded by a mind eminently +superior to one's own; for he, while yet more removed, comes yet nearer, +seeming to be that which our own soul may become in some future life, +and so yielding us the sense of our own being more deeply and powerfully +than it is given by the consciousness in our own bosom. And going +forward to the supreme point of this felicity, we may note that the +worshipper, in the ecstasy of his adoration, feels the Highest to be +also Nearest,--more remote than the borders of space and fringes of +heaven,--more intimate with his own being than the air he breathes or +the thought be thinks; and of this double sense is the rapture of his +adoration, and the joy indeed of every angel, born. + +Divineness appertains to the absolute nature of man; piquancy and charm +to that which serves and modifies this. Infinitude and immortality are +of the one; the strictest finiteness belongs to the other. In the first +you can never be too deep and rich; in the second never too delicate and +measured. Yet you will easily find a man in whom the latter so abounds +as not only to shut him out from others, but to absorb all the vital +resource generated in his own bosom, leaving to the pure personality +nothing. The finite nature fares sumptuously every day; the other is a +heavenly Lazarus sitting at the gate. + +Of such individuals there are many classes; and the majority of +eccentric men constitute one class. If a man have very peculiar ways, we +readily attribute to him a certain depth and force, and think that the +polished citizen wants character in comparison. Probably it is not so. +Singularity may be as shallow as the shallowest conformity. There are +numbers of such from whom if you deduct the eccentricity, it is like +subtracting red from vermilion or six from half a dozen. They are +grimaces of humanity,--no more. In particular, I make occasion to say, +that those oddities, whose chief characteristic it is to slink away from +the habitations of men, and claim companionship with musk-rats, are, +despite Mr. Thoreau's pleasant patronage of them, no whit more manly or +profound than the average citizen, who loves streets and parlors, and +does not endure estrangement from the Post-Office. Mice lurk in holes +and corners; could the cat speak, she would say that they have a genius +_only_ for lurking in holes. Bees and ants are, to say the least, quite +as witty as beetles, proverbially blind; yet they build insect cities, +and are as invincibly social and city-loving as Socrates himself. + +Aside, however, from special eccentricity, there are men, like the Earl +of Essex, Bacon's _soi-disant_ friend, who possess a certain emphatic +and imposing individuality, which, while commonly assumed to indicate +character and force, is really but the _succedaneum_ for these. They +are like oysters, with extreme stress of shell, and only a blind, soft, +acephalous body within. These are commonly great men so long as little +men will serve; and are something less than little ever after. As an +instance of this, I should select the late chief magistrate of this +nation. His whole ability lay in putting a most imposing countenance +upon commonplaces. He made a mere _air_ seem solid as rock. Owing to +this possibility of presenting all force on the outside, and so creating +a false impression of resource, all great social emergencies are +followed by a speedy breaking down of men to whom was generally +attributed an able spirit; while others of less outward mark, and for +this reason hitherto unnoticed, come forward, and prove to be indeed the +large vessels of manhood accorded to that generation. + +Our tendency to assume individual mark as the measure of personality +is flattered by many of the books we read. It is, of course, easier to +depict character, when it is accompanied by some striking individual +hue; and therefore in romances and novels this is conferred upon all the +forcible characters, merely to favor the author's hand: as microscopists +feed minute creatures with colored food to make their circulations +visible. It is only the great master who can represent a powerful +personality in the purest state, that is, with the maximum of character +and the minimum of individual distinction; while small artists, with a +feeble hold upon character, habitually resort to extreme quaintnesses +and singularities of circumstance, in order to confer upon their weak +portraitures some vigor of outline. It takes a Giotto to draw readily +a nearly perfect O; but a nearly perfect triangle any one can draw. +Shakspeare is able to delineate a Gentleman,--one, that is, who, while +nobly and profoundly a man, is so delicately individualized, that the +impression of him, however vigorous and commanding, cannot be harsh: +Shakspeare is equal to this task, but even so very able a painter as +Fielding is not. His Squire Western and Parson Adams are exquisite, his +Allworthy is vapid: deny him strong pigments of individualism, and he is +unable to portray strong character. Scott, among British novelists, is, +perhaps, in this respect most Shakspearian, though the Colonel Esmond of +Thackeray is not to be forgotten; but even Scott's Dandie Dinmonts, or +gentlemen in the rough, sparkle better than his polished diamonds. +Yet in this respect the Waverley Novels are singularly and admirably +healthful, comparing to infinite advantage with the rank and file of +novels, wherein the "characters" are but bundles of quaintnesses, and +the action is impossible. + +Written history has somewhat of the same infirmity with fictitious +literature, though not always by the fault of the historian. Far too +little can it tell us respecting those of whom we desire to know much; +while, on the other hand, it is often extremely liberal of information +concerning those of whom we desire to know nothing. The greatest of men +approach a pure personality, a pure representation of man's imperishable +nature; individual peculiarity they far less abound in; and what they do +possess is held in transparent solution by their manhood, as a certain +amount of vapor is always held by the air. The higher its temperature, +the more moisture can the atmosphere thus absorb, exhibiting it not as +cloud, but only as immortal azure of sky: and so the greater intensity +there is of the pure quality of man, the more of individual peculiarity +can it master and transform into a simple heavenliness of beauty, of +which the world finds few words to say. Men, in general, have, perhaps, +no more genius than novelists in general,--though it seems a hard speech +to make,--and while profoundly _impressed_ by any manifestation of the +pure genius of man, can _observe_ and _relate_ only peculiarities and +exceptional traits. Incongruities are noted; congruities are only felt. +If a two-headed calf be born, the newspapers hasten to tell of it; but +brave boys and beautiful girls by thousands grow to fulness of stature +without mention. We know so little of Homer and Shakspeare partly +because they were Homer and Shakspeare. Smaller men might afford more +plentiful materials for biography, because their action and character +would be more clouded with individualism. The biography of a supreme +poet is the history of his kind. He transmits himself by pure vital +impression. His remembrance is committed, not to any separable faculty, +but to a memory identical with the total being of men. If you would +learn his story, listen to the sprites that ride on crimson steeds along +the arterial highways, singing of man's destiny as they go. + + + + +THE GERMAN BURNS. + + +The extreme southwestern corner of Germany is an irregular right-angle, +formed by the course of the Rhine. Within this angle and an +hypothenuse drawn from the Lake of Constance to Carlsruhe lies a wild +mountain-region--a lateral offshoot from the central chain which +extends through Europe from west to east--known to all readers of +robber-romances as the Black Forest. It is a cold, undulating upland, +intersected with deep valleys which descend to the plains of the Rhine +and the Danube, and covered with great tracts of fir-forest. Here and +there a peak rises high above the general level, the Feldberg attaining +a height of five thousand feet. The aspect of this region is stern and +gloomy: the fir-woods appear darker than elsewhere; the frequent little +lakes are as inky in hue as the pools of the High Alps; and the meadows +of living emerald give but a partial brightness to the scenery. Here, +however, the solitary traveller may adventure without fear. Robbers and +robber-castles have long since passed away, and the people, rough and +uncouth as they may at first seem, are as kindly-hearted as they are +honest. Among them was born--and in their incomprehensible dialect +wrote--Hebel, the German Burns. + +We dislike the practice of using the name of one author as the +characteristic designation of another. It is, at best, the sign of an +imperfect fame, implying rather the imitation of a scholar than the +independent position of a master. We can, nevertheless, in no other way +indicate in advance the place which the subject of our sketch occupies +in the literature of Germany. A contemporary of Burns, and ignorant of +the English language, there is no evidence that he had ever even heard +of the former; but Burns, being the first truly great poet who succeeded +in making classic a local dialect, thereby constituted himself an +illustrious standard, by which his successors in the same path must be +measured. Thus, Bellman and Béranger have been inappropriately invested +with his mantle, from the one fact of their being song-writers of a +democratic stamp. The Gascon, Jasmin, better deserves the title; and +Longfellow, in translating his "Blind Girl of Castèl-Cuillè," says,-- + + "Only the lowland tongue of Scotland might + Rehearse this little tragedy aright":-- + +a conviction which we have frequently shared, in translating our German +author. + +It is a matter of surprise to us, that, while Jasmin's poems have gone +far beyond the bounds of France, the name of John Peter Hebel--who +possesses more legitimate claims to the peculiar distinction which +Burns achieved--is not only unknown outside of Germany, but not +even familiarly known to the Germans themselves. The most probable +explanation is, that the Alemannic dialect, in which he wrote, is spoken +only by the inhabitants of the Black Forest and a portion of Suabia, +and cannot be understood, without a glossary, by the great body of the +North-Germans. The same cause would operate, with greater force, in +preventing a translation into foreign languages. It is, in fact, only +within the last twenty years that the Germans have become acquainted +with Burns,--chiefly through the admirable translations of the poet +Freiligrath. + +To Hebel belongs the merit of having bent one of the harshest of German +dialects to the uses of poetry. We doubt whether the lyre of Apollo was +ever fashioned from a wood of rougher grain. Broad, crabbed, guttural, +and unpleasant to the ear which is not thoroughly accustomed to its +sound, the Alemannic _patois_ was, in truth, a most unpromising +material. The stranger, even though he were a good German scholar, would +never suspect the racy humor, the _naïve_, childlike fancy, and the pure +human tenderness of expression which a little culture has brought to +bloom on such a soil. The contractions, elisions, and corruptions which +German words undergo, with the multitude of terms in common use derived +from the Gothic, Greek, Latin, and Italian, give it almost the character +of a different language. It was Hebel's mother-tongue, and his poetic +faculty always returned to its use with a fresh delight which insured +success. His _German_ poems are inferior in all respects. + +Let us first glance at the poet's life,--a life uneventful, perhaps, yet +interesting from the course of its development. He was born in Basle, +in May, 1760, in the house of Major Iselin, where both his father and +mother were at service. The former, a weaver by trade, afterwards became +a soldier, and accompanied the Major to Flanders, France, and Corsica. +He had picked up a good deal of stray knowledge on his campaigns, and +had a strong natural taste for poetry. The qualities of the son were +inherited from him rather than from the mother, of whom we know nothing +more than that she was a steady, industrious person. The parents lived +during the winter in the little village of Hausen, in the Black Forest, +but with the approach of spring returned to Basle for their summer +service in Major Iselin's house. + +The boy was but a year old when his father died, and the discipline of +such a restless spirit as he exhibited in early childhood seems to have +been a task almost beyond the poor widow's powers. An incorrigible +spirit of mischief possessed him. He was an arrant scape-grace, +plundering cupboards, gardens, and orchards, lifting the gates of +mill-races by night, and playing a thousand other practical and not +always innocent jokes. Neither counsel nor punishment availed, and +the entire weight of his good qualities, as a counterbalance, barely +sufficed to prevent him from losing the patrons whom his bright, +eager, inquisitive mind attracted. Something of this was undoubtedly +congenital, and there are indications that the strong natural impulse, +held in check only by a powerful will and a watchful conscience, was the +torment of his life. In his later years, when he filled the posts of +Ecclesiastical Counsellor and Professor in the Gymnasium at Carlsruhe, +the phrenologist Gall, in a scientific _séance_, made an examination of +his head. "A most remarkable development of"----, said Gall, abruptly +breaking off, nor could he be induced to complete the sentence. +Hebel, however, frankly exclaimed,--"You certainly mean the thievish +propensity. I know I have it by nature, for I continually feel its +suggestions." What a picture is presented by this confession! A pure, +honest, and honorable life, won by a battle with evil desires, which, +commencing with birth, ceased their assaults only at the brink of the +grave! A daily struggle, and a daily victory! + +Hebel lost his mother in his thirteenth year, but was fortunate in +possessing generous patrons, who contributed enough to the slender means +he inherited to enable him to enter the Gymnasium at Carlsruhe. Leaving +this institution with the reputation of a good classical scholar, he +entered the University of Erlangen as a student of theology. Here his +jovial, reckless temperament, finding a congenial atmosphere, so got the +upperhand that he barely succeeded in passing the necessary examination, +in 1780. At the end of two years, during which time he supported himself +as a private tutor, he was ordained, and received a meagre situation +as teacher in the Academy at Lörrach, with a salary of one hundred and +forty dollars a year! Laboring patiently in this humble position for +eight years, he was at last rewarded by being transferred to the +Gymnasium at Carlsruhe, with the rank of Sub-Deacon. Hither, the +Markgraf Frederick of Baden, attracted by the warmth, simplicity, and +genial humor of the man, came habitually to listen to his sermons. He +found himself, without seeking it, in the path of promotion, and his +life thenceforth was a series of sure and moderate successes. His +expectations, indeed, were so humble that they were always exceeded by +his rewards. When Baden became a Grand Duchy, with a constitutional form +of government, it required much persuasion to induce him to accept +the rank of Prelate, with a seat in the Upper House. His friends were +disappointed, that, with his readiness and fluent power of speech, +he took so little part in the legislative proceedings. To one who +reproached him for this timidity he naively wrote,--"Oh, you have a +right to talk: you are the son of Pastor N. in X. Before you were twelve +years old, you heard yourself called _Mr._ Gottlieb; and when you went +with your father down the street, and the judge or a notary met you, +they took off their hats, you waiting for your father to return the +greeting, before you even lifted your cap. But I, as you well know, +grew up as the son of a poor widow in Hausen; and when I accompanied my +mother to Schopfheim or Basle, and we happened to meet a notary, she +commanded, 'Peter, jerk your cap off, there's a gentleman!'--but when +the judge or the counsellor appeared, she called out to me, when they +were twenty paces off, 'Peter, stand still where you are, and off with +your cap quick, the Lord Judge is comin'!' Now you can easily +imagine how I feel, when I recall those times,--and I recall them +often,--sitting in the Chamber among Barons, Counsellors of State, +Ministers, and Generals, with Counts and Princes of the reigning House +before me." Hebel may have felt that rank is but the guinea-stamp, but +he never would have dared to speak it out with the defiant independence +of Burns. Socially, however, he was thoroughly democratic in his tastes; +and his chief objection to accepting the dignity of Prelate was the fear +that it might restrict his intercourse with humbler friends. + +His ambition appears to have been mainly confined to his theological +labors, and he never could have dreamed that his after-fame was to rest +upon a few poems in a rough mountain-dialect, written to beguile his +intense longing for the wild scenery of his early home. After his +transfer to Carlsruhe, he remained several years absent from the Black +Forest; and the pictures of its dark hills, its secluded valleys, and +their rude, warm-hearted, and unsophisticated inhabitants, became more +and more fresh and lively in his memory. Distance and absence turned the +quaint dialect to music, and out of this mild home-sickness grew the +Alemannic poems. A healthy oyster never produces a pearl. + +These poems, written in the years 1801 and 1802, were at first +circulated in manuscript among the author's friends. He resisted the +proposal to collect and publish them, until the prospect of pecuniary +advantage decided him to issue an anonymous edition. The success of +the experiment was so positive that in the course of five years four +editions appeared,--a great deal for those days. Not only among his +native Alemanni, and in Baden and Würtemberg, where the dialect was +more easily understood, but from all parts of Germany, from poets and +scholars, came messages of praise and appreciation. Jean Paul (Richter) +was one of Hebel's first and warmest admirers. "Our Alemannic poet," he +wrote, "has life and feeling for everything,--the open heart, the open +arms of love; and every star and every flower are human in his sight.... +In other, better words,--the evening-glow of a lovely, peaceful soul +slumbers upon all the hills he bids arise; for the flowers of poetry he +substitutes the flower-goddess Poetry herself; he sets to his lips the +Swiss Alp-horn of youthful longing and joy, while pointing with the +other hand to the sunset-gleam of the lofty glaciers, and dissolved +in prayer, as the sound of the chapel-bells is flung down from the +mountains." + +Contrast this somewhat confused rhapsody with the clear, precise, yet +genial words wherewith Goethe welcomed the new poet. He instantly +seized, weighed in the fine balance of his ordered mind, and valued with +nice discrimination, those qualities of Hebel's genius which had but +stirred the splendid chaos of Richter with an emotion of vague delight. +"The author of these poems," says he, in the Jena "Literaturzeitung," +(1804,) "is about to achieve a place of his own on the German Parnassus. +His talent manifests itself in two opposite directions. On the one hand, +he observes with a fresh, cheerful glance those objects of Nature which +express their life in positive existence, in growth and in motion, +(objects which we are accustomed to call _lifeless_,) and thereby +approaches the field of descriptive poetry; yet he succeeds, by his +happy personifications, in lifting his pictures to a loftier plane of +Art. On the other hand, he inclines to the didactic and the allegorical; +but here, also, the same power of personification comes to his aid, and +as, in the one case, he finds a soul for his bodies, so, in the other, +he finds a body for his souls. As the ancient poets, and others who have +been developed through a plastic sentiment for Art, introduce +loftier spirits, related to the gods,--such as nymphs, dryads, and +hamadryads,--in the place of rocks, fountains, and trees: so the author +transforms these objects into peasants, and countrifies [_verbauert_] +the universe in the most _naïve_, quaint, and genial manner, until the +landscape, in which we nevertheless always recognize the human figure, +seems to become one with man in the cheerful enchantment exercised upon +our fancy." + +This is entirely correct, as a poetic characterization. Hebel, however, +possesses the additional merit--no slight one, either--of giving +faithful expression to the thoughts, emotions, and passions of the +simple people among whom his childhood was passed. The hearty native +kindness, the tenderness, hidden under a rough exterior, the lively, +droll, unformed fancy, the timidity and the boldness of love, the +tendency to yield to temptation, and the unfeigned piety of the +inhabitants of the Black Forest, are all reproduced in his poems. To say +that they teach, more or less directly, a wholesome morality, is but +indifferent praise; for morality is the cheap veneering wherewith +would-be poets attempt to conceal the lack of the true faculty. We +prefer to let our readers judge for themselves concerning this feature +of Hebel's poetry. + +The Alemannic dialect, we have said, is at first harsh to the ear. +It requires, indeed, not a little practice, to perceive its especial +beauties; since these consist in certain quaint, playful inflections and +elisions, which, like the speech of children, have a fresh, natural, +simple charm of their own. The changes of pronunciation, in German +words, are curious. _K_ becomes a light guttural _ch_, and a great +number of monosyllabic words--especially those ending in _ut_ and +_üh_--receive a peculiar twist from the introduction of _e_ or _ei_: +as _gut, früh_, which become _guet, früeih_. This seems to be a +characteristic feature of the South-German dialects, though in none is +it so pronounced as in the Alemannic. The change of _ist_ into _isch, +hast_ into _hesch, ich_ into _i, dich_ into _de_, etc., is much more +widely spread, among the peasantry, and is readily learned, even by the +foreign reader. But a good German scholar would be somewhat puzzled by +the consolidation of several abbreviated words into a single one, which +occurs in almost every Alemannic sentence: for instance, in _woni_ he +would have some difficulty in recognizing _wo ich; ságene_ does not +suggest _sage ihnen_, nor _uffeme, auf einem_. + +These singularities of the dialect render the translation of Hebel's +poems into a foreign language a work of great difficulty. In the absence +of any English dialect which possesses corresponding features, the +peculiar quaintness and raciness which they confer must inevitably be +lost. Fresh, wild, and lovely as the Schwarzwald heather, they are +equally apt to die in transplanting. How much they lose by being +converted into classical German was so evident to us (fancy, "Scots who +have with Wallace bled"!) that we at first shrank from the experiment of +reproducing them in a language still farther removed from the original. +Certainly, classical English would not answer; the individual soul of +the poems could never be recognized in such a garb. The tongue of Burns +can be spoken only by a born Scot; and our Yankee, which is rather a +grotesque English than a dialect, is unfortunately so associated +with the coarse and the farcical--Lowell's little poem of "'Zekel's +Courtship" being the single exception--that it seems hardly adapted to +the simple and tender fancies of Hebel. Like the comedian whose one +serious attempt at tragic acting was greeted with roars of laughter, as +an admirable burlesque, the reader might, in such a case, persist in +seeing fun where sentiment was intended. + +In this dilemma, it occurred to us that the common, rude form of the +English language, as it is spoken by the uneducated everywhere, without +reference to provincial idioms, might possibly be the best medium. +It offers, at least, the advantage of simplicity, of a directness +of expression which overlooks grammatical rules, of natural pathos, +even,--and therefore, so far as these traits go, may reproduce them +without detracting seriously from the original. Those other qualities of +the poems which spring from the character of the people of whom and +for whom they were written must depend, for their recognition, on the +sympathetic insight of the reader. We can only promise him the utmost +fidelity in the translation, having taken no other liberty than the +substitution of common idiomatic phrases, peculiar to our language, +for corresponding phrases in the other. The original metre, in every +instance, has been strictly adhered to. + +The poems, only fifty-nine in number, consist principally of short songs +or pastorals, and narratives. The latter are written in hexameter, but +by no means classic in form. It is a rough, irregular metre, in which +the trochees preponderate over the dactyls: many of the lines, in fact, +would not bear a critical scansion. We have not scrupled to imitate this +irregularity, as not inconsistent with the plain, ungrammatical speech +of the characters introduced, and the homely air of even the most +imaginative passages. The opening poem is a charmingly wayward idyl, +called "The Meadow," (_Die Wiese_,) the name of a mountain-stream, +which, rising in the Feldberg, the highest peak of the Black Forest, +flows past Hausen, Hebel's early home, on its way to the Rhine. An +extract from it will illustrate what Jean Paul calls the "hazardous +boldness" of Hebel's personifications:-- + + Beautiful "Meadow," daughter o' Feldberg, I + welcome and greet you. + Listen: I'm goin' to sing a song, and all in + y'r honor, + Makin' a music beside ye, follerin' wherever + you wander. + Born unbeknown in the rocky, hidden heart + o' the mountain, + Suckled o' clouds and fogs, and weaned by + the waters o' heaven, + There you slep' like a babblin' baby, a-kep' + in the bed-room, + Secret, and tenderly cared-for: and eye o' + man never saw you,-- + Never peeked through a key-hole and saw + my little girl sleepin' + Sound in her chamber o' crystal, rocked in + her cradle o' silver. + Neither an ear o' man ever listened to hear + her a-breathin', + No, nor her voice all alone to herself + a-laughin' or cryin'. + Only the close little spirits that know every + passage and entrance, + In and out dodgin', they brought ye up and + teached ye to toddle, + Gev' you a cheerful natur', and larnt you + how to be useful: + Yes, and their words didn't go into one ear + and out at the t'other. + Stand on your slippery feet as soon as may + be, and use 'em, + That you do, as you slyly creep from your + chamber o' crystal + Out o' doors, barefoot, and squint up to + heaven, mischievously smilin'. + Oh, but you're pretty, my darlin', y'r eyes + have a beautiful sparkle! + Isn't it nice, out o' doors? you didn't guess + 't was so pleasant? + Listen, the leaves is rustlin', and listen, the + birdies a-singin'! + "Yes," says you, "but I'm goin' furder, and + can't stay to hear 'm: + Pleasant, truly, 's my way, and more so the + furder I travel." + + Only see how spry my little one is at her + jumpin'! + "Ketch me!" she shouts, in her fun,--"if + you want me, foller and ketch me!" + Every minute she turns and jumps in another + direction. + + There, you'll fall from the bank! You see, + she's done it: I said so. + Didn't I say it? And now she wobbles + furder and furder, + Creepin' along on all-fours, then off on her + legs she's a-toddlin',-- + Slips in the bushes,--"Hunt me!"--and + there, on a sudden, she peeks out. + Wait, I'm a-comin'! Back o' the trees I + hear her a-callin': + "Guess where I am!"--she's whims of her + own, a plenty, and keeps 'em. + But, as you go, you're growin' han'somer, + bigger, and stronger. + Where the breath o' y'r breathin' falls, the + meadows is greener, + Fresher o' color, right and left, and the + weeds and the grasses + Sprout up as juicy as _can_ be, and posies o' + loveliest colors + Blossom as brightly as wink, and bees come + and suck 'em. + Water-wagtails come tiltin',--and, look! + there's the geese o' the village! + All are a-comin' to see you, and all want to + give you a welcome; + Yes, and you're kind o' heart, and you + prattle to all of 'em kindly; + "Come, you well-behaved creeturs, eat and + drink what I bring you,-- + I must be off and away: God bless you, + well-behaved creeturs!"[A] + +[Footnote A: As the reader of German may be curious to see a specimen +of the original, we give this last passage, which contains, in a brief +compass, many distinctive features of the Alemannic dialect:-- + + "Nei so lucg me doch, wie cha mi Meiddeli springe! + 'Chunnsch mi über,' seits und lacht, 'und witt + mi, se hol mi!' + All' wil en andere Weg, und alliwil anderi + Sprüngli! + Fall mer nit sel Reiuli ab!--Do hemmer's, i sags io-- + Hani's denn nit gseit? Doch gauckelet's witers + und witers, + Groblet uf alle Vieren, und stellt si wieder uf + d' Beinli, + Schlieft in d' Hürst--iez such mer's eisl--dört + güggelet's use, + Wart, i chumm! Druf rüefts mer wieder hinter + de Bäume: + 'Roth wo bin i iez!'--und het si urige Phatest. + Aber wie de gosch, wirsch sichtli grösser und + schöner. + Wo di liebligen Othern weiht, so färbt si der Rase + Grüener rechts und links, es stöhn in saftige + Triebe + Gras und Chrüter uf, es stöhn in frischere Gstalte + Farbigi Blüemli do, und d' Immli chömmen und + suge. + 'S Wasserstelzli chunnt, und lueg doch,'s Wuli + vo Todtnau! + Alles will di bschauen, und Alles will di bigrüsse, + Und di fründlig Herz git alle fründligi Rede: + 'Chömmet ihr ordlige Thierli, do hender, esset + und trinket! + Witers goht mi Weg, Gsegott, ihr ordlige Thierli!'" +] + +The poet follows the stream through her whole course, never dropping the +figure, which is adapted, with infinite adroitness, and with the play +of a fancy as wayward and unrestrained as her own waters, to all her +changing aspects. Beside the Catholic chapel of Fair-Beeches she pauses +to listen to the mass; but farther down the valley becomes an apostate, +and attends the Lutheran service in the Husemer church. Stronger and +statelier grown, she trips along with the step of a maiden conscious of +her own beauty, and the poet clothes her in the costume of an Alemannic +bride, with a green kirtle of a hundred folds, and a stomacher of Milan +gauze, "like a loose cloud on a morning sky in spring-time." Thus +equipped, she wanders at will over the broader meadows, around the feet +of vineyard-hills, visits villages and churches, or stops to gossip with +the lusty young millers. But the woman's destiny is before her; she +cannot escape it; and the time is drawing near when her wild, singing, +pastoral being shall be absorbed in that of the strong male stream, the +bright-eyed son of the Alps, who has come so far to woo and win her. + + Daughter o' Feldberg, half-and-half I've got + a suspicion + How as you've virtues and faults enough now + to choose ye a husband. + Castin' y'r eyes down, are you? Pickin' and + plattin' y'r ribbons? + Don't be so foolish, wench!--She thinks I + know nothin' about it, + How she's already engaged, and each is + a-waitin' for t'other. + Don't I know him, my darlin', the lusty + young fellow, y'r sweetheart? + + Over powerful rocks, and through the hedges + and thickets, + Right away from the snowy Swiss mountains + he plunges at Rheineck + Down to the lake, and straight ahead swims + through it to Constance, + Sayin': "'T's no use o' talkin', I'll have + the gal I'm engaged to!" + + + But, as he reaches Stein, he goes a little more slowly, + Leavin' the lake where he's decently washed his feet and his body. + Diessenhofen don't please him,--no, nor the convent beside it. + For'ard he goes to Schaffhausen, onto the rocks at the corner; + There he says: "It's no use o' talkin', I'll git to my sweetheart: + Body and life I'll stake, cravat and embroidered suspenders." + Woop! but he jumps! And now he talks to hisself, goin' furder, + Giddy, belike, in his head, but pushes for'ard to Rheinau, + Eglisau, and Kaiserstuhl, and Zurzach, and Waldshut,-- + All are behind him, passin' one village after another + Down to Grenzach, and out on the broad and beautiful bottoms + Nigh unto Basle; and there he must stop and look after his license. + + * * * * * + + Look! isn't that y'r bridegroom a-comin' down yonder to meet you?-- + Yes, it's him, it's him, I hear't, for his voice is so jolly! + Yes, it's him, it's him,--with his eyes as blue as the heavens, + With his Swiss knee-breeches o' green, and suspenders o' velvet, + With his shirt o' the color o' pearl, and buttons o' crystal, + With his powerful loins, and his sturdy back and his shoulders, + Grand in his gait, commandin', beautiful, free in his motions, + Proud as a Basle Councilman,--yes, it's the big boy o' Gothard![B] + +[Footnote B: The Rhine.] + +The daring with which Hebel _countrifies_ (or, rather, _farmerizes_, to +translate Goethe's--word more literally) the spirit of natural objects, +carrying his personifications to that point where the imaginative +borders on the grotesque, is perhaps his strongest characteristic. His +poetic faculty, putting on its Alemannic costume, seems to abdicate all +ambition of moving in a higher sphere of society, but within the bounds +it has chosen allows itself the utmost range of capricious enjoyment. +In another pastoral, called "The Oatmeal Porridge," he takes the grain +which the peasant has sown, makes it a sentient creature, and carries it +through the processes of germination, growth, and bloom, without once +dropping the figure or introducing an incongruous epithet. It is not +only a child, but a child of the Black Forest, uttering its hopes, its +anxieties, and its joys in the familiar dialect. The beetle, in +his eyes, becomes a gross, hard-headed boor, carrying his sacks of +blossom-meal, and drinking his mug of XX morning-dew; the stork parades +about to show his red stockings; the spider is at once machinist and +civil engineer; and even the sun, moon, and morning-star are not secure +from the poet's familiarities. In his pastoral of "The Field-Watchmen," +he ventures to say,-- + + Mister Schoolmaster Moon, with y'r forehead wrinkled with teachin', + With y'r face full o' larnin', a plaster stuck on y'r cheek-bone, + Say, do y'r children mind ye, and larn their psalm and their texes? + +We much fear that this over-quaintness of fancy, to which the Alemannic +dialect gives such a racy flavor, and which belongs, in a lesser +degree, to the minds of the people who speak that dialect, cannot be +successfully clothed in an English dress. Let us try, therefore, a +little poem, the sentiment whereof is of universal application:-- + + THE CONTENTED FARMER. + + I guess I'll take my pouch, and fill + My pipe just once,--yes, that I will! + Turn out my plough and home'ards go: + _Buck_ thinks, enough's been done, I know. + + Why, when the Emperor's council's done, + And he can hunt, and have his fun, + He stops, I guess, at any tree, + And fills his pipe as well as me. + + But smokin' does him little good: + He can't have all things as he would. + His crown's a precious weight, at that: + It isn't like my old straw hat. + + He gits a deal o' tin, no doubt, + But all the more he pays it out; + And everywheres they beg and cry + Heaps more than he can satisfy. + + And when, to see that nothin' 's wrong, + He plagues hisself the whole day long, + And thinks, "I guess I've fixed it now," + Nobody thanks him, anyhow. + + And so, when in his bloody clo'es + The Gineral out o' battle goes, + He takes his pouch, too, I'll agree, + And fills his pipe as well as me. + + But in the wild and dreadfle fight, + His pipe don't taste ezackly right: + He's galloped here and galloped there, + And things a'n't pleasant, anywhere. + + And sich a cursin': "Thunder!" "Hell!" + And "Devil!" (worse nor I can tell:) + His grannydiers in blood lay down, + And yonder smokes a burnin' town. + + And when, a-travellin' to the Fairs, + The merchant goes with all his wares, + He takes a pouch o' th' best, I guess, + And fills and smokes his pipe, no less. + + Poor devil, 't isn't good for you! + With all y'r gold, you've trouble, too. + Twice two is four, if stocks'll rise: + I see the figgers in your eyes. + + It's hurry, worry, tare and tret; + Ye ha'n't enough, the more ye get,-- + And couldn't use it, if ye had: + No wonder that y'r pipe tastes bad! + + But good, thank God! and wholesome's mine: + The bottom-wheat is growin' fine, + And God, o' mornin's, sends the dew, + And sends his breath o' blessin', too. + + And, home, there's Nancy bustlin' round: + The supper's ready, I'll be bound, + And youngsters waitin'. Lord! I vow + I dunno which is smartest, now. + + My pipe tastes good; the reason's plain: + (I guess I'll fill it once again:) + With cheerful heart, and jolly mood, + And goin' home, all things is good. + +Hebel's narrative poems abound with the wayward pranks of a fancy which +seems a little too restive to be entirely controlled by his artistic +sense; but they possess much dramatic truth and power. He delights in +the supernatural element, but approaches it from the gentler human side. +In "The Carbuncle," only, we find something of that weird, uncanny +atmosphere which casts its glamour around the "Tam O'Shanter" of Burns. +A more satisfactory illustration of his peculiar qualities is "The +Ghost's Visit on the Feldberg,"--a story told by a loafer of Basle to a +group of beer-drinkers in the tavern at Todtnau, a little village at +the foot of the mountain. This is, perhaps, the most popular of Hebel's +poems, and we therefore translate it entire. The superstition that a +child born on Sunday has the power of seeing spirits is universal among +the German peasantry. + + THE GHOST'S VISIT ON THE FELDBERG. + + Hark ye, fellows o' Todtnau, if ever I told + you the Scythe-Ghost[C] + Was a spirit of Evil, I've now got a different + story. + Out of the town am I,--yes, that I'll honestly + own to,-- + Related to merchants, at seven tables free to + take pot-luck. + But I'm a Sunday's child; and wherever the ghosts + at the cross-roads + Stand in the air, in vaults, and cellars, and + out-o'-way places,-- + Guardin' hidden money with eyes like fiery + sauce-pans, + Washin' with bitter tears the spot where + somebody's murdered, + Shovellin' the dirt, and scratchin' it over + with nails all so bloody,-- + Clear as day I can see, when it lightens. + Ugh! how they whimper! + Also, whenever with beautiful blue eyes the + heavenly angels, + Deep in the night, in silent, sleepin' + villages wander, + Peekin' in at the windows, and talkin' + together so pleasant, + Smilin' one at the t'other, and settin' + outside o' the house-doors, + So that the pious folks shall take no harm + while they're sleepin': + Then ag'in, when in couples or threes they + walk in the grave-yard, + Talkin' in this like: "There a faithful + mother is layin'; + And here's a man that was poor, but took no + advantage o' no one: + Take your rest, for you're tired,--we'll waken + ye up when the time comes!" + Clearly I see by the light o' the stars, and I + hear them a-talkin'. + Many I know by their names, and speak to, + whenever I meet 'em, + Give 'em the time o' day, and ask 'em, and + answer their questions. + "How do ye do?" "How's y'r watch?" + "Praise God, it's tolerable, thank you!" + Believe it, or not! Well, once on a time my + cousin, he sent me + Over to Todtnau, on business with all sorts o' + troublesome people, + Where you've coffee to drink, and biscuit + they give you to soak in 't. + "Don't you stop on the road, nor gabble + whatever comes foremost," + Hooted my cousin at startin', "nor don't you + let go o' your snuff-box, + Leavin' it round in the tavern, as gentlemen + do, for the next time." + Up and away I went, and all that my cousin + he'd ordered + Fairly and squarely I fixed. At the sign o' + the Eagle in Todtnau + Set for a while; then, sure o' my way, tramped + off ag'in, home'ards, + Nigh by the village, I reckoned,--but found + myself climbin' the Feldberg, + Lured by the birdies, and down by the brooks + the beautiful posies: + That's a weakness o' mine,--I ran like a fool + after such things. + Now it was dusk, and the birdies hushed up, + settin' still on the branches. + Hither and yonder a starlie stuck its head + through the darkness, + Peekin' out, as oncertain whether the sun was + in bed yet,-- + Whether it mightn't come, and called to the + other ones: "Come now!" + Then I knowed I was lost, and laid myself + down,--I was weary: + There, you know, there's a hut, and I found + an armful o' straw in 't. + "Here's a go!" I thinks to myself, "and I + wish I was safely + Cuddled in bed to home,--or 't was midnight, + and some little spirit + Somewhere popped out, as o' nights when it's + twelve they're accustomed, + Passin' the time with me, friendly, till winds + that blow early o' mornin's + Blow out the heavenly lights, and I see the + way back to the village." + Now, as thinkin' in this like, I felt all over my + watch-face,-- + Dark as pitch all around,--and felt with my + finger the hour-hand, + Found it was nigh onto 'leven, and hauled my + pipe from my pocket, + Thinkin': "Maybe a bit of a smoke'll keep + me from snoozin'": + Thunder! all of a sudden beside me was two + of 'em talkin', + Like as they'd business together! You'd + better believe that I listened. + "Say, a'n't I late a-comin'? Because there + was, over in Mambach, + Dyin', a girl with pains in the bones and terrible + fever: + Now, but she's easy! I held to her mouth the + drink o' departure, + So that the sufferin' ceased, and softly lowered + the eyelids, + Sayin': 'Sleep, and in peace,--I'll waken + thee up when the time comes!' + Do me the favor, brother: fetch in the basin o' + silver + Water, ever so little: my scythe, as you see, + must be whetted." + "Whetted?" says I to myself, "and a spirit?" + and peeked from the window. + Lo and behold, there sat a youngster with + wings that was golden; + White was his mantle, white, and his girdle + the color o' roses, + Fair and lovely to see, and beside him two + lights all a-burnin'. + "All the good spirits," says I, "Mr. Angel, + God have you in keepin'!" + "Praise their Master, the Lord," said the angel; + "God thank you, as I do!" + "Take no offence, Mr. Ghost, and by y'r good + leave and permission, + Tell me, what have you got for to mow?" + "Why, the scythe!" was his answer. + "Yes," says I, "for I see it; and that is my + question exackly, + What you're goin' to do with the scythe." + "Why, to mow!" was his answer. + Then I ventur'd to say: "And that is my question + exackly, + What you're goin' to mow, supposin' you're + willin' to tell me." + "Grass! And what is your business so late up + here in the night-time?" + "Nothin' special," I answered; "I'm burnin' + a little tobacco. + Lost my way, or most likely I'd be at the + Eagle, in Todtnau. + But to come to the subject, supposin' it isn't + a secret, + Tell me, what do you make o' the grass?" + And he answered me: "Fodder!" + "Don't understand it," says I; "for the Lord + has no cows up in heaven." + "Not precisely a cow," he remarked, "but + heifers and asses. + Seest, up yonder, the star?" and he pointed + one out with his finger. + "There's the ass o' the Christmas-Child, and + Fridolin's heifers,[D] + Breathin' the starry air, and waitin' for grass + that I bring 'em: + Grass doesn't grow there,--nothin' grows but + the heavenly raisins, + Milk and honey a-runnin' in rivers, plenty as + water: + But they're particular cattle,--grass they + must have every mornin', + Mouthfuls o' hay, and drink from earthly + fountains they're used to. + So for them I'm a-whettin' my scythe, and + soon must be mowin': + Wouldn't it be worth while, if politely you'd + offer to help me?" + So the angel he talked, and this way I answered + the angel: + "Hark ye, this it is, just: and I'll go wi' the + greatest o' pleasure. + Folks from the town know nothin' about it: + we write and we cipher, + Reckon up money,--that we can do!--and + measure and weigh out, + Unload, and on-load, and eat and drink without + any trouble. + All that we want for the belly, in kitchen, + pantry, and cellar, + Comes in lots through every gate, in baskets + and boxes, + Runs in every street, and cries at every + corner: + 'Buy my cherries!' and 'Buy my butter!' + and 'Look at my salad!' + 'Buy my onions!' and 'Here's your carrots!' + and 'Spinage and parsley!' + 'Lucifer matches! Lucifer matches!' 'Cabbage + and turnips!' + 'Here's your umbrellas!' 'Caraway-seed and + juniper-berries! + Cheap for cash, and all to be traded for sugar + and coffee!' + Say, Mr. Angel, didst ever drink coffee? + how do you like it?" + "Stop with y'r nonsense!" then he said, but + he couldn't help laughin'; + "No, we drink but the heavenly air, and eat + nothin' but raisins, + Four on a day o' the week, and afterwards five + on a Sunday. + Come, if you want to go with me, now, for + I'm off to my mowin', + Back o' Todtnau, there on the grassy holt by + the highway." + "Yes, Mr. Angel, that will I truly, seein' + you're willin': + Seems to me that it's cooler: give me y'r + scythe for to carry: + Here's a pipe and a pouch,--you're welcome + to smoke, if you want to." + While I was talkin', "Poohoo!" cried the + angel. A fiery man stood, + Quicker than lightnin', beside me. "Light us + the way to the village!" + Said he. And truly before us marched, a-burnin', + the Poohoo, + Over stock and rock, through the bushes, a + travellin' torch-light. + "Handy, isn't it?" laughin', the angel said. + --"What are ye doin'? + Why do you nick at y'r flint? You can light + y'r pipe at the Poohoo. + Use him whenever you like: but it seems to + me you're a-frightened,-- + You, and a Sunday's-child, as you are: do you + think he will bite you?" + "No, he ha'n't bit me; but this you'll allow + me to say, Mr. Angel,-- + Half-and-half I mistrust him: besides, my tobacco's + a-burnin'. + That's a weakness o' mine,--I'm afeard o' + them fiery creeturs: + Give me seventy angels, instead o' this big + burnin' devil!" + "Really, it's dreadfle," the angel says he, + "that men is so silly, + Fearful o' ghosts and spectres, and skeery + without any reason. + Two of 'em only is dangerous, two of 'em hurtful + to mankind: + One of 'em's known by the name o' Delusion, + and Worry the t'other. + Him, Delusion, 's a dweller in wine: from + cans and decanters + Up to the head he rises, and turns your sense + to confusion. + This is the ghost that leads you astray in forest + and highway: + Undermost, uppermost, hither and yon the + ground is a-rollin', + Bridges bendin', and mountains movin', and + everything double. + Hark ye, keep out of his way!" "Aha!" + I says to the angel, + "There you prick me, but not to the blood: I + see what you're after. + Sober am I, as a judge. To be sure, I emptied + my tankard + Once, at the Eagle,--_once_,--and the landlord + 'll tell you the same thing, + S'posin' you doubt me. And now, pray, tell + me who is the t'other?" + "Who is the t'other? Don't know without + askin'?" answered the angel. + "He's a terrible ghost: the Lord forbid you + should meet him! + When you waken early, at four or five in the + mornin', + There he stands a-waitin' with burnin eyes + at y'r bed-side, + Gives you the time o' day with blazin switches + and pinchers: + Even prayin' don't help, nor helps all your + _Ave Marias!_ + When you begin 'em, he takes your jaws and + claps 'em together; + Look to heaven, he comes and blinds y'r eyes + with his ashes; + Be you hungry, and eat, he pizons y'r soup + with his wormwood; + Take you a drink o' nights, he squeezes gall + in the tankard; + Run like a stag, he follows as close on y'r trail + as a blood-hound; + Creep like a shadow, be whispers: 'Good! we + had best take it easy'; + Kneels at y'r side in the church, and sets at + y'r side in the tavern. + Go wherever you will, there's ghosts a-hoverin' + round you. + Shut your eyes in y'r bed, they mutter: + 'There 's no need o' hurry; + By-and-by you can sleep, but listen! we've + somethin' to tell you: + Have you forgot how you stoled? and how + you cheated the orphans? + Secretly sinned?'--and this, and t'other; + and when they have finished, + Say it over ag'in, and you get little good o' + your slumber." + So the angel he talked, and, like iron under + the hammer, + Sparked and spirited the Poohoo. "Surely," + I says to the angel, + "Born on a Sunday was I, and friendly with + many a preacher, + Yet the Father protect me from these!" Says + he to me, smilin': + "Keep y'r conscience pure; it is better than + crossin' and blessin'. + Here we must part, for y'r way turns off and + down to the village. + Take the Poohoo along, but mind! put him + out, in the meadow, + Lest he should run in the village, settin' fire + to the stables. + God be with you and keep you!" And then + says I: "Mr. Angel, + God, the Father, protect you! Be sure, when + you come to the city, + Christmas evenin', call, and I'll hold it an + honor to see you: + Raisins I'll have at your service, and hippocras, + if you like it. + Chilly 's the air, o' evenin's, especially down + by the river." + Day was breakin' by this, and right there was + Todtnau before me! + Past, and onward to Basle I wandered, i' the + shade and the coolness. + When into Mambach I came, they bore a dead + girl to the grave-yard, + After the Holy Cross, and the faded banner o' + Heaven, + With the funeral garlands upon her, with sobbin' + and weepin'. + Ah, but she 'd heard what he said! he'll + waken her up when the time comes. + Afterwards, Tuesday it was, I got safely back + to my cousin; + But it turned out as he said,--I'd somewhere + forgotten my snuff-box! + +[Footnote C: _Dengle-Geist_, literally, "Whetting-Spirit." The exact +meaning of _dengeln_ is to sharpen a scythe by hammering the edge of the +blade, which was practised before whetstones came in use.] + +[Footnote D: According to an old legend, Fridolin (a favorite saint with +the Catholic population of the Black Forest) harnessed two young heifers +to a mighty fir-tree, and hauled it into the Rhine near Säckingen, +thereby damming the river and forcing it to take a new course, on the +other side of the town.] + +In this poem the hero of the story unconsciously describes himself by +his manner of telling it,--a reflective action of the dramatic faculty, +which Browning, among living poets, possesses in a marked degree. The +"moral" is so skilfully inwoven into the substance of the narrative as +to conceal the appearance of design, and the reader has swallowed the +pill before its sugar-coating of fancy has dissolved in his mouth. There +are few of Hebel's poems which were not written for the purpose of +inculcating some wholesome lesson, but in none does this object +prominently appear. Even where it is not merely implied, but directly +expressed, he contrives to give it the air of having been accidentally +suggested by the theme. In the following, which is the most pointedly +didactic of all his productions, the characteristic fancy still betrays +itself:-- + + THE GUIDE-POST. + + D' ye know the road to th' bar'l o' flour? + At break o' day let down the bars, + And plough y'r wheat-field, hour by hour, + Till sundown,--yes, till shine o' stars. + + You peg away, the livelong day, + Nor loaf about, nor gape around; + And that's the road to the thrashin'-floor, + And into the kitchen, I'll be bound! + + D' ye know the road where dollars lays? + Follow the red cents, here and there: + For if a man leaves them, I guess, + He won't find dollars anywhere. + + D' ye know the road to Sunday's rest? + Jist don't o' week-days be afeard; + In field and workshop do y'r best, + And Sunday comes itself, I've heerd. + On Saturdays it's not fur off, + And brings a basketful o' cheer,-- + A roast, and lots o' garden-stuff, + And, like as not, a jug o' beer! + + D' ye know the road to poverty? + Turn in at any tavern-sign: + Turn in,--it's temptin' as can be: + There's bran'-new cards and liquor fine. + + In the last tavern there's a sack, + And, when the cash y'r pocket quits, + Jist hang the wallet on y'r back,-- + You vagabond! see how it fits! + + D' ye know what road to honor leads, + And good old age?--a lovely sight! + By way o' temperance, honest deeds, + And tryin' to do y'r dooty right. + + And when the road forks, ary side, + And you're in doubt which one it is, + Stand still, and let y'r conscience guide: + Thank God, it can't lead much amiss! + + And now, the road to church-yard gate + You needn't ask! Go anywhere! + For, whether roundabout or straight, + All roads, at last, 'll bring you there. + + Go, fearin' God, but lovin' more!-- + I've tried to be an honest guide,-- + You'll find the grave has got a door, + And somethin' for you t'other side. + +We could linger much longer over our simple, brave old poet, were we +sure of the ability of the reader approximately to distinguish his +features through the veil of translation. In turning the leaves of the +smoky book, with its coarse paper and rude type,--which suggests to us, +by-the-by, the fact that Hebel was accustomed to hang a book, which he +wished especially to enjoy, in the chimney, for a few days,--we are +tempted by "The Market-Women in Town," by "The Mother on Christmas-Eve," +"The Morning-Star," and the charming fairy-story of "Riedliger's +Daughter," but must be content to close our specimens, for the present, +with a song of love,--"_Hans und Verene_,"--under the equivalent title +of + + JACK AND MAGGIE. + + There's only one I'm after, + And she's the one, I vow! + If she was here, and standin' by, + She is a gal so neat and spry, + So neat and spry, + I'd be in glory now! + + It's so,--I'm hankerin' for her, + And want to have her, too. + Her temper's always gay, and bright, + Her face like posies red and white, + Both red and white, + And eyes like posies blue. + + And when I see her comin', + My face gits red at once; + My heart feels chokin'-like, and weak, + And drops o' sweat run down my cheek, + Yes, down my cheek,-- + Confound me for a dunce! + + She spoke so kind, last Tuesday, + When at the well we met: + "Jack, give a lift! What ails you? Say! + I see that somethin' 's wrong to-day: + What's wrong to-day?" + No, that I can't forget! + + I know I'd ought to tell her, + And wish I'd told her then; + And if I wasn't poor and low, + And sayin' it didn't choke me so, + (It chokes me so,) + I'd find a chance again. + + Well, up and off I'm goin': + She's in the field below: + I'll try and let her know my mind; + And if her answer isn't kind, + If 't isn't kind, + I'll jine the ranks, and go! + + I'm but a poor young fellow, + Yes, poor enough, no doubt: + But ha'n't, thank God, done nothin' wrong, + And be a man as stout and strong, + As stout and strong, + As any roundabout. + + What's rustlin' in the bushes? + I see a movin' stalk: + The leaves is openin': there's a dress! + O Lord, forbid it! but I guess-- + I guess--I guess + Somebody's heard me talk! + + "Ha! here I am! you've got me! + So keep me, if you can! + I've guessed it ever since last Fall, + And Tuesday morn I saw it all, + _I_ saw it all! + Speak out, then, like a man! + + "Though rich you a'n't in money, + Nor rich in goods to sell, + An honest heart is more than gold, + And hands you've got for field and fold, + For house and fold, + And--Jack--I love you well!" + + "O Maggie, say it over! + O Maggie, is it so? + I couldn't longer bear the doubt: + 'Twas hell,--but now you've drawed me out, + You've drawed me out! + And will I? _Won't_ I, though!" + +The later years of Hebel's life quietly passed away in the circle of his +friends at Carlsruhe. After the peculiar mood which called forth the +Alemannic poems had passed away, he seems to have felt no further +temptation to pursue his literary success. His labors, thenceforth, were +chiefly confined to the preparation of a Biblical History, for schools, +and the editing of the "Rhenish House-Friend," an illustrated calendar +for the people, to which he gave a character somewhat similar to that of +Franklin's "Poor Richard." His short, pithy narratives, each with its +inevitable, though unobtrusive moral, are models of style. The calendar +became so popular, under his management, that forty thousand copies were +annually printed. He finally discontinued his connection with it, in +1819, in consequence of an interference with his articles on the part of +the censor. + +In society Hebel was a universal favorite. Possessing, in his personal +appearance, no less than in his intellect, a marked individuality, he +carried a fresh, vital, inspiring element into every company which he +visited. His cheerfulness was inexhaustible, his wit keen and lambent +without being acrid, his speech clear, fluent, and genial, and his fund +of anecdote commensurate with his remarkable narrative power. He was +exceedingly frank, joyous, and unconstrained in his demeanor; fond of +the pipe and the beer-glass; and as one of his maxims was, "Not to close +any door through which Fortune might enter," he not only occasionally +bought a lottery-ticket, but was sometimes to be seen, during the +season, at the roulette-tables of Baden-Baden. One of his friends +declares, however, that he never obtruded "the clergyman" at +inappropriate times! + +In person he was of medium height, with a body of massive Teutonic +build, a large, broad head, inclined a little towards one shoulder, the +eyes small, brown, and mischievously sparkling, the hair short, crisp, +and brown, the nose aquiline, and the mouth compressed, with the +commencement of a smile stamped in the corners. He was careless in +his gait, and negligent in his dress. Warm-hearted and tender, and +especially attracted towards women and children, the cause of his +celibacy always remained a mystery to his friends. + +The manner of his death, finally, illustrated the genuine humanity of +his nature. In September, 1826, although an invalid at the time, he made +a journey to Mannheim for the sake of procuring a mitigation of the +sentence of a condemned poacher, whose case appealed strongly to his +sympathy. His exertions on behalf of the poor man so aggravated his +disease that he was soon beyond medical aid. Only his corpse, crowned +with laurel, returned to Carlsruhe. Nine years afterwards a monument was +erected to his memory in the park attached to the Ducal palace. Nor have +the inhabitants of the Black Forest failed in worthy commemoration of +their poet's name. A prominent peak among the mountains which inclose +the valley of his favorite "Meadow" has been solemnly christened +"Hebel's Mount"; and a flower of the Forest--the _Anthericum_ of +Linnaeus--now figures in German botanies as the _Hebelia Alemannica_. + + + +THE FORESTER. + + Then bless thy secret growth, nor catch + At noise, but thrive unseen and dumb, + Keep clean, bear fruit, earn life, and watch + Till the white-winged reapers come.--Henry Vaughan + + +I had never thought of knowing a man so thoroughly of the country as +this friend of mine, and so purely a son of Nature. Perhaps he has +the profoundest passion for it of any one living; and had the human +sentiment been as tender from the first, and as pervading, we might have +had pastorals of which Virgil and Theocritus would have envied him the +authorship, had they chanced to be his contemporaries. As it is, he has +come nearer the antique spirit than any of our native poets, and touched +the fields and groves and streams of his native town with a classic +interest that shall not fade. Some of his verses are suffused with an +elegiac tenderness, as if the woods and fields bewailed the absence +of their forester, and murmured their griefs meanwhile to one +another,--responsive like idyls. Living in close companionship with +Nature, his Muse breathes the spirit and voice of poetry; his excellence +lying herein: for when the heart is once divorced from the senses and +all sympathy with common things, then poetry has fled, and the love that +sings. + +The most welcome of companions, this plain countryman. One shall not +meet with thoughts invigorating like his often; coming so scented of +mountain and field breezes and rippling springs, so like a luxuriant +clod from under forest-leaves, moist and mossy with earth-spirits. His +presence is tonic, like ice-water in dog-days to the parched citizen +pent in chambers and under brazen ceilings. Welcome as the gurgle of +brooks, the dripping of pitchers,--then drink and be cool! He seems one +with things, of Nature's essence and core, knit of strong timbers, most +like a wood and its inhabitants. There are in him sod and shade, woods +and waters manifold, the mould and mist of earth and sky. Self-poised +and sagacious as any denizen of the elements, he has the key to every +animal's brain, every plant, every shrub; and were an Indian to flower +forth, and reveal the secrets hidden in his cranium, it would not be +more surprising than the speech of our Sylvanus. He must belong to the +Homeric age,--is older than pastures and gardens, as if he were of the +race of heroes, and one with the elements. He, of all men, seems to be +the native New-Englander, as much so as the oak, the granite ledge, our +best sample of an indigenous American, untouched by the Old Country, +unless he came down from Thor, the Northman; as yet unfathered by any, +and a nondescript in the books of natural history. + +A peripatetic philosopher, and out of doors for the best parts of his +days and nights, he has manifold weather and seasons in him, and the +manners of an animal of probity and virtues unstained. Of our moralists +he seems the wholesomest; and the best republican citizen in the +world,--always at home, and minding his own affairs. Perhaps a little +over-confident sometimes, and stiffly individual, dropping society clean +out of his theories, while standing friendly in his strict sense of +friendship, there is in him an integrity and sense of justice that make +possible and actual the virtues of Sparta and the Stoics, and all the +more welcome to us in these times of shuffling and of pusillanimity. +Plutarch would have made him immortal in his pages, had he lived before +his day. Nor have we any so modern as be,--his own and ours; too purely +so to be appreciated at once. A scholar by birthright, and an author, +his fame has not yet travelled far from the banks of the rivers he has +described in his books; but I hazard only the truth in affirming of his +prose, that in substance and sense it surpasses that of any naturalist +of his time, and that he is sure of a reading in the future. There are +fairer fishes in his pages than any now swimming in our streams, and +some sleep of his on the banks of the Merrimack by moonlight that Egypt +never rivalled; a morning of which Memnon might have envied the music, +and a greyhound that was meant for Adonis; some frogs, too, better than +any of Aristophanes. Perhaps we have had no eyes like his since Pliny's +time. His senses seem double, giving him access to secrets not easily +read by other men: his sagacity resembling that of the beaver and the +bee, the dog and the deer; an instinct for seeing and judging, as by +some other or seventh sense, dealing with objects as if they were +shooting forth from his own mind mythologically, thus completing Nature +all round to his senses, and a creation of his at the moment. I am sure +he knows the animals, one by one, and everything else knowable in our +town, and has named them rightly as Adam did in Paradise, if he be +not that ancestor himself. His works are pieces of exquisite sense, +celebrations of Nature's virginity, exemplified by rare learning and +original observations. Persistently independent and manly, he criticizes +men and times largely, urging and defending his opinions with the spirit +and pertinacity befitting a descendant of him of the Hammer. A head +of mixed genealogy like his, Franco-Norman crossed by Scottish and +New-England descent, may be forgiven a few characteristic peculiarities +and trenchant traits of thinking, amidst his great common sense and +fidelity to the core of natural things. Seldom has a head circumscribed +so much of the sense of Cosmos as this footed intelligence,--nothing +less than all out-of-doors sufficing his genius and scopes, and, day by +day, through all weeks and seasons, the year round. + +If one would find the wealth of wit there is in this plain man, the +information, the sagacity, the poetry, the piety, let him take a walk +with him, say of a winter's afternoon, to the Blue Water, or anywhere +about the outskirts of his village-residence. Pagan as he shall +outwardly appear, yet he soon shall be seen to be the hearty worshipper +of whatsoever is sound and wholesome in Nature,--a piece of russet +probity and sound sense that she delights to own and honor. His talk +shall be suggestive, subtile, and sincere, under as many masks and +mimicries as the shows he passes, and as significant,--Nature choosing +to speak through her chosen mouth-piece,--cynically, perhaps, sometimes, +and searching into the marrows of men and times he chances to speak of, +to his discomfort mostly, and avoidance. Nature, poetry, life,--not +politics, not strict science, not society as it is,--are his preferred +themes: the new Pantheon, probably, before he gets far, to the naming of +the gods some coming Angelo, some Pliny, is to paint and describe. The +world is holy, the things seen symbolizing the Unseen, and worthy of +worship so, the Zoroastrian rites most becoming a nature so fine as ours +in this thin newness, this worship being so sensible, so promotive of +possible pieties,--calling us out of doors and under the firmament, +where health and wholesomeness are finely insinuated into our +souls,--not as idolaters, but as idealists, the seekers of the Unseen +through images of the Invisible. + +I think his religion of the most primitive type, and inclusive of all +natural creatures and things, even to "the sparrow that falls to the +ground,"--though never by shot of his,--and, for whatsoever is manly +in man, his worship may compare with that of the priests and heroes +of pagan times. Nor is he false to these traits under any +guise,--worshipping at unbloody altars, a favorite of the Unseen, +Wisest, and Best. Certainly he is better poised and more nearly +self-reliant than other men. + +Perhaps he deals best with matter, properly, though very adroitly with +mind, with persons, as he knows them best, and sees them from Nature's +circle, wherein he dwells habitually. I should say he inspired the +sentiment of love, if, indeed, the sentiment he awakens did not seem to +partake of a yet purer sentiment, were that possible,--but nameless from +its excellency. Friendly he is, and holds his friends by bearings as +strict in their tenderness and consideration as are the laws of his +thinking,--as prompt and kindly equitable,--neighborly always, and as +apt for occasions as he is strenuous against meddling with others in +things not his. + +I know of nothing more creditable to his greatness than the thoughtful +regard, approaching to reverence, by which he has held for many years +some of the best persons of his time, living at a distance, and wont +to make their annual pilgrimage, usually on foot, to the master,--a +devotion very rare in these times of personal indifference, if not of +confessed unbelief in persons and ideas. + +He has been less of a housekeeper than most, has harvested more wind and +storm, sun and sky; abroad night and day with his leash of keen scents, +bounding any game stirring, and running it down, for certain, to be +spread on the dresser of his page, and served as a feast to the sound +intelligences, before he has done with it. We have been accustomed to +consider him the salt of things so long that they must lose their savor +without his to season them. And when he goes hence, then Pan is dead, +and Nature ailing throughout. + +His friend sings him thus, with the advantages of his Walden to show him +in Nature:-- + + "It is not far beyond the Village church, + After we pass the wood that skirts the road, + A Lake,--the blue-eyed Walden, that doth smile + Most tenderly upon its neighbor Pines; + And they, as if to recompense this love, + In double beauty spread their branches forth. + This Lake has tranquil loveliness and breadth, + And, of late years, has added to its charms; + For one attracted to its pleasant edge + Has built himself a little Hermitage, + Where with much piety he passes life. + + "More fitting place I cannot fancy now, + For such a man to let the line run off + The mortal reel,--such patience hath the Lake, + Such gratitude and cheer is in the Pines. + But more than either lake or forest's depths + This man has in himself: a tranquil man, + With sunny sides where well the fruit is ripe, + Good front and resolute bearing to this life, + And some serener virtues, which control + This rich exterior prudence,--virtues high, + That in the principles of Things are set, + Great by their nature, and consigned to him, + Who, like a faithful Merchant, does account + To God for what he spends, and in what way. + Thrice happy art thou, Walden, in thyself! + Such purity is in thy limpid springs,-- + In those green shores which do reflect in thee, + And in this man who dwells upon thy edge, + A holy man within a Hermitage. + May all good showers fall gently into thee, + May thy surrounding forests long be spared, + And may the Dweller on thy tranquil marge + There lead a life of deep tranquillity, + Pure as thy Waters, handsome as thy Shores, + And with those virtues which are like the Stars!" + + + + +METHODS OF STUDY IN NATURAL HISTORY. + + +VII. + + +I come now to an obscure part of my subject, very difficult to present +in a popular form, and yet so important in the scientific investigations +of our day that I cannot omit it entirely. I allude to what are called +by naturalists Collateral Series or Parallel Types. These are by +no means difficult to trace, because they are connected by seeming +resemblances, which, though very likely to mislead and perplex the +observer, yet naturally suggest the association of such groups. Let me +introduce the subject with the statement of some facts. + +There are in Australia numerous Mammalia, occupying the same relation +and answering the same purposes as the Mammalia of other countries. Some +of them are domesticated by the natives, and serve them with meat, milk, +wool, as our domesticated animals serve us. Representatives of almost +all types, Wolves, Foxes, Sloths, Bears, Weasels, Martens, Squirrels, +Rats, etc., are found there; and yet, though all these animals resemble +ours so closely that the English settlers have called many of them by +the same names, there are no genuine Wolves, Foxes, Sloths, Bears, +Weasels, Martens, Squirrels, or Rats in Australia. The Australian +Mammalia are peculiar to the region where they are found, and are all +linked together by two remarkable structural features which distinguish +them from all other Mammalia and unite them under one head as the +so-called Marsupials. They bring forth their young in an imperfect +condition, and transfer them to a pouch, where they remain attached to +the teats of the mother till their development is as far advanced as +that of other Mammalia at the time of their birth; and they are further +characterized by an absence of that combination of transverse fibres +forming the large bridge which unites the two hemispheres of the brain +in all the other members of their class. Here, then, is a series of +animals parallel with ours, separated from them by anatomical features, +but so united with them by form and external features that many among +them have been at first associated together. + +This is what Cuvier has called subordination of characters, +distinguishing between characters that control the organization and +those that are not essentially connected with it. The skill of the +naturalist consists in detecting the difference between the two, so +that he may not take the more superficial features as the basis of his +classification, instead of those important ones which, though often less +easily recognized, are more deeply rooted in the organization. It is a +difference of the same nature as that between affinity and analogy, to +which I have alluded before, when speaking of the ingrafting of certain +features of one type upon animals of another type, thus producing a +superficial resemblance, not truly characteristic. In the Reptiles, for +instance, there are two groups,--those devoid of scales, with naked +skin, laying numerous eggs, but hatching their young in an imperfect +state, and the Scaly Reptiles, which lay comparatively few eggs, but +whose young, when hatched, are completely developed, and undergo no +subsequent metamorphosis. Yet, notwithstanding this difference in +essential features of structure, and in the mode of reproduction and +development, there is such an external resemblance between certain +animals belonging to the two groups that they were associated together +even by so eminent a naturalist as Linnaeus. Compare, for instance, the +Serpents among the Scaly Reptiles with the Caecilians among the Naked +Reptiles. They have the same elongated form, and are both destitute +of limbs; the head in both is on a level with the body, without any +contraction behind it, such as marks the neck in the higher Reptiles, +and moves only by the action of the back-bone; they are singularly alike +in their external features, but the young of the Serpent are hatched in +a mature condition, while the young of the type to which the Caecilians +belong undergo a succession of metamorphoses before attaining to a +resemblance to the parent. Or compare the Lizard and the Salamander, in +which the likeness is perhaps even more striking; for any inexperienced +observer would mistake one for the other. Both are superior to the +Serpents and Caecilians, for in them the head moves freely on the neck +and they creep on short imperfect legs. But the Lizard is clothed with +scales, while the body of the Salamander is naked, and the young of +the former is complete when hatched, while the Tadpole born from the +Salamander has a life of its own to live, with certain changes to pass +through before it assumes its mature condition; during the early part of +its life it is even destitute of legs, and has gills like the Fishes. +Above the Lizards and Salamanders, highest in the class of Reptiles, +stand two other collateral types,--the Turtles at the head of the Scaly +Reptiles, the Toads and Frogs at the Lead of the Naked Reptiles. The +external likeness between these two groups is perhaps less striking than +between those mentioned above, on account of the large shield of the +Turtle. But there are Turtles with a soft covering, and there are some +Toads with a hard shield over the head and neck at least, and both +groups are alike distinguished by the shortness and breadth of the body +and by the greater development of the limbs as compared with the lower +Reptiles. But here again there is the same essential difference in the +mode of development of their young as distinguishes all the rest. The +two series may thus be contrasted:-- + +_Naked Reptiles_. Toads and Frogs, Salamanders, Caecilians. + +_Scaly Reptiles._ Turtles, Lizards, Serpents. + +Such corresponding groups or parallel types, united only by external +resemblance, and distinguished from each other by essential elements of +structure, exist among all animals, though they are less striking among +Birds on account of the uniformity of that class. Yet even there we may +trace such analogies,--as between the Palmate or Aquatic Birds, for +instance, and the Birds of Prey, or between the Frigate Bird and the +Kites. Among Fishes such analogies are very common, often suggesting a +comparison even with land animals, though on account of the scales and +spines of the former the likeness may not be easily traced. But the +common names used by the fishermen often indicate these resemblances, +--as, for instance, Sea-Vulture, Sea-Eagle, Cat-Fish, Flying-Fish, +Sea-Porcupine, Sea-Cow, Sea-Horse, and the like. In the branch of +Mollusks, also, the same superficial analogies are found. In the lowest +class of this division of the Animal Kingdom there is a group so similar +to the Polyps, that, until recently, they have been associated with +them,--the Bryozoa. They are very small animals, allied to the Clams by +the plan of their structure, but they have a resemblance to the Polyps +on account of a radiating wreath of feelers around the upper part of +their body: yet, when examined closely, this wreath is found to be +incomplete; it does not, form a circle, but leaves an open space between +the two ends, where they approach each other, so that it has a horseshoe +outline, and partakes of the bilateral symmetry characteristic of its +type and on which its own structure is based. These series have not yet +been very carefully traced, and young naturalists should turn their +attention to them, and be prepared to draw the nicest distinction +between analogies and true affinities among animals. + + +VIII. + + +After this digression, let us proceed to a careful examination of the +natural groups of animals called Families by naturalists,--a subject +already briefly alluded to in a previous chapter. Families are natural +assemblages of animals of less extent than Orders, but, like Orders, +Classes, and Branches, founded upon certain categories of structure, +which are as distinct for this kind of group as for all the other +divisions in the classification of the Animal Kingdom. + +That we may understand the true meaning of these divisions, we must not +be misled by the name given by naturalists to this kind of group. Here, +as in so many other instances, a word already familiar, and that had +become, as it were, identified with the special sense in which it +had been used, has been adopted by science and has received a new +signification. When naturalists speak of Families among animals, they do +not allude to the progeny of a known stock, as we designate, in common +parlance, the children or the descendants of known parents by the word +family; they understand by Families natural groups of different kinds +of animals, having no genetic relations so far as we know, but agreeing +with one another closely enough to leave the impression of a more +or less remote common parentage. The difficulty here consists in +determining the natural limits of such groups, and in tracing the +characteristic features by which they may be defined; for individual +investigators differ greatly as to the degree of resemblance existing +between the members of many Families, and there is no kind of +group which presents greater diversity of circumscription in the +classifications of animals proposed by different naturalists than these +so-called Families. + +It should be remembered, however, that, unless a sound criterion be +applied to the limitation of Families, they, like all other groups +introduced into zoölogical systems, must forever remain arbitrary +divisions, as they have been hitherto. A retrospective glance at the +progress of our science during the past century, in this connection, +may perhaps help us to solve the difficulty. Linnaeus, in his System +of Nature, does not admit Families; he has only four kinds of +groups,--Classes, Orders, Genera, and Species. It was among plants that +naturalists first perceived those general traits of resemblance which +exist everywhere among the members of natural families, and added this +kind of group to the framework of their system. In France, particularly, +this method was pursued with success; and the improvements thus +introduced by the French botanists were so great, and rendered their +classification so superior to that of Linnaeus, that the botanical +systems in which Families were introduced were called natural systems, +in contradistinction especially to the botanical classification of +Linnaeus, which was founded upon the organs of reproduction, and which +received thenceforth the name of the sexual system of plants. The same +method so successfully used by botanists was soon introduced +into Zoölogy by the French naturalists of the beginning of this +century,--Lamarck, Latreille, and Cuvier. But, to this day, the +limitation of Families among animals has not yet reached the precision +which it has among plants, and I see no other reason for the difference +than the absence of a leading principle to guide us in Zoölogy. + +Families, as they exist in Nature, are based upon peculiarities of form +as related to structure; but though a very large number of them have +been named and recorded, very few are characterized with anything like +scientific accuracy. It has been a very simple matter to establish such +groups according to the superficial method that has been pursued, for +the fact that they are determined by external outline renders the +recognition of them easy and in many instances almost instinctive; but +it is very difficult to characterize them, or, in other words, to trace +the connection between form and structure. Indeed, many naturalists do +not admit that Families are based upon form; and it was in trying to +account for the facility with which they detect these groups, while they +find it so difficult to characterize them, that I perceived that they +are always associated with peculiarities of form. Naturalists have +established Families simply by bringing together a number of animals +resembling each other more or less closely, and, taking usually the name +of the Genus to which the best known among them belongs, they have given +it a patronymic termination to designate the Family, and allowed the +matter to rest there, sometimes without even attempting any description +corresponding to those by which Genus and Species are commonly defined. + +For instance, from _Canis_, the Dog, _Canidae_ has been formed, to +designate the whole Family of Dogs, Wolves, Foxes, etc. Nothing can be +more superficial than such a mode of classification; and if these +groups actually exist in Nature, they must be based, like all the other +divisions, upon some combination of structural characters peculiar to +them. We have seen that Branches are founded upon the general plan of +structure, Classes on the mode of executing the plan, Orders upon the +greater or less complication of a given mode of execution, and we shall +find that form, as _determined by structure_, characterizes Families. I +would call attention to this qualification of my definition; since, of +course, when speaking of form in this connection, I do not mean those +superficial resemblances in external features already alluded to in +my remarks upon Parallel or Collateral Types. I speak now of form as +controlled by structural elements; and unless we analyze Families in +this way, the mere distinguishing and naming them does not advance our +science at all. Compare, for instance, the Dogs, the Seals, and the +Bears. These are all members of one Order,--that of the Carnivorous +Mammalia. Their dentition is peculiar and alike in all, (cutting teeth, +canine teeth, and grinders,) adapted for tearing and chewing their +food; and their internal structure bears a definite relation to their +dentition. But look at these animals with reference to form. The Dog is +comparatively slender, with legs adapted for running and hunting his +prey; the Bear is heavier, with shorter limbs; while the Seal has a +continuous uniform outline adapted for swimming. They form separate +Families, and are easily recognized as such by the difference in their +external outline; but what is the anatomical difference which produces +the peculiarity of form in each, by which they have been thus +distinguished? It lies in the structure of the limbs, and especially in +that of the wrist and fingers. In the Seal the limbs are short, and the +wrists are on one continuous line with them, so that it has no power of +bending the wrist or the fingers, and the limbs, therefore, act like +flappers or oars. The Bear has a well-developed paw with a flexible +wrist, but it steps on the whole sole of the foot, from the wrist to the +tip of the toe, giving it the heavy tread so characteristic of all the +Bears. The Dogs, on the contrary, walk on tip-toe, and their step, +though firm, is light, while the greater slenderness and flexibility of +their legs add to their nimbleness and swiftness. By a more extensive +investigation of the anatomical structure of the limbs in their +connection with the whole body, it could easily be shown that the +peculiarity of form in these animals is essentially determined by, or at +least stands in the closest relation to, the peculiar structure of the +wrist and fingers. + +Take the Family of Owls as distinguished from the Falcons, Kites, etc. +Here the difference of form is in the position of the eyes. In the +Owl, the sides of the head are prominent and the eye-socket is brought +forward. In the Falcons and Kites, on the contrary, the sides of the +head are flattened and the eyes are set back. The difference in the +appearance of the birds is evident to the most superficial observer; but +to call the one Strigidae and the other Falconidae tells us nothing of +the anatomical peculiarities on which this difference is founded. + +These few examples, selected purposely among closely allied and +universally known animals, may be sufficient to show, that, beyond the +general complication of the structure which characterizes the Orders, +there is a more limited element in the organization of animals, bearing +chiefly upon their form, which, if it have any general application as +a principle of classification, may well be considered as essentially +characteristic of the Families. There are certainly closely allied +natural groups of animals, belonging to the same Order, but including +many Genera, which differ from each other chiefly in their form, while +that form is determined by peculiarities of structure which do not +influence the general structural complication upon which Orders are +based, or relate to the minor details of structure on which Genera are +founded. I am therefore convinced that form is the criterion by which +Families may be determined. The great facility with which animals may +be combined together in natural groups of this kind without any special +investigation of their structure, a superficial method of classification +in which zoölogists have lately indulged to a most unjustifiable degree, +convinces me that it is the similarity of form which has unconsciously +led such shallow investigators to correct results, since upon close +examination it is found that a large number of the Families so +determined, and to which no characters at all are assigned, nevertheless +bear the severest criticism founded upon anatomical investigation. + +The questions proposed to themselves by all students who would +characterize Families should be these: What are, throughout the +Animal Kingdom, the peculiar patterns of form by which Families are +distinguished? and on what structural features are these patterns based? +Only the most patient investigations can give us the answer, and it will +be very long before we can write out the formulae of these patterns with +mathematical precision, as I believe we shall be able to do in a more +advanced stage of our science. But while the work is in progress, it +ought to be remembered that a mere general similarity of outline is not +yet in itself evidence of identity of form or pattern, and that, while +seemingly very different forms may be derived from the same formula, the +most similar forms may belong to entirely different systems, when their +derivation is properly traced. Our great mathematician, in a lecture +delivered at the Lowell Institute last winter, showed that in his +science, also, similarity of outline does not always indicate identity +of character. Compare the different circles,--the perfect circle, in +which every point of the periphery is at the same distance from the +centre, with an ellipse in which the variation from the true circle is +so slight as to be almost imperceptible to the eye; yet the latter, like +all ellipses, has its two _foci_ by which it differs from a circle, +and to refer it to the family of circles instead of the family of +ellipses would be overlooking its true character on account of its +external appearance; and yet ellipses may be so elongated, that, far +from resembling a circle, they make the impression of parallel lines +linked at their extremities. Or we may have an elastic curve in which +the appearance of a circle is produced by the meeting of the two ends; +nevertheless it belongs to the family of elastic curves, in which may +even be included a line actually straight, and is formed by a process +entirely different from that which produces the circle or the ellipse. + +But it is sometimes exceedingly difficult to find the relation between +structure and form in Families, and I remember a case which I had taken +as a test of the accuracy of the views I entertained upon this subject, +and which perplexed and baffled me for years. It was that of our +fresh-water Mussels, the Family of Unios. There is a great variety of +outline among them,--some being oblong and very slender, others broad +with seemingly square outlines, others having a nearly triangular form, +while others again are almost circular; and I could not detect among +them all any feature of form that was connected with any essential +element of their structure. At last, however, I found this +test-character, and since that time I have had no doubt left in my mind +that form, determined by structure, is the true criterion of Families. +In the Unios it consists of the rounded outline of the anterior end of +the body reflected in a more or less open curve of the shell, bending +more abruptly along the lower side with an inflection followed by a +bulging, corresponding to the most prominent part of the gills, to which +alone, in a large number of American Species of this Family, the eggs +are transferred, giving to this part of the shell a prominence which it +has not in any of the European Species. At the posterior end of the body +this curve then bends upwards and backwards again, the outline meeting +the side occupied by the hinge and ligament, which, when very short, may +determine a triangular form of the whole shell, or, when equal to the +lower side and connected with a great height of the body, gives it a +quadrangular form, or, if the height is reduced, produces an elongated +form, or, finally, a rounded form, if the passage from one side to the +other is gradual. A comparison of the position of the internal organs of +different Species of Unios with the outlines of their shells will leave +no doubt that their form is determined by the structure of the animal. + +A few other and more familiar examples may complete this discussion. +Among Climbing Birds, for instance, which are held together as a +more comprehensive group by the structure of their feet and by other +anatomical features, there are two Families so widely different in +their form that they may well serve as examples of this principle. The +Woodpeckers (_Picidae_) and the Parrots (_Psittacidae_), once considered +as two Genera only, have both been subdivided, in consequence of a more +intimate knowledge of their generic characters, into a large number of +Genera; but all the Genera of Woodpeckers and all the Genera of the +Parrots are still held together by their form as Families, corresponding +as such to the two old Genera of _Picus_ and _Psittacus_. They are now +known as the Families of Woodpeckers and Parrots; and though each group +includes a number of Genera combined upon a variety of details in the +finish of special parts of the structure, such as the number of toes, +the peculiarities of the bill, etc., it is impossible to overlook the +peculiar form which is characteristic of each. No one who is familiar +with the outline of the Parrot will fail to recognize any member of +that Family by a general form which is equally common to the diminutive +Nonpareil, the gorgeous Ara, and the high-crested Cockatoo. Neither will +any one, who has ever observed the small head, the straight bill, the +flat back, and stiff tail of the Woodpecker, hesitate to identify the +family form in any of the numerous Genera into which this group is now +divided. The family characters are even more invariable than the generic +ones; for there are Woodpeckers which, instead of the four toes, two +turning forward and two backward, which form an essential generic +character, have three toes only, while the family form is always +maintained, whatever variations there may be in the characters of the +more limited groups it includes. + +The Turtles and Terrapins form another good illustration of family +characters. They constitute together a natural Order, but are +distinguished from each other as two Families very distinct in general +form and outline. Among Fishes I may mention the Family of Pickerels, +with their flat, long snout, and slender, almost cylindrical body, as +contrasted with the plump, compressed body and tapering tail of the +Trout Family. Or compare, among Insects, the Hawk-Moths with the Diurnal +Butterfly, or with the so-called Miller,--or, among Crustacea, the +common Crab with the Sea-Spider, or the Lobsters with the Shrimps,--or, +among Worms, the Leeches with the Earth-Worms,--or, among Mollusks, +the Squids with the Cuttle-Fishes, or the Snails with the Slugs, or the +Periwinkles with the Limpets and Conchs, or the Clam with the so-called +Venus, or the Oyster with the Mother-of-Pearl shell,--everywhere, +throughout the Animal Kingdom, difference of form points at difference +of Families. + +There is a chapter in the Natural History of Animals that has hardly +been touched upon as yet, and that will be especially interesting with +reference to Families. The voices of animals have a family character not +to be mistaken. All the Canidae bark and howl: the Fox, the Wolf, the +Dog have the same kind of utterance, though on a somewhat different +pitch. All the Bears growl, from the White Bear of the Arctic snows to +the small Black Bear of the Andes. All the Cats _miau_, from our quiet +fireside companion to the Lions and Tigers and Panthers of the forest +and jungle. This last may seem a strange assertion; but to any one who +has listened critically to their sounds and analyzed their voices, +the roar of the Lion is but a gigantic _miau_, bearing about the same +proportion to that of a Cat as its stately and majestic form does to the +smaller, softer, more peaceful aspect of the Cat. Yet, notwithstanding +the difference in their size, who can look at the Lion, whether in his +more sleepy mood as he lies curled up in the corner of his cage, or in +his fiercer moments of hunger or of rage, without being reminded of a +Cat? And this is not merely the resemblance of one carnivorous animal to +another; for no one was ever reminded of a Dog or Wolf by a Lion. Again, +all the Horses and Donkeys neigh; for the bray of the Donkey is only a +harsher neigh, pitched on a different key, it is true, but a sound of +the same character,--as the Donkey himself is but a clumsy and dwarfish +Horse. All the Cows low, from the Buffalo roaming the prairie, the +Musk-Ox of the Arctic ice-fields, or the Jack of Asia, to the Cattle +feeding in our pastures. Among the Birds, this similarity of voice in +Families is still more marked. We need only recall the harsh and noisy +Parrots, so similar in their peculiar utterance. Or take as an example +the web-footed Family,--do not all the Geese and the innumerable host +of Ducks quack? Does not every member of the Crow Family caw, whether it +be the Jackdaw, the Jay, the Magpie, the Rook in some green rookery of +the Old World, or the Crow of our woods, with its long, melancholy caw +that seems to make the silence and solitude deeper? Compare all the +sweet warblers of the Songster Family,--the Nightingales, the Thrushes, +the Mocking-Birds, the Robins; they differ in the greater or less +perfection of their note, but the same kind of voice runs through the +whole group. These affinities of the vocal systems among animals form a +subject well worthy of the deepest study, not only as another character +by which to classify the Animal Kingdom correctly, but as bearing +indirectly also on the question of the origin of animals. Can we suppose +that characteristics like these have been communicated from one animal +to another? When we find that all the members of one zoological Family, +however widely scattered over the surface of the earth, inhabiting +different continents and even different hemispheres, speak with one +voice, must we not believe that they have originated in the places where +they now occur with all their distinctive peculiarities? Who taught the +American Thrush to sing like his European relative? He surely did not +learn it from his cousin over the waters. Those who would have us +believe that all animals have originated from common centres and single +pairs, and have been distributed from such common centres over the +world, will find it difficult to explain the tenacity of such characters +and their recurrence and repetition under circumstances that seem to +preclude the possibility of any communication, on any other supposition +than that of their creation in the different regions where they are now +found. We have much yet to learn in this kind of investigation, with +reference not only to Families among animals, but to nationalities among +men also. I trust that the nature of languages will teach us as much +about the origin of the races as the vocal systems of the animals may +one day teach us about the origin of the different groups of animals. +At all events, similarity of vocal utterance among animals is not +indicative of identity of Species; I doubt, therefore, whether +similarity of speech proves community of origin among men. + +The similarity of motion in Families is another subject well worth the +consideration of the naturalist: the soaring of the Birds of Prey,--the +heavy flapping of the wings in the Gallinaceous Birds,--the floating of +the Swallows, with their short cuts and angular turns,--the hopping +of the Sparrows,--the deliberate walk of the Hens and the strut of the +Cocks,--the waddle of the Ducks and Geese,--the slow, heavy creeping +of the Land-Turtle,--the graceful flight of the Sea-Turtle under the +water,--the leaping and swimming of the Frog,--the swift run of the +Lizard, like a flash of green or red light in the sunshine,--the +lateral undulation of the Serpent,--the dart of the Pickerel,--the +leap of the Trout,--the rush of the Hawk-Moth through the air,--the +fluttering flight of the Butterfly,--the quivering poise of the +Humming-Bird,--the arrow-like shooting of the Squid through the water, +--the slow crawling of the Snail on the land,--the sideway movement +of the Sand-Crab,--the backward walk of the Crawfish,--the almost +imperceptible gliding of the Sea-Anemone over the rock,--the graceful, +rapid motion of the Pleurobrachia, with its endless change of curve and +spiral. In short, every Family of animals has its characteristic action +and its peculiar voice; and yet so little is this endless variety +of rhythm and cadence both of motion and sound in the organic world +understood, that we lack words to express one-half its richness and +beauty. + + +IX. + + +The well-known meaning of the words _generic_ and _specific_ may serve, +in the absence of a more precise definition, to express the relative +importance of those groups of animals called Genera and Species in our +scientific systems. The Genus is the more comprehensive of the two kinds +of groups, while the Species is the most precisely defined, or at least +the most easily recognized, of all the divisions of the Animal Kingdom. +But neither the term Genus nor Species has always been taken in the same +sense. Genus especially has varied in its acceptation, from the time +when Aristotle applied it indiscriminately to any kind of comprehensive +group, from the Classes down to what we commonly call Genera, till the +present day. But we have already seen, that, instead of calling all the +various kinds of more comprehensive divisions by the name of Genera, +modern science has applied special names to each of them, and we have +now Families, Orders, Classes, and Branches above Genera proper. If +the foregoing discussion upon the nature of these groups is based upon +trustworthy principles, we must admit that they are all founded upon +distinct categories of characters,--the primary divisions, or the +Branches, on plan of structure, the Classes upon the manner of its +execution, the Orders upon the greater or less complication of a given +mode of execution, the Families upon form; and it now remains to be +ascertained whether Genera also exist in Nature, and by what kind of +characteristics they may be distinguished. Taking the practice of the +ablest naturalists in discriminating Genera as a guide in our estimation +of their true nature, we must, nevertheless, remember that even now, +while their classifications of the more comprehensive groups usually +agree, they differ greatly in their limitation of Genera, so that the +Genera of some authors correspond to the Families of others, and vice +versa. This undoubtedly arises from the absence of a definite standard +for the estimation of these divisions. But the different categories of +structure which form the distinctive criteria of the more comprehensive +divisions once established, the question is narrowed down to an inquiry +into the special category upon which Genera may be determined; and if +this can be accurately defined, no difference of opinion need interfere +hereafter with their uniform limitation. Considering all these divisions +of the Animal Kingdom from this point of view, it is evident that the +more comprehensive ones must be those which are based on the broadest +characters,--Branches, as united upon plan of structure, standing of +course at the head; next to these the Classes, since the general mode +of executing the plan presents a wider category of characters than +the complication of structure on which Orders rest; after Orders come +Families, or the patterns of form in which these greater or less +complications of structure are clothed; and proceeding in the same way +from more general to more special considerations, we can have no other +category of structure as characteristic of Genera than the details of +structure by which members of the same Family may differ from each +other, and this I consider as the only true basis on which to limit +Genera, while it is at the same time in perfect accordance with the +practice of the most eminent modern zoologists. It is in this way that +Cuvier has distinguished the large number of Genera he has characterized +in his great Natural History of the Fishes, in connection with +Valenciennes. Latreille has done the same for the Crustacea and Insects; +and Milne Edwards, with the coöperation of Haime, has recently proceeded +upon the same principle in characterizing a great number of Genera among +the Corals. Many others have followed this example, but few have kept +in view the necessity of a uniform mode of proceeding, or, if they have +done their researches have covered too limited a ground, to be taken +into consideration in a discussion of principles. It is, in fact, only +when extending over a whole Class that the study of Genera acquires a +truly scientific importance, as it then shows in a connected manner, in +what way, by what features, and to what extent a large number of animals +are closely linked together in Nature. Considering the Animal Kingdom as +a single complete work of one Creative Intellect, consistent throughout, +such keen analysis and close criticism of all its parts have the same +kind of interest, in a higher degree, as that which attaches to other +studies undertaken in the spirit of careful comparative research. +These different categories of characters are, as it were, different +peculiarities of style in the author, different modes of treating the +same material, new combinations of evidence bearing on the same general +principles. The study of Genera is a department of Natural History which +thus far has received too little attention even at the hands of our best +zoologists, and has been treated in the most arbitrary manner; it +should henceforth be made a philosophical investigation into the closer +affinities which naturally bind in minor groups all the representatives +of a natural Family. + +Genera, then, are groups of a more restricted character than any of +those we have examined thus far. Some of them include only one Species, +while others comprise hundreds; since certain definite combinations of +characters may be limited to a single Species, while other combinations +may be repeated in many. We have striking examples of this among Birds: +the Ostrich stands alone in its Genus, while the number of Species among +the Warblers is very great. Among Mammalia the Giraffe also stands +alone, while Mice and Squirrels include many Species. Genera are +founded, not, as we have seen, on general structural characters, but on +the finish of special parts, as, for instance, on the dentition. The +Cats have only four grinders in the upper jaw and three in the lower, +while the Hyenas have one more above and below, and the Dogs and Wolves +have two more above and two more below. In the last, some of the teeth +have also flat surfaces for crushing the food, adapted especially to +their habits, since they live on vegetable as well as animal substances. +The formation of the claws is another generic feature. There is a +curious example with reference to this in the Cheetah, which is again +a Genus containing only one Species. It belongs to the Cat Family, +but differs from ordinary Lions and Tigers in having its claws so +constructed that it cannot draw them back under the paws, though in +every other respect they are like the claws of all the Cats. But while +it has the Cat-like claw, its paws are like those of the Dog, and this +singular combination of features is in direct relation to its habits, +for it does not lie in wait and spring upon its prey like the Cat, but +hunts it like the Dog. + +While Genera themselves are, like Families, easily distinguished, the +characters on which they are founded, like those of Families, are +difficult to trace. There are often features belonging to these groups +which attract the attention and suggest their association, though they +are not those which may be truly considered generic characters. It is +easy to distinguish the Genus Fox, for instance, by its bushy tail, and +yet that is no true generic character; the collar of feathers round the +neck of the Vultures leads us at once to separate them from the Eagles, +but it is not the collar that truly marks the Genus, but rather the +peculiar structure of the feathers which form it. No Bird has a more +striking plumage than the Peacock, but it is not the appearance merely +of its crest and spreading fan that constitutes a Genus, but the +peculiar structure of the feathers. Thousands of examples might be +quoted to show how easily Genera may be singled out, named, and entered +in our systems, without being duly characterized, and it is much to be +lamented that there is no possibility of checking the loose work of this +kind with which the annals of our science are daily flooded. + +It would, of course, be quite inappropriate to present here any +general revision of these groups; but I may present a few instances to +illustrate the principle of their classification, and to show on what +characters they are properly based. Among Reptiles, we find, for +instance, that the Genera of our fresh-water Turtles differ from each +other in the cut of their bill, in the arrangement of their scales, +in the form of their claws, etc. Among Fishes, the different Genera +included under the Family of Perches are distinguished by the +arrangement of their teeth, by the serratures of their gill-covers, and +of the arch to which the pectoral fins are attached, by the nature and +combination of the rays of their fins, by the structure of their scales, +etc. Among Insects, the various Genera of the Butterflies differ in the +combination of the little rods which sustain their wings, in the form +and structure of their antennae, of their feet, of the minute scales +which cover their wings, etc. Among Crustacea, the Genera of Shrimps +vary in the form of the claws, in the structure of the parts of the +mouth, in the articulations of their feelers, etc. Among Worms, the +different Genera of the Leech Family are combined upon the form of the +disks by which they attach themselves, upon the number and arrangement +of their eyes, upon the structure of the hard parts with which the mouth +is armed, etc. Among Cephalopods, the Family of Squids contains several +Genera distinguished by the structure of the solid shield within the +skin of the back, by the form and connection of their fins, by the +structure of the suckers with which their arms are provided, by the +form of their beak, etc. In every Class, we find throughout the Animal +Kingdom that there is no sound basis for the discrimination of Genera +except the details of their structure; but in order to define them +accurately an extensive comparison of them is indispensable, and in +characterizing them only such features should be enumerated as are truly +generic; whereas in the present superficial method of describing them, +features are frequently introduced which belong not only to the whole +Family, but even to the whole Class which includes them. + + +X. + + +There remains but one more division of the Animal Kingdom for our +consideration, the most limited of all in its circumscription,--that +of Species. It is with the study of this kind of group that naturalists +generally begin their investigations. I believe, however, that the study +of Species as the basis of a scientific education is a great mistake. +It leads us to overrate the value of Species, and to believe that they +exist in Nature in some different sense from other groups; as if there +were something more real and tangible in Species than in Genera, +Families, Orders, Classes, or Branches. The truth is, that to study a +vast number of Species without tracing the principles that combine +them under more comprehensive groups is only to burden the mind with +disconnected facts, and more may be learned by a faithful and careful +comparison of a few Species than by a more cursory examination of a +greater number. When one considers the immense number of Species already +known, naturalists might well despair of becoming acquainted with them +all, were they not constructed on a few fundamental patterns, so that +the study of one Species teaches us a great deal for all the rest. De +Candolle, who was at the same time a great botanist and a great teacher, +told me once that he could undertake to illustrate the fundamental +principles of his science with the aid of a dozen plants judiciously +selected, and that it was his unvarying practice to induce students to +make a thorough study of a few minor groups of plants, in all their +relations to one another, rather than to attempt to gain a superficial +acquaintance with a large number of species. The powerful influence he +has had upon the progress of Botany vouches for the correctness of his +views. Indeed, every profound scholar knows that sound learning can be +attained only by this method, and the study of Nature makes no exception +to the rule. I would therefore advise every student to select a few +representatives from all the Classes, and to study these not only with +reference to their specific characters, but as members also of a Genus, +of a Family, of an Order, of a Class, and of a Branch. He will soon +convince himself that Species have no more definite and real existence +in Nature than all the other divisions of the Animal Kingdom, and that +every animal is the representative of its Branch, Class, Order, Family, +and Genus as much as of its Species, Specific characters are only +those determining size, proportion, color, habits, and relations to +surrounding circumstances and external objects. How superficial, then, +must be any one's knowledge of an animal who studies it only with +relation to its specific characters! He will know nothing of the finish +of special parts of the body,--nothing of the relations between its +form and its structure,--nothing of the relative complication of its +organization as compared with other allied animals,--nothing of the +general mode of execution,--nothing of the plan expressed in that mode +of execution. Yet, with the exception of the ordinal characters, which, +since they imply relative superiority and inferiority, require, of +course, a number of specimens for comparison, his one animal would tell +him all this as well as the specific characters. + +All the more comprehensive groups, equally with Species, have a +positive, permanent, specific principle, maintained generation after +generation with all its essential characteristics. Individuals are +the transient representatives of all these organic principles, which +certainly have an independent, immaterial existence, since they outlive +the individuals that embody them, and are no less real after the +generation that has represented them for a time has passed away than +they were before. + +From a comparison of a number of well-known Species belonging to a +natural Genus, it is not difficult to ascertain what are essentially +specific characters. There is hardly among Mammalia a more natural Genus +than that which includes the Rabbits and Hares, or that to which the +Rats and Mice are referred. Let us see how the different Species differ +from one another. Though we give two names in the vernacular to +the Genus Hare, both Hares and Rabbits agree in all the structural +peculiarities which constitute a Genus; but the different Species are +distinguished by their absolute size when full-grown,--by the nature and +color of their fur,--by the size and form of the ear,--by the relative +length of their legs and tail,--by the more or less slender build of +their whole body,--by their habits, some living in open grounds, +others among the bushes, others in swamps, others burrowing under the +earth,--by the number of young they bring forth,--by their different +seasons of breeding,--and by still minor differences, such as the +permanent color of the hair throughout the year in some, while in others +it turns white in winter. The Rats and Mice differ in a similar way: +there being large and small Species,--some gray, some brown, others +rust-colored,--some with soft, others with coarse hair; they differ also +in the length of the tail, and in having it more or less covered with +hair,--in the cut of the ears, and their size,--in the length of +their limbs, which are slender and long in some, short and thick in +others,--in their various ways of living,--in the different substances +on which they feed,--and also in their distribution over the surface +of the earth, whether circumscribed within certain limited areas +or scattered over a wider range. What is now the nature of these +differences by which we distinguish Species? They are totally distinct +from any of the categories on which Genera, Families, Orders, Classes, +or Branches are founded, and may readily be reduced to a few heads. They +are differences in the proportion of the parts and in the absolute size +of the whole animal, in the color and general ornamentation of the +surface of the body, and in the relations of the individuals to one +another and to the world around. A farther analysis of other Genera +would show us that among Birds, Reptiles, Fishes, and, in fact, +throughout the Animal Kingdom, Species of well-defined natural Genera +differ in the same way. We are therefore justified in saying that the +category of characters on which Species are based implies no structural +differences, but presents the same structure combined under certain +minor differences of size, proportion, and habits. All the specific +characters stand in direct reference to the generic structure, the +family form, the ordinal complication of structure, the mode of +execution of the Class, and the plan of structure of the Branch, all of +which are embodied in the frame of each individual in each Species, even +though all these individuals are constantly dying away and reproducing +others; so that the specific characters have no more permanency in the +individuals than those which characterize the Genus, the Family, the +Order, the Class, and the Branch. I believe, therefore, that naturalists +have been entirely wrong in considering the more comprehensive groups +to be theoretical and in a measure arbitrary, an attempt, that is, of +certain men to classify the Animal Kingdom according to their individual +views, while they have ascribed to Species, as contrasted with the other +divisions, a more positive existence in Nature. No further argument +is needed to show that it is not only the Species that lives in the +individual, but that every individual, though belonging to a distinct +Species, is built upon a precise and definite plan which characterizes +its Branch,--that that plan is executed in each individual in a +particular way which characterizes its Class,--that every individual +with its kindred occupies a definite position in a series of structural +complications which characterizes its Order,--that in every individual +all these structural features are combined under a definite pattern of +form which characterizes its Family,--that every individual exhibits +structural details in the finish of its parts which characterize its +Genus,--and finally that every individual presents certain peculiarities +in the proportion of its parts, in its color, in its size, in its +relations to its fellow-beings and surrounding things, which constitute +its specific characters; and all this is repeated in the same kind of +combination, generation after generation, while the individuals die. +If we accept these propositions, which seem to me self-evident, it is +impossible to avoid the conclusion that Species do not exist in Nature +in any other sense than the more comprehensive groups of the zoological +systems. + +There is one question respecting Species that gives rise to very earnest +discussions in our day, not only among naturalists, but among all +thinking people. How far are they permanent, and how far mutable? With +reference to the permanence of Species, there is much to be learned from +the geological phenomena that belong to our own period, and that bear +witness to the invariability of types during hundreds of thousands of +years at least. I hope to present a part of this evidence in a future +article upon Coral Reefs, but in the mean time I cannot leave this +subject without touching upon a point of which great use has been made +in recent discussions. I refer to the variability of Species as shown in +domestication. + +The domesticated animals with their numerous breeds are constantly +adduced as evidence of the changes which animals may undergo, and as +furnishing hints respecting the way in which the diversity now observed +among animals has already been produced. It is my conviction that such +inferences are in no way sustained by the facts of the case, and that, +however striking the differences may be between the breeds of our +domesticated animals, as compared with the wild Species of the same +Genus, they are of a peculiar character entirely distinct from those +that prevail among the latter, and are altogether incident to the +circumstances under which they occur. By this I do not mean the natural +action of physical conditions, but the more or less intelligent +direction of the circumstances under which they live. The inference +drawn from the varieties introduced among animals in a state of +domestication, with reference to the origin of Species, is usually this: +that what the farmer does on a small scale Nature may do on a large one. +It is true that man has been able to produce certain changes in the +animals under his care, and that these changes have resulted in a +variety of breeds. But in doing this, he has, in my estimation, in no +way altered the character of the Species, but has only developed its +pliability to the will of man, that is, to a power similar in its +nature and mode of action to that power to which animals owe their very +existence. The influence of man upon Animals is, in other words, the +action of mind upon them; and yet the ordinary mode of arguing upon +this subject is, that, because the intelligence of man has been able to +produce certain varieties in domesticated animals, therefore physical +causes have produced all the diversities among wild ones. Surely, the +sounder logic would be to infer, that, because our finite intelligence +can cause the original pattern to vary by some slight shades of +difference, therefore an infinite intelligence must have established +all the boundless diversity of which our boasted varieties are but the +faintest echo. It is the most intelligent farmer that has the greatest +success in improving his breeds; and if the animals he has so fostered +are left to themselves without that intelligent care, they return +to their normal condition. So with plants: the shrewd, observing, +thoughtful gardener will obtain many varieties from his flowers; but +those varieties will fade out, if left to themselves. There is, as it +were, a certain degree of pliability and docility in the organization +both of animals and plants, which may be developed by the fostering care +of man, and within which he can exercise a certain influence; but the +variations which he thus produces are of a peculiar kind, and do not +correspond to the differences of the wild Species. Let us take some +examples to illustrate this assertion. + +Every Species of wild Bull differs from the others in its size; but +all the individuals correspond to the average standard of size +characteristic of their respective Species, and show none of those +extreme differences of size so remarkable among our domesticated +Cattle. Every Species of wild Bull has its peculiar color, and all the +individuals of one Species share in it: not so with our domesticated +Cattle, among which every individual may differ in color from every +other. All the individuals of the same Species of wild Bull agree in the +proportion of their parts, in the mode of growth of the hair, in its +quality, whether fine or soft: not so with our domesticated Cattle, +among which we find in the same Species overgrown and dwarfish +individuals, those with long and short legs, with slender and stout +build of the body, with horns or without, as well as the greatest +variety in the mode of twisting the horns,--in short, the widest +extremes of development which the degree of pliability in that Species +will allow. + +A curious instance of the power of man, not only in developing the +pliability of an animal's organization, but in adapting it to suit his +own caprices, is that of the Golden Carp, so frequently seen in bowls +and tanks as the ornament of drawing-rooms and gardens. Not only an +infinite variety of spotted, striped, variegated colors has been +produced in these Fishes, but, especially among the Chinese, so famous +for their morbid love of whatever is distorted and warped from its +natural shape and appearance, all sorts of changes have been brought +about in this single Species. A book of Chinese paintings showing the +Golden Carp in its varieties represents some as short and stout, +others long and slender,--some with the ventral side swollen, others +hunch-backed,--some with the mouth greatly enlarged, while in others +the caudal fin, which in the normal condition of the Species is placed +vertically at the end of the tail and is forked like those of other +Fishes, has become crested and arched, or is double, or crooked, or has +swerved in some other way from its original pattern. But in all these +variations there is nothing which recalls the characteristic specific +differences among the representatives of the Carp Family, which in their +wild state are very monotonous in their appearance all the world over. + +Were it appropriate to accumulate evidence here upon this subject, I +could bring forward many more examples quite as striking as those above +mentioned. The various breeds of our domesticated Horses present the +same kind of irregularities, and do not differ from each other in the +same way as the wild Species differ from one another. Or take the Genus +Dog: the differences between its wild Species do not correspond in the +least with the differences observed among the domesticated ones. Compare +the differences between the various kinds of Jackals and Wolves with +those that exist between the Bull-Dog and Greyhound, for instance, or +between the St. Charles and the Terrier, or between the Esquimaux and +the Newfoundland Dog. I need hardly add that what is true of the Horses, +the Cattle, the Dogs, is true also of the Donkey, the Goat, the Sheep, +the Pig, the Cat, the Rabbit, the different kinds of barn-yard fowl,--in +short, of all those animals that are in domesticity the chosen +companions of man. + +In fact, all the variability among domesticated Species is due to the +fostering care, or, in its more extravagant freaks, to the fancies of +man, and it has never been observed in the wild Species, where, on +the contrary, everything shows the closest adherence to the distinct, +well-defined, and invariable limits of the Species. It surely does +not follow, that, because the Chinese can, under abnormal conditions, +produce a variety of fantastic shapes in the Golden Carp, therefore +water, or the physical conditions established in the water, can create a +Fish, any more than it follows, that, because they can dwarf a tree, or +alter its aspect by stunting its growth in one direction and forcing it +in another, therefore the earth, or the physical conditions connected +with their growth, can create a Pine, an Oak, a Birch, or a Maple. +I confess that in all the arguments derived from the phenomena of +domestication, to prove that all animals owe their origin and diversity +to the natural action of the conditions under which they live, the +conclusion does not seem to me to follow logically from the premises. +And the fact that the domesticated animals of all races of men, equally +with the white race, vary among themselves in the same way and differ +in the same way from the wild Species, makes it still more evident that +domesticated varieties do not explain the origin of Species, except, as +I have said, by showing that the intelligent will of man can produce +effects which physical causes have never been known to produce, and that +we must therefore look to some cause outside of Nature, corresponding in +kind, though so different in degree, to the intelligence of man, for +all the phenomena connected with the existence of animals in their wild +state. So far from attributing these original differences among animals +to natural influences, it would seem, that, while a certain freedom of +development is left, within the limits of which man can exercise his +intelligence and his ingenuity, not even this superficial influence is +allowed to physical conditions unaided by some guiding power, since in +their normal state the wild Species remain, so far as we have been able +to discover, entirely unchanged,--maintained, it is true, in their +integrity by the circumstances that were established for their support +by the power that created both, but never altered by them. Nature holds +inviolable the stamp that God has set upon his creatures; and if man +is able to influence their organization in some slight degree, it is +because the Creator has given to his relations with the animals he has +intended for his companions the same plasticity which he has allowed to +every other side of his life, in virtue of which he may in some sort +mould and shape it to his own ends, and be held responsible also for its +results. + +The common sense of a civilized community has already pointed out the +true distinction in applying another word to the discrimination of the +different kinds of domesticated animals. They are called Breeds, and +Breeds among animals are the work of man;--Species were created by God. + + * * * * * + + +THE STRASBURG CLOCK. + + + Many and many a year ago,-- + To say how many I scarcely dare,-- + Three of us stood in Strasburg streets, + In the wide and open square, + Where, quaint and old and touched with the gold + Of a summer morn, at stroke of noon + The tongue of the great Cathedral tolled, + And into the church with the crowd we strolled + To see their wonder, the famous Clock. + Well, my love, there are clocks a many, + As big as a house, as small as a penny; + And clocks there be with voices as queer + As any that torture human ear,-- + Clocks that grunt, and clocks that growl, + That wheeze like a pump, and hoot like an owl, + From the coffin shape with its brooding face + That stands on the stair, (you know the place,) + Saying, "Click, cluck," like an ancient hen, + A-gathering the minutes home again, + To the kitchen knave with its wooden stutter, + Doing equal work with double splutter, + Yelping, "Click, clack," with a vulgar jerk, + As much as to say, "Just see me work!" + + But of all the clocks that tell Time's bead-roll, + There are none like this in the old Cathedral; + Never a one so bids you stand + While it deals the minutes with even hand: + For clocks, like men, are better and worse, + And some you dote on, and some you curse; + And clock and man may have such a way + Of telling the truth that you can't say nay. + + So in we went and stood in the crowd + To hear the old clock as it crooned aloud, + With sound and symbol, the only tongue + The maker taught it while yet 't was young. + And we saw Saint Peter clasp his hands, + And the cock crow hoarsely to all the lands, + And the Twelve Apostles come and go, + And the solemn Christ pass sadly and slow; + And strange that iron-legged procession, + And odd to us the whole impression, + As the crowd beneath, in silence pressing, + Bent to that cold mechanic blessing. + + But I alone thought far in my soul + What a touch of genius was in the whole, + And felt how graceful had been the thought + Which for the signs of the months had sought, + Sweetest of symbols, Christ's chosen train; + And much I pondered, if he whose brain + Had builded this clock with labor and pain + Did only think, twelve months there are, + And the Bible twelve will fit to a hair; + Or did he say, with a heart in tune, + Well-loved John is the sign of June, + And changeful Peter hath April hours, + And Paul the stately, October bowers, + And sweet, or faithful, or bold, or strong, + Unto each one shall a month belong. + + But beside the thought that under it lurks, + Pray, do you think clocks are saved by their works? + + + + +ARTHUR HUGH CLOUGH. + + +To win such love as Arthur Hugh Clough won in life, to leave so dear a +memory as he has left, is a happiness that falls to few men. In America, +as in England, his death is mourned by friends whose affection is better +than fame, and who in losing him have met with an irreparable loss. +Outside the circle of his friends his reputation had no large extent; +but though his writings are but little known by the great public of +readers, they are prized by all those of thoughtful and poetic temper +to whose hands they have come, as among the most precious and original +productions of the time. To those who knew him personally his poems had +a special worth and charm, as the sincere expression of a character of +the purest stamp, of rare truthfulness and simplicity, not less tender +than strong, and of a genius thoroughly individual in its form, and full +of the promise of a large career. He was by Nature endowed with subtile +and profound powers of thought, with feeling at once delicate and +intense, with lively and generous sympathies, and with conscientiousness +so acute as to pervade and control his whole intellectual disposition. +Loving, seeking, and holding fast to the truth, he despised all +falseness and affectation. With his serious and earnest thinking was +joined the play of a genial humor and the brightness of poetic fancy. +Liberal in sentiment, absolutely free from dogmatism and pride of +intellect, of a questioning temper, but of reverent spirit, faithful in +the performance not only of the larger duties, but also of the lesser +charities and the familiar courtesies of life, he has left a memory of +singular consistency, purity, and dignity. He lived to conscience, not +for show, and few men carry through life so white a soul. + +A notice of Mr. Clough understood to be written by one who knew him well +gives the outline of his life. + +"Arthur Hugh Clough was educated at Rugby, to which school he went +very young, soon after Dr. Arnold had been elected head-master. He +distinguished himself at once by gaining the only scholarship which +existed at that time, and which was open to the whole school under the +age of fourteen. Before he was sixteen he was at the head of the fifth +form, and, as that was the earliest age at which boys were then admitted +into the sixth, had to wait for a year before coming under the personal +tuition of the headmaster. He came in the next (school) generation to +Stanley and Vaughan, and gained a reputation, if possible, even greater +than theirs. At the yearly speeches, in the last year of his residence, +when the prizes are given away in the presence of the school and the +friends who gather on such occasions, Arnold took the almost unexampled +course of addressing him, (when he and two fags went up to carry off his +load of splendidly bound books,) and congratulating him on having +gained every honor which Rugby could bestow, and having also already +distinguished himself and done the highest credit to his school at the +University. He had just gained a scholarship at Balliol, then, as now, +the blue ribbon of undergraduates. + +"At school, although before all things a student, he had thoroughly +entered into the life of the place, and before he left had gained +supreme influence with the boys. He was the leading contributor to the +'Rugby Magazine'; and though a weakness in his ankles prevented him from +taking a prominent part in the games of the place, was known as the +best goal-keeper on record, a reputation which no boy could have gained +without promptness and courage. He was also one of the best swimmers in +the school, his weakness of ankle being no drawback here, and in his +last half passed the crucial test of that day, by swimming from Swift's +(the bathing-place of the sixth) to the mill on the Leicester road, and +back again, between callings over. + +"He went to reside at Oxford when the whole University was in a ferment. +The struggle of Alma Mater to humble or cast out the most remarkable +of her sons was at its height. Ward had not yet been arraigned for his +opinions, and was a fellow and tutor of Balliol, and Newman was in +residence at Oriel, and incumbent of St. Mary's. + +"Clough's was a mind which, under any circumstances, would have thrown +itself into the deepest speculative thought of its time. He seems soon +to have passed through the mere ecclesiastical debatings to the deep +questions which lay below them. There was one lesson--probably one +only--which he had never been able to learn from his great master, +namely, to acknowledge that there are problems which intellectually are +not to be solved by man, and before these to sit down quietly. Whether +it were from the harass of thought on such matters which interfered with +his regular work, or from one of those strange miscarriages in the most +perfect of examining machines, which every now and then deprive the best +men of the highest honors, to the surprise of every one Clough missed +his first class. But he completely retrieved this academical mishap +shortly afterwards by gaining an Oriel fellowship. In his new college, +the college of Pusey, Newman, Keble, Marriott, Wilberforce, presided +over by Dr. Hawkins, and in which the influence of Whately, Davidson, +and Arnold had scarcely yet died out, he found himself in the very +centre and eye of the battle. His own convictions were by this time +leading him far away from both sides in the Oxford contest; he, however, +accepted a tutorship at the college, and all who had the privilege of +attending them will long remember his lectures on logic and ethics. +His fault (besides a shy and reserved manner) was that he was much too +long-suffering to youthful philosophic coxcombry, and would rather +encourage it by his gentle 'Ah! you think so?' or, 'Yes, but might not +such and such be the case?'" + +Clough was at Oxford in 1847,--the year of the terrible Irish famine, +and with others of the most earnest men at the University he took part +in an association which had for its object "Retrenchment for the sake +of the Irish." Such a society was little likely to be popular with the +comfortable dignitaries or the luxurious youth of the University. Many +objections, frivolous or serious as the case might be, were raised +against so subversive a notion as that of the self-sacrifice of the rich +for the sake of the poor. Disregarding all personal considerations, +Clough printed a pamphlet entitled, "A Consideration of Objections +against the Retrenchment Association," in which he met the careless or +selfish arguments of those who set themselves against the efforts of +the society. It was a characteristic performance. His heart was deeply +stirred by the harsh contrast between the miseries of the Irish poor and +the wasteful extravagance of living prevalent at Oxford. He wrote with +vehement indignation against the selfish pleas of the indifferent and +the thoughtless possessors of wealth, wasters of the goods given them as +a trust for others. His words were chiefly addressed to the young men +at the University,--and they were not without effect. Such views of the +rights and duties of property as he put forward, of the claims of labor, +and of the responsibilities of the aristocracy, had not been often heard +at Oxford. He was called a Socialist and a Radical, but it mattered +little to him by what name he was known to those whose consciences were +not touched by his appeal. "Will you say," he writes toward the end of +this pamphlet, "this is all rhetoric and declamation? There is, I dare +say, something too much in that kind. What with criticizing style and +correcting exercises, we college tutors perhaps may be likely, in the +heat of composition, to lose sight of realities, and pass into the limbo +of the factitious,--especially when the thing must be done at odd times, +in any case, and, if at all, quickly. But if I have been obliged to +write hurriedly, believe me, I have obliged myself to think not hastily. +And believe me, too, though I have desired to succeed in putting vividly +and forcibly that which vividly and forcibly I felt and saw, still the +graces and splendors of composition were thoughts far less present to my +mind than Irish poor men's miseries, English poor men's hardships, and +your unthinking indifference. Shocking enough the first and the second, +almost more shocking the third." + +It was about this time that the most widely known of his works, "The +Bothie of Toper-na-Fuosich, a Long-Vacation Pastoral," was written. It +was published in 1848, and though it at once secured a circle of warm +admirers, and the edition was very soon exhausted, it "is assuredly +deserving of a far higher popularity than it has ever attained." The +poem was reprinted in America, at Cambridge, in 1849, and it may be +safely asserted that its merit was more deeply felt and more generously +acknowledged by American than by English readers. The fact that its +essential form and local coloring were purely and genuinely English, and +thus gratified the curiosity felt in this country concerning the social +habits and ways of life in the mother-land, while on the other hand its +spirit was in sympathy with the most liberal and progressive thought +of the age, may sufficiently account for its popularity here. But +the lovers of poetry found delight in it, apart from these +characteristics,--in its fresh descriptions of Nature, its healthy +manliness of tone, its scholarly construction, its lively humor, its +large thought quickened and deepened by the penetrating imagination of +the poet. + +"Any one who has read it will acknowledge that a tutorship at Oriel was +not the place for the author. The intense love of freedom, the deep and +hearty sympathy with the foremost thought of the time, the humorous +dealing with old formulas and conventionalisms grown meaningless, which +breathe in every line of the 'Bothie,' show this clearly enough. He +would tell in after-life, with much enjoyment, how the dons of the +University, who, hearing that he had something in the press, and knowing +that his theological views were not wholly sound, were looking for a +publication on the Articles, were astounded by the appearance of that +fresh and frolicsome poem. Oxford (at least the Oriel common room) +and he were becoming more estranged daily. How keenly he felt the +estrangement, not from Oxford, but from old friends, about this time, +can be read only in his own words." It is in such poems as the "Qua +Cursum Ventus," or the sonnet beginning, "Well, well,--Heaven bless you +all from day to day!" that it is to be read. These, with a few other +fugitive pieces, were printed, in company with verses by a friend, as +one part of a small volume entitled, "Ambarvalia," which never attained +any general circulation, although containing some poems which will take +their place among the best of English poetry of this generation. + + "_Qua Cursum Ventus_. + + "As ships, becalmed at eve, that lay + With canvas drooping, side by side, + Two towers of sail at dawn of day, + Are scarce long leagues apart descried: + + "When fell the night, upsprung the breeze, + And all the darkling hours they plied, + Nor dreamt but each the self-same seas + By each was cleaving side by side: + + "E'en so----But why the tale reveal + Of those whom, year by year unchanged, + Brief absence joined anew to feel, + Astounded, soul from soul estranged? + + "At dead of night their sails were filled, + And onward each rejoicing steered: + Ah, neither blame, for neither willed, + Or wist, what first with dawn appeared! + + "To veer, how vain! On, onward strain, + Brave barks! In light, in darkness too, + Through winds and tides one compass guides: + To that, and your own selves, be true! + + "But, O blithe breeze! and O great seas! + Though ne'er, that earliest parting past, + On your wide plain they join again, + Together lead them home at last! + + "One port, methought, alike they sought, + One purpose hold where'er they fare: + O bounding breeze! O rushing seas! + At last, at last, unite them there!" + +"In 1848-49 the revolutionary crisis came on Europe, and Clough's +sympathies drew him with great earnestness into the struggles which were +going on. He was in Paris directly after the barricades, and in Rome +during the siege, where he gained the friendship of Saffi and other +leading Italian patriots." A part of his experiences and his thoughts +while at Rome are interwoven with the story in his "Amours de Voyage," a +poem which exhibits in extraordinary measure the subtilty and delicacy +of his powers, and the fulness of his sympathy with the intellectual +conditions of the time. It was first published in the "Atlantic Monthly" +for 1858, and was at once established in the admiration of readers +capable of appreciating its rare and refined excellence. The spirit +of the poem is thoroughly characteristic of its author, and the +speculative, analytic turn of his mind is represented in many passages +of the letters of the imaginary hero. Had he been writing in his own +name, he could not have uttered his inmost conviction more distinctly, +or have given the clue to his intellectual life more openly than in the +following verses:-- + + "I will look straight out, see things, not try to + evade them: + Fact shall be Fact for me; and the Truth the + Truth as ever, + Flexible, changeable, vague, and multiform + and doubtful." + +Or, again,-- + + "Ah, the key of our life, that passes all wards, + opens all locks, + Is not _I will_, but _I must_. I must,--I must, + --and I do it." + +And still again,-- + + "But for the steady fore-sense of a freer and + larger existence, + Think you that man could consent to be + circumscribed here into action? + But for assurance within of a limitless ocean + divine, o'er + Whose great tranquil depths unconscious + the wind-tost surface + Breaks into ripples of trouble that come and + change and endure not,-- + But that in this, of a truth, we have our + being, and know it, + Think you we men could submit to live and + move as we do here?" + +"To keep on doing right,--not to speculate only, but to act, not to +think only, but to live,"--was, it has been said, characteristic of the +leading men at Oxford during this period. "It was not so much a part of +their teaching as a doctrine woven into their being." And while they +thus exercised a moral not less than an intellectual influence over +their contemporaries and their pupils, they themselves, according to +their various tempers and circumstances, were led on into new paths of +inquiry or of life. Some of them fell into the common temptations of +an English University career, and lost the freshness of energy and the +honesty of conviction which first inspired them; others, holding their +places in the established order of things, were able by happy faculties +of character to retain also the vigor and simplicity of their early +purposes; while others again, among whom was Clough, finding the +restraints of the University incompatible with independence, gave up +their positions at Oxford to seek other places in which they could more +freely search for the truth and express their own convictions. + +It was not long after his return from Italy that he became Professor of +English Language and Literature at University College, London. He filled +this place, which was not in all respects suited to him, until 1852. +After resigning it, he took various projects into consideration, and +at length determined to come to America with the intention of settling +here, if circumstances should prove favorable. In November, 1852, +he arrived in Boston. He at once established himself at Cambridge, +proposing to give instruction to young men preparing for college, or to +take on in more advanced studies those who had completed the collegiate +course. He speedily won the friendship of those whose friendship +was best worth having in Boston and its neighborhood. His thorough +scholarship, the result of the best English training, and his intrinsic +qualities caused his society to be sought and prized by the most +cultivated and thoughtful men. He had nothing of insular narrowness, and +none of the hereditary prejudices which too often interfere with the +capacity of English travellers or residents among us to sympathize with +and justly understand habits of life and of thought so different from +those to which they have been accustomed. His liberal sentiments and his +independence of thought harmonized with the new social conditions in +which he found himself, and with the essential spirit of American life. +The intellectual freedom and animation of this country were congenial +to his disposition. From the beginning he took a large share in the +interests of his new friends. He contributed several remarkable articles +to the pages of the "North American Review" and of "Putnam's Magazine," +and he undertook a work which was to occupy his scanty leisure for +several years, the revision of the so-called Dryden's Translation of +Plutarch's Lives. Although the work was undertaken simply as a revision, +it turned out to involve little less labor than a complete new +translation, and it was so accomplished that henceforth it must remain +the standard version of this most popular of the ancient authors. + +But all that made the presence of such a man a great gain to his new +friends made his absence felt by his old ones as a great loss. In July, +1853, he received the announcement that a place had been obtained for +him by their efforts in the Education Department of the Privy Council, +and he was so strenuously urged to return to England, that, although +unwilling to give up the prospect of a final settlement in America, +he felt that it was best to go home for a time. Some months after his +return he was married to the granddaughter of the late Mr. William +Smith, M.P. for Norwich. He established himself in a house in London, +and settled down to the hard routine-work of his office. In a private +letter written not long after his return, he said,--"As for myself, whom +you ask about, there is nothing to tell about me. I live on contentedly +enough, but feel rather unwilling to be re-Englished, after once +attaining that higher transatlantic development. However, _il faut s'y +soumettre_, I presume,--though I fear I am embarked in the foundering +ship. I hope to Heaven you'll get rid of slavery, and then I shouldn't +fear but you would really 'go ahead' in the long run. As for us and our +inveterate feudalism, it is not hopeful." + +In another letter about this time, he wrote,--"I like America all the +better for the comparison with England on my return. Certainly I think +you are more right than I was willing to admit, about the position of +the poorer classes here. Such is my first reimpression. However, it +will wear off soon enough, I dare say; so you must make the most of my +admissions." + +Again, a little later, he wrote,--"I do truly hope that you will get the +North erelong thoroughly united against any further encroachments. I +don't by any means feel that the slave-system is an intolerable crime, +nor do I think that our system here is so much better; but it is clear +to me that the only safe ground to go upon is that of your Northern +States. I suppose the rich-and-poor difficulties must be creeping in at +New York, but one would fain hope that European analogies will not be +quite accepted even there." + +His letters were reflections of himself,--full of thought, fancy, and +pleasant humor, as well as of affectionateness and true feeling. Their +character is hardly to be given in extracts, but a few passages may +serve to illustrate some of these qualities. + +"Ambrose Philips, the Roman Catholic, who set up the new St. Bernard +Monastery at Charnwood Forest, has taken to spirit-rappings. He avers, +_inter alia_, that a Buddhist spirit in misery held communication with +him through the table, and entreated his confessor, Father Lorraine, to +say three masses for him. Pray, convey this to T---- for his warning. +For, moreover, it remains uncertain whether Father Lorraine did say the +masses; so that perhaps T----'s deceased co-religionist is still in the +wrong place." + +Some time after his return, he wrote,--"Really, I may say I am only +just beginning to recover my spirits after returning from the young and +hopeful and humane republic, to this cruel, unbelieving, inveterate old +monarchy. There are deeper waters of ancient knowledge and experience +about one here, and one is saved from the temptation of flying off into +space; but I think you have, beyond all question, the happiest country +going. Still, the political talk of America, as one hears it here, is +not always true to the best intentions of the country, is it?" + +Writing on a July day from his office in Whitehall, he says, after +speaking of the heat of the weather,--"Time has often been compared to +a river: if the Thames at London represent the stream of traditional +wisdom, the comparison will indeed be of an ill odor; the accumulated +wisdom of the past will be proved upon analogy to be as it were the +collected sewage of the centuries; and the great problem, how to get rid +of it." + +In March, 1854, he wrote,--"People talk a good deal about that book of +Whewell's on the Plurality of Worlds. I recommend Fields to pirate it. +Have you seen it? It is to show that Jupiter, Venus, Saturn, etc., are +all pretty certainly uninhabitable,--being (Jupiter, Saturn, etc., to +wit) strange washy limbos of places, where at the best only mollusks +(or, in the case of Venus, salamanders) could exist. Hence we conclude +we are the only rational creatures, which is highly satisfactory, and, +what is more, quite Scriptural. Owen, on the other hand, I believe, +and other scientific people, declare it a most presumptuous essay,-- +conclusions audacious, and reasoning fallacious, though the facts are +allowed; and in that opinion I, on the ground that there are more things +in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in the inductive philosophy, +incline to concur." + +Of his work he wrote,--"Well, I go on in the office, _operose nihil +agenda_, very _operose_, and very _nihil_ too. For lack of news, I send +you a specimen of my labors."--"We are here going on much as usual, +--occupied with nothing else but commerce and the money-market. I do not +think any one is thinking audibly of anything else."--"I have read with +more pleasure than anything else that I have read lately Kane's Arctic +Explorations, i.e., his second voyage, which is certainly a wonderful +story. The whole narrative is, I think, very characteristic of the +differences between the English and the American-English habits of +command and obedience." + +In the autumn of 1857, after speaking of some of the features of the +Sepoy revolt, he said,--"I don't believe Christianity can spread far in +Asia, unless it will allow men more than one wife,--which isn't likely +yet out of Utah. But I believe the old Brahmin 'Touch not and taste not, +and I am holier than thou, because I don't touch and taste,' may be got +rid of. As for Mahometanism, it is a crystallized monotheism, out of +which no vegetation can come. I doubt its being good even for the +Central negro." + +March, 1859. "Excuse this letter all about my own concerns. I am pretty +busy, and have time for little else: such is our fate after forty. My +figure 40 stands nearly three months behind me on the roadway, unwept, +unhonored, and unsung, an _octavum lustrum_ bound up and laid on the +shelf. 'So-and-so is dead,' said a friend to Lord Melbourne of some +author. 'Dear me, how glad I am! Now I can bind him up.'" + +It was not until 1859 that the translation of Plutarch, begun six years +before, was completed and published. It had involved much wearisome +study, and gave proof of patient, exact, and elegant scholarship. +Clough's life in the Council-Office was exceedingly laborious, and +for several years his work was increased by services rendered to Miss +Nightingale, a near relative of his wife. He employed "many hours, both +before and after his professional duties were over, to aid her in those +reforms of the military administration to which she has devoted the +remaining energies of her overtasked life." For this work he was the +better fitted from having acted, during a period of relief from his +regular employment, as Secretary to a Military Commission appointed by +Government shortly after the Crimean War to examine and report upon the +military systems of some of the chief Continental nations. But at length +his health gave way under the strain of continuous overwork. He had for +a long time been delicate, and early in 1861 he was obliged to give +up work, and was ordered to travel abroad. He went to Greece and +Constantinople, and enjoyed greatly the charms of scenery and of +association which he was so well fitted to appreciate. But the release +from work had come too late. He returned to England in July, his health +but little improved. In a letter written at that time he spoke of Lord +Campbell's death, which had just occurred. "Lord Campbell's death is +rather the characteristic death of the English political man. In the +Cabinet, on the Bench, and at a dinner-party, busy, animated, and full +of effort to-day, and in the early morning a vessel has burst. It is a +wonder they last so long." But of himself he says, in words of striking +contrast,--"My nervous energy is pretty nearly spent for to-day, so I +must come to a stop. I have leave till November, and by that time I hope +I shall be strong again for another good spell of work." After a happy +three weeks in England, he went abroad again, and spent some time +with his friends the Tennysons in Auvergne and among the Pyrenees. In +September he was joined by his wife in Paris, and thence went with her +through Switzerland to Italy. He had scarcely reached Florence before +he became alarmingly ill with symptoms of a low malaria fever. His +exhausted constitution never rallied against its attack. He sank +gradually away, and died on the 13th of November. "I have leave till +November, and by that time I hope I shall be strong again for another +good spell of work." That hope is accomplished;-- + + "For sure in the wide heaven there is room + For love, and pity, and for helpful deeds." + +He was buried in the little Protestant cemetery at Florence, a fit +resting-place for a poet, the Protestant Santa Croce, where the tall +cypresses rise over the graves, and the beautiful hills keep guard +around. + +"Every one who knew Clough even slightly," says one of his oldest +friends, "received the strongest impression of the unusual breadth +and massiveness of his mind. Singularly simple and genial, he was +unfortunately cast upon a self-questioning age, which led him to worry +himself with constantly testing the veracity of his own emotions. He has +delineated in four lines the impression which his habitual reluctance to +converse on the deeper themes of life made upon those of his friends who +were attracted by his frank simplicity. In one of his shorter poems he +writes,-- + + 'I said, My heart is all too soft; + He who would climb and soar aloft + Must needs keep ever at his side + The tonic of a wholesome pride.' + +That expresses the man in a very remarkable manner. He had a kind of +proud simplicity about him singularly attractive, and often singularly +disappointing to those who longed to know him well. He had a fear, which +many would think morbid, of leaning much on the approbation of the +world. And there is one remarkable passage in his poems in which he +intimates that men who live on the good opinion of others might even be +benefited by a crime which would rob them of that evil stimulant:-- + + 'Why, so is good no longer good, but crime + Our truest, best advantage, since it lifts us + Out of the stifling gas of men's opinion + Into the vital atmosphere of Truth, + Where He again is visible, though in anger.' + +"So eager was his craving for reality and perfect sincerity, so morbid +his dislike even for the unreal conventional forms of life, that a mind +quite unique in simplicity and truthfulness represents _itself_ in his +poems as + + 'Seeking in vain, in all my store, + One feeling based on truth.' + +"Indeed, he wanted to reach some guaranty for simplicity deeper than +simplicity itself. We remember his principal criticism on America, +after returning from his residence in Massachusetts, was, that the +New-Englanders were much simpler than the English, and that this was +the great charm of New-England society. His own habits were of the same +kind, sometimes almost austere in their simplicity. Luxury he disliked, +and sometimes his friends thought him even ascetic. + +"This almost morbid craving for a firm base on the absolute realities +of life was very wearing in a mind so self-conscious as Clough's, and +tended to paralyze the expression of a certainly great genius. He heads +some of his poems with a line from Wordsworth's great ode, which depicts +perfectly the expression often written in the deep furrows which +sometimes crossed and crowded his massive forehead:-- + + 'Blank misgivings of a creature moving about + in worlds not realized.' + +"Nor did Clough's great powers ever realize themselves to his +contemporaries by any outward sign at all commensurate with the profound +impression which they produced in actual life. But if his powers did +not, there was much in his character that did produce its full effect +upon all who knew him. He never looked, even in time of severe trial, to +his own interest or advancement. He never flinched from the worldly loss +which his deepest convictions brought on him. Even when clouds were +thick over his own head, and the ground beneath his feet seemed +crumbling away, he could still bear witness to an eternal light behind +the cloud, and tell others that there is solid ground to be reached in +the end by the weary feet of all who will wait to be strong. Let him +speak his own farewell:-- + + 'Say not the struggle nought availeth, + The labor and the wounds are vain, + The enemy faints not nor faileth, + And as things have been things remain. + + 'Though hopes were dupes, fears may be liars; + It may be, in yon smoke concealed, + Your comrades chase e'en now the fliers, + And but for you possess the field. + + 'For though the tired wave, idly breaking, + Seems here no tedious inch to gain, + Far back, through creek and inlet making, + Came, silent flooding in, the main. + + 'And not through eastern windows only, + When daylight comes, comes in the light; + In front the sun climbs slow,--how slowly! + But westward--look! the land is bright.'" + + + + +WHAT SHALL WE DO WITH THEM? + + +We have many precedents upon the part of the "Guardian of Civilization," +which may or may not guide us. Not to return to that age "whereunto the +memory of man runneth not to the contrary," "the day of King Richard our +grandfather," and to the Wars of the Roses, we will begin with the happy +occasion of the Restoration of King Charles of merry and disreputable +fame. Since he came back to his kingdoms on sufferance and as a +convenient compromise between anarchy and despotism, he could hardly +afford the luxury of wholesale proscription. What the returning +Royalists could, they did. It was obviously unsafe, as well as +ungrateful, to hang General Monk in presence of his army, many of whom +had followed the "Son of the Man" from Worcester Fight in hot pursuit, +and had hunted him from thicket to thicket of Boscobel Wood. But to dig +up the dead Cromwell and Ireton, to suspend them upon the gallows, to +mark out John Milton, old and blind, for poverty and contempt, was both +safe and pleasant. And civilization was guarded accordingly. One little +bit of comfort, however, was permitted. Scotland had been the Virginia +of his day, and Charles had the satisfaction of hearing that the Whigs, +who had betrayed and sold his father, and who had (a far worse offence) +made himself listen to three-hours' sermons, were chased like wild +beasts among the hills, after the defeat of Bothwell Brigg. But what +Charles could not do was permitted to his brother. After the rebellion +of Monmouth was put down, the West of England was turned to mourning. +From the princely bastard who sued in agony and vain humiliation, to the +clown of Devon forced into the rebel ranks,--from the peer who plotted, +to the venerable and Christian woman whose sole crime was sheltering the +houseless and starving fugitive, there was given to the vanquished no +mercy but the mercy of Jeffreys, no tenderness but the tenderness of +Kirk. + +But the House of Stuart was not always to represent the side of victory. +Thirty years after the Rout of Sedgemoor, the son of James, whose name +was clouded by rumor with the same stain of spuriousness as that of his +unfortunate cousin, was proclaimed by the Earl of Mar. The Jacobites +were forced to drink to the dregs the cup of bitterness they had so +gladly administered to others. Over Temple Bar and London Bridge the +heads of the defeated rebels bore witness to the guardianship of +civilization as understood in the eighteenth century. + +Another thirty years brings us to the landing of Moidart, the rising +of the clans, the fall of Edinburgh and Carlisle, the "Bull's Run" at +Prestonpans, and the panic of London. If we are anxious to guard our +civilization according to Hanoverian precedents, there is one name +commonly given to the Commander-in-chief at Culloden which Congress +should add to the titles it is preparing against McClellan's successful +advance. The "Butcher Cumberland" not only hounded on his troops with +the tempting price of thirty thousand pounds for the Pretender _dead or +alive_, but every adherent of the luckless Jefferson Davis of that day +was in peril of life and wholesale confiscation. The House of Hanover +not only broke the backbone of the Rebellion, but mangled without mercy +its remains. + +We come now, in another thirty years, to the next struggle of England +with a portion of her people. It is impossible, as well as unfair, +to say what might have been done with "Mr. Washington, the Virginia +colonel," and Mr. Franklin, the Philadelphia printer, had they not been +able to determine their own destiny. We can only surmise, by referring +to two well-known localities in New York, the "Old Sugar-House" and the +"Jersey Prison-Ship," how paternally George III was disposed then to +resume his rights. And without disposition to press historic parallels, +we cannot but compare Arnold and Tryon's raid along the south shore of +Connecticut with a certain sail recently made up the Tennessee River to +the foot of the Muscle Shoals by the command of a modern Connecticut +officer. + +But as we were spared the necessity of testing the royal clemency to the +submitted Provinces of North America, we had better pass on twenty years +to the era of the Act of Union between Great Britain and Ireland. In +this country the Irishman need not "fear to speak of '98," and in this +country he still treasures the memory of the whippings and pitch-caps of +Major Beresford's riding-house, and other pleasant souvenirs of the way +in which, sixty years ago, loyalty dealt with rebellion. There is no +inherent proneness to treason in the Hibernian nature, as Corcoran and +the Sixty-Ninth can bear witness; nor is Pat so fond of a riot that he +cannot with fair play be a--well, a good citizen. Yet at home he has +been so "civilized" by his British guardian as to be in a chronic state +of discontent and fretfulness. + +We must, however, hasten to our latest precedent,--England in India. +The Sepoy Rebellion had some features in common with our own. It was +inaugurated by premeditated military treachery. It seized upon a large +quantity of Government munitions of war. It only asked "to be let +alone." It found the Government wholly unprepared. But it was the +uprising of a conquered people. The rebels were in circumstances, as in +complexion, much nearer akin to that portion of our Southern citizens +which has _not_ rebelled, and which has lost no opportunity of seeking +our lines "to take the oath of allegiance" or any other little favor +which could be found there. We do not defend their atrocities, although +a plea in mitigation might be put in, that these "were wisely planned to +break the spell which British domination had woven over the native mind +of India," and that they were part of that decided and desperate policy +which was designed to forever bar the way of reconstruction. But toward +the recaptured rebels there was used a course for which the only +precedent, so far as we know, was furnished by that highly civilized +guardian, the Dey of Algiers. These prisoners of war were in cold blood +tied to the muzzles of cannon and blown into fragments. The illustrated +papers of that most Christian land which is overcome with the barbarity +of sinking old hulks in a channel through which privateers were wont to +escape our blockade furnished effective engravings "by our own artist" +of the scene. Wholesale plunder and devastation of the chief city of the +revolt followed. The rebellion was put down, and put down, we may say, +without any unnecessary tenderness, any womanish weakness for the +rebels. + +We have thus established what we believe is called by theologians a +_catena_ of precedents, coming down from the days of the Commonwealth to +our own time. It covers about the whole period of New England history. +And we next propose to ask the question, how far it may be desirable to +be bound by such indisputable authority. + +Is it too late to reopen the question, and to retry the issue between +sovereign and rebel, less with respect to ancient and immemorial usage, +and more according to eternal principle? We answer, No. The same power +that enables us to master this rebellion will give us original and final +jurisdiction over it. + +But one principle asserts itself out of the uniform coarse of history. +The restoration of the lawful authority over rebels does not restore +them to their old _status_. They are at the pleasure of the conquering +power. Rights of citizenship, having been abjured, do not return +with the same coercion which demands duties of citizenship. Thus, to +illustrate on an individual scale, every wrong-doer is _ipso facto_ a +rebel. He forfeits, according to due course of law, a measure of his +privileges, while constrained to the same responsibility of obedience. +His property is not exempt from taxes because he is in prison, but his +right of voting is gone; he cannot bear arms, but he must keep the +peace, he must labor compulsorily, and attend such worship as the State +provides. In short, he becomes a ward of the State, while not ceasing to +be a member. His inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of +happiness were inalienable only so long as he remained obedient and true +to the sovereign. Now this is equally true on the large scale as on the +small. The only difficulty is to apply it to broad masses of men and to +States. + +It may not be expedient to try South Carolina collectively, but we +contend that the application of the principle gives us the right. +Corporate bodies have again and again been punished by suspension of +franchise, while held to allegiance and duties. + +The simple question for us is, What will it be best to do? The South +may save us the trouble of deciding for the present a part of the many +questions that occur. We may put down the Confederate Government, and +take military occupation. We cannot compel the Southerners to hold +elections and resume their share in the Government. It can go on without +them. The same force which reopens the Mississippi can collect taxes or +exact forfeitures along its banks. If Charleston is sullen, the National +Government, having restored its flag to Moultrie and Sumter, can take +its own time in the matter of clearing out the channel and rebuilding +the light-houses. If a secluded neighborhood does not receive a +Government postmaster, but is disposed to welcome him with tarry hands +to a feathery bed, it can be left without the mails. The rebel we can +compel to return to his duties; if necessary, we can leave him to get +back his rights as he best may. + +But we are the representatives of a great political discovery. The +American Union is founded on a fact unknown to the Old World. That fact +is the direct ratio of the prosperity of the parts to the prosperity of +the whole. It is the principle upon which in every community our life +is built. We cannot, therefore, afford to have any part of the land +languishing and suffering. We are fighting, not for conquest, for we +mean to abjure our power the moment we safely can,--not for vengeance, +for those with whom we fight are our brethren. We are compelled by a +necessity, partly geographical and partly social, into restoring a Union +politically which never for a day has actually ceased. + +Let us advert to one fact very patent and significant. We have heard +of nearly all our successes through Rebel sources. Even where it made +against them, they could not help telling us (we do not say the _truth_, +for that is rather strong, but) the _news_. Never did two nations at war +know one-tenth part as much of each other's affairs. Like husband and +wife, the two parts of the country cannot keep secrets from one another, +let them try ever so hard. And the end of all will be that we shall know +and respect one another a great deal better for our sharp encounter. + +But this necessity of union demands of the Government, imperatively +demands, that it take whatever step is necessary to its own +preservation. It is as with a ship at sea,--all must pull together, or +somebody must go overboard. There can be no such order of things as an +_agreed state of mutiny_,--forecastle seceding from cabin, and steerage +independent of both. + +Not only is rebellion to be put down, therefore, but to be kept from +coming up again. It is obvious to every one, not thoroughly blinded by +party, how it did come up. The Gulf States were coaxed out, the Border +States were bullied or conjured out. A few leading men, who had made +the science of political management their own, got the control of the +popular mind. One great secret of their success was their constant +assumption that what was to be done had been done already. It is the +very art of the veteran seducer, who ever persuades his victim that +return is impossible, in order that he may actually make it so. North +Carolina, as one expressively said, "found herself out of the Union she +hardly knew how." Virginia was dragged out. Tennessee was forced out. +Missouri was declared out. Kentucky was all but out. Maryland hung in +the crisis of life and death under the guns of Fort McHenry. In South +Carolina alone can it be said that any fair expression of the popular +will was on the Secession side. The Rebellion was the work of a +governing class, all whose ideas and hopes were the aggrandizement of +their own order. Terrorism opened the way, reckless lying made the game +sure. If any one is inclined to doubt this, let him look at the sway +which Robespierre and his few associates exercised in Paris. Some +seventy executions delivered that great city from its nightmare agony of +months. A dozen resolute, united men, with arms and without scruples, +could seize almost any New England village for a time, provided they +knew just what they wanted to do. Decision and energy are master-keys to +almost most all doors not fortified by Hobbs's patent locks. A party of +tipsy Americans one night stormed a Parisian guard-house, disarmed the +sentry, and sent the guard flying in desperate fear, thinking that a +general _émente_ was in progress. Now one issue of the Rebellion must +be to put down, not only this governing class, but also the system from +which it springs. We have no such class at the North. We can have no +such class. The very collision of interests, the rivalries of trade, the +thousand-and-one social relations, all neutralize each other, are checks +and counterchecks, which, like the particles in a vessel of water, +always tend toward the level of an equilibrium. Two men meet in their +lodge as Odd-Fellows, but they are opponents on "town-meeting day." Two +partners in business are, one the most bitter of Calvinists, and the +other the most progressive of Universalists. Dr. A. and the Rev. Mr. B. +pull asunder the men whom 'Change unites. But with the Southerner of the +governing class it is not so. One sympathy, more potent than any other +can be, leagues them all. All are masters of the Helot race upon which +their success and station are built. It is a living relation, the most +powerful and vital which can bind men together, that sense of authority +borne by the few over the many. + +The Norman barons after the Conquest, the Spanish conquerors in Mexico +and Peru, the Englishmen of the days of Clive and Hastings in India, are +all examples of that thorough concentration of strength which must arise +in the conflicts of races. Republics have fallen through their standing +armies. The proprietary class at the South was the most dangerous of +standing armies, for it was disciplined to the use of power night and +day. The overthrow of the Rebellion will to a great degree ruin this +class. But since it is one not founded on birth or culture, but simply +on white blood and circumstance, (for no Secessionist is so fierce as +your converted Northerner,) it cannot fall like the Norman nobility in +the Wars of the Roses, or waste by operation of climate like the +masters of Mexico and Hindostan. It renews itself whenever it touches +slave-soil. That gives it life. We contend that Government must for its +own preservation go to the root of the matter. And we cannot see that +there is any Constitutional difficulty. There are probably not ten +slave-proprietors in the South whom it has not the right to arrest, try, +and hang, for high-treason. Of course, every one can see the practical +difficulty, as well as the manifest folly, of doing this. But if it has +that right toward these individuals, it certainly may say, by Act of +Congress, if we choose, that it will not waive it except upon conditions +which shall secure it from any further trouble. It seems to us fully +within our power. And we will use an illustration that may help to show +what we mean. President Lincoln has no right to require of any citizen +of the United States that he take the temperance-pledge. But suppose a +murderer who has taken life in a fit of drunkenness applies for pardon +to the Executive. The Executive, Governor or President, as the case may +be, may surely then impose that condition before commuting the sentence +or releasing the prisoner. Now the Nation stands toward the Rebels in a +like attitude. It may be good policy to take them back as fast as they +submit, it may be Christian magnanimity to make the way as easy as +possible for their return, but they have no right to come back to +anything but a prison and hard labor for life. Many of them have trebly +forfeited their lives,--as traitors, as deserters from the naval and +military service, and as paroled prisoners who have broken their parole. +And therefore we say, since we cannot deal with all the individuals, +we must deal with the masses, and that in their corporate capacity. If +South Carolina is a sovereign State, is in the Union as a feudal chief +in his king's court, with power to carry from York to Lancaster and from +Lancaster to York his subject vassals, then South Carolina has dared the +hazard of rebellion, and her political head is forfeit. + +It is next to be asked, what these conditions are to be. And that is +not to be answered in a breath. That they can have but one result, +emancipation, is a foregone conclusion; but the mode of reaching it is +not so easily determined. A cotton-loaded ship took fire at sea. It +would have been easy to pump in water enough to drown the fire. But the +captain said, "No," for that would swell the bales to such an extent +as to open every seam and start every timber. So with, the ship now +carrying King Cotton: you may indeed quench the fire, but you may +possibly turn the ship inside out into the bargain. + +But something we have a right to insist on. We have it, over and above +the Constitutional right shown just now, upon the broad principle of +necessity. Slavery has proved itself a nuisance. Just as we say to the +owner of a bone-boiling establishment, "You poison the air; we cannot +live here; you must go farther off,"--and if a fever break out which can +be clearly traced to that source, we say it emphatically: so now Slavery +having proved itself pestilential, we say, "March!" + +We are not disposed, _à la_ Staten Island, to burn down our +yellow-feverish neighbor's house. We will give everybody time to pack +up. We will make up a little purse for any specially hard case which the +removal may show. But stay and be plague-stricken we will no longer; nor +are we disposed to spend our whole income in burning sulphur, saltpetre, +and charcoal to keep out infection. And certainly, when by neglect to +pay ground-rent, or other illegality, the owner of our nuisance has +_forfeited_ his right to stay, no mortal can blame us for taking the +strictest and most decisive steps known to the law to remove him. + + + + +AGNES OF SORRENTO. + + +CHAPTER XXVII. + +THE SAINT'S REST. + + +Agnes entered the city of Rome in a trance of enthusiastic emotion, +almost such as one might imagine in a soul entering the heavenly +Jerusalem above. To her exalted ideas she was approaching not only the +ground hallowed by the blood of apostles and martyrs, not merely the +tombs of the faithful, but the visible "general assembly and church of +the first-born which are written in heaven." Here reigned the appointed +representative of Jesus,--and she imagined a benignant image of a prince +clothed with honor and splendor, who was yet the righter of all wrongs, +the redresser of all injuries, the friend and succorer of the poor and +needy; and she was firm in a secret purpose to go to this great and +benignant father, and on her knees entreat him to forgive the sins of +her lover, and remove the excommunication that threatened at every +moment his eternal salvation. For she trembled to think of it,--a sudden +accident, a thrust of a dagger, a fall from his horse might put him +forever beyond the pale of repentance,--he might die unforgiven, and +sink to eternal pain. + +If any should wonder that a Christian soul could preserve within itself +an image so ignorantly fair, in such an age, when the worldliness and +corruption in the Papal chair were obtruded by a thousand incidental +manifestations, and were alluded to in all the calculations of simple +common people, who looked at facts with a mere view to the guidance of +their daily conduct, it is necessary to remember the nature of Agnes's +religious training, and the absolute renunciation of all individual +reasoning which from infancy had been laid down before her as the first +and indispensable prerequisite of spiritual progress. To believe,--to +believe utterly and blindly,--not only without evidence, but against +evidence,--to reject the testimony even of her senses, when set against +the simple affirmation of her superiors,--had been the beginning, +middle, and end of her religious instruction. When a doubt assailed her +mind on any point, she had been taught to retire within herself and +repeat a prayer; and in this way her mental eye had formed the habit +of closing to anything that might shake her faith as quickly as the +physical eye closes at a threatened blow. Then, as she was of a poetic +and ideal nature, entirely differing from the mass of those with whom +she associated, she had formed that habit of abstraction and mental +reverie which prevented her hearing or perceiving the true sense of a +great deal that went on around her. The conversations that commonly +were carried on in her presence had for her so little interest that +she scarcely heard them. The world in which she moved was a glorified +world,--wherein, to be sure, the forms of every-day life appeared, +but appeared as different from what they were in reality as the old +mouldering daylight view of Rome is from the warm translucent glory of +its evening transfiguration. + +So in her quiet, silent heart she nursed this beautiful hope of finding +in Rome the earthly image of her Saviour's home above, of finding in the +head of the Church the real image of her Redeemer,--the friend to whom +the poorest and lowliest may pour out their souls with as much freedom +as the highest and noblest. The spiritual directors who had formed the +mind of Agnes in her early days had been persons in the same manner +taught to move in an ideal world of faith. The Mother Theresa had never +seen the realities of life, and supposed the Church on earth to be all +that the fondest visions of human longing could paint it. The hard, +energetic, prose experience of old Jocunda, and the downright way with +which she sometimes spoke of things as a trooper's wife must have seen +them, were repressed and hushed, down, as the imperfect faith of a +half-reclaimed worldling,--they could not be allowed to awaken her +from the sweetness of so blissful a dream. In like manner, when Lorenzo +Sforza became Father Francesco, he strove with earnest prayer to bury +his gift of individual reason in the same grave with his family name +and worldly experience. As to all that transpired in the real world, he +wrapped himself in a mantle of imperturbable silence; the intrigues of +popes and cardinals, once well known to him, sank away as a forbidden +dream; and by some metaphysical process of imaginative devotion he +enthroned God in the place of the dominant powers, and taught himself to +receive all that came from them in uninquiring submission, as proceeding +from unerring wisdom. Though he had begun his spiritual life under the +impulse of Savonarola, yet so perfect had been his isolation from all +tidings of what transpired in the external world that the conflict which +was going on between that distinguished man and the Papal hierarchy +never reached his ear. He sought and aimed as much as possible to make +his soul like the soul of one dead, which adores and worships in ideal +space, and forgets forever the scenes and relations of earth; and he +had so long contemplated Rome under the celestial aspects of his faith, +that, though the shock of his first confession there had been painful, +still it was insufficient to shake his faith. It had been God's will, he +thought, that where he looked for aid he should meet only confusion, +and he bowed to the inscrutable will, and blindly adored the mysterious +revelation. If such could be the submission and the faith of a strong +and experienced man, who can wonder at the enthusiastic illusions of an +innocent, trustful child? + +Agnes and her grandmother entered the city of Rome just as the twilight +had faded into night; and though Agnes, full of faith and enthusiasm, +was longing to begin immediately the ecstatic vision of shrines and holy +places, old Elsie commanded her not to think of anything further that +night. They proceeded, therefore, with several other pilgrims who had +entered the city, to a church specially set apart for their reception, +connected with which were large dormitories and a religious order whose +business was to receive and wait upon them, and to see that all their +wants were supplied. This religious foundation is one of the oldest in +Rome; and it is esteemed a work of especial merit and sanctity among the +citizens to associate themselves temporarily in these labors in Holy +Week. Even princes and princesses come, humble and lowly, mingling with +those of common degree, and all, calling each other brother and sister, +vie in kind attentions to these guests of the Church. + +When Agnes and Elsie arrived, several of these volunteer assistants were +in waiting. Agnes was remarked among all the rest of the company for her +peculiar beauty and the rapt enthusiastic expression of her face. + +Almost immediately on their entrance into the reception-hall connected +with the church, they seemed to attract the attention of a tall lady +dressed in deep mourning, and accompanied by a female servant, with whom +she was conversing on those terms of intimacy which showed confidential +relations between the two. + +"See!" she said, "my Mona, what a heavenly face is there!--that sweet +child has certainly the light of grace shining through her. My heart +warms to her." + +"Indeed," said the old servant, looking across, "and well it +may,--dear lamb come so far! But, Holy Virgin, how my head swims! How +strange!--that child reminds me of some one. My Lady, perhaps, may think +of some one whom she looks like." + +"Mona, you say true. I have the same strange impression that I have seen +a face like hers, but who or where I cannot say." + +"What would my Lady say, if I said it was our dear Prince?--God rest his +soul!" + +"Mona, it _is_ so,--yes," added the lady, looking more intently,--"how +singular!--the very traits of our house in a peasant-girl! She is of +Sorrento, I judge, by her costume,--what a pretty one it is! That old +woman is her mother, perhaps. I must choose her for my care,--and, Mona, +you shall wait on her mother." + +So saying, the Princess Paulina crossed the hall, and, bending affably +over Agnes, took her hand and kissed her, saying,-- + +"Welcome, my dear little sister, to the house of our Father!" + +Agnes looked up with strange, wondering eyes into the face that was bent +to hers. It was sallow and sunken, with deep lines of ill-health and +sorrow, but the features were noble, and must once have been, beautiful; +the whole action, voice, and manner were dignified and impressive. +Instinctively she felt that the lady was of superior birth and breeding +to any with whom she had been in the habit of associating. + +"Come with me," said the lady; "and this--your mother"--she added. + +"She is my grandmother," said Agnes. + +"Well, then, your grandmother, sweet child, shall be attended by my good +sister Mona here." + +The Princess Paulina drew the hand of Agnes through her arm, and, laying +her hand affectionately on it, looked down and smiled tenderly on her. + +"Are you very tired, my dear?" + +"Oh, no! no!" said Agnes,--"I am so happy, so blessed to be here!" + +"You have travelled a long way?" + +"Yes, from Sorrento; but I am used to walking,--I did not feel it to be +long,--my heart kept me up,--I wanted to come home so much." + +"Home?" said the Princess. + +"Yes, to my soul's home,--the house of our dear Father the Pope." + +The Princess started, and looked incredulously down for a moment; then +noticing the confiding, whole-hearted air of the child, she sighed and +was silent. + +"Come with me above," she said, "and let me attend a little to your +comfort." + +"How good you are, dear lady!" said Agnes. + +"I am not good, my child,--I am only your unworthy sister in Christ"; +and as the lady spoke, she opened the door into a room where were a +number of other female pilgrims seated around the wall, each attended by +a person whose peculiar care she seemed to be. + +At the feet of each was a vessel of water, and when the seats were all +full, a cardinal in robes of office entered, and began reading prayers. +Each lady present, kneeling at the feet of her chosen pilgrim, divested +them carefully of their worn and travel-soiled shoes and stockings, and +proceeded to wash them. It was not a mere rose-water ceremony, but a +good hearty washing of feet that for the most part had great need of the +ablution. While this service was going on, the cardinal read from the +Gospel how a Greater than they all had washed the feet of His disciples, +and said, "If I, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet, ye also +ought to wash one another's feet." Then all repeated in concert the +Lord's Prayer, while each humbly kissed the feet she had washed, and +proceeded to replace the worn and travel-soiled shoes and stockings with +new and strong ones, the gift of Christian love. Each lady then led her +charge into a room where tables were spread with a plain and wholesome +repast of all such articles of food as the season of Lent allowed. Each +placed her _protégée_ at table, and carefully attended to all her wants +at the supper, and afterwards dormitories were opened for their repose. + +The Princess Paulina performed all these offices for Agnes with a tender +earnestness which won upon her heart. The young girl thought herself +indeed in that blessed society of which she had dreamed, where the +high-born and the rich become through Christ's love the servants of the +poor and lowly,--and through all the services she sat in a sort of dream +of rapture. How lovely this reception into the Holy City! how sweet thus +to be taken to the arms of the great Christian family, bound together in +the charity which is the bond of perfectness! + +"Please tell me, dear lady," said Agnes, after supper, "who is that holy +man that prayed with us?" + +"Oh, he--he is the Cardinal Capello," said the Princess. + +"I should like to have spoken with him," said Agnes. + +"Why, my child?" + +"I wanted to ask him when and how I could get speech with our dear +Father the Pope,--for there is somewhat on my mind that I would lay +before him." + +"My poor little sister," said the Princess, much perplexed, "you do not +understand things. What you speak of is impossible. The Pope is a great +king." + +"I know he is," said Agnes,--"and so is our Lord Jesus,--but every soul +may come to him." + +"I cannot explain to you now," said the Princess,--"there is not time +to-night. But I shall see you again. I will send for you to come to my +house, and there talk with you about many things which you need to know. +Meanwhile, promise me, dear child, not to try to do anything of the kind +you spoke of until I have talked with you." + +"Well, I will not," said Agnes, with a glance of docile affection, +kissing the hand of the Princess. + +The action was so pretty,--the great, soft, dark eyes looked so +fawn-like and confiding in their innocent tenderness, that the lady +seemed much moved. + +"Our dear Mother bless thee, child!" she said, laying her hand on her +head, and stooping to kiss her forehead. + +She left her at the door of the dormitory. + +The Princess and her attendant went out of the church-door, where her +litter stood in waiting. The two took their seats in silence, and +silently pursued their way through the streets of the old dimly-lighted +city and out of one of its principal gates to the wide Campagna beyond. +The villa of the Princess was situated on an eminence at some distance +from the city, and the night-ride to it was solemn and solitary. They +passed along the old Appian Way over pavements that had rumbled under +the chariot-wheels of the emperors and nobles of a by-gone age, while +along their way, glooming up against the clear of the sky, were vast +shadowy piles,--the tombs of the dead of other days. All mouldering and +lonely, shaggy and fringed with bushes and streaming wild vines through +which the night-wind sighed and rustled, they might seem to be pervaded +by the restless spirits of the dead; and as the lady passed them, she +shivered, and, crossing herself, repeated an inward prayer against +wandering demons that walk in desolate places. + +Timid and solitary, the high-born lady shrank and cowered within herself +with a distressing feeling of loneliness. A childless widow in delicate +health, whose paternal family had been for the most part cruelly robbed, +exiled, or destroyed by the reigning Pope and his family, she felt her +own situation a most unprotected and precarious one, since the least +jealousy or misunderstanding might bring upon her, too, the ill-will +of the Borgias, which had proved so fatal to the rest of her race. No +comfort in life remained to her but her religion, to whose practice she +clung as to her all; but even in this her life was embittered by facts +to which, with the best disposition in the world, she could not shut her +eyes. Her own family had been too near the seat of power not to see all +the base intrigues by which that sacred and solemn position of Head of +the Christian Church had been traded for as a marketable commodity. The +pride, the indecency, the cruelty of those who now reigned in the name +of Christ came over her mind in contrast with the picture painted by +the artless, trusting faith of the peasant-girl with whom she had just +parted. Her mind had been too thoroughly drilled in the non-reflective +practice of her faith to dare to put forth any act of reasoning upon +facts so visible and so tremendous,--she rather trembled at herself for +seeing what she saw and for knowing what she knew, and feared somehow +that this very knowledge might endanger her salvation; and so she rode +homeward cowering and praying like a frightened child. + +"Does my Lady feel ill?" said the old servant, anxiously. + +"No, Mona, no,--not in body." + +"And what is on my Lady's mind now?" + +"Oh, Mona, it is only what is always there. To-morrow is Palm Sunday, +and how can I go to see the murderers and robbers of our house in holy +places? Oh, Mona, what can Christians do, when such men handle holy +things? It was a comfort to wash the feet of those poor simple pilgrims, +who tread in the steps of the saints of old; but how I felt when that +poor child spoke of wanting to see the Pope!" + +"Yes," said Mona, "it's like sending the lamb to get spiritual counsel +of the wolf." + +"See what sweet belief the poor infant has! Should not the head of the +Christian Church be such as she thinks? Ah, in the old days, when the +Church here in Rome was poor and persecuted, there were popes who were +loving fathers and not haughty princes." + +"My dear Lady," said the servant, "pray, consider, the very stones have +ears. We don't know what day we may be turned out, neck and heels, to +make room for some of their creatures." + +"Well, Mona," said the lady, with some spirit, "I'm sure I haven't said +any more than you have." + +"Holy Mother! and so you haven't, but somehow things look more dangerous +when other people say them.--A pretty child that was, as you say; but +that old thing, her grandmother, is a sharp piece. She is a Roman, +and lived here in her early days. She says the little one was born +hereabouts; but she shuts up her mouth like a vice, when one would get +more out of her." + +"Mona, I shall not go out to-morrow; but you go to the services, and +find the girl and her grandmother, and bring them out to me. I want to +counsel the child." + +"You may be sure," said Mona, "that her grandmother knows the ins and +outs of Rome as well as any of us, for all she has learned to screw up +her lips so tight" + +"At any rate, bring her to me, because she interests me." + +"Well, well, it shall be so," said Mona. + + +CHAPTER XXVIII. + +PALM SUNDAY. + + +The morning after her arrival in Rome, Agnes was awakened from sleep +by a solemn dropping of bell-tones which seemed to fill the whole air, +intermingled dimly at intervals with long-drawn plaintive sounds of +chanting. She had slept profoundly, overwearied with her pilgrimage, and +soothed by that deep lulling sense of quiet which comes over one, when, +after long and weary toils, some auspicious goal is at length reached. +She had come to Rome, and been received with open arms into the +household of the saints, and seen even those of highest degree imitating +the simplicity of the Lord in serving the poor. Surely, this was indeed +the house of God and the gate of heaven; and so the bell-tones and +chants, mingling with her dreams, seemed naturally enough angel-harpings +and distant echoes of the perpetual adoration of the blessed. She rose +and dressed herself with a tremulous joy. She felt full of hope that +somehow--in what way she could not say--this auspicious beginning +would end in a full fruition of all her wishes, an answer to all her +prayers. + +"Well, child," said old Elsie, "you must have slept well; you look fresh +as a lark." + +"The air of this holy place revives me," said Agnes, with enthusiasm. + +"I wish I could say as much," said Elsie. "My bones ache yet with the +tramp, and I suppose nothing will do but we must go out now to all the +holy places, up and down and hither and yon, to everything that goes on. +I saw enough of it all years ago when I lived here." + +"Dear grandmother, if you are tired, why should you not rest? I can go +forth alone in this holy city. No harm can possibly befall me here. I +can join any of the pilgrims who are going to the holy places where I +long to worship." + +"A likely story!" said Elsie. "I know more about old Rome than you do, +and I tell you, child, that you do not stir out a step without me; so if +you must go, I must go too,--and like enough it's for my soul's health. +I suppose it is," she added, after a reflective pause. + +"How beautiful it was that we were welcomed so last night!" said +Agnes,--"that dear lady was so kind to me!" + +"Ay, ay, and well she might be!" said Elsie, nodding her head. "But +there's no truth in the kindness of the nobles to us, child. They don't +do it because they love us, but because they expect to buy heaven by +washing our feet and giving us what little they can clip and snip off +from their abundance." + +"Oh, grandmother," said Agnes, "how can you say so? Certainly, if any +one ever spoke and looked lovingly, it was that dear lady." + +"Yes, and she rolls away in her carriage, well content, and leaves you +with a pair of new shoes and stockings,--you, as worthy of a carriage +and a palace as she." + +"No, grandmamma; she said she should send for me to talk more with her." + +"_She_ said she should send for you?" said Elsie. "Well, well, that is +strange, to be sure!--that is wonderful!" she added, reflectively. "But +come, child, we must hasten through our breakfast and prayers, and go to +see the Pope, and all the great birds with fine feathers that fly after +him." + +"Yes, indeed!" said Agnes, joyfully. "Oh, grandmamma, what a blessed +sight it will be!" + +"Yes, child, and a fine sight enough he makes with his great canopy and +his plumes and his servants and his trumpeters;--there isn't a king in +Christendom that goes so proudly as he." + +"No other king is worthy of it," said Agnes. "The Lord reigns in him." + +"Much you know about it!" said Elsie, between her teeth, as they started +out. + +The streets of Rome through which they walked were damp and cellar-like, +filthy and ill-paved; but Agnes neither saw nor felt anything of +inconvenience in this: had they been floored, like those of the New +Jerusalem, with translucent gold, her faith could not have been more +fervent. + +Rome is at all times a forest of quaint costumes, a pantomime of +shifting scenic effects of religious ceremonies. Nothing there, however +singular, strikes the eye as out-of-the-way or unexpected, since no +one knows precisely to what religious order it may belong, or what +individual vow or purpose it may represent. Neither Agnes nor Elsie, +therefore, was surprised, when they passed through the door-way to the +street, at the apparition of a man covered from head to foot in a long +robe of white serge, with a high-peaked cap of the same material drawn +completely down over his head and face. Two round holes cut in this +ghostly head-gear revealed simply two black glittering eyes, which shone +with that singular elfish effect which belongs to the human eye when +removed from its appropriate and natural accessories. As they passed +out, the figure rattled a box on which was painted an image of +despairing souls raising imploring hands from very red tongues of flame, +by which it was understood at once that he sought aid for souls in +Purgatory. Agnes and her grandmother each dropped therein a small coin +and went on their way; but the figure followed them at a little distance +behind, keeping carefully within sight of them. + +By means of energetic pushing and striving, Elsie contrived to secure +for herself and her grandchild stations in the piazza in front of the +church, in the very front rank, where the procession was to pass. A +motley assemblage it was, this crowd, comprising every variety of +costume of rank and station and ecclesiastical profession,--cowls +and hoods of Franciscan and Dominican,--picturesque headdresses of +peasant-women of different districts,--plumes and ruffs of more +aspiring gentility,--mixed with every quaint phase of foreign costume +belonging to the strangers from different parts of the earth;--for, +like the old Jewish Passover, this celebration of Holy Week had its +assemblage of Parthians, Medes, Elamites, dwellers in Mesopotamia, +Cretes, and Arabians, all blending in one common memorial. + +Amid the strange variety of persons among whom they were crowded, Elsie +remarked the stranger in the white sack, who had followed them, and who +had stationed himself behind them,--but it did not occur to her that his +presence there was other than merely accidental. + +And now came sweeping up the grand procession, brilliant with scarlet +and gold, waving with plumes, sparkling with gems,--it seemed as if +earth had been ransacked and human invention taxed to express the +ultimatum of all that could dazzle and bewilder,--and, with a rustle +like that of ripe grain before a swaying wind, all the multitude went +down on their knees as the cortege passed. Agnes knelt, too, with +clasped hands, adoring the sacred vision enshrined in her soul; and as +she knelt with upraised eyes, her cheeks flushed with enthusiasm, her +beauty attracted the attention of more than one in the procession. + +"There is the model which our master has been looking for," said a young +and handsome man in a rich dress of black velvet, who, by his costume, +appeared to hold the rank of first chamberlain in the Papal suite. + +The young man to whom he spoke gave a bold glance at Agnes and +answered,-- + +"Pretty little rogue, how well she does the saint!" + +"One can see, that, with judicious arrangement, she might make a nymph +as well as a saint," said the first speaker. + +"A Daphne, for example," said the other, laughing. + +"And she wouldn't turn into a laurel, either," said the first. "Well, +we must keep our eye on her." And as they were passing into the +church-door, he beckoned to a servant in waiting and whispered +something, indicating Agnes with a backward movement of his hand. + +The servant, after this, kept cautiously within observing distance of +her, as she with the crowd pressed into the church to assist at the +devotions. + +Long and dazzling were those ceremonies, when, raised on high like an +enthroned God, Pope Alexander VI. received the homage of bended knee +from the ambassadors of every Christian nation, from heads of all +ecclesiastical orders, and from generals and chiefs and princes and +nobles, who, robed and plumed and gemmed in all the brightest and +proudest that earth could give, bowed the knee humbly and kissed his +foot in return for the palm-branch which he presented. Meanwhile, voices +of invisible singers chanted the simple event which all this splendor +was commemorating,--how of old Jesus came into Jerusalem meek and lowly, +riding on an ass,--how His disciples cast their garments in the way, +and the multitude took branches of palm-trees to come forth and meet +Him,--how He was seized, tried, condemned to a cruel death,--and +the crowd, with dazzled and wondering eyes following the gorgeous +ceremonial, reflected little how great was the satire of the contrast, +how different the coming of that meek and lowly One to suffer and to +die from this triumphant display of worldly-pomp and splendor in His +professed representative. + +But to the pure all things are pure, and Agnes thought only of the +enthronement of all virtues, of all celestial charities and unworldly +purities in that splendid ceremonial, and longed within herself to +approach so near as to touch the hem of those wondrous and sacred +garments. It was to her enthusiastic imagination like the unclosing of +celestial doors, where the kings and priests of an eternal and heavenly +temple move to and fro in music, with the many-colored glories of +rainbows and sunset clouds. Her whole nature was wrought upon by the +sights and sounds of that gorgeous worship,--she seemed to burn and +brighten like an altar-coal, her figure appeared to dilate, her eyes +grew deeper and shone with a starry light, and the color of her cheeks +flushed up with a vivid glow,--nor was she aware how often eyes were +turned upon her, nor how murmurs of admiration followed all her +absorbed, unconscious movements. "_Ecco! Eccola_!" was often repeated +from mouth to mouth around her, but she heard it not. + +When at last the ceremony was finished, the crowd rushed again out of +the church to see the departure of various dignitaries. There was +a perfect whirl of dazzling equipages, and glittering lackeys, and +prancing horses, crusted with gold, flaming in scarlet and purple, +retinues of cardinals and princes and nobles and ambassadors all in one +splendid confused jostle of noise and brightness. + +Suddenly a servant in a gorgeous scarlet livery touched Agnes on the +shoulder, and said, in a tone of authority,-- + +"Young maiden, your presence is commanded." + +"Who commands it?" said Elsie, laying her hand on her grandchild's +shoulder fiercely. + +"Are you mad?" whispered two or three women of the lower orders to Elsie +at once; "don't you know who that is? Hush, for your life!" + +"I shall go with you, Agnes," said Elsie, resolutely. + +"No, you will not," said the attendant, insolently. "This maiden is +commanded, and none else." + +"He belongs to the Pope's nephew," whispered a voice in Elsie's ear. +"You had better have your tongue torn out than say another word." +Whereupon, Elsie found herself actually borne backward by three or four +stout women. + +Agnes looked round and smiled on her,--a smile full of innocent +trust,--and then, turning, followed the servant into the finest of the +equipages, where she was lost to view. + +Elsie was almost wild with fear and impotent rage; but a low, impressive +voice now spoke in her ear. It came from the white figure which had +followed them in the morning. + +"Listen," it said, "and be quiet; don't turn your head, but hear what +I tell you. Your child is followed by those who will save her. Go your +ways whence you came. Wait till the hour after the Ave Maria, then come +to the Porta San Sebastiano, and all will be well." + +When Elsie turned to look she saw no one, but caught a distant glimpse +of a white figure vanishing in the crowd. + +She returned to her asylum, wondering and disconsolate, and the first +person whom she saw was old Mona. + +"Well, good morrow, sister!" she said. "Know that I am here on a strange +errand. The Princess has taken such a liking to you that nothing will +do but we must fetch you and your little one out to her villa. I +looked everywhere for you in church this morning. Where have you hid +yourselves?" + +"We were there," said Elsie, confused, and hesitating whether to speak +of what had happened. + +"Well, where is the little one? Get her ready; we have horses in +waiting. It is a good bit out of the city." + +"Alack!" said Elsie, "I know not where she is." + +"Holy Virgin!" said Mona, "how is this?" + +Elsie, moved by the necessity which makes it a relief to open the heart +to some one, sat down on the steps of the church and poured forth the +whole story into the listening ear of Mona. + +"Well, well, well!" said the old servant, "in our days, one does +not wonder at anything,--one never knows one day what may come the +next,--but this is bad enough!" + +"Do you think," said Elsie, "there is any hope in that strange promise?" + +"One can but try it," said Mona. + +"If you could but be there then," said Elsie, "and take us to your +mistress." + +"Well, I will wait, for my mistress has taken an especial fancy to your +little one, more particularly since this morning, when a holy Capuchin +came to our house and held a long conference with her, and after he was +gone I found my lady almost in a faint, and she would have it that we +should start directly to bring her out here, and I had much ado to let +her see that the child would do quite as well after services were over. +I tired myself looking about for you in the crowd." + +The two women then digressed upon various gossiping particulars, as they +sat on the old mossy, grass-grown steps, looking up over house-tops +yellow with lichen, into the blue spring air, where flocks of white +pigeons were soaring and careering in the soft, warm sunshine. +Brightness and warmth and flowers seemed to be the only idea natural to +that charming weather, and Elsie, sad-hearted and foreboding as she was, +felt the benign influence. Rome, which had been so fatal a place to her +peace, yet had for her, as it has for every one, potent spells of a +lulling and soothing power. Where is the grief or anxiety that can +resist the enchantment of one of Rome's bright, soft, spring days? + + +CHAPTER XXIX. + +THE NIGHT-RIDE. + + +The villa of the Princess Paulina was one of those soft, idyllic +paradises which lie like so many fairy-lands around the dreamy solitudes +of Rome. They are so fair, so wild, so still, these villas! Nature in +them seems to run in such gentle sympathy with Art that one feels as if +they had not been so much the product of human skill as some indigenous +growth of Arcadian ages. There are quaint terraces shadowed by clipped +ilex-trees whose branches make twilight even in the sultriest noon; +there are long-drawn paths, through wildernesses where cyclamens blossom +in crimson clouds among crushed fragments of sculptured marble green +with the moss of ages, and glossy-leaved myrtles put forth their pale +blue stars in constellations under the leafy shadows. Everywhere is the +voice of water, ever lulling, ever babbling, and taught by Art to run in +many a quaint caprice,--here to rush down marble steps slippery with +sedgy green, there to spout up in silvery spray, and anon to spread into +a cool, waveless lake, whose mirror reflects trees and flowers far down +in some visionary underworld. Then there are wide lawns, where the +grass in spring is a perfect rainbow of anemones, white, rose, crimson, +purple, mottled, streaked, and dappled with ever varying shade of sunset +clouds. There are soft, moist banks where purple and white violets grow +large and fair, and trees all interlaced with ivy, which runs and twines +everywhere, intermingling its dark, graceful leaves and vivid young +shoots with the bloom and leafage of all shadowy places. + +In our day, these lovely places have their dark shadow ever haunting +their loveliness: the malaria, like an unseen demon, lies hid in their +sweetness. And in the time we are speaking of, a curse not less deadly +poisoned the beauties of the Princess's villa,--the malaria of fear. + +The gravelled terrace in front of the villa commanded, through the +clipped arches of the ilex-trees, the Campagna with its soft, undulating +bands of many-colored green, and the distant city of Rome, whose bells +were always filling the air between with a tremulous vibration. Here, +during the long sunny afternoon while Elsie and Monica were crooning +together on the steps of the church, the Princess Paulina walked +restlessly up and down, looking forth on the way towards the city for +the travellers whom she expected. + +Father Francesco had been there that morning and communicated to her +the dying message of the aged Capuchin, from which it appeared that the +child who had so much interested her was her near kinswoman. Perhaps, +had her house remained at the height of its power and splendor, she +might have rejected with scorn the idea of a kinswoman whose existence +had been owing to a _mésalliance_; but a member of an exiled and +disinherited family, deriving her only comfort from unworldly sources, +she regarded this event as an opportunity afforded her to make expiation +for one of the sins of her house. The beauty and winning graces of her +young kinswoman were not without their influence in attracting a lonely +heart deprived of the support of natural ties. The Princess longed for +something to love, and the discovery of a legitimate object of family +affection was an event in the weary monotony of her life; and therefore +it was that the hours of the afternoon seemed long while she looked +forth towards Rome, listening to the ceaseless chiming of its bells, and +wondering why no one appeared along the road. + +The sun went down, and all the wide plain seemed like the sea at +twilight, lying in rosy and lilac and purple shadowy bands, out of +which rose the old city, solemn and lonely as some enchanted island of +dream-land, with a flush of radiance behind it and a tolling of weird +music filling all the air around. Now they are chanting the Ave Maria in +hundreds of churches, and the Princess worships in distant accord, and +tries to still the anxieties of her heart with many a prayer. Twilight +fades and fades, the Campagna becomes a black sea, and the distant city +looms up like a dark rock against the glimmering sky, and the Princess +goes within and walks restlessly through the wide halls, stopping first +at one open window and then at another to listen. Beneath her feet she +treads a cool mosaic pavement where laughing Cupids are dancing. Above, +from the ceiling, Aurora and the Hours look down in many-colored clouds +of brightness. The sound of the fountains without is so clear in the +intense stillness that the peculiar voice of each one can be told. That +is the swaying noise of the great jet that rises from marble shells and +falls into a wide basin, where silvery swans swim round and round in +enchanted circles; and the other slenderer sound is the smaller jet that +rains down its spray into the violet-borders deep in the shrubbery; and +that other, the shallow babble of the waters that go down the marble +steps to the lake. How dreamlike and plaintive they all sound in the +night stillness! The nightingale sings from the dark shadows of the +wilderness; and the musky odors of the cyclamen come floating ever +and anon through the casement, in that strange, cloudy way in which +flower-scents seem to come and go in the air in the night season. + +At last the Princess fancies she hears the distant tramp of horses' +feet, and her heart beats so that she can scarcely listen: now she hears +it,--and now a rising wind, sweeping across the Campagna, seems to bear +it moaning away. She goes to a door and looks out into the darkness. +Yes, she hears it now, quick and regular,--the beat of many horses' feet +coming in hot haste along the road. Surely the few servants whom she has +sent cannot make all this noise! and she trembles with vague affright. +Perhaps it is a tyrannical message, bringing imprisonment and death. She +calls a maid, and bids her bring lights into the reception-hall. A +few moments more, and there is a confused stamping of horses' feet +approaching the house, and she hears the voices of her servants. She +runs into the piazza, and sees dismounting a knight who carries Agnes in +his arms pale and fainting. Old Elsie and Monica, too, dismount, with +the Princess's men-servants; but, wonderful to tell, there seems besides +them to be a train of some hundred armed horsemen. + +The timid Princess was so fluttered and bewildered that she lost all +presence of mind, and stood in uncomprehending wonder, while Monica +pushed authoritatively into the house, and beckoned the knight to bring +Agnes and lay her on a sofa, when she and old Elsie busied themselves +vigorously with restoratives. + +The Lady Paulina, as soon as she could collect her scattered senses, +recognized in Agostino the banished lord of the Sarelli family, a race +who had shared with her own the hatred and cruelty of the Borgia tribe; +and he in turn had recognized a daughter of the Colonnas. + +He drew her aside into a small boudoir adjoining the apartment. + +"Noble lady," he said, "we are companions in misfortune, and so, I +trust, you will pardon what seems a tumultuous intrusion on your +privacy. I and my men came to Rome in disguise, that we might watch over +and protect this poor innocent, who now finds asylum with you." + +"My Lord," said the Princess, "I see in this event the wonderful working +of the good God. I have but just learned that this young person is my +near kinswoman; it was only this morning that the fact was certified to +me on the dying confession of a holy Capuchin, who privately united my +brother to her mother. The marriage was an indiscretion of his youth; +but afterwards he fell into more grievous sin in denying the holy +sacrament, and leaving his wife to die in misery and dishonor, and +perhaps for this fault such great judgments fell upon him. I wish to +make atonement in such sort as is yet possible by acting as a mother to +this child." + +"The times are so troublous and uncertain," said Agostino, "that she +must have stronger protection than that of any woman. She is of a most +holy and religious nature, but as ignorant of sin as an angel who never +has seen anything out of heaven; and so the Borgias enticed her into +their impure den, from which, God helping, I have saved her. I tried +all I could to prevent her coming to Rome, and to convince her of the +vileness that ruled here; but the poor little one could not believe me, +and thought me a heretic only for saying what she now knows from her own +senses." + +The Lady Paulina shuddered with fear. + +"Is it possible that you have come into collision with the dreadful +Borgias? What will become of us?" + +"I brought a hundred men into Rome in different disguises," said +Agostino, "and we gained over a servant in their household, through whom +I entered and carried her off. Their men pursued us, and we had a fight +in the streets, but for the moment we mustered more than they. Some of +them chased us a good distance. But it will not do for us to remain +here. As soon as she is revived enough, we must retreat towards one +of our fastnesses in the mountains, whence, when rested, we shall go +northward to Florence, where I have powerful friends, and she has also +an uncle, a holy man, by whose counsels she is much guided." + +"You must take me with you," said the Princess, in a tremor of anxiety. + +"Not for the world would I stay, if it be known you have taken refuge +here. For a long time their spies have been watching about me; they +only wait for some occasion to seize upon my villa, as they have on the +possessions of all my father's house. Let me flee with you. I have a +brother-in-law in Florence who hath often urged me to escape to him till +times mend,--for, surely, God will not allow the wicked to bear rule +forever." + +"Willingly, noble lady, will we give you our escort,--the more so that +this poor child will then have a friend with her beseeming her father's +rank. Believe me, lady, she will do no discredit to her lineage. She was +trained in a convent, and her soul is a flower of marvellous beauty. I +must declare to you here that I have wooed her honorably to be my wife, +and she would willingly be so, had not some scruples of a religious +vocation taken hold on her, to dispel which I look for the aid of the +holy father, her uncle." + +"It would be a most fit and proper thing," said the Princess, "thus to +ally our houses, in hope of some good time to come which shall restore +their former standing and possessions. Of course some holy man must +judge of the obstacle interposed by her vocation; but I doubt not the +Church will be an indulgent mother in a case where the issue seems so +desirable." + +"If I be married to her," said Agostino, "I can take her out of all +these strifes and confusions which now agitate our Italy to the court of +France, where I have an uncle high in favor with the King, and who will +use all his influence to compose these troubles in Italy, and bring +about a better day." + +While this conversation was going on, bountiful refreshments had been +provided for the whole party, and the attendants of the Princess +received orders to pack all her jewels and valuable effects for a sudden +journey. + +As soon as preparations could be made, the whole party left the villa of +the Princess for a retreat in the Alban Mountains, where Agostino +and his band had one of their rendezvous. Only the immediate female +attendants of the Princess, and one or two men-servants, left with her. +The silver plate, and all objects of particular value, were buried in +the garden. This being done, the keys of the house were intrusted to a +gray-headed servant, who with his wife had grown old in the family. + +It was midnight before everything was ready for starting. The moon cast +silver gleams through the ilex-avenues, and caused the jet of the great +fountain to look like a wavering pillar of cloudy brightness, when the +Princess led forth Agnes upon the wide veranda. Two gentle, yet spirited +little animals from the Princess's stables were there awaiting them, and +they were lifted into their saddles by Agostino. + +"Fear nothing, Madam," he said, observing how the hands of the Princess +trembled; "a few hours will put us in perfect safety, and I shall be at +your side constantly." + +Then lifting Agnes to her seat, he placed the reins in her hand. + +"Are you rested?" he asked. + +It was the first time since her rescue that he had spoken to Agnes. The +words were brief, but no expressions of endearment could convey more +than the manner in which they were spoken. + +"Yes, my Lord," said Agnes, firmly, "I am rested." + +"You think you can bear the ride?" + +"I can bear anything, so I escape," she said. + +The company were now all mounted, and were marshalled in regular order. +A body of armed men rode in front; then came Agnes and the Princess, +with Agostino between them, while two or three troopers rode on either +side; Elsie, Monica, and the servants of the Princess followed close +behind, and the rear was brought up in like manner by armed men. + +The path wound first through the grounds of the villa, with its plats +of light and shade, its solemn groves of stone-pines rising like +palm-trees high in air above the tops of all other trees, its terraces +and statues and fountains,--all seeming so lovely in the midnight +stillness. + +"Perhaps I am leaving all this forever," said the Princess. + +"Let us hope for the best," said Agostino. "It cannot be that God will +suffer the seat of the Apostles to be subjected to such ignominy +and disgrace much longer. I am amazed that no Christian kings have +interfered before for the honor of Christendom. I have it from the best +authority that the King of Naples burst into tears when he heard of the +election of this wretch to be Pope. He said that it was a scandal which +threatened the very existence of Christianity. He has sent me secret +messages divers times expressive of sympathy, but he is not of himself +strong enough. Our hope must lie either in the King of France or the +Emperor of Germany: perhaps both will engage. There is now a most holy +monk in Florence who has been stirring all hearts in a wonderful way. It +is said that the very gifts of miracles and prophecy are revived in him, +as among the holy Apostles, and he has been bestirring himself to have +a General Council of the Church to look into these matters. When I left +Florence, a short time ago, the faction opposed to him broke into the +convent and took him away. I myself was there." + +"What!" said Agnes, "did they break into the convent of the San Marco? +My uncle is there." + +"Yes, and he and I fought side by side with the mob who were rushing +in." + +"Uncle Antonio fight!" said Agnes, in astonishment. + +"Even women will fight, when what they love most is attacked," said the +knight. + +He turned to her, as he spoke, and saw in the moonlight a flash from her +eye, and an heroic expression on her face, such as he had never remarked +before; but she said nothing. The veil had been rudely torn from her +eyes; she had seen with horror the defilement and impurity of what she +had ignorantly adored in holy places, and the revelation seemed to have +wrought a change in her whole nature. + +"Even you could fight, Agnes," said the knight, "to save your religion +from disgrace." + +"No," said she; "but," she added, with gathering firmness, "I could die. +I should be glad to die with and for the holy men who would save the +honor of the true faith. I should like to go to Florence to my uncle. If +he dies for his religion, I should like to die with him." + +"Ah, live to teach it to me!" said the knight, bending towards her, as +if to adjust her bridle-rein, and speaking in a voice scarcely audible. +In a moment he was turned again towards the Princess, listening to her. + +"So it seems," she said, "that we shall be running into the thick of the +conflict in Florence." + +"Yes, but my uncle hath promised that the King of France shall +interfere. I have hope something may even now have been done. I hope to +effect something myself." + +Agostino spoke with the cheerful courage of youth. Agnes glanced timidly +up at him. How great the change in her ideas! No longer looking on him +as a wanderer from the fold, an enemy of the Church, he seemed now in +the attitude of a champion of the faith, a defender of holy men and +things against a base usurpation. What injustice had she done him, and +how patiently had he borne that injustice! Had he not sought to warn +her against the danger of venturing into that corrupt city? Those words +which so much shocked her, against which she had shut her ears, were all +true; she had found them so; she could doubt no longer. And yet he had +followed her, and saved her at the risk of his life. Could she help +loving one who had loved her so much, one so noble and heroic? Would +it be a sin to love him? She pondered the dark warnings of Father +Francesco, and then thought of the cheerful, fervent piety of her old +uncle. How warm, how tender, how life-giving had been his presence +always! how full of faith and prayer, how fruitful of heavenly words and +thoughts had been all his ministrations!--and yet it was for him and +with him and his master that Agostino Sarelli was fighting, and against +him the usurping head of the Christian Church. Then there was another +subject for pondering during this night-ride. The secret of her birth +had been told her by the Princess, who claimed her as kinswoman. It had +seemed to her at first like the revelations of a dream; but as she rode +and reflected, gradually the idea shaped itself in her mind. She was, in +birth and blood, the equal of her lover, and henceforth her life would +no more be in that lowly plane where it had always moved. She thought of +the little orange-garden at Sorrento, of the gorge with its old bridge, +the Convent, the sisters, with a sort of tender, wondering pain. Perhaps +she should see them no more. In this new situation she longed once more +to see and talk with her old uncle, and to have him tell her what were +her duties. + +Their path soon began to be a wild clamber among the mountains, now lost +in the shadow of groves of gray, rustling olives, whose knotted, serpent +roots coiled round the rocks, and whose leaves silvered in the moonlight +whenever the wind swayed them. Whatever might be the roughness and +difficulties of the way, Agnes found her knight ever at her bridle-rein, +guiding and upholding, steadying her in her saddle when the horse +plunged down short and sudden descents, and wrapping her in his mantle +to protect her from the chill mountain-air. When the day was just +reddening in the sky, the whole troop made a sudden halt before a square +stone tower which seemed to be a portion of a ruined building, and here +some of the men dismounting knocked at an arched door. It was soon swung +open by a woman with a lamp in her hand, the light of which revealed +very black hair and eyes, and heavy gold earrings. + +"Have my directions been attended to?" said Agostino, in a tone of +command. "Are there places made ready for these ladies to sleep?" + +"There are, my Lord," said the woman, obsequiously,--"the best we could +get ready on so short a notice." + +Agostino came up to the Princess. "Noble Madam," he said, "you will +value safety before all things; doubtless the best that can be done here +is but poor, but it will give you a few hours for repose where you may +be sure of being in perfect safety." + +So saying, he assisted her and Agnes to dismount, and Elsie and Monica +also alighting, they followed the woman into a dark stone passage and up +some rude stone steps. She opened at last the door of a brick-floored +room, where beds appeared to have been hastily prepared. There was no +furniture of any sort except the beds. The walls were dusty and hung +with cobwebs. A smaller apartment opening into this had beds for Elsie +and Monica. + +The travellers, however, were too much exhausted with their night-ride +to be critical, the services of disrobing and preparing for rest were +quickly concluded, and in less than an hour all were asleep, while +Agostino was busy concerting the means for an immediate journey to +Florence. + + +CHAPTER XXX. + +"LET US ALSO GO, THAT WE MAY DIE WITH HIM." + + +Father Antonio sat alone in his cell in the San Marco in an attitude of +deep dejection. The open window looked into the garden of the convent, +from which steamed up the fragrance of violet, jasmine, and rose, and +the sunshine lay fair on all that was without. On a table beside him +were many loose and scattered sketches, and an unfinished page of +the Breviary he was executing, rich in quaint tracery of gold and +arabesques, seemed to have recently occupied his attention, for his +palette was wet and many loose brushes lay strewed around. Upon the +table stood a Venetian glass with a narrow neck and a bulb clear +and thin as a soap-bubble, containing vines and blossoms of the +passion-flower, which he had evidently been using as models in his work. + +The page he was illuminating was the prophetic Psalm which describes the +ignominy and sufferings of the Redeemer. It was surrounded by a wreathed +border of thorn-branches interwoven with the blossoms and tendrils of +the passion-flower, and the initial letters of the first two words were +formed by a curious combination of the hammer, the nails, the spear, the +crown of thorns, the cross, and other instruments of the Passion; and +clear, in red letter, gleamed out those wonderful, mysterious words, +consecrated by the remembrance of a more than mortal anguish,--"My God, +my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" + +The artist-monk had perhaps fled to his palette to assuage the +throbbings of his heart, as a mourning mother flies to the cradle of her +child; but even there his grief appeared to have overtaken him, for the +work lay as if pushed from him in an access of anguish such as comes +from the sudden recurrence of some overwhelming recollection. He was +leaning forward with his face buried in his hands, sobbing convulsively. + +The door opened, and a man advancing stealthily behind laid a hand +kindly on his shoulder, saying softly, "So, so, brother!" + +Father Antonio looked up, and, dashing his hand hastily across his +eyes, grasped that of the new-comer convulsively, and saying only, "Oh, +Baccio! Baccio!" hid his face again. + +The eyes of the other filled with tears, as he answered gently,-- + +"Nay, but, my brother, you are killing yourself. They tell me that you +have eaten nothing for three days, and slept not for weeks; you will die +of this grief." + +"Would that I might! Why could not I die with him as well as Fra +Domenico? Oh, my master! my dear master!" + +"It is indeed a most heavy day to us all," said Baccio della Porta, +the amiable and pure-minded artist better known to our times by his +conventual name of Fra Bartolommeo. "Never have we had among us such a +man; and if there be any light of grace in my soul, his preaching first +awakened it, brother. I only wait to see him enter Paradise, and then +I take farewell of the world forever. I am going to Prato to take the +Dominican habit, and follow him as near as I may." + +"It is well, Baccio, it is well," said Father Antonio; "but you must not +put out the light of your genius in those shadows,--you must still paint +for the glory of God." + +"I have no heart for painting now," said Baccio, dejectedly. "He was my +inspiration, he taught me the holier way, and he is gone." + +At this moment the conference of the two was interrupted by a knocking +at the door, and Agostino Sarelli entered, pale and disordered. + +"How is this?" he said, hastily. "What devils' carnival is this which +hath broken loose in Florence? Every good thing is gone into dens and +holes, and every vile thing that can hiss and spit and sting is crawling +abroad. What do the princes of Europe mean to let such things be?" + +"Only the old story," said Father Antonio,--"_Principes convenerunt in +unum adversus Dominum, adversus Christum ejus_." + +So much were all three absorbed in the subject of their thoughts, that +no kind of greeting or mark of recognition passed among them, such as is +common when people meet after temporary separation. Each spoke out from +the fulness of his soul, as from an overflowing bitter fountain. + +"Was there no one to speak for him,--no one to stand up for the pride of +Italy,--the man of his age?" said Agostino. + +"There was one voice raised for him in the council," said Father +Antonio. "There was Agnolo Niccolini: a grave man is this Agnolo, and of +great experience in public affairs, and he spoke out his mind boldly. He +told them flatly, that, if they looked through the present time or the +past ages, they would not meet a man of such a high and noble order as +this, and that to lay at our door the blood of a man the like of whom +might not be born for centuries was too impious and execrable a thing to +be thought of. I'll warrant me, he made a rustling among them when he +said that, and the Pope's commissary--old Romalino--then whispered +and frowned; but Agnolo is a stiff old fellow when he once begins a +thing,--he never minded it, and went through with his say. It seems to +me he said that it was not for us to quench a light like this, capable +of giving lustre to the faith even when it had grown dim in other parts +of the world,--and not to the faith alone, but to all the arts and +sciences connected with it. If it were needed to put restraint on him, +he said, why not put him into some fortress, and give him commodious +apartments, with abundance of books, and pen, ink, and paper, where he +would write books to the honor of God and the exaltation of the holy +faith? He told them that this might be a good to the world, whereas +consigning him to death without use of any kind would bring on our +republic perpetual dishonor." + +"Well said for him!" said Baccio, with warmth; "but I'll warrant me, he +might as well have preached to the north wind in March, his enemies are +in such a fury." + +"Yes, yes," said Antonio, "it is just as it was of old: the chief +priests and Scribes and Pharisees were instant with loud voices, +requiring he should be put to death; and the easy Pilates, for fear of +the tumult, washed their hands of it." + +"And now," said Agostino, "they are putting up a great gibbet in the +shape of a cross in the public square, where they will hang the three +holiest and best men of Florence!" + +"I came through there this morning," said Baccio, "and there were young +men and boys shouting, and howling, and singing indecent songs, and +putting up indecent pictures, such as those he used to preach against. +It is just as you say. All things vile have crept out of their lair, and +triumph that the man who made them afraid is put down; and every house +is full of the most horrible lies about him,--things that they said he +confessed." + +"Confessed!" said Father Antonio,--"was it not enough that they tore +and tortured him seven times, but they must garble and twist the very +words that he said in his agony? The process they have published is +foully falsified,--stuffed full of improbable lies; for I myself have +read the first draught of all he did say, just as Signor Ceccone took it +down as they were torturing him. I had it from Jacopo Manelli, canon of +our Duomo here, and he got it from Ceccone's wife herself. They not only +can torture and slay him, but they torture and slay his memory with +lies." + +"Would I were in God's place for one day!" said Agostino, speaking +through his clenched teeth. "May I be forgiven for saying so." + +"We are hot and hasty," said Father Antonio, "ever ready to call down +fire from heaven,--but, after all, 'the Lord reigneth, let the earth +rejoice.' 'Unto the upright there ariseth light in the darkness.' Our +dear father is sustained in spirit and full of love. Even when they +let him go from the torture, he fell on his knees, praying for his +tormentors." + +"Good God! this passes me!" said Agostino, striking his hands together. +"Oh, wherefore hath a strong man arms and hands, and a sword, if he +must stand still and see such things done? If I had only my hundred +mountaineers here, I would make one charge for him to-morrow. If I could +only _do_ something!" he added, striding impetuously up and down the +cell and clenching his fists. "What! hath nobody petitioned to stay this +thing?" + +"Nobody for him," said Father Antonio. "There was talk in the city +yesterday that Fra Domenico was to be pardoned; in fact, Romalino was +quite inclined to do it, but Battista Albert talked violently against +it, and so Romalino said, 'Well, a monk more or less isn't much matter,' +and then he put his name down for death with the rest. The order was +signed by both commissaries of the Pope, and one was Frà Turiano, the +general of our order, a mild man, full of charity, but unable to stand +against the Pope." + +"Mild men are nuisances in such places", said Agostino, hastily; "our +times want something of another sort." + +"There be many who have fallen away from him even in our house here," +said Father Antonio,--"as it was with our blessed Lord, whose disciples +forsook him and fled. It seems to be the only thought with some how they +shall make their peace with the Pope." + +"And so the thing will be hurried through to-morrow," said Agostino, +"and when it's done and over, I'll warrant me there will be found kings +and emperors to say they meant to have saved him. It's a vile, evil +world, this of ours; an honorable man longs to see the end of it. But," +he added, coming up and speaking to Father Antonio, "I have a private +message for you." + +"I am gone this moment," said Baccio, rising with ready courtesy; "but +keep up heart, brother." + +So saying, the good-hearted artist left the cell, and Agostino said,-- + +"I bring tidings to you of your kindred. Your niece and sister are here +in Florence, and would see you. You will find them at the house of one +Gherardo Rosselli, a rich citizen of noble blood." + +"Why are they there?" said the monk, lost in amazement. + +You must know, then, that a most singular discovery hath been made +by your niece at Rome. The sister of her father, being a lady of the +princely blood of Colonna, hath been assured of her birth by the +confession of the priest that married him; and being driven from Rome by +fear of the Borgias, they came hither under my escort, and wait to see +you. So, if you will come with me now, I will guide you to them." + +"Even so," said Father Antonio. + + +CHAPTER XXXI. + +MARTYRDOM. + + +In a shadowy chamber of a room overlooking the grand square of Florence +might be seen, on the next morning, some of the principal personages of +our story. Father Antonio, Baccio della Porta, Agostino Sarelli, the +Princess Paulina, Agnes, with her grandmother, and mixed crowd of +citizens and ecclesiastics who all spoke in hushed and tremulous voices, +as men do in the chamber of mourners at a funeral. The great, mysterious +bell of the Campanile was swinging with dismal, heart-shaking toll, like +a mighty voice from the spirit-world; and it was answered by the +tolling of all the bells in the city, making such wavering clangors and +vibrating circles in the air over Florence that it might seem as if it +were full of warring spirits wrestling for mastery. + +Toll! toll! toll! O great bell of the fair Campanile! for this day the +noblest of the wonderful men of Florence is to offered up. Toll! for an +era is going out,--the era of her artists, her statesmen, her poets, and +her scholars. Toll! for an era is coming in,--the era of her disgrace +and subjugation and misfortune! + +The stepping of the vast crowd in the square was like the patter of a +great storm, and the hum of voices rose up like the murmur of the ocean; +but in the chamber all was so still that one could have heard the +dropping of a pin. + +Under the balcony of this room were seated in pomp and state the Papal +commissioners, radiant in gold and scarlet respectability; and Pilate +and Herod, on terms of the most excellent friendship, were ready to act +over again the part they had acted fourteen hundred years by before. Now +has arrived the moment when the three followers of the Man of Calvary +are to be degraded from the fellowship of His visible Church. + +Father Antonio, Agostino, and Baccio stood forth in the balcony, and, +drawing in their breath, looked down, as the three men of the hour, pale +and haggard with imprisonment and torture, were brought up amid the +hoots and obscene jests of the populace. Savonarola first was led before +the tribunal, and there, with circumstantial minuteness, endued with +all his priestly vestments, which again, with separate ceremonies of +reprobation and ignominy, were taken from him. He stood through it all +serene as stood his Master when stripped of His garments on Calvary. +There is a momentary hush of voices and drawing in of breaths in the +great crowd. The Papal legate takes him by the hand and pronounces the +words, "Jerome Savonarola, I separate thee from the Church Militant and +the Church Triumphant." + +He is going to speak. + +"What says he?" said Agostino, leaning over the balcony. + +Solemnly and clear that impressive voice which so often had thrilled the +crowds in that very square made answer,-- + +"From the Church Militant you _may_ divide me; but from the Church +Triumphant, _no,--that_ is above your power!"--and a light flashed out +in his face as if a smile from Christ had shone down upon him. + +"Amen!" said Father Antonio; "he hath witnessed a good confession,"--and +turning, he went in, and, burying his face in his hands, remained in +prayer. + +"When like ceremonies had been passed through with the others, the three +martyrs were delivered to the secular executioner, and, amid the scoffs +and jeers of the brutal crowd, turned their faces to the gibbet. + +"Brothers, let us sing the Te Deum," said Savonarola. + +"Do not so infuriate the mob," said the executioner,--"for harm might be +done." + +"At least let us repeat it together," said he, "lest we forget it." + +And so they went forward, speaking to each other of the glorious company +of the apostles, the goodly fellowship of the prophets, the noble army +of martyrs, and giving thanks aloud in that great triumphal hymn of the +Church of all Ages. + +When the lurid fires were lighted which blazed red and fearful through +that crowded square, all in that silent chamber fell on their knees, and +Father Antonio repeated prayers for departing souls. + +To the last, that benignant right hand which had so often pointed the +way of life to that faithless city was stretched out over the crowd +in the attitude of blessing; and so loving, not hating, praying with +exaltation, and rendering blessing for cursing, the souls of the martyrs +ascended to the great cloud of witnesses above. + + +CHAPTER XXXII. + +CONCLUSION. + + +A few days after the death of Savonarola, Father Antonio was found one +morning engaged in deep converse with Agnes. + +The Princess Paulina, acting for her family, desired to give her hand to +the Prince Agostino Sarelli, and the interview related to the religious +scruples which still conflicted with the natural desires of the child. + +"Tell me, my little one," said Father Antonio, "frankly and truly, dost +thou not love this man with all thy heart?" + +"Yes, my father, I do," said Agnes; "but ought I not to resign this love +for the love of my Saviour?" + +"I see not why," said the monk. "Marriage is a sacrament as well as holy +orders, and it is a most holy and venerable one, representing the divine +mystery by which the souls of the blessed are united to the Lord. I do +not hold with Saint Bernard, who, in his zeal for a conventual life, +seemed to see no other way of serving God but for all men and women to +become monks and nuns. The holy order is indeed blessed to those souls +whose call to it is clear and evident, like mine; but if there be a +strong and virtuous love for a worthy object, it is a vocation unto +marriage, which should not be denied." + +"So, Agnes," said the knight, who had stolen into the room unperceived, +and who now boldly possessed himself of one of her hands--"Father +Antonio hath decided this matter," he added, turning to the Princess +and Elsie, who entered, "and everything having been made ready for +my journey into France, the wedding ceremony shall take place on the +morrow, and, for that we are in deep affliction, it shall be as private +as may be." + +And so on the next morning the wedding ceremony took place, and the +bride and groom went on their way to France, where preparations +befitting their rank awaited them. + +Old Elsie was heard to observe to Monica, that there was some sense in +making pilgrimages, since this to Rome, which she had undertaken so +unwillingly, had turned out so satisfactory. + +In the reign of Julius II., the banished families who had been plundered +by the Borgias were restored to their rights and honors at Rome; and +there was a princess of the house of Sarelli then at Rome, whose +sanctity of life and manners was held to go back to the traditions of +primitive Christianity, so that she was renowned not less for goodness +than for rank and beauty. + +In those days, too, Raphael, the friend of Frà Bartolommeo, placed in +one of the grandest halls of the Vatican, among the Apostles and Saints, +the image of the traduced and despised martyr whose ashes had been cast +to the winds and waters in Florence. His memory lingered long in Italy, +so that it was even claimed that miracles were wrought in his name and +by his intercession. Certain it is, that the living words he spoke were +seeds of immortal flowers which blossomed in secret dells and obscure +shadows of his beautiful Italy. + + * * * * * + + +EXODUS. + + + Hear ye not how, from all high points of Time,-- + From peak to peak adown the mighty chain + That links the ages,--echoing sublime + A Voice Almighty,--leaps one grand refrain, + Wakening the generations with a shout, + And trumpet-call of thunder,--Come ye out! + + Out from old forms and dead idolatries; + From fading myths and superstitious dreams; + From Pharisaic rituals and lies, + And all the bondage of the life that seems! + Out,--on the pilgrim path, of heroes trod, + Over earth's wastes, to reach forth after God! + + The Lord hath bowed His heaven, and come down! + Now, in this latter century of time, + Once more His tent is pitched on Sinai's crown! + Once more in clouds must Faith to meet Him climb! + Once more His thunder crashes on our doubt + And fear and sin,--"My people! come ye out! + + "From false ambitions and base luxuries; + From puny aims and indolent self-ends; + From cant of faith, and shams of liberties, + And mist of ill that Truth's pure daybeam bends: + Out, from all darkness of the Egypt-land, + Into My sun-blaze on the desert sand! + + "Leave ye your flesh-pots; turn from filthy greed + Of gain that doth the thirsting spirit mock; + And heaven shall drop sweet manna for your need, + And rain clear rivers from the unhewn rock! + Thus saith the Lord!" And Moses--meek, unshod-- + Within the cloud stands hearkening to his God! + + Show us our Aaron, with his rod in flower! + Our Miriam, with her timbrel-soul in tune! + And call some Joshua, in the Spirit's power, + To poise our sun of strength at point of noon! + God of our fathers! over sand and sea, + Still keep our struggling footsteps close to Thee! + + * * * * * + + +THEN AND NOW IN THE OLD DOMINION. + + +The history of Virginia opens with a romance. No one will be surprised +at this, for it is a habit histories have. There is Plymouth Rock, for +example; it would be hard to find anything more purely romantic than +that. Well do we remember the sad day when a friend took us to the +perfectly flat wharf at Plymouth, and recited Mrs. Hemans's humorous +verse,-- + + "The breaking waves dashed high, + On a stern and rock-bound coast." + +"Such, then," we reflected, "is History! If Plymouth Rock turns out to +be a myth, why may not Columbus or Santa Claus or Napoleon, or anything +or anybody?" Since then we have been skeptical about history even where +it seems most probable; at times doubt whether Rip Van Winkle really +slept twenty years without turning over; are annoyed with misgivings as +to whether our Western pioneers Boone, Crockett, and others, _did_ keep +bears in their stables for saddle-horses, and harness alligators as we +do oxen. So we doubted the story of John Smith and Pocahontas with which +Virginia opens. In one thing we had already caught that State making a +mythical statement: it was named by Queen Elizabeth Virginia in honor of +her own virgin state,--which, if Cobbett is to be believed, was also a +romance. Well, America was named after a pirate, and Sir Walter Raleigh, +who suggested the name of the Virgin Queen, was fond of a joke. + +But notwithstanding the suspicion with which we entered upon the +investigation, we are convinced that the romance of Pocahontas is true. +As only a portion of the story of this Indian maiden, "the colonial +angel," as she was termed by the settlers, is known, and that not +generally with exactness, we will reproduce it here. + +It will be remembered that Pocahontas, when about thirteen years of age, +saved the young English captain, John Smith, from the death which her +father, Powhatan, had resolved he should suffer. As the tomahawk was +about to descend on his head, the girl rushed forward and clasped that +head in her arms. The stern heart of Powhatan relented, and he consented +that the captive should live to make tomahawks for him and beads and +bells for Pocahontas. Afterward Powhatan agreed that Smith should return +to Jamestown, on condition of his sending him two guns and a grindstone. +Soon, after this Jamestown with all its stores was destroyed by fire, +and the colonists came near perishing from cold and hunger. Half of them +died; and the rest were saved only by Pocahontas, who appeared in the +midst of their distress, bringing bread, raccoons, and venison. + +John Smith and his companions after this explored a large portion of the +State, and a second time came to rest at the home of Powhatan and his +beautiful daughter. The name of the place was Werowocomoco. His visit +this time fell on the eve of the coronation of Powhatan. The king, +being absent when Smith came, was sent for; meanwhile Pocahontas called +together a number of Indian maidens to get up a dramatic entertainment +and ballet for the handsome young Englishman and his companions. They +made a fire in a level field, and Smith sat on a mat before it. A +hideous noise and shrieking were suddenly heard in the adjoining woods. +The English snatched up their arms, apprehending foul play. Pocahontas +rushed forward, and asked Smith to slay her rather than suspect her of +perfidy; so their apprehensions were quieted. Then thirty young Indian +maidens issued suddenly from the wood, all naked except a cincture of +green leaves, their bodies painted. Pocahontas was a complete picture of +an Indian Diana: a quiver hung on her shoulder, and she held a bow and +arrow in her hand; she wore, also, on her head a beautiful pair of +buck's horns, an otter's skin at her girdle, and another on her arm. The +other nymphs had antlers on their heads and various savage decorations. +Bursting from the forest, they circled around the fire and John Smith, +singing and dancing for an hour. They then disappeared into the wood as +suddenly as they had come forth. When they reappeared, it was to invite +Smith to their habitations, where they danced around him again, singing, +"Love you not me? Love you not me?" They then feasted him richly, and, +lastly, with pine-knot torches lighted him to his finely decorated +apartments. + +Captain John Smith was, without doubt, an imperial kind of man. His +personal appearance was fine, his sense and tact excellent, his manners +both cordial and elegant. There is no doubt, as there is no wonder, that +the Indian maiden felt some tender palpitations on his account. Once +again, when, owing to some misunderstanding, Powhatan had decreed the +death of all the whites, Pocahontas spent the whole pitch-dark night +climbing hills and toiling through pathless thickets, to save Smith and +his friends by warning them of the imminent danger. Smith offered her +many beautiful presents on this occasion, evidently not appreciating the +sentiment that was animating her. To this offer of presents she replied +with tears; and when their acceptance was urged, Smith himself relates, +that, "with the teares running downe her cheeks, she said she durst not +be seen to have any, for, if Powhatan should know it, she were but dead; +and so she ran away by herself, as she came." + +There is no doubt what the Muse of History ought to do here: were she a +dame of proper sensibilities, she would have Mr. John Smith married to +Miss P. Powhatan as soon as a parson could be got from Jamestown. Were +it a romance, this would be the result. As it is, we find Smith going +off to England in two years, and living unmarried until his death; and +Pocahontas married to the Englishman John Rolfe, for reasons of state, +we fear,--a link of friendship between the Reds and the Whites being +thought desirable. She was of course Christianized and baptized, as any +one may see by Chapman's picture in the Rotunda at Washington, unless +Zouave criticism has demolished it. Immediately she went with her +husband to England. At Brentford, where she was staying,. Captain John +Smith went to visit her. Their meeting was significant and affecting. +"After a modest salutation, without uttering a word, she turned away and +hid her face as if displeased.". She remained thus motionless for two or +three hours. Who can know what struggles passed through the heart of +the Indian bride at this moment,--emotions doubly unutterable to this +untaught stranger? It seems that she had been deceived by Rolfe and his +friends into thinking that Smith was dead, under the conviction that she +could not be induced to marry him, if she thought Smith alive. After +her long, sad silence, before mentioned, she came forward to Smith and +touchingly reminded him, there in the presence of her husband and a +large company, of the kindness she had shown him in her own country, +saying, "You did promise Powhatan what was yours should be his, and he +the like to you; you called him 'Father,' being in his land a stranger, +and for the same reason so I must call you." After a pause, during which +she seemed to be under the influence of strong emotion, she said, "I +will call you Father, and you shall call me Child, and so I will be +forever and ever your countrywoman." Then she added, slowly and with +emphasis, "_They did tell us always you were dead, and I knew no other +till I came to Plimoth; yet Powhatan did command Uttamattomakin to seeke +you and know the truth, because your countrymen will lie much_." It was +not long after this interview that Pocahontas died: she never returned +to Virginia. Her death occurred in 1617. The issue of her marriage was +one child, Thomas Rolfe; so it is through him that the First Families of +Virginia are so invariably descended from the Indian Princess. Captain +Smith lived until 1631, and, as we have said, never married. He was a +noble and true man, and Pocahontas was every way worthy to be his wife; +and one feels very ill-natured at Rolfe and Company for the cruel +deception which, we must believe, was all that kept them asunder, and +gave to the story of the lovely maiden its almost tragic close. + +One can scarcely imagine a finer device for Virginia to have adopted +than that of the Indian maiden protecting the white man from the +tomahawk. But, alas! with the departure of Smith the soul seems to have +left the Colony. The beautiful lands became a prey to the worn-out +English gentry, who spent their time cheating the simple-hearted red +men. These called themselves gentlemen, because they could do nothing. +In a classification of seventy-eight persons at Jamestown we are +informed that there were "four carpenters, twelve laborers, one +blacksmith, one bricklayer, one sailor, one barber, one mason, one +tailor, one drummer, one chirurgeon, and fifty-four gentlemen." To this +day there seems to be a large number in that vicinity who have no other +occupation than that of being gentlemen, and it is evidently in many +cases just as much as they can do. + +When Pocahontas died, the last link was broken between the Indian and +the settler. Unprovoked wars of extermination were begun to dispossess +these children of Nature of the very breasts of their mother, which had +sustained them so long and so peacefully. For a century the Indian's +name for Virginian was "Longknife." The very missionaries robbed him +with one hand whilst baptizing him with the other. One story concerning +the missionaries strikes us as sufficiently characteristic of the wit +of the Indian and the temper of the period to be preserved. There was a +branch of the Catawbas on the Potomac, in which river are to be found +the best shad in the world. The missionaries who settled among +this tribe taught them that it would be a good investment in their +soul-assurance to catch large quantities of the shad for them, the +missionaries. The Indians earnestly set themselves to the work; their +reverend teachers taking the fish and sending them off secretly to +various settlements in Virginia and Maryland, and making thereby +large sums of money. The Indians worked on for several months without +receiving any compensation, and the missionaries were getting richer and +richer,--when by some means the red men discovered the trick, and routed +the holy men from their neighborhood. Many years afterward the Catholics +made an effort to establish a mission with this same tribe. The +priest who first addressed them took as his text, "Ho, every one that +thirsteth, come ye to the waters,"--and went on in figurative style to +describe the waters of life. When the sermon was ended, the Indians held +a council to consider what they had just heard, and finally sent three +of their number to the missionaries, who said, "White men, you speak in +fine words of the waters of life; but before we decide on what we have +heard, we wish to know _whether any shad swim in those waters_." + +It is very certain that Christianity, as illustrated by the Virginians, +did not make a good impression on these savages. They were always +willing to compare their own religion with that of the whites, and +generally regarded the contrast as in their favor. One of them said to +Colonel Barnett, the commissioner to run the boundary-line of lands +ceded by the Indians, "As to religion, you go to your churches, sing +loud, pray loud, and make great noise. The red people meet once a year +at the feast of New Corn, extinguish all their fires and kindle up a +new one, the smoke of which ascends to the Great Spirit as a grateful +incense and sacrifice. Now what better is your religion than ours?" One +of the chiefs, it is said, received an Episcopal divine who wished to +indoctrinate him into the mystery of the Trinity. The Indian, who was +a "model of deportment," heard his argument; and then, when he was +through, began in turn to indoctrinate the divine in _his_ faith, +speaking of the Great Spirit, whose voice was the thunder, whose eye was +the sun. The clergyman interrupted him rather rudely, saying, "But +that is not true,--that is all heathen trash!" The chief turned to his +companions and said gravely, "This is the most impolite man I have ever +met; he has just declared that he has three gods, and now will not let +me have one!" + +The valley of Virginia, its El Dorado in every sense, had a different +settlement, and by a different people. They were, for the most part, +Germans, of the same class with those that settled in the great valleys +of Pennsylvania, and who have made so large a portion of that State into +a rich ingrain-carpet of cultivation upon a floor of limestone. One day +the history of the Germans of Pennsylvania and Virginia will be written, +and it will be full of interest and value. They were the first strong +sinews strung in the industrial arm of the Colonies to which they came; +and although mingled with nearly every European race, they remain to +this day a distinct people. A partition-wall rarely broken down has +always inclosed them, and to this, perhaps, is due that slowness of +progress which marks them. The restless ambition of _Le Grand Monarque_ +and the cruelties of Turenne converted the beautiful valley of the Rhine +into a smoking desert, and the wretched peasantry of the Palatinate fled +from their desolated firesides to seek a more hospitable home in the +forests of New York and Pennsylvania, and thence, somewhat later, +found their way into Virginia. The exodus of the Puritans has had more +celebrity, but was scarcely attended with more hardship and heroism. The +greater part of the German exiles landed in America stripped of their +all. They came to the forests of the Susquehanna and the Shenandoah +armed only with the woodman's axe. They were ignorant and superstitious, +and brought with them the legends of their fatherland. The spirits +of the Hartz Mountains and the genii of the Black Forest, which +Christianity had not been able entirely to exorcise, were transferred to +the wild mountains and dark caverns of the Old Dominion, and the same +unearthly visitants which haunted the old castles of the Rhine continued +their gambols in some deserted cabin on the banks of the Sherandah (as +the Shenandoah was then called). Since these men left their fatherland, +a great Literature and Philosophy have breathed like a tropic upon that +land, and the superstitions have been wrought into poetry and thought; +but that raw material of legend which in Germany has been woven into +finest tissues on the brain-looms of Wieland, Tieck, Schiller, and +Goethe, has remained raw material in the great valley that stretches +from New York to Upper Alabama. Whole communities are found which in +manners and customs are much the same with their ancestors who crossed +the ocean. The horseshoe is still nailed above the door as a protection +against the troublesome spook, and the black art is still practised. +Rough in their manners, and plain in their appearance, they yet conceal +under this exterior a warm hospitality, and the stranger will much +sooner be turned away from the door of the "chivalry" than from that of +the German farmer. Seated by his blazing fire, with plenty of apples and +hard cider, the Dutchman of the Kanawha enjoys his condition with gusto, +and is contented with the limitations of his fence. We have seen one +within two miles of the great Natural Bridge who could not direct us to +that celebrated curiosity; his wife remarking, that "a great many people +passed that way to the hills, but for what she could not see: for her +part, give her a level country." + +The first German settler who came to Virginia was one Jacob Stover, who +went there from Pennsylvania, and obtained a grant of five thousand +acres of land on the Shenandoah. Stover was very shrewd, and does not at +all justify the character we have ascribed to his race: there is a story +that casts a suspicion on his proper Teutonism. The story runs, that, +on his application to the colonial governor of Virginia for a grant of +land, he was refused, unless he could give satisfactory assurance that +he would have the land settled with the required number of families +within a given time. Being unable to do this, he went over to England, +and petitioned the King himself to direct the issuing of his grant; and +in order to insure success, had given human names to every horse, cow, +hog, and dog he owned, and which he represented as heads of families, +ready to settle the land. His Majesty, ignorant that the Williams, +Georges, and Susans seeking royal consideration were some squeaking +in pig-pens, others braying in the luxuriant meadows for which they +petitioned, issued the huge grant; and to-day there is serious reason +to suppose that many of the wealthiest and oldest families around +Winchester are enjoying their lands by virtue of titles given to +ancestral flocks and herds. + +The condition of Virginia for the period immediately preceding the +Revolution was one which well merits the consideration of political +philosophers. For many years the extent of the territory of the Old +Dominion was undecided, no lines being fixed between that State and Ohio +and Pennsylvania. Virginia claimed a large part of both these States +as hers; and, indeed, there seems to be in that State an hereditary +unconsciousness of the limits of her dominion. The question of +jurisdiction superseded every other for the time, and the formal +administration of the law itself ceased. There is a period lasting +through a whole generation in which society in the western part of the +State went on without courts or authorities. There was no court but of +public opinion, no administration but of the mob. Judges were ermined +and juries impanelled by the community when occasion demanded. +Kercheval, who grew from that vicinity and state of things, and whose +authority is excellent, says,--"They had no civil, military, or +ecclesiastical laws,--at least, none were enforced; yet we look in vain +for any period, before or since, when property, life, and morals were +any better protected." A statement worth pondering by those who tell +us that man is nought, government all. The tongue-lynchings and other +punishments inflicted by the community upon evil-doers were adapted to +the reformation of the culprit or his banishment from the community. The +punishment for idleness, lying, dishonesty, and ill-fame generally, was +that of "hating the offender out," as they expressed it. This was about +equivalent to the [Greek: atimia] among the Greeks. It was a public +expression, in various ways, of the general indignation against any +transgressor, and commonly resulted either in the profound repentance or +the voluntary exile of the person against whom it was directed: it was +generally the fixing of any epithet which was proclaimed by each tongue +when the sinner appeared,--_e.g.,_ Foultongue, Lawrence, Snakefang. +The name of Extra-Billy Smith is a quite recent case of this +"tongue-lynching." It was in these days of no laws, however, that the +practice of duelling was imported into Virginia. With this exception, +the State can trace no evil results to the period when society was +resolved into its simplest elements. Indeed, it was at this time +that there began to appear there signs of a sturdy and noble race of +Americanized Englishmen. The average size of the European Englishman was +surpassed. A woman was equal to an Indian. A young Virginian one day +killed a buffalo on the Alleghany Mountains, stretched its skin over +ribs of wood, and on the boat so made sailed the full length of the Ohio +and Mississippi Rivers. But this development was checked by the influx +of "English gentry," who brought laws and fashions from London. The old +books are full of the conflicts which these fastidious gentlemen and +ladies had with the rude pioneer customs and laws. The fine ladies found +that there was an old statute of the Colony which read,--"It shall be +permitted to none but the Council and Heads of Hundreds to wear gold +in their clothes, or to wear silk till they make it themselves." What, +then, could Miss Softdown do with the silks and breastpins brought from +London? "Let her wear deer-skin and arrow-head," said the natives. But +Miss Softdown soon had her way. Still more were these new families +shocked, when, on ringing for some newly purchased negro domestic, the +said negro came into the parlor nearly naked. Then began one of the most +extended controversies in the history of Virginia,--the question being, +whether out-door negroes should wear clothes, and domestics dress like +other people. The popular belief, in which it seems the negroes shared, +was, that the race would perish, if subjected to clothing the year +round. The custom of negro men going about _in puris naturalibus_ +prevailed to a much more recent period than is generally supposed. + +One by one, the barbarisms of Old Virginia were eradicated, and the +danger was then that effeminacy would succeed; but a better class of +families began to come from England, now that the Colony was somewhat +prepared for them. These aimed to make Virginia repeat England: it might +have repeated something worse, and in the end has. About one or two old +mansions in Maryland and Virginia the long silvery grass characteristic +of the English park is yet found: the seed was carefully brought from +England by those gentlemen who came under Raleigh's administration, +and who regarded their residence in these Colonies as patriotic +self-devotion. On one occasion, the writer, walking through one of +these fields, startled an English lark, which rose singing and soaring +skyward. It sang a theme of the olden time. Governor Spottswood brought +with him, when he came, a number of these larks, and made strenuous +efforts to domesticate them in the neighborhood of Fredericksburg, +Virginia. He did not succeed. Now and then we have heard of one's being +seen, companionless. It is a sad symbol of that nobler being who tried +to domesticate himself in Virginia, the fine old English gentleman. He +is now seen but little oftener than the silver grass and the lark which +he brought with him. But let no one think, whilst ridiculing those who +can now only hide their poor stature under the lion-skin of F-F-V-ism, +that the race of old Virginia gentlemen is a mythic race. Through +the fair slopes of Eastern Virginia we have wandered and counted the +epitaphs of as princely men and women as ever trod this continent. +Yonder is the island, floating on the crystal Rappahannock, which, +instead of, as now, masking the guns which aim at Freedom's heart, +once bore witness to the noble Spottswood's effort to realize for the +working-man a Utopia in the New World. Yonder is the house, on the same +river, frowning now with the cannon which defend the slave-shamble, (for +the Richmond railroad passes on its verge,) where Washington was reared +to love justice and honor; and over to the right its porch commands +a marble shaft on which is written, "Here lies Mary, the Mother of +Washington." A little lower is the spot where John Smith gave the right +hand to the ambassadors of King Powhatan. In that old court-house the +voice of Patrick Henry thundered for Liberty and Union. Time was when +the brave men on whose hearts rested the destinies of the New World made +this the centre of activity and rule upon the continent; they lived and +acted here as Anglo-Saxon blood should live and act, wherever it bears +its rightful sceptre; but now one walks here as through the splendid +ruins of some buried Nineveh, and emerges to find the very sunlight sad, +as it reveals those who garnish the sepulchres of their ancestors with +one hand, whilst with the other they stone and destroy the freedom and +institutions which their fathers lived to build and died to defend. + +And this, alas! is the first black line in the sketch of Virginia as +it now is. The true preface to the present edition of Virginia, which, +unhappily, has been for many years stereotyped, may be found in a single +entry of Captain John Smith's journal:-- + +"August, 1619. A Dutch man-of-war visited Jamestown and sold the +settlers twenty negroes, the first that have ever touched the soil of +Virginia." + +They have scarcely made it "sacred soil." A little entry it is, of what +seemed then, perhaps, an unimportant event,--but how pregnant with +evil! + +The very year in which that Dutch ship arrived with its freight of +slaves at Jamestown, the Mayflower sailed with its freight of freemen +for Plymouth. + +Let us pause a moment and consider the prospects and opportunities which +opened before the two bands of pilgrim. How hard and bleak were the +shores that received the Mayflower pilgrims! Winter seemed the only +season of the land to which they had come; when the snow disappeared, it +was only to reveal a landscape of sand and rock. To have soil they must +pulverize rock. Nature said to these exiles from a rich soil, with her +sternest voice,--"Here is no streaming breast: sand with no gold mined: +all the wealth you get must be mined from your own hearts and coined by +your own right hands!" + +How different was it in Virginia! Old John Rolfe, the husband of +Pocahontas, writing to the King in 1616, said,--"Virginia is the same as +it was, I meane for the goodness of the scate, and the fertilenesse of +the land, and will, no doubt, so continue to the worlds end,--a countrey +as worthy of good report as can be declared by the pen of the best +writer; a countrey spacious and wide, capable of many hundred thousands +of inhabitants." It must be borne in mind that Rolfe's idea of an +inhabitant's needs was that he should own a county or two to begin with, +which will account for his moderate estimate of the number that could be +accommodated upon a hundred thousand square miles. He continues,--"For +the soil, most fertile to plant in; for ayre, fresh and temperate, +somewhat hotter in summer, and not altogether so cold in winter as in +England, yet so agreable is it to our constitutions that now 't is more +rare to hear of a man's death than in England; for water, most wholesome +and verie plentifull; and for fayre navigable rivers and good harbors, +no countrey in Christendom, in so small a circuite, is so well stored." +Any one who has passed through the State, or paid any attention to its +resources, may go far beyond the old settler's statement. Virginia is a +State combining, as in some divinely planned garden, every variety of +soil known on earth, resting under a sky that Italy alone can match, +with a Valley anticipating in vigor the loam of the prairies: up to that +Valley and Piedmont stretch throughout the State navigable rivers, like +fingers of the Ocean-hand, ready to bear to all marts the produce of +the soil, the superb vein of gold, and the iron which, unlocked from +mountain-barriers, could defy competition. But in her castle Virginia is +still, a sleeping beauty awaiting the hero whose kiss shall recall her +to life. Comparing what free labor has done for the granite rock called +Massachusetts, and what slave labor has done for the enchanted garden +called Virginia, one would say, that, though the Dutch ship that brought +to our shores the Norway rat was bad, and that which brought the Hessian +fly was worse, the most fatal ship that ever cast anchor in American +waters was that which brought the first twenty negroes to the settlers +of Jamestown. Like the Indian in her own aboriginal legend, on whom a +spell was cast which kept the rain from falling on him and the sun from +shining on him, Virginia received from that Dutch ship a curse which +chained back the blessings which her magnificent resources would have +rained upon her, and the sun of knowledge shining everywhere has left +her to-day more than eighty thousand white adults who cannot read or +write. + +It was at an early period as manifest as now that a slave population +implied and rendered necessary a large poor-white population. And whilst +the pilgrims of Plymouth inaugurated the free-school system in their +first organic law, which now renders it impossible for one sane person +born in their land to be unable to read and write, Virginia was boasting +with Lord Douglas in "Marmion," + + "Thanks to Saint Bothan, son of mine + Could never pen a written line." + +Sir William Berkeley, Governor of Virginia for thirty-six years, +beginning with 1641, wrote to the King as follows:--"I thank God, there +are no free schools nor printing, and I hope we shall not have these +hundred years; for learning has brought disobedience and heresy and +sects into the world, and printing has divulged them, and libels upon +the best governments. God keep us from both!" Most fearfully has the +prayer been answered. In Berkeley's track nearly all the succeeding ones +went on. Henry A. Wise boasted in Congress that no newspaper was printed +in his district, and he soon became governor. + +It gives but a poor description of the "poor-white trash" to say that +they cannot read. The very slaves cannot endure to be classed on their +level. They are inconceivably wretched and degraded. For every rich +slave-owner there are some eight or ten families of these miserable +tenants. Both sexes are almost always drunk. + +There is no better man than the Anglo-Saxon man who labors; there is no +worse animal than the same man when bred to habits of idleness. When +Watts wrote, + + "Satan finds some mischief still + For idle hands to do," + +he wrote what is much truer of his own race than of any other. This +law has been the Nemesis of the young Virginian. His descent demands +excitement and activity; and unless he becomes emasculated into a +clay-eater, he obtains the excitement that his ancestors got in war, and +the New-Englander gets in work, in gaming, horse-racing, and all manner +of dissipation. His life verifies the proverb, that the idle brain is +the Devil's workshop. He is trained to despise labor, for it puts him on +a level with his father's slaves. At the University of Virginia one may +see the extent of demoralization to which eight generations of idleness +can bring English blood. There the spree, the riot, and we might almost +say the duel, are normal. About five years ago we spent some time +at Charlottesville. The evening of our arrival was the occasion of +witnessing some of the ways of the students. A hundred or more of them +with blackened or masked faces were rushing about the college yard; a +large fire was burning around a stake, upon which was the effigy of a +woman. A gentleman connected with the University, with whom we were +walking, informed us that the special occasion of this affair was, that +a near relative of Mrs. Stowe's, a sister, perhaps, had that day arrived +to visit her relative, Mrs. McGuffey. The effigy of Mrs. Stowe was +burned for her benefit. The lady and her friends were very much alarmed, +and left on the early train next morning, without completing their +visit. + +"They will close up by all getting dead-drunk," said our friend, the +Professor. + +"But," we asked, "why does not the faculty at once interfere in this +disgraceful procedure?" + +"They have got us lately," he replied, "where we are powerless. Whenever +they wish a spree, they tackle it on to the slavery question, and know +that their parents will pardon everything to the spirit of the South +when it is burning the effigy of Mrs. Stowe or Charles Sumner, or the +last person who furnishes a chance for a spree. To arrest them ends only +in casting suspicion of unsoundness on the professor who does it." + +Virginia has had, for these same causes, no religious development +whatever. The people spend four-and-a-half fifths of their time arguing +about politics and religion,--questions of the latter being chiefly as +to the best method of being baptized, or whether sudden conversions are +the safest,--but they never take a step forward in either. Archbishop +Purcell, of Cincinnati, stated to us, that, once being in Richmond, +he resolved to give a little religious exploration to the surrounding +country. About seven miles out from the city he saw a man lying +down,--the Virginian's natural posture,--and approaching, he made +various inquiries, and received lazy Yes and No replies. Presently he +inquired to what churches the people in that vicinity usually went. + +"Well, not much to any." + +"What are their religious views?" + +"Well, not much of any." + +"Well, my friend, may I inquire what are _your_ opinions on religious +subjects?" + +"The man, yet reclining," said the Archbishop, "looked at me sleepily a +moment, and replied,-- + +"'My opinion is that them as made me will take care of me.'" + +The Archbishop came off discouraged; but we assured him that the man +was far ahead of many specimens we had met. We never see an opossum in +Virginia--a fossil animal in most other places--but it seems the sign +of the moral stratification around. There are many varieties of +opossum in Virginia,--political and religious: Saturn, who devours his +offspring, has not come to Virginia yet. + +Old formulas have, doubtless, to a great extent, lost their power there +also, but there is not vitality enough to create a higher form. For no +new church can ever be anywhere inaugurated in this world until the +period has come when its chief corner-stone can be Humanity. Till then +the old creeds in Virginia must wander like ghosts, haunting the old +ruins which their once exquisite churches have become. Nothing can be +more picturesque, nothing more sad, than these old churches,--every +brick in them imported from Old England, every prayer from the past +world and its past need: the high and wide pews where the rich sat +lifted some feet above the seats of the poor represent still the faith +in a God who subjects the weak to the strong. These old churches, rarely +rebuilt, are ready now to become rocks imbedding fossil creeds. In these +old aisles one walks, and the snake glides away on the pavement, and the +bat flutters in the high pulpit, whilst moss and ivy tenderly enshroud +the lonely walls; and over all is written the word DESOLATION. Symbol it +is of the desolation which caused it, even the trampled fanes and altars +of the human soul,--the temple of God, whose profanation the church has +suffered to go on unrebuked, till now both must crumble into the same +grave. + + * * * * * + + +AMERICAN CIVILIZATION. + + +A certain degree of progress from the rudest state in which man is +found,--a dweller in caves, or on trees, like an ape, a cannibal, an +eater of pounded snails, worms, and offal,--a certain degree of progress +from this extreme is called Civilization. It is a vague, complex name, +of many degrees. Nobody has attempted a definition. Mr. Guizot, writing +a book on the subject, does not. It implies the evolution of a highly +organized man, brought to supreme delicacy of sentiment, as in practical +power, religion, liberty, sense of honor, and taste. In the hesitation +to define what it is, we usually suggest it by negations. A nation that +has no clothing, no alphabet, no iron, no marriage, no arts of peace, no +abstract thought, we call barbarous. And after many arts are invented or +imported, as among the Turks and Moorish nations, it is often a little +complaisant to call them civilized. + +Each nation grows after its own genius, and has a civilization of its +own. The Chinese and Japanese, though each complete in his way, is +different from the man of Madrid or the man of New York. The term +imports a mysterious progress. In the brutes is none; and in mankind, +the savage tribes do not advance. The Indians of this country have not +learned the white man's work; and in Africa, the negro of to-day is the +negro of Herodotus. But in other races the growth is not arrested; but +the like progress that is made by a boy, "when he cuts his eye-teeth," +as we say,--childish illusions pricing daily away, and he seeing things +really and comprehensively,--is made by tribes. It is the learning the +secret of cumulative power, of advancing on one's self. It implies a +facility of association, power to compare, the ceasing from fixed ideas. +The Indian is gloomy and distressed, when urged to depart from his +habits and traditions. He is overpowered by the gaze of the white, and +his eye sinks. The occasion of one of these starts of growth is always +some novelty that astounds the mind, and provokes it to dare to change. +Thus there is a Manco Capac at the beginning of each improvement, some +superior foreigner importing new and wonderful arts, and teaching them. +Of course, he must not know too much, but must have the sympathy, +language, and gods of those he would inform. But chiefly the sea-shore +has been the point of departure to knowledge, as to commerce. The most +advanced nations are always those who navigate the most. The power which +the sea requires in the sailor makes a man of him very fast, and the +change of shores and population clears his head of much nonsense of his +wigwam. + +Where shall we begin or end the list of those feats of liberty and wit, +each of which feats made an epoch of history? Thus, the effect of +a framed or stone house is immense on the tranquillity, power, and +refinement of the builder. A man in a cave, or in a camp, a nomad, will +die with no more estate than the wolf or the horse leaves. But so simple +a labor as a house being achieved, his chief enemies are kept at bay. +He is safe from the teeth of wild animals, from frost, sunstroke, and +weather; and fine faculties begin to yield their fine harvest. Invention +and art are born, manners and social beauty and delight. 'T is wonderful +how soon a piano gets into a log-hut on the frontier. You would think +they found it under a pine-stump. With it comes a Latin grammar, and one +of those towhead boys has written a hymn on Sunday. Now let colleges, +now let senates take heed! for here is one, who, opening these fine +tastes on the basis of the pioneer's iron constitution, will gather all +their laurels in his strong hands. + +When the Indian trail gets widened, graded, and bridged to a good +road,--there is a benefactor, there is a missionary, a pacificator, a +wealth-bringer, a maker of markets, a vent for industry. The building +three or four hundred miles of road in the Scotch Highlands in 1726 +to 1749 effectually tamed the ferocious clans, and established public +order. Another step in civility is the change from war, hunting, and +pasturage, to agriculture. Our Scandinavian forefathers have left us a +significant legend to convey their sense of the importance of this step. +"There was once a giantess who had a daughter, and the child saw a +husbandman ploughing in the field. Then she ran and picked him up with +her finger and thumb, and put him and his plough and his oxen into her +apron, and carried them to her mother, and said, 'Mother, what sort of a +beetle is this that I found wriggling in the sand?' But the mother said, +'Put it away, my child; we must begone out of this land, for these +people will dwell in it.'" Another success is the post-office, with +its educating energy, augmented by cheapness, and guarded by a certain +religious sentiment in mankind, so that the power of a wafer or a drop +of wax or gluten to guard a letter, as it flies over sea, over land, and +comes to its address as if a battalion of artillery brought it, I look +upon as a fine metre of civilization. + +The division of labor, the multiplication of the arts of peace, which is +nothing but a large allowance to each man to choose his work according +to his faculty, to live by his better hand, fills the State with useful +and happy laborers,--and they, creating demand by the very temptation +of their productions, are rapidly and surely rewarded by good sale: and +what a police and ten commandments their work thus becomes! So true is +Dr. Johnson's remark, that "men are seldom more innocently employed than +when they are making money." + +The skilful combinations of civil government, though they usually +follow natural leadings, as the lines of race, language, religion, and +territory, yet require wisdom and conduct in the rulers, and in their +result delight the imagination. "We see insurmountable multitudes +obeying, in opposition to their strongest passions, the restraints of +a power which they scarcely perceive, and the crimes of a single +individual marked and punished at the distance of half the earth."[A] + +[Footnote A: Dr. Thomas Brown.] + +Right position of woman in the State is another index. Poverty and +industry with a healthy mind read very easily the laws of humanity, and +love them: place the sexes in right relations of mutual respect, and a +severe morality gives that essential charm to woman which educates all +that is delicate, poetic, and self-sacrificing, breeds courtesy and +learning, conversation and wit, in her rough mate; so that I have +thought it a sufficient definition of civilization to say, it is the +influence of good women. + +Another measure of culture is the diffusion of knowledge, overrunning +all the old barriers of caste, and, by the cheap press, bringing the +university to every poor man's door in the newsboy's basket. Scraps of +science, of thought, of poetry are in the coarsest sheet, so that in +every house we hesitate to tear a newspaper until we have looked it +through. + +The ship, in its latest complete equipment, is an abridgment and compend +of a nation's arts: the ship steered by compass and chart, longitude +reckoned by lunar observation, and, when the heavens are hid, by +chronometer; driven by steam; and in wildest sea-mountains, at vast +distances from home, + + "The pulses of her iron heart + Go beating through the storm." + +No use can lessen the wonder of this control, by so weak a creature, of +forces so prodigious. I remember I watched, in crossing the sea, the +beautiful skill whereby the engine in its constant working was made to +produce two hundred gallons of fresh water out of salt water, every +hour,--thereby supplying all the ship's want. + +The skill that pervades complex details; the man that maintains himself; +the chimney taught to burn its own smoke; the farm made to produce all +that is consumed on it; the very prison compelled to maintain itself +and yield a revenue, and, better than that, made a reform school, and a +manufactory of honest men out of rogues, as the steamer made fresh +water out of salt: all these are examples of that tendency to combine +antagonisms, and utilize evil, which is the index of high civilization. + +Civilization is the result of highly complex organization. In the snake, +all the organs are sheathed: no hands, no feet, no fins, no wings. In +bird and beast, the organs are released, and begin to play. In man, they +are all unbound, and full of joyful action. With this unswaddling, he +receives the absolute illumination we call Reason, and thereby true +liberty. + +Climate has much to do with this melioration. The highest civility has +never loved the hot zones. Wherever snow falls, there is usually civil +freedom. Where the banana grows, the animal system is indolent and +pampered at the cost of higher qualities: the man is grasping, sensual, +and cruel. But this scale is by no means invariable. For high degrees of +moral sentiment control the unfavorable influences of climate; and some +of our grandest examples of men and of races come from the equatorial +regions,--as the genius of Egypt, of India, and of Arabia. + +These feats are measures or traits of civility; and temperate climate is +an important influence, though not quite indispensable, for there have +been learning, philosophy, and art in Iceland, and in the tropics. But +one condition is essential to the social education of man,--namely, +morality. There can be no high civility without a deep morality, though +it may not always call itself by that name, but sometimes the point +of honor, as in the institution of chivalry; or patriotism, as in the +Spartan and Roman republics; or the enthusiasm of some religious sect +which imputes its virtue to its dogma; or the cabalism, or _esprit du +corps_, of a masonic or other association of friends. + +The evolution of a highly destined society must be moral; it must run in +the grooves of the celestial wheels. It must be catholic in aims. What +is moral? It is the respecting in action catholic or universal ends. +Hear the definition which Kant gives of moral conduct: "Act always so +that the immediate motive of thy will may become a universal rule for +all intelligent beings." + +Civilization depends on morality. Everything good in man leans on what +is higher. This rule holds in small as in great. Thus, all our strength +and success in the work of our hands depend on our borrowing the aid of +the elements. You have seen a carpenter on a ladder with a broad-axe +chopping upward chips and slivers from a beam. How awkward! at what +disadvantage he works! But see him on the ground, dressing his timber +under him. Now, not his feeble muscles, but the force of gravity brings +down the axe; that is to say, the planet itself splits his stick. The +farmer had much ill-temper, laziness, and shirking to endure from his +hand-sawyers, until, one day, he bethought him to put his saw-mill on +the edge of a waterfall; and the river never tires of turning his wheel: +the river is good-natured, and never hints an objection. + +We had letters to send: couriers could not go fast enough, nor far +enough; broke their wagons, foundered their horses; bad roads in spring, +snow-drifts in winter, heats in summer; could not get the horses out +of a walk. But we found out that the air and earth were full of +electricity; and it was always going our way,--just the way we wanted to +send. _Would he take a message?_ Just as lief as not; had nothing +else to do; would carry it in no time. Only one doubt occurred, one +staggering objection,--he had no carpet-bag, no visible pockets, no +hands, not so much as a mouth, to carry a letter. But, after much +thought and many experiments, we managed to meet the conditions, and to +fold up the letter in such invisible compact form as he could carry in +those invisible pockets of his, never wrought by needle and thread,--and +it went like a charm. + +I admire still more than the saw-mill the skill which, on the sea-shore, +makes the tides drive the wheels and grind corn, and which thus engages +the assistance of the moon, like a hired hand, to grind, and wind, and +pump, and saw, and split stone, and roll iron. + +Now that is the wisdom of a man, in every instance of his labor, +to hitch his wagon to a star, and see his chore done by the gods +themselves. That is the way we are strong, by borrowing the might of the +elements. The forces of steam, gravity, galvanism, light, magnets, wind, +fire, serve us day by day, and cost us nothing. + +Our astronomy is full of examples of calling in the aid of these +magnificent helpers. Thus, on a planet so small as ours, the want of +an adequate base for astronomical measurements is early felt, as, for +example, in detecting the parallax of a star. But the astronomer, having +by an observation fixed the place of a star, by so simple an expedient +as waiting six months, and then repeating his observation, contrived +to put the diameter of the earth's orbit, say two hundred millions of +miles, between his first observation and his second, and this line +afforded him a respectable base for his triangle. + +All our arts aim to win this vantage. We cannot bring the heavenly +powers to us, but, if we will only choose our jobs in directions in +which they travel, they will undertake them with the greatest pleasure. +It is a peremptory rule with them, that _they never go out of their +road_. We are dapper little busybodies, and run this way and that +way superserviceably; but they swerve never from their fore-ordained +paths,--neither the sun, nor the moon, nor a bubble of air, nor a mote +of dust. + +And as our handiworks borrow the elements, so all our social and +political action leans on principles. To accomplish anything excellent, +the will must work for catholic and universal ends. A puny creature +walled in on every side, as Donne wrote,-- + + ------"unless above himself he can + Erect himself, how poor a thing is man!" + +but when his will leans on a principle, when he is the vehicle of ideas, +he borrows their omnipotence. Gibraltar may be strong, but ideas are +impregnable, and bestow on the hero their invincibility. "It was a great +instruction," said a saint in Cromwell's war, "that the best courages +are but beams of the Almighty." Hitch your wagon to a star. Let us not +fag in paltry works which serve our pot and bag alone. Let us not lie +and steal. No god will help. We shall find all their teams going the +other way,--Charles's Wain, Great Bear, Orion, Leo, Hercules:--every +god will leave us. Work rather for those interests which the divinities +honor and promote,--justice, love, freedom, knowledge, utility. + +If we can thus ride in Olympian chariots by putting our works in the +path of the celestial circuits, we can harness also evil agents, the +powers of darkness, and force them to serve against their will the ends +of wisdom and virtue. Thus, a wise Government puts fines and penalties +on pleasant vices. What a benefit would the American Government, now +in the hour of its extreme need, render to itself, and to every city, +village, and hamlet in the States, if it would tax whiskey and rum +almost to the point of prohibition! Was it Bonaparte who said that he +found vices very good patriots?--"he got five millions from the love of +brandy, and he should be glad to know which of the virtues would pay him +as much." Tobacco and opium have broad backs, and will cheerfully carry +the load of armies, if you choose to make them pay high for such joy as +they give and such harm as they do. + +These are traits, and measures, and modes; and the true test of +civilization is, not the census, nor the size of cities, nor the +crops,--no, but the kind of man the country turns out. I see the vast +advantages of this country, spanning the breadth of the temperate zone. +I see the immense material prosperity,--towns on towns, states on +states, and wealth piled in the massive architecture of cities, +California quartz-mountains dumped down in New York to be re-piled +architecturally along-shore from Canada to Cuba, and thence westward to +California again. But it is not New-York streets built by the confluence +of workmen and wealth of all nations, though stretching out towards +Philadelphia until they touch it, and northward until they touch New +Haven, Hartford, Springfield, Worcester, and Boston,--not these that +make the real estimation. But, when I look over this constellation of +cities which animate and illustrate the land, and see how little +the Government has to do with their daily life, how self-helped and +self-directed all families are,--knots of men in purely natural +societies,--societies of trade, of kindred blood, of habitual +hospitality, house and house, man acting on man by weight of opinion, of +longer or better-directed industry, the refining influence of women, +the invitation which experience and permanent causes open to youth and +labor,--when I see how much each virtuous and gifted person whom all men +consider lives affectionately with scores of excellent people who are +not known far from home, and perhaps with great reason reckons these +people his superiors in virtue, and in the symmetry and force of their +qualities, I see what cubic values America has, and in these a better +certificate of civilization than great cities or enormous wealth. + +In strictness, the vital refinements are the moral and intellectual +steps. The appearance of the Hebrew Moses, of the Indian Buddh,--in +Greece, of the Seven Wise Masters, of the acute and upright Socrates, +and of the Stoic Zeno,--in Judea, the advent of Jesus,--and in modern +Christendom, of the realists Huss, Savonarola, and Luther, are causal +facts which carry forward races to new convictions, and elevate the rule +of life. In the presence of these agencies, it is frivolous to insist +on the invention of printing or gunpowder, of steam-power or gas-light, +percussion-caps and rubber-shoes, which are toys thrown off from that +security, freedom, and exhilaration which a healthy morality creates in +society. These arts add a comfort and smoothness to house and +street life; but a purer morality, which kindles genius, civilizes +civilization, casts backward all that we held sacred into the profane, +as the flame of oil throws a shadow when shined upon by the flame of the +Bude-light. Not the less the popular measures of progress will ever be +the arts and the laws. + +But if there be a country which cannot stand any one of these tests,--a +country where knowledge cannot be diffused without perils of mob-law +and statute-law,--where speech is not free,--where the post-office is +violated, mail-bags opened, and letters tampered with,--where public +debts and private debts outside of the State are repudiated,--where +liberty is attacked in the primary institution of their social +life,--where the position of the white woman is injuriously affected by +the outlawry of the black woman,--where the arts, such as they have, +are all imported, having no indigenous life,--where the laborer is not +secured in the earnings of his own hands,--where suffrage is not free +or equal,--that country is, in all these respects, not civil, but +barbarous, and no advantages of soil, climate, or coast can resist these +suicidal mischiefs. + +Morality is essential, and all the incidents of morality,--as, justice +to the subject, and personal liberty. Montesquieu says,--"Countries are +well cultivated, not as they are fertile, but as they are free"; and the +remark holds not less, but more, true of the culture of men than of the +tillage of land. And the highest proof of civility is, that the whole +public action of the State is directed on securing the greatest good of +the greatest number. + +Our Southern States have introduced confusion into the moral sentiments +of their people, by reversing this rule in theory and practice, and +denying a man's right to his labor. The distinction and end of a soundly +constituted man is his labor. Use is inscribed on all his faculties. Use +is the end to which he exists. As the tree exists for its fruit, so a +man for his work. A fruitless plant, an idle animal, is not found in +the universe. They are all toiling, however secretly or slowly, in the +province assigned them, and to a use in the economy of the world,--the +higher and more complex organizations to higher and more catholic +service; and man seems to play a certain part that tells on the general +face of the planet,--as if dressing the globe for happier races of +his own kind, or, as we sometimes fancy, for beings of superior +organization. + +But thus use, labor of each for all, is the health and virtue of all +beings. ICH DIEN, _I serve_, is a truly royal motto. And it is the mark +of nobleness to volunteer the lowest service,--the greatest spirit only +attaining to humility. Nay, God is God because he is the servant of +all. Well, now here comes this conspiracy of slavery,--they call it an +institution, I call it a destitution,--this stealing of men and setting +them to work,--stealing their labor, and the thief sitting idle himself; +and for two or three ages it has lasted, and has yielded a certain +quantity of rice, cotton, and sugar. And standing on this doleful +experience, these people have endeavored to reverse the natural +sentiments of mankind, and to pronounce labor disgraceful, and the +well-being of a man to consist in eating the fruit of other men's labor. +Labor: a man coins himself into his labor,--turns his day, his strength, +his thought, his affection into some product which remains as the +visible sign of his power; and to protect that, to secure that to +him, to secure his past self to his future self, is the object of all +government. There is no interest in any country so imperative as that +of labor; it covers all, and constitutions and governments exist for +that,--to protect and insure it to the laborer. All honest men are daily +striving to earn their bread by their industry. And who is this who +tosses his empty head at this blessing in disguise, the constitution of +human nature, and calls labor vile, and insults the faithful workman at +his daily toil? I see for such madness no hellebore,--for such calamity +no solution but servile war, and the Africanization of the country that +permits it. + +At this moment in America the aspects of political society absorb +attention. In every house, from Canada to the Gulf, the children ask +the serious father,--"What is the news of the war to-day? and when will +there be better times?" The boys have no new clothes, no gifts, no +journeys; the girls must go without new bonnets; boys and girls find +their education, this year, less liberal and complete. All the little +hopes that heretofore made the year pleasant are deferred. The state of +the country fills us with anxiety and stern duties. We have attempted to +hold together two states of civilization: a higher state, where labor +and the tenure of land and the right of suffrage are democratical; and +a lower state, in which the old military tenure of prisoners or slaves, +and of power and land in a few hands, makes an oligarchy: we have +attempted to hold these two states of society under one law. But the +rude and early state of society does not work well with the later, +nay, works badly, and has poisoned politics, public morals, and social +intercourse in the Republic, now for many years. + +The times put this question,--Why cannot the best civilization be +extended over the whole country, since the disorder of the less +civilized portion menaces the existence of the country? Is this secular +progress we have described, this evolution of man to the highest powers, +only to give him sensibility, and not to bring duties with it? Is he +not to make his knowledge practical? to stand and to withstand? Is not +civilization heroic also? Is it not for action? has it not a will? +"There are periods," said Niebuhr, "when something much better than, +happiness and security of life is attainable." We live in a new and +exceptional age. America is another word for Opportunity. Our whole +history appears like a last effort of the Divine Providence in behalf of +the human race; and a literal slavish following of precedents, as by +a justice of the peace, is not for those who at this hour lead the +destinies of this people. The evil you contend with has taken alarming +proportions, and you still content yourself with parrying the blows it +aims, but, as if enchanted, abstain from striking at the cause. + +If the American people hesitate, it is not for want of warning or +advices. The telegraph has been swift enough to announce our disasters. +The journals have not suppressed the extent of the calamity. Neither +was there any want of argument or of experience. If the war brought +any surprise to the North, it was not the fault of sentinels on the +watch-towers, who had furnished full details of the designs, the muster, +and the means of the enemy. Neither was anything concealed of the theory +or practice of slavery. To what purpose make more big books of these +statistics? There are already mountains of facts, if any one wants them. +But people do not want them. They bring their opinions into the world. +If they have a comatose tendency in the brain, they are pro-slavery +while they live; if of a nervous sanguineous temperament, they are +abolitionists. Then interests were never persuaded. Can you convince the +shoe interest, or the iron interest, or the cotton interest, by reading +passages from Milton or Montesquieu? You wish to satisfy people that +slavery is bad economy. Why, the "Edinburgh Review" pounded on that +string, and made out its case forty years ago. A democratic statesman +said to me, long since, that, if he owned the State of Kentucky, he +would manumit all the slaves, and be a gainer by the transaction. Is +this new? No, everybody knows it. As a general economy it is admitted. +But there is no one owner of the State, but a good many small owners. +One man owns land and slaves; another owns slaves only. Here is a woman +who has no other property,--like a lady in Charleston I knew of, who +owned fifteen chimney-sweeps and rode in her carriage. It is clearly a +vast inconvenience to each of these to make any change, and they are +fretful and talkative, and all their friends are; and those less +interested are inert, and, from want of thought, averse to innovation. +It is like free trade, certainly the interest of nations, but by no +means the interest of certain towns and districts, which tariff feeds +fat; and the eager interest of the few overpowers the apathetic general +conviction of the many. Banknotes rob the public, but are such a daily +convenience that we silence our scruples, and make believe they are +gold. So imposts are the cheap and right taxation; but by the dislike of +people to pay out a direct tax, governments are forced to render life +costly by making them pay twice as much, hidden in the price of tea and +sugar. + +In this national crisis, it is not argument that we want, but that rare +courage which dares commit itself to a principle, believing that Nature +is its ally, and will create the instruments it requires, and more than +make good any petty and injurious profit which it may disturb. There +never was such a combination as this of ours, and the rules to meet it +are not set down in any history. We want men of original perception and +original action, who can open their eyes wider than to a nationality, +namely, to considerations of benefit to the human race, can act in the +interest of civilization. Government must not be a parish clerk, a +justice of the peace. It has, of necessity, in any crisis of the State, +the absolute powers of a Dictator. The existing Administration is +entitled to the utmost candor. It is to be thanked for its angelic +virtue, compared with any executive experiences with which we have been +familiar. But the times will not allow us to indulge in compliment. I +wish I saw in the people that inspiration which, if Government would not +obey the same, it would leave the Government behind, and create on the +moment the means and executors it wanted. Better the war should more +dangerously threaten us,--should threaten fracture in what is still +whole, and punish us with burned capitals and slaughtered regiments, and +so exasperate the people to energy, exasperate our nationality. There +are Scriptures written invisibly on men's hearts, whose letters do not +come out until they are enraged. They can be read by war-fires, and by +eyes in the last peril. + +We cannot but remember that there have been days in American history, +when, if the Free States had done their duty, Slavery had been blocked +by an immovable barrier, and our recent calamities forever precluded. +The Free States yielded, and every compromise was surrender, and invited +new demands. Here again is a new occasion which Heaven offers to sense +and virtue. It looks as if we held the fate of the fairest possession +of mankind in our hands, to be saved by our firmness or to be lost by +hesitation. + +The one power that has legs long enough and strong enough to cross the +Potomac offers itself at this hour; the one strong enough to bring all +the civility up to the height of that which is best prays now at the +door of Congress for leave to move. Emancipation is the demand of +civilization. That is a principle; everything else is an intrigue. This +is a progressive policy,--puts the whole people in healthy, productive, +amiable position,--puts every man in the South in just and natural +relations with every man in the North, laborer with laborer. + +We shall not attempt to unfold the details of the project of +emancipation. It has been stated with great ability by several of its +leading advocates. I will only advert to some leading points of the +argument, at the risk of repeating the reasons of others.[B] + +[Footnote B: I refer mainly to a Discourse by the Rev. M.D. Conway, +delivered before the "Emancipation League," in Boston, in January last.] + +The war is welcome to the Southerner: a chivalrous sport to him, like +hunting, and suits his semi-civilized condition. On the climbing scale +of progress, he is just up to war, and has never appeared to such +advantage as in the last twelve-month. It does not suit us. We are +advanced some ages on the war-state,--to trade, art, and general +cultivation. His laborer works for him at home, so that he loses no +labor by the war. All our soldiers are laborers; so that the South, with +its inferior numbers, is almost on a footing in effective war-population +with the North. Again, as long as we fight without any affirmative step +taken by the Government, any word intimating forfeiture in the rebel +States of their old privileges under the law, they and we fight on the +same side, for Slavery. Again, if we conquer the enemy,--what then? We +shall still have to keep him under, and it will cost as much to hold him +down as it did to get him down. Then comes the summer, and the fever +will drive our soldiers home; next winter, we must begin at the +beginning, and conquer him over again. What use, then, to take a fort, +or a privateer, or get possession of an inlet, or to capture a regiment +of rebels? + +But one weapon we hold which is sure. Congress can, by edict, as a part +of the military defence which it is the duty of Congress to provide, +abolish slavery, and pay for such slaves as we ought to pay for. Then +the slaves near our armies will come to us: those in the interior will +know in a week what their rights are, and will, where opportunity +offers, prepare to take them. Instantly, the armies that now confront +you must run home to protect their estates, and must stay there, and +your enemies will disappear. + +There can be no safety until this step is taken. We fancy that the +endless debate, emphasized by the crime and by the cannons of this war, +has brought the Free States to some conviction that it can never go well +with us whilst this mischief of Slavery remains in our politics, and +that by concert or by might we must put an end to it. But we have too +much experience of the futility of an easy reliance on the momentary +good dispositions of the public. There does exist, perhaps, a popular +will that the Union shall not be broken,--that our trade, and therefore +our laws, must have the whole breadth of the continent, and from Canada +to the Gulf. But, since this is the rooted belief and will of the +people, so much the more are they in danger, when impatient of defeats, +or impatient of taxes, to go with a rush for some peace, and what kind +of peace shall at that moment be easiest attained: they will make +concessions for it,--will give up the slaves; and the whole torment of +the past half-century will come back to be endured anew. + +Neither do I doubt, if such a composition should take place, that the +Southerners will come back quietly and politely, leaving their haughty +dictation. It will be an era of good feelings. There will be a lull +after so loud a storm; and, no doubt, there will be discreet men from +that section who will earnestly strive to inaugurate more moderate and +fair administration of the Government, and the North will for a time +have its full share and more, in place and counsel. But this will not +last,--not for want of sincere good-will in sensible Southerners, but +because Slavery will again speak through them its harsh necessity. It +cannot live but by injustice, and it will be unjust and violent to the +end of the world. + +The power of Emancipation is this, that it alters the atomic social +constitution of the Southern people. Now their interest is in keeping +out white labor; then, when they must pay wages, their interest will be +to let it in, to get the best labor, and, if they fear their blacks, to +invite Irish, German, and American laborers. Thus, whilst Slavery makes +and keeps disunion, Emancipation removes the whole objection to union. +Emancipation at one stroke elevates the poor white of the South, and +identifies his interest with that of the Northern laborer. + +Now, in the name of all that is simple and generous, why should not +this great right be done? Why should not America be capable of a second +stroke for the well-being of the human race, as eighty or ninety years +ago she was for the first? an affirmative step in the interests of human +civility, urged on her, too, not by any romance of sentiment, but by +her own extreme perils? It is very certain that the statesman who shall +break through the cobwebs of doubt, fear, and petty cavil that lie +in the way, will be greeted by the unanimous thanks of mankind. Men +reconcile themselves very fast to a bold and good measure, when once it +is taken, though they condemned it in advance. A week before the two +captive commissioners were surrendered to England, every one thought it +could not be done: it would divide the North. It was done, and in two +days all agreed it was the right action. And this action which costs so +little (the parties injured by it being such a handful that they can +very easily be indemnified) rids the world, at one stroke, of this +degrading nuisance, the cause of war and ruin to nations. This measure +at once puts all parties right. This is borrowing, as I said, the +omnipotence of a principle. What is so foolish as the terror lest the +blacks should be made furious by freedom and wages? It is denying these +that is the outrage, and makes the danger from the blacks. But justice +satisfies everybody,--white man, red man, yellow man, and black man. All +like wages, and the appetite grows by feeding. + +But this measure, to be effectual, must come speedily. The weapon is +slipping out of our hands. "Time," say the Indian Scriptures, "drinketh +up the essence of every great and noble action which ought to be +performed, and which is delayed in the execution." + +I hope it is not a fatal objection to this policy that it is simple and +beneficent thoroughly, which is the attribute of a moral action. An +unprecedented material prosperity has not tended to make us Stoics or +Christians. But the laws by which the universe is organized reappear at +every point, and will rule it. The end of all political struggle is +to establish morality as the basis of all legislation. It is not free +institutions, 't is not a republic, 't is not a democracy, that is the +end,--no, but only the means. Morality is the object of government. +We want a state of things in which crime shall not pay. This is the +consolation on which we rest in the darkness of the future and the +afflictions of to-day, that the government of the world is moral, and +does forever destroy what is not. + +It is the maxim of natural philosophers, that the natural forces wear +out in time all obstacles, and take place: and 't is the maxim of +history, that victory always falls at last where it ought to fall; or, +there is perpetual march and progress to ideas. But, in either case, +no link of the chain can drop out. Nature works through her appointed +elements; and ideas must work through the brains and the arms of good +and brave men, or they are no better than dreams. + + * * * * * + +Since the above pages were written, President Lincoln has proposed to +Congress that the Government shall coöperate with any State that shall +enact a gradual abolishment of Slavery. In the recent series of national +successes, this Message is the best. It marks the happiest day in the +political year. The American Executive ranges itself for the first time +on the side of freedom. If Congress has been backward, the President has +advanced. This state-paper is the more interesting that it appears to be +the President's individual act, done under a strong sense of duty. He +speaks his own thought in his own style. All thanks and honor to the +Head of the State! The Message has been received throughout the country +with praise, and, we doubt not, with more pleasure than has been spoken. +If Congress accords with the President, it is not yet too late to begin +the emancipation; but we think it will always be too late to make it +gradual. All experience agrees that it should be immediate. More and +better than the President has spoken shall, perhaps, the effect of this +Message be,--but, we are sure, not more or better than he hoped in his +heart, when, thoughtful of all the complexities of his position, he +penned these cautious words. + + * * * * * + + + COMPENSATION. + + + In the strength of the endeavor, + In the temper of the giver, + In the loving of the lover, + Lies the hidden recompense. + + In the sowing of the sower, + In the fleeting of the flower, + In the fading of each hour, + Lurks eternal recompense. + + + + +A MESSAGE OF JEFF DAVIS IN SECRET SESSION. + +CONJECTURALLY REPORTED BY H. BIGLOW. + + +_To the Editors of the_ ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + +Jaalam, 10th March, 1862. + +GENTLEMEN,--My leisure has been so entirely occupied with the hitherto +fruitless endeavour to decypher the Runick inscription whose fortunate +discovery I mentioned in my last communication, that I have not found +time to discuss, as I had intended, the great problem of what we are to +do with slavery, a topick on which the publick mind in this place is at +present more than ever agitated. What my wishes and hopes are I need +not say, but for safe conclusions I do not conceive that we are yet +in possession of facts enough on which to bottom them with certainty. +Acknowledging the hand of Providence, as I do, in all events, I am +sometimes inclined to think that they are wiser than we, and am willing +to wait till we have made this continent once more a place where +freemen can live in security and honour, before assuming any further +responsibility. This is the view taken by my neighbour Habakkuk +Sloansure, Esq., the president of our bank, whose opinion in the +practical affairs of life has great weight with me, as I have generally +found it to be justified by the event, and whose counsel, had I followed +it, would have saved me from an unfortunate investment of a considerable +part of the painful economies of half a century in the Northwest-Passage +Tunnel. After a somewhat animated discussion with this gentleman, a +few days since, I expanded, on the _audi alteram partem_ principle, +something which he happened to say by way of illustration, into the +following fable. + + FESTINA LENTE. + + Once on a time there was a pool + Fringed all about with flag-leaves cool + And spotted with cow-lilies garish, + Of frogs and pouts the ancient parish. + Alders the creaking redwings sink on, + Tussocks that house blithe Bob o' Lincoln. + Hedged round the unassailed seclusion, + Where muskrats piled their cells Carthusian; + And many a moss-embroidered log, + The watering-place of summer frog, + Slept and decayed with patient skill, + As watering-places sometimes will. + + Now in this Abbey of Theleme, + Which realized the fairest dream + That ever dozing bull-frog had, + Sunned on a half-sunk lily-pad, + There rose a party with a mission + To mend the polliwogs' condition, + Who notified the selectmen + To call a meeting there and then. + "Some kind of steps." they said, "are needed; + They don't come on so fast as we did: + Let's dock their tails; if that don't make 'em + Frogs by brevet, the Old One take 'em! + That boy, that came the other day + To dig some flag-root down this way, + His jack-knife left, and 't is a sign + That Heaven approves of our design: + 'T were wicked not to urge the step on, + When Providence has sent the weapon." + + Old croakers, deacons of the mire, + That led the deep batrachiain choir, + _Uk! Uk! Caronk!_ with bass that might + Have left Lablache's out of sight, + Shook knobby heads, and said, "No go! + You'd better let 'em try to grow: + Old Doctor Time is slow, but still + He does know how to make a pill." + + But vain was all their hoarsest bass, + Their old experience out of place, + And, spite of croaking and entreating, + The vote was carried in marsh-meeting. + + "Lord knows," protest the polliwogs, + "We're anxious to be grown-up frogs; + But do not undertake the work + Of Nature till she prove a shirk; + 'T is not by jumps that she advances, + But wins her way by circumstances: + Pray, wait awhile, until you know + We're so contrived as not to grow; + Let Nature take her own direction, + And she'll absorb our imperfection; + _You_ mightn't like 'em to appear with, + But we must have the things to steer with." + + "No," piped the party of reform, + "All great results are ta'en by storm; + Fate holds her best gifts till we show + We've strength to make her let them go: + No more reject the Age's chrism, + Your cues are an anachronism; + No more the Future's promise mock, + But lay your tails upon the block, + Thankful that we the means have voted + To have you thus to frogs promoted." + + The thing was done, the tails were cropped, + And home each philotadpole hopped, + In faith rewarded to exult, + And wait the beautiful result. + Too soon it came; our pool, so long + The theme of patriot bull-frogs' song, + Next day was reeking, fit to smother, + With heads and tails that missed each other,-- + Here snoutless tails, there tailless snouts: + The only gainers were the pouts. + + MORAL. + + From lower to the higher next, + Not to the top, is Nature's text; + And embryo Good, to reach full stature, + Absorbs the Evil in its nature. + +I think that nothing will ever give permanent peace and security to +this continent but the extirpation of Slavery therefrom, and that the +occasion is nigh; but I would do nothing hastily or vindictively, nor +presume to jog the elbow of Providence. No desperate measures for me +till we are sure that all others are hopeless,--_flectere si nequeo +SUPEROS, Acheronta movebo_. To make Emancipation a reform instead of +a revolution is worth a little patience, that we may have the Border +States first, and then the non-slaveholders of the Cotton States with us +in principle,--a consummation that seems to me nearer than many imagine. +_Fiat justitia, ruat coelum,_ is not to be taken in a literal sense by +statesmen, whose problem is to get justice done with as little jar as +possible to existing order, which has at least so much of heaven in it +that it is not chaos. I rejoice in the President's late Message, which +at last proclaims the Government on the side of freedom, justice, and +sound policy. + +As I write, comes the news of our disaster at Hampton Roads. I do not +understand the supineness which, after fair warning, leaves wood to an +unequal conflict with iron. It is not enough merely to have the right +on our side, if we stick to the old flint-lock of tradition. I have +observed in my parochial experience (_haud ignarus mali_) that the Devil +is prompt to adopt the latest inventions of destructive warfare, and may +thus take even such a three-decker as Bishop Butler at an advantage. It +is curious, that, as gunpowder made armour useless on shore, so armour +is having its revenge by baffling its old enemy at sea,--and that, while +gunpowder robbed land-warfare of nearly all its picturesqueness to give +even greater stateliness and sublimity to a sea-fight, armour bids fair +to degrade the latter into a squabble between two iron-shelled turtles. + +Yours, with esteem and respect, + +HOMER WILBUR, A.M. + +P.S. I had wellnigh forgotten to say that the object of this letter is +to inclose a communication from the gifted pen of Mr. Biglow. + + I sent you a messige, my friens, t' other day, + To tell you I'd nothin' pertickler to say: + 'T wuz the day our new nation gut kin' o' stillborn, + So't wuz my pleasant dooty t' acknowledge the corn, + An' I see clearly then, ef I didn't before, + Thet the _augur_ in inauguration means _bore_. + I needn't tell _you_ thet my messige wuz written + To diffuse correc' notions in France an' Gret Britten, + An' agin to impress on the poppylar mind + The comfort an' wisdom o' goin' it blind,-- + To say thet I didn't abate not a hooter + O' my faith in a happy an' glorious futur', + Ez rich in each soshle an' p'litickle blessin' + Ez them thet we now hed the joy o' possessin', + With a people united, an' longin' to die + For wut _we_ call their country, without askin' why, + An' all the gret things we concluded to slope for + Ez much within reach now ez ever--to hope for. + We've all o' the ellermunts, this very hour, + Thet make up a fus'-class, self-governin' power: + We've a war, an' a debt, an' a flag; an' ef this + Ain't to be inderpendunt, why, wut on airth is? + An' nothin' now henders our takin' our station + Ez the freest, enlightenedest, civerlized nation, + Built up on our bran'-new politickle thesis + Thet a Guv'ment's fust right is to tumble to pieces,-- + I say nothin' henders our takin' our place + Ez the very fus'-best o' the whole human race, + A-spittin' tobacker ez proud ez you please + On Victory's bes' carpets, or loafin' at ease + In the Tool'ries front-parlor, discussin' affairs + With our heels on the backs o' Napoleon's new chairs, + An' princes a-mixin' our cocktails an' slings,-- + Excep', wal, excep' jest a very few things, + Sech ez navies an' armies an' wherewith to pay, + An' gittin' our sogers to run t' other way, + An' not be too over-pertickler in tryin' + To hunt up the very las' ditches to die in. + + Ther' are critters so base thet they want it explained + Jes' wut is the totle amount thet we've gained, + Ez ef we could maysure stupenjious events + By the low Yankee stan'ard o' dollars an' cents: + They seem to forgit, thet, sence last year revolved, + We've succeeded in gittin' seceshed an' dissolved, + An' thet no one can't hope to git thru dissolootion + 'Thout sonic kin' o' strain on the best Constitootion. + Who asks for a prospec' more flettrin' an' bright, + When from here clean to Texas it's all one free fight? + Hain't we rescued from Seward the gret leadin' featurs + Thet makes it wuth while to be reasonin' creaturs? + Hain't we saved Habus Coppers, improved it in fact, + By suspending the Unionists 'stid o' the Act? + Ain't the laws free to all? Where on airth else d' ye see + Every freeman improvin' his own rope an' tree? + + It's ne'ssary to take a good confident tone + With the public; but here, jest amongst us, I own + Things looks blacker 'n thunder. Ther' 's no use denyin' + We're clean out o' money, an' 'most out o' lyin',-- + Two things a young nation can't mennage without, + Ef she wants to look wal at her fust comin' out; + For the fust supplies physickle strength, while the second + Gives a morril edvantage thet's hard to be reckoned: + For this latter I'm willin' to du wut I can; + For the former you'll hev to consult on a plan,-- + Though our _fust_ want (an' this pint I want your best views on) + Is plausible paper to print I.O.U.s on. + Some gennlemen think it would cure all our cankers + In the way o' finance, ef we jes' hanged the bankers; + An' I own the proposle 'ud square with my views, + Ef their lives wuzn't all thet we'd left 'em to lose. + Some say thet more confidence might be inspired, + Ef we voted our cities an' towns to be fired,-- + A plan thet 'ud suttenly tax our endurance, + Coz 't would be our own bills we should git for th' insurance; + But cinders, no metter how sacred we think 'em, + Mightn't strike furrin minds ez good sources of income, + Nor the people, perhaps, wouldn't like the eclaw + O' bein' all turned into paytriots by law. + Some want we should buy all the cotton an' burn it, + On a pledge, when we've gut thru the war, to return it,-- + Then to take the proceeds an' hold _them_ ez security + For an issue o' bonds to be met at maturity + With an issue o' notes to be paid in hard cash + On the fus' Monday follerin' the 'tarnal Allsmash: + This hez a safe air, an', once hold o' the gold, + 'Ud leave our vile plunderers out in the cold, + An' _might_ temp' John Bull, ef it warn't for the dip he + Once gut from the banks o' my own Massissippi. + Some think we could make, by arrangin' the figgers, + A hendy home-currency out of our niggers; + But it wun't du to lean much on ary sech staff, + For they're gittin' tu current a'ready, by half. + One gennleman says, ef we lef' our loan out + Where Floyd could git hold on 't, _he_'d take it, no doubt; + But 't ain't jes' the takin', though 't hez a good look, + We mus' git sunthin' out on it arter it's took, + An' we need now more 'n ever, with sorrer I own, + Thet some one another should let us a loan, + Sence a soger wun't fight, on'y jes' while he draws his + Pay down on the nail, for the best of all causes, + 'Thout askin' to know wut the quarrel's about,-- + An' once come to thet, why, our game is played out. + It's ez true ez though I shouldn't never hev said it + Thet a hitch hez took place in our system o' credit; + I swear it's all right in my speeches an' messiges, + But ther' 's idees afloat, ez ther' is about sessiges: + Folks wun't take a bond ez a basis to trade on, + Without nosin' round to find out wut it's made on, + An' the thought more an' more thru the public min' crosses + Thet our Treshry hez gut 'mos' too many dead hosses. + Wut's called credit, you see, is some like a balloon, + Thet looks while it's up 'most ez harnsome 'z a moon, + But once git a leak in 't an' wut looked so grand + Caves righ' down in a jiffy ez flat ez your hand. + Now the world is a dreffle mean place, for our sins, + Where ther' ollus is critters about with long pins + A-prickin' the globes we've blowcd up with sech care, + An' provin' ther' 's nothin' inside but bad air: + They're all Stuart Millses, poor-white trash, an' sneaks, + Without no more chivverlry 'n Choctaws or Creeks, + Who think a real gennleman's promise to pay + Is meant to be took in trade's ornery way: + Them fellers an' I couldn' never agree; + They're the nateral foes o' the Southun Idee; + I'd gladly take all of our other resks on me + To be red o' this low-lived politikle 'con'my! + + Now a dastardly notion is gittin' about + Thet our bladder is bust an' the gas oozin' out, + An' onless we can mennage in some way to stop it, + Why, the thing's a gone coon, an' we might ez wal drop it. + Brag works wal at fust, but it ain't jes' the thing + For a stiddy inves'ment the shiners to bring, + An' votin' we're prosp'rous a hundred times over + Wun't change bein' starved into livin' on clover. + Manassas done sunthin' tow'rds drawin' the wool + O'er the green, anti-slavery eyes o' John Bull: + Oh, _warn't_ it a godsend, jes' when sech tight fixes + Wuz crowdin' us mourners, to throw double-sixes! + I wuz tempted to think, an' it wuzn't no wonder, + Ther' wuz reelly a Providence,--over or under,-- + When, all packed for Nashville, I fust ascertained + From the papers up North wut a victory we'd gained, + 'T wuz the time for diffusin' correc' views abroad + Of our union an' strength an' relyin' on God; + An', fact, when I'd gut thru my fust big surprise, + I much ez half b'lieved in my own tallest lies, + An' conveyed the idee thet the whole Southun popperlace + Wuz Spartans all on the keen jump for Thermopperlies, + Thet set on the Lincolnites' bombs till they bust, + An' fight for the priv'lege o' dyin' the fust; + But Roanoke, Bufort, Millspring, an' the rest + Of our recent starn-foremost successes out West, + Hain't left us a foot for our swellin' to stand on,-- + + We've showed _too_ much o' wut Buregard calls _abandon_, + For all our Thermopperlies (an' it's a marcy + We hain't hed no more) hev ben clean vicy-varsy, + An' wut Spartans wuz lef' when the battle wuz done + Wuz them thet wuz too unambitious to run. + + Oh, ef we hed on'y jes' gut Reecognition, + Things now would ha' ben in a different position! + You'd ha' hed all you wanted: the paper blockade + Smashed up into toothpicks,--unlimited trade + In the one thing thet's needfle, till niggers, I swow, + Hed ben thicker 'n provisional shinplasters now,-- + Quinine by the ton 'ginst the shakes when they seize ye,-- + Nice paper to coin into C.S.A. specie; + The voice of the driver'd be heerd in our land, + An' the univarse scringe, ef we lifted our hand: + Wouldn't _thet_ be some like a fulfillin' the prophecies, + With all the fus' fem'lies in all the best offices? + 'T wuz a beautiful dream, an' all sorrer is idle,-- + But _ef_ Lincoln _would_ ha' hanged Mason an' Slidell! + They ain't o' no good in European pellices, + But think wut a help they'd ha' ben on their gallowses! + They'd ha' felt they wuz truly fulfillin' their mission, + An', oh, how dog-cheap we'd ha' gut Reecognition! + + But somehow another, wutever we've tried, + Though the the'ry's fust-rate, the facs _wun't_ coincide: + Facs are contrary 'z mules, an' ez hard in the mouth, + An' they allus hev showed a mean spite to the South. + Sech bein' the case, we hed best look about + For some kin' o' way to slip _our_ necks out: + Le''s vote our las' dollar, ef one can be found, + (An', at any rate, votin' it hez a good sound,)-- + Le''s swear thet to arms all our people is flyin', + (The critters can't read, an' wun't know how we're lyin',)-- + Thet Toombs is advancin' to sack Cincinnater, + With a rovin' commission to pillage an' slarter,-- + Thet we've throwed to the winds all regard for wut's lawfle, + An' gone in for sunthin' promiscu'sly awfle. + Ye see, hitherto, it's our own knaves an' fools + Thet we've used,--those for whetstones, an't' others ez tools,-- + An' now our las' chance is in puttin' to test + The same kin' o' cattle up North an' out West. + I----But, Gennlemen, here's a despatch jes' come in + Which shows thet the tide's begun turnin' agin,-- + Gret Cornfedrit success! C'lumbus eevacooated! + I mus' run down an' hev the thing properly stated, + An' show wut a triumph it is, an' how lucky + To fin'lly git red o' thet cussed Kentucky,-- + An' how, sence Fort Donelson, winnin' the day + Consists in triumphantly gittin' away. + + + + +REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES. + + +_The Sisters, Inisfail, and other Poems._ By AUBREY DE VERE. London. + +Whatever Mr. De Vere writes is welcomed by a select audience. Not taking +rank among the great masters of English poetry, he yet possesses a +genuine poetic faculty which distinguishes him from "the small harpers +with their glees" who counterfeit the true gift of Nature. In refined +and delicate sensibility, in purity of feeling, in elevation of tone, +there is no English writer of verse at the present day who surpasses +him. The fine instinct of a poet is united in him with the cultivated +taste of a scholar. There is nothing forced or spasmodic in his verse; +it is the true expression of character disciplined by thought and study, +of fancy quickened by ready sympathies, of feeling deepened and calmed +by faith. As is the case with most English poets since Wordsworth, he +invests the impressions received from the various aspects of Nature with +moral associations, and with fine spiritual insight he seeks out the +inner meaning of the external life of the earth. No one describes more +truthfully than he those transient beauties of Nature which in their +briefness and their exquisite variety of change elude the coarse grasp +of the common observer, and too frequently pass half unnoticed and +unfelt even by those whose temperament is susceptive of their inspiring +influences, but whose thoughts are occupied with the cares and business +of living. But it is especially as the poet of Ireland, and of the Roman +Church, that Mr. De Vere presents himself to us in this last volume; +and while, consequently, the subject and treatment of many of the poems +contained in it give to them a special rather than a universal interest, +the patriotic spirit and the fervor of faith manifest in them appeal +powerfully to the sympathies of readers in other countries and of other +creeds. "'Inisfail' may be regarded as a sort of National Chronicle, +cast in a form partly lyrical, partly narrative.... Its aim is to record +the past alone, and that chiefly as its chances might have been sung by +those old bards, who, consciously or unconsciously, uttered the voice +which comes from a people's heart." In this attempt Mr. De Vere has had +an uncommon measure of success. The strings of the Irish harp sound with +the cadences of fitting harmonies under his hand, as he sings of the +sorrows and the joys of Ireland, of the wild storms and the rare +sunshine of her pathetic history,--as he denounces vengeance on her +oppressors, or blesses the saints and the heroes who have made the land +dear and beautiful to its children. The key-note of the series of poems +which form this poetic chronicle is struck in the fine verses with which +it begins, entitled "History," and of which our space allows us to quote +but the opening stanza:-- + + "At my casement I sat by night, while the wind far off in dark valleys + Voluminous gathered and grew, and waxing swelled to a gale; + An hour I heard it, or more, ere yet it sobbed on my lattice: + Far off, 't was a People's moan; hard by, but a widow's wail. + Atoms we are, we men: of the myriad sorrow around us + Our littleness little grasps; and the selfish in that have no part: + Yet time with the measureless chain of a world-wide mourning hath + wound us; + History but counts the drops as they fall from a Nation's heart." + +One of the most vigorous poems in the volume is that called "The Bard +Ethell," and which represents this bard of the thirteenth century +telling in his old age of himself and his country, of his memories, and +of the wrongs that he and his land had alike suffered:-- + + "I am Ethell, the son of Conn; + Here I live at the foot of the hill; + I am clansman to Brian, and servant to none; + Whom I hated, I hate; whom I loved, love still." + +Here is a passage from near the end of this poem:-- + + "Ah me, that man who is made of dust + Should have pride toward God! 'T is an angel's sin! + I have often feared lest God, the All-Just, + Should bend from heaven and sweep earth clean, + Should sweep us all into corners and holes, + Like dust of the house-floor, both bodies and + souls; + I have often feared He would send some + wind + In wrath, and the nation wake up stone-blind! + In age or youth we have all wrought ill." + +But a large part of the volume before us is made up of poems that do not +belong to this Irish series, and the readers of the "Atlantic" will find +in it several pieces which they will recognize with pleasure as having +first appeared in our own pages, and which, once read, were not to be +readily forgotten. Mr. De Vere has expressed in several passages his +warm sympathy in our national affairs, and his clear appreciation of +the great cause, so little understood abroad, which we of the North are +engaged in upholding and maintaining. And although in these days of war +there is little reading of poetry, and little chance that this volume +will find the welcome it deserves and would receive in quieter times in +America, we yet trust that it will meet with worthy readers among those +who possess their souls in quietness in the midst of the noise of arms, +and to such we heartily commend it. + + +_A Book about Doctors_. By J. CORDY JEAFFRESON, Author of "Novels and +Novelists," "Crewe Else," etc., etc. New York: Rudd & Carleton. 12mo. + +Mr. Jeaffreson is not usually either a brilliant or a sensible man with +pen in hand, albeit he dates from "Rolls Chambers, Chancery Lane." He is +apt to select slow coaches, whenever he attempts a ride. His "Novels +and Novelists" is a sad move in the "deadly lively" direction, and his +"Crewe Rise" has not risen to much distinction among the reading crew. +In those volumes of departed rubbish he sinks very low, whenever he +essays to mount; but his dulness is innoxious, for few there be who can +say, "We have read him." His "Book about Doctors" is the best literary +venture he has yet made. It is not a dull volume. The anecdotes so +industriously collected keep attention alert, and one feels inclined to +applaud Mr. Jeaffreson as the leaves of his book are turned. + +Everything about Doctors is interesting. Here are a few Bible verses +which it will do no harm to quote in connection with Mr. Jeaffreson's +volume:-- + + "Honor a physician with the honor due + unto him for the uses which you have made + of him: for the Lord hath created him." + + "For of the Most High cometh healing, and + he shall receive honor of the king." + + "The skill of the physician shall lift up his + head; and in the sight of great men he shall + be in admiration." + + "The Lord hath created medicines out of + the earth; and he that is wise will not abhor + them." + +It was no unwise thing in Mr. Jeaffreson to bring so many noble men +together, as it were into one family. What "names embalmed" one meets +with in the collection! Here are Sydenham, Goldsmith, Smollett, Sir +Thomas Browne, and a golden line of other Doctors, nearly all the +way down to our own time. (Our well-beloved M.D. [Monthly Diamond] +contributor is too young to be included.) Keats is among the worthies, +although he got no farther into the mysteries than the apothecary's +counter. Meeting with this interesting series of splendid medicine-men +leads us to muse a good deal about the Faculty, and to re-read several +good anecdotes about the great symptom-watchers of the past and the +present day. + +When Sir Richard Blackmore asked the great Sydenham, "Prince of English +physicians," what he would advise him for medical reading, he is said to +have replied, "Read Don Quixote, Sir." Sensible and witty old man! + +We are struck with the cheerful character of nearly all the M.D.s +mentioned in the volume, and are constantly reminded of the advice we +once read of an old Doctor to a young one:--"Moreover, let me tell you, +my young doctor friend, that a cheerful face, and step, and neckcloth, +and button-hole, and an occasional hearty and kindly joke, a power of +executing and setting a-going a good laugh, are stock in our trade not +to be despised." + +"I may give an instance," says the same good-natured physician, "when +a joke was more and better than itself. A comely young wife, the +'cynosure' of her circle, was in bed, apparently dying from swelling and +inflammation of the throat, an inaccessible abscess stopping the way; +she could swallow nothing; everything had been tried. Her friends were +standing round the bed in misery and helplessness. '_Try her wi' a +compliment_,' said her husband, in a not uncomic despair. She had +genuine humor, as well as he; and an physiologists know, there is a sort +of mental tickling which is beyond and above control, being under the +reflex system, and instinctive as well as sighing. She laughed with her +whole body, and burst the abscess, and was well." + +Mr. Jeaffreson's book might be better, but it might be worse. We cannot +forgive him for his "Novels and Novelists" and his "Crewe Rise," two +works which go far to prove their author a person of indefatigable +incoherency; but we thank him for the industry which brought together so +much that is very readable about Doctors. + + +_John Brent_. By THEODORE WINTHROP, Author of "Cecil Dreeme." Boston: +Ticknor & Fields. 16mo. + +It is probable that we have not yet completely appreciated the value +of the bright and noble life which a wretched Rebel sharp-shooter +extinguished in the disastrous fight of Great Bethel. "John Brent" is +a book which gives us important aid in the attempt to form an adequate +conception of Winthrop's character. Its vivid pages shine throughout +with the author's brave and tender spirit. "Cecil Dreeme" was an +embodiment of his thoughts, observations, and imaginations; "John Brent" +shows us the inbred poetry and romance of the man in the grander form of +action. The scene is placed in the wild Western plains of America, among +men entirely free from the restraints of conventional life; and the +book has a buoyancy and brisk vitality, a dashing, daring, and jubilant +vigor, such as we are not accustomed to in ordinary romances of American +life. Sir Philip Sidney is the type of the Anglo-Saxon hero; but we +think that Winthrop was fully his match in delicacy and intrepidity, in +manly courage, and in sweet, instinctive tenderness. As to style, the +American far exceeds the Englishman. A certain conventional artifice and +dainty affectation clouded the clear and beautiful nature of Sidney, +when he wrote. The elaborate embroidery of thought, the stiff and +cumbrous Elizabethan _dress_ of language, with all its ruffles and +laces, make the "Arcadia" an imperfect exponent of Sidney's nature. +His intense thoughts, delicate emotions, and burning passions are half +concealed in the form he adopts for their expression. But Winthrop is as +fresh, natural, strong, and direct in his language as in his life. +He used words, not for ornament, but for expression. Every phrase is +stamped by a die supplied by reflection or feeling, and not a paragraph +in "John Brent" differs in spirit from the practical heroism which urged +the author to expose himself to certain death at Great Bethel. The +condensed, lucid, picturesque, and sharp-cut sentences, flooded with +will, show the nature of the man,--a man who announced no sentiments and +principles he was not willing to sacrifice himself to disseminate or +defend. A living energy of soul glows over the whole book,--swift, +fiery, brave, wholesome, sincere, impatient of all physical obstacles to +the operation of thought and affection, and eager to make stubborn facts +yield to the impatient pressure of spiritual purpose. + +We cannot say much in praise of the plot of "John Brent," but it at +least enables the author to supply a good framework for his incidents, +descriptions, and characters. The plot is based rather on possibilities +than probabilities; but the men and women he depicts are thoroughly +natural. It would be difficult to point to any other American novel +which furnishes incidents that can compare in vigor and vividness +with some of the incidents in this romance. The ride to rescue Helen +Clitheroe from her kidnappers is a masterpiece, worthy to rank with the +finest passages of Cooper or Scott. The fierce, swift black stallion, +"Don Fulano," a horse superior to any which Homer has immortalized, is +almost the hero of the romance. That Winthrop, with all his sympathy +with the "advanced" ideas and sentiments of the reformers and +philanthropists of the time, was not a mere prattling and scribbling +sentimentalist, is proved by his glorious idealization of this +magnificent horse. He raises the beast into a moral and intellectual +sympathy with his human rider, and there is a poetic justice in making +him die at last in an attempt to further the escape of a fugitive slave. + +The characterization of the book is original. Gerrian, Jake Shamberlain, +Armstrong, Sizzum, the Mormon preacher, are absolutely new creations. +Hugh Clitheroe may suggest Dickens's Skimpole and Hawthorne's Clifford, +but the character is developed under entirely new circumstances. As for +Wade and Brent, they are persons whom we all recognize as the old heroes +of romance, though the conditions under which they act are changed. +Helen, the heroine of the story, is a more puzzling character to the +critic; but, on the whole, we are bound to say that she is a new +development of womanhood. The author exhausts all the resources of his +genius in giving a "local habitation and a name" to this fond creation +of his imagination, and he has succeeded. Helen Clitheroe promises to be +one of those "beings of the mind" which will he permanently remembered. + +Heroism, active or passive, is the lesson taught by this romance, and +we know that the author, in his life, illustrated both phases of the +quality. His novels, which, when he was alive, the booksellers refused +to publish, are now passing through their tenth and twelfth editions. +Everybody reads "Cecil Dreeme" and "John Brent," and everybody must +catch a more or less vivid glimpse of the noble nature of their author. +But these books give but an imperfect expression of the soul of Theodore +Winthrop. They have great merits, but they are still rather promises +than performances. They hint of a genius which was denied full +development. The character, however, from which they derive their +vitality and their power to please, shines steadily through all the +imperfections of plot and construction. The novelist, after all, only +suggests the power and beauty of the man; and the man, though dead, will +keep the novels alive. Through them we can commune with a rare and noble +spirit, called away from earth before all its capacities of invention +and action were developed, but still leaving brilliant traces in +literature of the powers it was denied the opportunity adequately to +unfold. + + * * * * * + + +FOREIGN LITERATURE. + + +To keep pace with the productions of foreign literature is a task beyond +the possibilities of any reader. The bibliographical journals of France, +Germany, Italy, and Spain weekly present such copious lists of new +works, that a mere mention of only the principal ones would far exceed +the limits we have proposed to ourselves. However, from the chaos of +contemporary productions it is our intention to sift, as far as lies in +our power, such works as may with justice be styled _representative_ of +the country in which they are produced. Ranging in this introductory +article through the year 1861, we shall limit ourselves to a few of the +contributions upon French literary history. + +No branch of letters is richer at the present time than that in which +the writer, laying aside all thought of direct creativeness, confines +himself to the criticism of the works of the past or present, analyzing +and studying the influences that have been brought to hear upon the +poet, historian, or novelist, anatomizing literature and resolving it +into its elements, pointing out the action exercised upon thought and +expression by the age, and seeking the effects of these upon society +and politics as well as upon the general tastes and moral being of a +generation. Methods of writing are now discussed rather than put in +practice. We are in a transition age more than politically. Creative +genius seems to be resting for more marked and permanent channels to be +formed; so that, though every year gives birth to numberless works in +every branch of art, original production is rarer than the activity, the +restlessness of the time might lead us to expect. + +In no country has literary criticism more life than in France. It +engages the attention of the best minds. No writer, whatever be his +speciality, thinks it derogatory to give long and elaborate notices +in the daily press of new books or new editions of old books. Thus, +Sainte-Beuve in the "Moniteur," De Sacy, Saint-Marc Girardin, Philarète +Chasles, Prévost-Paradol in the "Journal des Débats," not to mention the +numerous writers of the "Revue des Deux Mondes," the "Européenne," and +the "Nationale," vie with each other in extracting from all that appears +what is most acceptable to the general reader. + +M. Sainte-Beuve may be taken as a type of the avowedly professional +critic. Whatever he may accomplish as the historian of Port-Royal, it is +to his weekly articles, informal and disconnected as they are, that he +owes his high rank among French authors. These "Causeries du Lundi" have +now reached the fourteenth volume.[A] In the last we find the same easy +admiration, facility of approbation, and suppleness that enable him to +praise the "Fanny" of Feydeau, calling it a poem, and on the next page +to do justice to the last volume of Thiers's "Consulate and Empire," +or to the recent publication of the Correspondence of Buffon. The most +important articles in the volume are those on Vauvenargues, on the Abbé +de Marolles, and on Bonstetten. + +[Footnote A: _Causeries du Lundi_. Par C.A. Sainte-Beuve, de l'Académie +Française. Tome Quatorziéme. Paris: Garnier Frères. 12mo. pp. 480.] + +Of quite a different school is M. Armand de Pontmartin, who, under the +titles of "Causeries du Samedi," "Causeries Littéraires," etc., has +now issued over a dozen volumes touching on all points of contemporary +letters, often very severe in their strictures. The last, "Les Semaines +Littéraires,"[B] contains notices of late works by Cousin, About, +Quinet, Laprade, and others, and concludes with an article on Scribe. +Pontmarlin represents the Catholic sentiment in literature. He measures +everything as it agrees or disagrees with Legitimacy and Ultramontanism. +His works are a continual defence of the Bourbons and the Pope. Modern +democracy he cannot pardon. Without seeking to deny the excesses and +shortcomings of his own party, he finds an explanation for all in the +levelling tendencies of the age. He cannot be too severe on the first +French Revolution and its results. "In letters," he tells us, "it has +led to materialism and anarchy, while the Bourbons personify for France +peace, glory," etc. + +[Footnote B: _Les Semaines Littéraires_. Troisième Série des Causeries +Littéraires. Par Armand de Pontmartin. Paris: Michel Lévy Frères. 12mo. +pp. 364.] + +Pontmartin is an able representative of the side he has taken. He +believes in and ably defends those heroes of literature so well +characterized as "Prophets of the Past," Chateaubriand, De Bonald, +and J. de Maistre. His special objects of antipathy are writers +like Michelet and Quinet, pamphleteers like About, and critics like +Sainte-Beuve. + +The last he cannot pardon for his work on Chateaubriand,[C] published in +the early part of the year 1861. The time is past for giving a fuller +account of this remarkable production of the historian of Port-Royal. +Suffice it to say, that, though it deals in very small criticism indeed, +though its author seems to have made it his task to sum up all the +weaknesses of one the prestige of whose name fills, in France at least, +the first half of this century, yet there exists no more valuable +contribution to the history of literature under the first Empire. It has +been called "a work no one would wish to have written, yet which is read +by all with exquisite pleasure." Nothing could be truer. + +[Footnote C: _Chateaubriand et son Groupe Littéraire sous l'Empire_. +Cours professé à Liége en 1848-1849, par C.A. Sainte-Beuve, de +l'Académie Française. Paris: Garnier Frères. 2 vols. 8vo. pp. 410, 457.] + +"Chateaubriand and his Literary Group under the Empire" is a course +of twenty-one lectures delivered by Sainte-Beuve at Liège, whither he +repaired soon after the Revolution of 1848 broke out in Paris. Fragments +of the work appeared in the "Revue des Deux Mondes," among others the +paper on Chênedollé, which forms the most interesting portion of the +second division. In this are to be found several original letters, now +published for the first time, casting much new light on the life of that +unfortunate poet. + +Of more general interest, however, are the pages on Chateaubriand +himself. It was the fate of this writer to be flattered beyond measure +in his lifetime, and now come the first judgments of posterity, which +deals with him no less harshly than it has already begun to deal +with another idol of the French people, Béranger. Sainte-Beuve has +constituted himself judge, reversing even his own adulatory articles, +as they may be read in the earlier volumes of the "Causeries." It is at +best an ungrateful task to dissect a reputation in the way in which we +find it done in the present work. It must seem strange to many a reader +that the very man who in early life could utter such sweet flattery, who +long was the foremost to bear incense, should now consider it his duty +"to seek the foot of clay beneath the splendid drapery, and to replace +about the statue the aromas of the sanctuary by the perfumes of the +boudoir." In spite of this, "Chateaubriand and his Literary Group" must +be ranked among the most remarkable of literary biographies. Here the +critic gives full scope to his inclination for minute analysis; the +history of the author of "René" explains his works, and these in turn +are made to tell his life,--that life so full of love of effect, and +constant painstaking to seem rather than to be. Even in his religious +sentiments the author of the "Genius of Christianity" appears lukewarm, +not to say more. + +In comprehensive works on literary history France is far from being +as rich as Germany. Beyond the native literature little has been +accomplished; and even in this, works of importance may be counted on +the fingers. The past year saw the conclusion of Nisard's work, the most +comprehensive history of French literature. The fourth volume[D] is +devoted to the eighteenth century, and concludes with a few general +chapters on the nineteenth. + +[Footnote D: _Histoire de la Literature Française_. Par D. Nisard, de +l'Académie Française, Inspecteur-Général de l'Enseignement Supérieur. +Tome Quatrième, Paris: Firmin Didot Frères, Fils, et Cie. 8vo. pp. 584.] + +The work of M. Gerusez, "History of French Literature from its Origin to +the Devolution,"[E] although it had the honor of being considered worthy +of the _prix Gobert_ by the French Academy, is far from satisfying the +requirements of general literary history. It may rather be considered +a systematic series of essays, beginning with the "Chansons de Geste," +analyzing several poems of the cycle of Charlemagne, and followed by +successive independent chapters on the Middle Ages, the revival of +letters, and modern times down to the Revolution. It will be remembered +that in 1859 M. Gerusez published a "History of Literature during the +French Revolution, 1789-1800." This also obtained a prize from the +Academy,--much more deservedly, we think, than the last production, when +we consider the interest he cast over the literary efforts of a period +much more marked by action than by artistic productiveness of any kind. +The German writer Schmidt-Weiszenfels in the same year issued a work +with the pretentious title, "History of the Revolution-Literature of +France."[F] This is little more than a declamatory production, wanting +in what is most characteristic of the German mind, original research. +The "Literary History of the National Convention," [G] by E. Maron, is +devoted more to politics than to letters. + +[Footnote E: Histoire de la Littérature Française, depuis ses Origines +jusqu'à la Revolution. Par Eugène Gerusez. Paris: Didier et Cie. 2 vols. +8vo. pp. 488, 507.] + +[Footnote F: _Geschichte der Französischen Revolutions-Literatur_, +1789-1795. Von Schmidt-Weiszenfels. Prague: Kober und Markgraf. 8vo. pp. +395.] + +[Footnote G: _Histoire Littéraire de la Convention Nationale_. Par +Eugène Maron. Paris: Poulet-Malassis et De Boise. 12mo. pp. 359.] + +To return to the volumes of M. Gerusez. It is rather a sign of poverty +in general literary history, that detached sketches, with little +connection beyond their chronological order, should have been deemed +worthy of the prize and the praises awarded to them. However, though +lacking in comprehensive views such as we have a right to expect from an +author who attempts to portray the rise, growth, and full expansion of +a literature, the work of M. Gerusez may be perused with pleasure and +profit by the student. It is clear and satisfactory in the details. +Thus, the pages devoted to the writers of the "Encyclopédie," though +few, may vie with any that have been written to set in their true light +men whose influence was so great on the generation that succeeded them. +If impartiality consisted in always steering in the _juste-milieu_, M. +Gerusez would be the most impartial of historians. As it is, we have to +thank him for a good book, regretting only that he has gone no farther. + +Far otherwise is it with M. Saint-Marc Girardin. The eloquent Sorbonne +professor has seen his fame increase with every new volume of his +"Course of Dramatic Literature." We have now the fourth volume.[H] "A +Course of Dramatic Literature";--it is more. It is the history of the +expression of Passion among the ancients and the moderns, by no means +confined to the drama. The present volume, as well as the third, +published several years ago, is devoted to the analysis of Love as +expressed in different ages and by different nations, under the two +divisions of _L'Amour Ingénu_ and _L'Amour Conjugal_. + +[Footnote H: _Cours de Littérature Dramatique._ Par Saint-Marc Girardin, +de l'Académie Française, Professeur à la Faculté des Lettres de Paris, +Membre du Conseil Impérial de l'Instruction Publique. Tome IV. Paris: +Charpentier.] + +The first he had studied in the authors of antiquity in his third +volume, beginning in this with the episode of Cupid and Psyche in +Apuleius; then following up, through the moderns, the expression +of Ingenuous Love in Corneille, La Fontaine, Sédaine, Bernardin de +Saint-Pierre, Milton, Gessner, Voss, André Chénier, and Chateaubriand. +For the last he finds more blame than praise. Indeed, this +effect-seeking writer, with all his genius, seemed less fitted than any +one to express the natural and spontaneous. His Atala, who charms us so +at the first reading, deals in studied emotions. As to René, his is the +vain sentimentality parading its own impotency for higher feelings, +a virtual boasting of want of soul,--the sickly dissatisfaction of +Werther, without his passion for an excuse. M. Saint-Marc Girardin then +follows up his subject through later authors, even in Madame George +Sand and in Madame Émile de Girardin. He is particularly severe upon +Lamartine, that poet "who for more than thirty years seemed best to +express love as our century understands it," but who in Raphael +and Graziella destroyed, by disclosing too much, the power of his +"Méditations Poétiques." + +On Conjugal Love the classic models are first consulted,--Oenone, +Evadne, Medea,--these characters being followed through the delineation +of modern dramatists. We know of no more exquisite criticism than +the pages devoted to Griseldis. Analyzing the accounts of Boccaccio, +Chaucer, and Perault, our author concludes with the play of "Munck +Bellinghausen." The last chapters, on "Love and Duty," are among the +most eloquently written in the volume. For style, M. Saint-Marc Girardin +is second to no living author of France. + +In this course we find an evident predilection for the models of +antiquity. When a comparison is instituted between the ancients and the +moderns, we feel pretty certain of the result before the writer has +proceeded very far. Not that we ever find a systematic idolizing of all +that is classic merely. Far from it. Modern writers are not neglected. +In this particular a genuine service is done to critical literature. It +often seems as if literary lecturers and historians were attacked by an +aesthetic presbyopy. For them the present age never produces anything +worth even a passing remark. The masterpieces they notice must be old +and time-honored. Not so in the present studies on the passions. Ponsard +finds his place side by side with older names. After an appreciative +notice of the Lucretia of Livy, we find a comment on the Lucretia which +may have been played the week before at the Théâtre Français. Nor is +it a slight service done to contemporary letters, when a master-critic +turns his thoughts to works which, if they do not hold the first rank, +yet, by the talent of their authors and the nature of their subjects, +have attracted all eyes for a time. Such are the writings of Madame +George Sand. Of these, "André," "La Mare au Diable," and "La Petite +Fadette" are reviewed with praise in the work under consideration, while +the force of criticism is expended on "Indiana," "Lelia," and "Jacques." + + * * * * * + +Whatever claims the academician Victor de Laprade may have to poetic +talent, he certainly sinks below mediocrity when he attempts to +discuss the principles of the art he practises. Since it has been his +good-fortune to be numbered among the illustrious Forty he has several +times attempted literary criticism, but never so extensively as in +his last work, "Questions d'Art et de Morale."[I] This is a series of +discursive essays, a few upon art in general, the greater part, however, +restricted to letters; the whole written in a poetic prose not without a +certain charm, but wearisome for continuous reading. + +[Footnote I: _Questions d'Art et de Morale._ Par Victor de Laprade, de +l'Académie Française. Paris: Didier et Cie. 8vo.] + +The object of M. de Laprade is to defend what he calls "Spiritualism in +Art." He wages an unrelenting war against the modern school of Realism. +It is not the representation of visible Nature that the artist must +seek; his aim must be "the representation of the invisible." He grows +eloquent when he develops his favorite theories, and always succeeds in +interesting when he applies them successively to all the arts. As to the +author's political opinions, he takes no pains to conceal them. His work +is an outcry against equality and universal suffrage. He traces the +apathy of poetic creativeness in France to the sovereignty usurped +everywhere "by the inferior elements of intelligence in the State." He +seems to think, that, as humanity grows older, art falls from its divine +ideal. Of contemporary architecture, he says that it can produce nothing +original save railroad depots and crystal palaces. "A glass architecture +is the only one that fully belongs to our age." Music, the "vaguest and +most sensuous of all the arts," he regards as the art of the present. +The religious worship of the future appears to him "a symphony with a +thousand instruments executed under a dome of glass." + +As to the purely literary essays of M. de Laprade, they may be read both +with more pleasure and more profit than those in which he attempts to +discuss the principles of aesthetics. "French Tradition in Literature," +and "Poetry, and Industrialism," are full of suggestive thoughts, and, +coming in the latter half of the volume, make us forget the pretentious +nature of the first. + + * * * * * + +M. Gustave Merlet is a more modest opponent of some of the tendencies +of the age. He presents his first book to the public under the title, +"Réalisme et Fantaisie,"[J] earnestly and loyally attacking the two +extremes of literature. + +[Footnote J: _Le Réalisme et la Fantaisie dans la Littérature_. Par +Gustave Merlet. Paris: Didier et Cie. 12mo. pp. 431.] + +Two styles of writing, diametrically opposed in every particular, have +of late years flourished in the lighter productions of France. Some +there are who would seek to incarnate in letters Nature as it is, +without adornings, without ideal additions. The cry of the upholders +of this doctrine is: Truth in art, war against the freaks of the +imagination that colors all in unreal tints. The writers who have +adopted such sentiments have been termed "Realists," much to their +dissatisfaction. Balzac was the greatest of them. Champfleury may be +called the most strenuous supporter of the system. There is a certain +force, a false air of truth, in this daguerreotype process of writing, +that seduces at first sight. When a man of some genius, as Gustave +Flaubert in "Madame Bovary," undertakes to paint Nature, he sets details +otherwise revolting in such relief that the very novelty and boldness of +the attempt put us off our guard, and we are in danger of admitting as +beauties what, after all, are only audacities. + +The other extreme into which the literature of the day in France has +fallen is an excess of fancy. A writer like Arsène Houssaye will write +his "King Voltaire" or his "Madame de Pompadour," or Capefigue his +"Madame de la Vallière," in which the judgment seems to have been +set aside, and historical facts accumulated in some opium-dream are +strangely woven into a narrative representing reality, with about as +much truth as Oriental arabesques, or the adornings of richly wrought +tapestry. This extreme is even more dangerous than the former, for it +makes of letters a mere plaything, and recommends itself to many by its +very faults. Paradox and overdrawn scenes usurp the place of the real. +The world presented by the exclusive worshippers of fancy is +little better than that "Pompadour" style of painting in which the +carnation-tipped checks of shepherds and shepherdesses take the place of +a too healthy Rubens-like portraiture. There are dainty, well-trimmed +lambs, with pretty blue favors tied about their necks, just like +_dragées_ and _bonbons_. As we wander among those opera-swains in silk +hose and those shepherdesses in satin bodices, their perfumes tire +and nauseate, till we fairly wish for a good breeze wafted from some +farm-yard, reconciled in a measure to the extravagances of the so-called +"school of Nature." + +M. Merlet's subject, it may be seen, is of interest merely to the +student of the latest French literature. A more comprehensive study +would not have been out of place in his volume. To those who may be +interested in writers like Murger, Feydeau, Houssaye, and Brifaut, the +book is full of interesting matter. To the general reader it may be of +value as characterizing with fidelity some of the tendencies of French +thought. + + * * * * * + +We must not omit mentioning a work published in Germany on the +"Literature of the Second Empire since the _Coup d'État_ of the Second +of December, 1852."[K] The nature of this sketch could almost be +predicated with certainty from the state of feeling towards France in +the capital in which it was issued, and the encomiums it received from +the Prussian political press. The author, William Reymond, who has +proved himself no mean critic in some of his former essays upon the +modern productions of France, addresses himself almost exclusively to a +German public. His work, as he himself seemed to fear, is not calculated +for the taste of Paris, even if it were considered unobjectionable there +on the score of the political strictures that are introduced, whether in +the discussion of the last play or in the analysis of the last volume of +poems. + +[Footnote K: _Études sur la Littérature du Second Empire Français, +depuis le Coup d'État du deux Decembre._ Par William Reymond. Berlin: A. +Charisius. 12mo. pp. 227.] + +The truth is, M. Reymond, with much apparent praise, very nearly comes +to the conclusion that the second Empire has no literature, and very +little philosophy is granted to it in the chapter, "What remains of +Philosophy in France." The Novel and the Theatre fare little better at +his hands. He has literally made a police investigation of what is most +objectionable in French letters, citing now and then some great name, +but dwelling with complacency on what is deserving of censure. The +influence of France, and of Paris in particular, on the tastes of the +Continent, irritates him. He seeks to impress upon his readers the +venality of letters and the general debasement of character and of +talent that are prevalent in that capital. Such is the spirit of these +"Études." The author has, unfortunately, not to seek far for a practical +corroboration of his theory, though it is but justice to say that the +verses he quotes as characteristic are far from being so. It is to be +feared that M. Reymond has rather sought out the blemishes. He has found +many, we admit. His readers will thank him for his clever exposition of +them, satisfied in many cases to accept the results he presents, without +feeling inclined to make such a personal investigation into the lower +regions of letters. + + * * * * * + +"The Political and Literary History of the Press in France,"[L] by +Eugene Hatin, is now concluded. As early as 1846, this author published +a small work, "Histoire du Journal en France." Since that time he has +devoted himself exclusively to the study of French journalism. Though +liberal in his views, he is not in favor of unlimited liberty of the +press. He believes it to be the interest of society that a curb should +be put on its excesses. "What we must hope for is a liberty that may +have full power for good, but not for evil." + +[Footnote L: _Histoire Politique et Littéraire de la Presse en France._ +Avec une Introduction Historique sur les Origines du Journal et la +Bibliographie Générale des Journaux, depuis leur Origine. Par Eugène +Hatin. Paris: Poulet-Malassis et De Boise. 8 vols. 12mo.] + +The two volumes published in 1861 contain the history of journalism +during the latter part of the French Revolution, under the first Empire, +the Restoration, and the Government of July. The work may be said to +conclude with 1848, as less than twenty pages are devoted to the twelve +years following. In this, however, the writer has done all he could be +expected to do. This is no time for the candid historian to utter his +thoughts of the present _régime_ in France. Since the fatal decree of +the 17th of February, 1852, the press has had only so much of life as +the present sovereign has thought fit to grant it. Then it was that a +representative of the people uttered the words,--"We must overthrow the +press, as we have overthrown the barricades." Such were the sentiments +of the National Assembly,--not understanding, that, when it struck at +such an ally, it destroyed itself. And, indeed, it was but a short time +before the tribune shared the fate of journalism. Better things had been +hoped on the accession of the present Minister of the Interior, but as +yet they have not been realized. + + + + +RECENT AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS + +RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS OF THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + + +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 of the U.S. +Army. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & Brothers. 16mo. paper, pp. 63. 25 +cts. + +The Artist's Married Life; being that of Albert Dürer. Translated from +the German of Leopold Scheffer, by Mrs. J.R. Stoddart. Revised Edition, +with Memoir. Boston and Cambridge. J. Munroe & Co. 16mo. pp. xxviii., +204. $1.00. + +Young Benjamin Franklin; or, The Right Road through Life. A Boy's Book +on a Boy's Own Subject. By Henry Mayhew, Author of "The Peasant-Boy +Philosopher," etc. With Illustrations by John Gilbert. New York. Harper +& Brothers. 16mo. pp. 561. $1.00. + +The Stokesley Secret; or, How the Pig paid the Rent. By the Author of +"The Heir of Redclyffe," etc. New York. D. Appleton & Co. 18mo. pp. 245. +50 cts. + +Chinese and Indo-European Roots and Analogues. First Number. By Pliny +Earle Chase, A.M. Philadelphia. Butler & Co. 8vo. paper, pp. 48. 50 cts. + +The Works of Charles Dickens. Household Edition. Illustrated from +Drawings by F.O.C. Darley and John Gilbert. Christmas Stories. In Two +Volumes. New York. J.G. Gregory. 16mo. pp. 300, 300. $1.50. + +Hickory Hall; or, The Outcast. A Romance of the Blue Ridge. By Mrs. Emma +D.E.N. Southworth. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & Brothers. 8vo. paper, +pp. 136. 50 cts. + +Alleghania: A Geographical and Statistical Memoir, exhibiting the +Strength of the Union and the Weakness of Slavery in the Mountain +Districts of the South. By James W. Taylor. St. Paul. J. Davenport. 8vo. +paper, pp. 24. 10 cts. + +A Treatise on Ordnance and Naval Gunnery. Compiled and arranged as a +Text-Book for the U.S. Naval Academy. By Lieutenant Edward Simpson, U.S. +Navy. Second Edition, revised and enlarged. New York. D. Van Nostrand. +8vo. pp. 493. $4.00. + +The Constitutional History of England, since the Accession of George the +Third. 1760-1860. By Thomas Erskine May, C.B. In Two Volumes. Vol. I. +Boston. Crosby & Nichols. 12mo. pp. 484. $1.25. + +Dinah. New York. C. Scribner. 12mo. pp. 466. $1.25. + +Tom Tiddler's Ground. Christmas and New-Year's Story for 1862. From +"All the Year Round." By Charles Dickens. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & +Brothers. 8vo. paper. pp. 64. 25 cts. + +A Pedestrian Tour of Thirty-Seven Days in the Alps of Switzerland and +Savoy. By Charles Henry Jones. Reading, Pa. J.L. Getz. 18mo. paper. pp. +118. 25 cts. + +Practical Christianity. A Treatise specially designed for Young Men. By +John S.C. Abbott. New York. Harper & Brothers. 16mo. pp. 302. 50 cts. + +The Sutherlands. By the Author of "Rutledge." New York. G.W. Carleton. +12mo. pp. 474. $1.25. + +Memoir of the Duchess of Orléans. By the Marquess de H. Together with +Biographical Souvenirs and Original Letters. Collected by Professor G.H. +de Schubert. Translated from, the French. Second Edition. New York. C. +Scribner. 12mo. pp. 391. $1.00. + +The Uprising of a Great People. The United States in 1861. To which is +added, A Word of Peace on the Difference between England and the United +States. From the French of Count Agénor de Gasparin. By Mary L. Booth. +New American Edition, from the Author's Revised Edition. New York. C. +Scribner. 12mo. pp. xiv., 298. 75 cts. + +Fort Lafayette; or, Love and Secession. A Novel. By Benjamin Wood. New +York. G.W. Carleton. 12mo. pp. 300. $1.00. + +The National School for the Soldier. An Elementary Work on Military +Tactics, in Question and Answer. Conforming to the Army-Regulations +adopted and approved by the War Department of the United States. By +Captain W.W. Van Ness. New York. G.W. Carleton. 24mo. pp. 75. 50 cts. + +The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus under the Constitution. By +Horace Binney. Philadelphia. T.B. Pugh. 16mo. pp. 52. 25 cts. + +The Army-Officer's Pocket-Companion; principally designed for +Staff-Officers in the Field. Partly translated from the French of M. de +Rouvre, Lieutenant-Colonel of the French Staff-Corps; with Additions +from Standard American, English, and French Authorities. By William P. +Craighill, First Lieutenant U.S. Corps of Engineers, Assistant Professor +of Engineering at the U.S. Military Academy. New York. D. Van Nostrand. +18mo. pp. 314. $1.50. + +Saint Gildas; or, The Three Paths. By Julia Kavanagh, Author of +"Nathalie," etc. Concord, N.H. E.C. Eastman. 16mo. pp. 219. 63 cts. + +Infantry Tactics, for the Instruction, Exercise, and Manoeuvres of the +Soldier, a Company, Line of Skirmishers, Battalion, Brigade, or Corps +d'Armée. By Brigadier-General Silas Casey, U.S. Army. In Three Volumes. +New York. D. Van Nostrand. 18mo. pp. 279, 272, 183. $2.50. + +A Text-Book of the History of Doctrines. By Dr. K.R. Hagenbach, +Professor of Theology in the University of Basle. The Edinburgh +Translation of C.W. Buch, revised, with Large Additions from the Fourth +German Edition, and other Sources. By Henry B. Smith, D.D., Professor in +the Union Theological Seminary of the City of New York. Volume II. New +York. Sheldon & Co. 8vo. pp. 558. $2.50. + +The True Story of the Barons of the South; or, The Rationale of the +American Conflict. By E.W. Reynolds, Author of "The Records of Bubbleton +Parish," etc. Boston. Walker, Wise, & Co. 16mo. pp. xii., 240. 75 cts. + +Charles O'Malley, the Irish Dragoon. By Charles Lever. Philadelphia. +T.B. Peterson & Brothers. 8vo. paper, pp. 324. 50 cts. + +The Flower of the Prairie. By Gustave Aimard. Philadelphia. T.B. +Peterson & Brothers. 8vo. paper, pp. 165. 50 cts. + +Mistakes of Educated Men. By John S. Hart, LL.D. Philadelphia. J.C. +Garrigues. 16mo. paper, pp. 77. 25 cts. + +A Strange Story. A Novel. By Sir E. Bulwer Lytton, Author of "The +Caxtons." With Illustrations. New York. Harper & Brothers. 8vo. paper, +pp. 195. 25 cts. + +Teach Us to Pray; being Experimental, Doctrinal, and Practical +Observations on the Lord's Prayer. By the Rev. John Cumming, D.D., +F.R.S.E., Author of "The Great Tribulation," etc. New York. G.W. +Carleton. 12mo. pp. 303. $1.00. + +The Law of Freedom and Bondage in the United States. By John Codman +Kurd, Counsellor-at-Law. In Two Volumes. Vol. II. Boston. Little, Brown, +& Co. New York. D. Van Nostrand. 8vo. pp. xliv., 800. $3.50. + +The Young Step-Mother; or, A Chronicle of Mistakes. By the Author of +"The Heir of Redclyffe," "Heartsease," etc. In Two Volumes. New York. D. +Appleton & Co. 16mo. pp. 294, 307. $1.50. + +A Primary Geography, on the Basis of the Object Method of Instruction. +Illustrated with Numerous Engravings and Pictorial Maps. By Fordyce A. +Allen, Principal of the Chester-County Normal School, West Chester, Pa. +Philadelphia. Lippincott & Co. 4to. pp. 56. 50 cts. + +Report of the Superintendent of Common Schools of Pennsylvania, for the +Year ending June 3, 1861. Harrisburg. Printed for the State. 8vo. pp. +254. + +The Works of Francis Bacon, Baron of Verulam, Viscount St. Albans, and +Lord High Chancellor of England. Collected and Edited by James Spedding, +M.A., of Trinity College, Cambridge; Robert Leslie Ellis, M.A., +late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge; and Douglas Denon Heath, +Barrister-at-Law, late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. Vol. III. +Boston. Brown & Taggard. 12mo. pp. 502. $1.50. + +The Spirit of the Hebrew Poetry. By Isaac Taylor, Author of "Saturday +Evening," etc., etc. With a Biographical Introduction by Wm. Adams, +D.D., Pastor of the Madison-Square Presbyterian Church, N.Y. New York. +G.W. Carleton. 8vo. pp. 386. + +Ethical and Physiological Inquiries, chiefly Relative to Subjects of +Popular Interest. By A.H. Dana. New York. C. Scribner. 12mo. pp. 308. +$1.00. + +The New American Cyclopaedia: A Popular Dictionary of General Knowledge. +Edited by George Ripley and Charles A. Dana. Volume XIV. Reed-Spire. New +York. D. Appleton & Co. 8vo. pp. 850, viii. $3.00. + +Tracts for Priests and People. By Various Writers. Boston. Walker, Wise, +& Co. 12mo. pp. 372. $1.00. + +Method of Teachers' Institutes, and the Theory of Education. By +Samuel P. Bates. A.M., Deputy-Superintendent of the Common Schools of +Pennsylvania, and Author of "Institute Lectures." New York. Barnes & +Burr. 8vo. pp. 75. 50 cts. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 54, +April, 1862, by Various + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12097 *** 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..25127fa --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #12097 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12097) diff --git a/old/12097-8.txt b/old/12097-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ab6d927 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/12097-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9358 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 54, April, 1862, 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, Vol. 9, No. 54, April, 1862 + +Author: Various + +Release Date: April 21, 2004 [EBook #12097] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY *** + + + + +Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Tonya Allen and PG Distributed +Proofreaders. Produced from page scans provided by Cornell University. + + + + + + +THE + +ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + +A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS. + +VOL. IX.--APRIL, 1862.--NO. LIV. + + + + +LETTER TO A YOUNG CONTRIBUTOR. + + +My dear young gentleman or young lady,--for many are the Cecil Dreemes +of literature who superscribe their offered manuscripts with very +masculine names in very feminine handwriting,--it seems wrong not to +meet your accumulated and urgent epistles with one comprehensive reply, +thus condensing many private letters into a printed one. And so large a +proportion of "Atlantic" readers either might, would, could, or should +be "Atlantic" contributors also, that this epistle will be sure of +perusal, though Mrs. Stowe remain uncut and the Autocrat go for an hour +without readers. + +Far from me be the wild expectation that every author will not +habitually measure the merits of a periodical by its appreciation of +his or her last manuscript. I should as soon ask a young lady not to +estimate the management of a ball by her own private luck in respect +to partners. But it is worth while at least to point out that in the +treatment of every contribution the real interests of editor and writer +are absolutely the same, and any antagonism is merely traditional, like +the supposed hostility between France and England, or between England +and Slavery. No editor can ever afford the rejection of a good thing, +and no author the publication of a bad one. The only difficulty lies in +drawing the line. Were all offered manuscripts unequivocally good or +bad, there would be no great trouble; it is the vast range of mediocrity +which perplexes: the majority are too bad for blessing and too good for +banning; so that no conceivable reason can be given for either fate, +save that upon the destiny of any single one may hang that of a hundred +others just like it. But whatever be the standard fixed, it is equally +for the interest of all concerned that it be enforced without flinching. + +Nor is there the slightest foundation for the supposed editorial +prejudice against new or obscure contributors. On the contrary, every +editor is always hungering and thirsting after novelties. To take the +lead in bringing forward a new genius is as fascinating a privilege as +that of the physician who boasted to Sir Henry Halford of having been +the first man to discover the Asiatic cholera and to communicate it to +the public. It is only stern necessity which compels the magazine to +fall back so constantly on the regular old staff of contributors, whose +average product has been gauged already; just as every country-lyceum +attempts annually to arrange an entirely new list of lecturers, and ends +with no bolder experiment than to substitute Chapin and Beecher in place +of last year's Beecher and Chapin. + +Of course no editor is infallible, and the best magazine contains an +occasional poor article. Do not blame the unfortunate conductor. He +knows it as well as you do,--after the deed is done. The newspapers +kindly pass it over, still preparing their accustomed opiate of sweet +praises, so much for each contributor, so much for the magazine +collectively,--like a hostess with her tea-making, a spoonful for each +person and one for the pot. But I can tell you that there is an official +person who meditates and groans, meanwhile, in the night-watches, to +think that in some atrocious moment of good-nature or sleepiness he left +the door open and let that ungainly intruder in. Do you expect him to +acknowledge the blunder, when you tax him with it? Never,--he feels it +too keenly. He rather stands up stoutly for the surpassing merits of the +misshapen thing, as a mother for her deformed child; and as the mother +is nevertheless inwardly imploring that there may never be such another +born to her, so be sure that it is not by reminding the editor of this +calamity that you can allure him into risking a repetition of it. + +An editor thus shows himself to be but human; and it is well enough to +remember this fact, when you approach him. He is not a gloomy despot, +no Nemesis or Rhadamanthus, but a bland and virtuous man, exceedingly +anxious to secure plenty of good subscribers and contributors, and very +ready to perform any acts of kindness not inconsistent with this +grand design. Draw near him, therefore, with soft approaches and mild +persuasions. Do not treat him like an enemy, and insist on reading your +whole manuscript aloud to him, with appropriate gestures. His time has +some value, if yours has not; and he has therefore educated his eye till +it has become microscopic, like a naturalist's, and can classify nine +out of ten specimens by one glance at a scale or a feather. Fancy an +ambitious echinoderm claiming a private interview with Agassiz, to +demonstrate by verbal arguments that he is a mollusk! Besides, do +you expect to administer the thing orally to each of the two hundred +thousand, more or less, who turn the leaves of the "Atlantic"? You are +writing for the average eye, and must submit to its verdict. "Do not +trouble yourself about the light on your statue; it is the light of the +public square which must test its value." + +Do not despise any honest propitiation, however small, in dealing with +your editor. Look to the physical aspect of your manuscript, and prepare +your page so neatly that it shall allure instead of repelling. Use good +pens, black ink, nice white paper and plenty of it. Do not emulate +"paper-sparing Pope," whose chaotic manuscript of the "Iliad," written +chiefly on the backs of old letters, still remains in the British +Museum. If your document be slovenly, the presumption is that its +literary execution is the same, Pope to the contrary notwithstanding. +An editor's eye becomes carnal, and is easily attracted by a comely +outside. If you really wish to obtain his good-will for your production, +do not first tax his time for deciphering it, any more than in visiting +a millionnaire to solicit a loan you would begin by asking him to pay +for the hire of the carriage which takes you to his door. + +On the same principle, send your composition in such a shape that it +shall not need the slightest literary revision before printing. Many a +bright production dies discarded which might have been made thoroughly +presentable by a single day's labor of a competent scholar, in shaping, +smoothing, dovetailing, and retrenching. The revision seems so slight +an affair that the aspirant cannot conceive why there should be so much +fuss about it. + + "The piece, you think, is incorrect; why, take it; + I'm all submission; what you'd have it, make it." + +But to discharge that friendly office no universal genius is salaried; +and for intellect in the rough there is no market. + +Rules for style, as for manners, must be chiefly negative: a positively +good style indicates certain natural powers in the individual, but an +unexceptionable style is merely a matter of culture and good models. Dr. +Channing established in New England a standard of style which really +attained almost the perfection of the pure and the colorless, and the +disciplinary value of such a literary influence, in a raw and crude +nation, has been very great; but the defect of this standard is that it +ends in utterly renouncing all the great traditions of literature, and +ignoring the magnificent mystery of words. Human language may be polite +and powerless in itself, uplifted with difficulty into expression by the +high thoughts it utters, or it may in itself become so saturated with +warm life and delicious association that every sentence shall palpitate +and thrill with the mere fascination of the syllables. The statue is +not more surely included in the block of marble than is all conceivable +splendor of utterance in "Worcester's Unabridged." And as Ruskin says of +painting that it is in the perfection and precision of the instantaneous +line that the claim to immortality is made, so it is easy to see that a +phrase may outweigh a library. Keats heads the catalogue of things real +with "sun, moon, and passages of Shakspeare"; and Keats himself has +left behind him winged wonders of expression which are not surpassed by +Shakspeare, or by any one else who ever dared touch the English tongue. +There may be phrases which shall be palaces to dwell in, treasure-houses +to explore; a single word may be a window from which one may perceive +all the kingdoms of the earth and the glory of them. Oftentimes a word +shall speak what accumulated volumes have labored in vain to utter: +there may be years of crowded passion in a word, and half a life in a +sentence. + +Such being the majesty of the art you seek to practise, you can at least +take time and deliberation before dishonoring it. Disabuse yourself +especially of the belief that any grace or flow of style can come from +writing rapidly. Haste can make you slipshod, but it can never make +you graceful. With what dismay one reads of the wonderful fellows in +fashionable novels, who can easily dash off a brilliant essay in a +single night! When I think how slowly my poor thoughts come in, how +tardily they connect themselves, what a delicious prolonged perplexity +it is to cut and contrive a decent clothing of words for them, as a +little girl does for her doll,--nay, how many new outfits a single +sentence sometimes costs before it is presentable, till it seems at +last, like our army on the Potomac, as if it never could be thoroughly +clothed,--I certainly should never dare to venture into print, but for +the confirmed suspicion that the greatest writers have done even so. I +can hardly believe that there is any autograph in the world so precious +or instructive as that scrap of paper, still preserved at Ferrara, on +which Ariosto wrote in sixteen different revisions one of his most +famous stanzas. Do you know, my dear neophyte, how Balzac used to +compose? As a specimen of the labor that sometimes goes to make an +effective style, the process is worth recording. When Balzac had a new +work in view, he first spent weeks in studying from real life for it, +haunting the streets of Paris by day and night, note-book in hand. His +materials gained, he shut himself up till the book was written, perhaps +two months, absolutely excluding everybody but his publisher. He emerged +pale and thin, with the complete manuscript in his hand,--not only +written, but almost rewritten, so thoroughly was the original copy +altered, interlined, and rearranged. This strange production, almost +illegible, was sent to the unfortunate printers; with infinite +difficulty a proof-sheet was obtained, which, being sent to the author, +was presently returned in almost as hopeless a chaos of corrections as +the manuscript first submitted. Whole sentences were erased, others +transposed, everything modified. A second and a third followed, alike +torn to pieces by the ravenous pen of Balzac. The despairing printers +labored by turns, only the picked men of the office being equal to the +task, and they relieving each other at hourly intervals, as beyond +that time no one could endure the fatigue. At last, by the fourth +proof-sheet, the author too was wearied out, though not contented. "I +work ten hours out of the twenty-four," said he, "over the elaboration +of my unhappy style, and I am never satisfied, myself, when all is +done." + +Do not complain that this scrupulousness is probably wasted, after all, +and that nobody knows. The public knows. People criticize higher than +they attain. When the Athenian audience hissed a public speaker for a +mispronunciation, it did not follow that any one of the malcontents +could pronounce as well as the orator. In our own lyceum-audiences there +may not be a man who does not yield to his own private eccentricities of +dialect, but see if they do not appreciate elegant English from Phillips +or Everett! Men talk of writing down to the public taste who have never +yet written up to that standard. "There never yet was a good tongue," +said old Fuller, "that wanted ears to hear it." If one were expecting to +be judged by a few scholars only, one might hope somehow to cajole them; +but it is this vast, unimpassioned, unconscious tribunal, this average +judgment of intelligent minds, which is truly formidable,--something +more undying than senates and more omnipotent than courts, something +which rapidly cancels all transitory reputations, and at last becomes +the organ of eternal justice and infallibly awards posthumous fame. + +The first demand made by the public upon every composition is, of +course, that it should be attractive. In addressing a miscellaneous +audience, whether through eye or ear, it is certain that no man living +has a right to be tedious. Every editor is therefore compelled to insist +that his contributors should make themselves agreeable, whatever else +they may do. To be agreeable, it is not necessary to be amusing; an +essay may be thoroughly delightful without a single witticism, while a +monotone of jokes soon grows tedious. Charge your style with life, +and the public will not ask for conundrums. But the profounder your +discourse, the greater must necessarily be the effort to refresh and +diversify. I have observed, in addressing audiences of children in +schools and elsewhere, that there is no fact so grave, no thought so +abstract, but you can make it very interesting to the small people, if +you will only put in plenty of detail and illustration; and I have not +observed that in this respect grown men are so very different. If, +therefore, in writing, you find it your mission to be abstruse, fight to +render your statement clear and attractive, as if your life depended on +it: your literary life does depend on it, and, if you fail, relapses +into a dead language, and becomes, like that of Coleridge, only a +_Biographia Literaria_. Labor, therefore, not in thought alone, but in +utterance; clothe and reclothe your grand conception twenty times, until +you find some phrase that with its grandeur shall be lucid also. It is +this unwearied literary patience that has enabled Emerson not merely to +introduce, but even to popularize, thoughts of such a quality as never +reached the popular mind before. And when such a writer, thus laborious +to do his utmost for his disciples, becomes after all incomprehensible, +we can try to believe that it is only that inevitable obscurity of vast +thought which Coleridge said was a compliment to the reader. + +In learning to write availably, a newspaper-office is a capital +preparatory school. Nothing is so good to teach the use of materials, +and to compel to pungency of style. Being always at close quarters with +his readers, a journalist must shorten and sharpen his sentences, or he +is doomed. Yet this mental alertness is bought at a severe price; such +living from hand to mouth cheapens the whole mode of intellectual +existence, and it would seem that no successful journalist could ever +get the newspaper out of his blood, or achieve any high literary +success. + +For purposes of illustration and elucidation, and even for amplitude of +vocabulary, wealth of accumulated materials is essential; and whether +this wealth be won by reading or by experience makes no great +difference. Coleridge attended Davy's chemical lectures to acquire new +metaphors, and it is of no consequence whether one comes to literature +from a library, a machine-shop, or a forecastle, provided he has learned +to work with thoroughness the soil he knows. After all is said and done, +however, books remain the chief quarries. Johnson declared, putting the +thing perhaps too mechanically, "The greater part of an author's time is +spent in reading in order to write; a man will turn over half a library +to make one book." Addison collected three folios of materials before +publishing the first number of the "Spectator." Remember, however, that +copious preparation has its perils also, in the crude display to which +it tempts. The object of high culture is not to exhibit culture, but +its results. You do not put guano on your garden that your garden may +blossom guano. Indeed, even for the proper subordination of one's own +thoughts the same self-control is needed; and there is no severer test +of literary training than in the power to prune out one's most cherished +sentence, when it grows obvious that the sacrifice will help the +symmetry or vigor of the whole. + +Be noble both in the affluence and the economy of your diction; spare +no wealth that you can put in, and tolerate no superfluity that can be +struck out. Remember the Lacedemonian who was fined for saying that in +three words which might as well have been expressed in two. Do not throw +a dozen vague epithets at a thing, in the hope that some one of them +will fit; but study each phrase so carefully that the most ingenious +critic cannot alter it without spoiling the whole passage for everybody +but himself. For the same reason do not take refuge, as was the +practice a few years since, in German combinations, heart-utterances, +soul-sentiments, and hyphenized phrases generally; but roll your thought +into one good English word. There is no fault which seems so hopeless as +commonplaceness, but it is really easier to elevate the commonplace +than to reduce the turgid. How few men in all the pride of culture can +emulate the easy grace of a bright woman's letter! + +Have faith enough in your own individuality to keep it resolutely down +for a year or two. A man has not much intellectual capital who cannot +treat himself to a brief interval of modesty. Premature individualism +commonly ends either in a reaction against the original whims, or in a +mannerism which perpetuates them. For mannerism no one is great enough, +because, though in the hands of a strong man it imprisons us in novel +fascination, yet we soon grow weary, and then hate our prison forever. +How sparkling was Reade's crisp brilliancy in "Peg Woffington"!--but +into what disagreeable affectations it has since degenerated! Carlyle +was a boon to the human race, amid the lameness into which English style +was declining; but who is not tired of him and his catchwords now? He +was the Jenner of our modern style, inoculating and saving us all by his +quaint frank Germanism, then dying of his own disease. Now the age has +outgrown him, and is approaching a mode of writing which unites the +smoothness of the eighteenth century with the vital vigor of the +seventeenth, so that Sir Thomas Browne and Andrew Marvell seem quite as +near to us as Pope or Addison,--a style penetrated with the best spirit +of Carlyle, without a trace of Carlylism. + +Be neither too lax nor too precise in your use of language: the one +fault ends in stiffness, the other in slang. Some one told the Emperor +Tiberius that he might give citizenship to men, but not to words. To be +sure, Louis XIV. in childhood, wishing for a carriage, called for _mon +carrosse_, and made the former feminine a masculine to all future +Frenchmen. But do not undertake to exercise these prerogatives of +royalty until you are quite sure of being crowned. The only thing I +remember of our college text-book of Rhetoric is one admirable verse of +caution which it quoted:-- + + "In words, as fashions, the same rule will hold, + Alike fantastic, if too new or old; + Be not the first by whom the new are tried, + Nor yet the last to lay the old aside." + +Especially do not indulge any fantastic preference for either Latin or +Anglo-Saxon, the two great wings on which our magnificent English soars +and sings; we can spare neither. The combination gives an affluence of +synonymes and a delicacy of discrimination such as no unmixed idiom can +show. + +While you utterly shun slang, whether native-or foreign-born,--(at +present, by the way, our popular writers use far less slang than the +English,)--yet do not shrink from Americanisms, so they be good ones. +American literature is now thoroughly out of leading-strings; and the +nation which supplied the first appreciative audience for Carlyle, +Tennyson, and the Brownings, can certainly trust its own literary +instincts to create the new words it needs. To be sure, the inelegancies +with which we are chiefly reproached are not distinctively American: +Burke uses "pretty considerable"; Miss Burney says, "I trembled a +few"; the English Bible says "reckon," Locke has "guess," and Southey +"realize," in the exact senses in which one sometimes hears them used +colloquially here. Nevertheless such improprieties are of course to be +avoided; but whatever good Americanisms exist, let us hold to them by +all means. The diction of Emerson alone is a sufficient proof, by its +unequalled range and precision, that no people in the world ever had +access to a vocabulary so rich and copious as we are acquiring. To +the previous traditions and associations of the English tongue we add +resources of contemporary life such as England cannot rival. Political +freedom makes every man an individual; a vast industrial activity makes +every man an inventor, not merely of labor-saving machines, but of +labor-saving words; universal schooling popularizes all thought and +sharpens the edge of all language. We unconsciously demand of our +writers the same dash and the same accuracy which we demand in +railroading or dry-goods-jobbing. The mixture of nationalities is +constantly coining and exchanging new felicities of dialect: Ireland, +Scotland, Germany, Africa are present everywhere with their various +contributions of wit and shrewdness, thought and geniality; in New York +and elsewhere one finds whole thoroughfares of France, Italy, Spain, +Portugal; on our Western railways there are placards printed in Swedish; +even China is creeping in. The colonies of England are too far and too +provincial to have had much reflex influence on her literature, but +how our phraseology is already amplified by our relations with +Spanish-America! The life-blood of Mexico flowed into our newspapers +while the war was in progress; and the gold of California glitters in +our primer: Many foreign cities may show a greater variety of mere +national costumes, but the representative value of our immigrant tribes +is far greater from the very fact that they merge their mental costume +in ours. Thus the American writer finds himself among his phrases like +an American sea-captain amid his crew: a medley of all nations, waiting +for the strong organizing New-England mind to mould them into a unit of +force. + +There are certain minor matters, subsidiary to elegance, if not +elegancies, and therefore worth attention. Do not habitually prop your +sentences on crutches, such as Italics and exclamation-points, but make +them stand without aid; if they cannot emphasize themselves, these +devices are commonly but a confession of helplessness. Do not leave +loose ends as you go on, straggling things, to be caught up and dragged +along uneasily in foot-notes, but work them all in neatly, as Biddy at +her bread-pan gradually kneads in all the outlying bits of dough, till +she has one round and comely mass. + +Reduce yourself to short allowance of parentheses and dashes; if you +employ them merely from clumsiness, they will lose all their proper +power in your hands. Economize quotation-marks also, clear that dust +from your pages, assume your readers to be acquainted with the current +jokes and the stock epithets: all persons like the compliment of having +it presumed that they know something, and prefer to discover the wit or +beauty of your allusion without a guide-board. + +The same principle applies to learned citations and the results of +study. Knead these thoroughly in, supplying the maximum of desired +information with a minimum of visible schoolmaster. It requires no +pedantic mention of Euclid to indicate a mathematical mind, but only the +habitual use of clear terms and close connections. To employ in argument +the forms of Whately's Logic would render it probable that you are +juvenile and certain that you are tedious; wreathe the chain with roses. +The more you have studied foreign languages, the more you will be +disposed to keep Ollendorff in the background: the proper result of such +acquirements is visible in a finer ear for words; so that Goethe said, +the man who had studied but one language could not know that one. But +spare the raw material; deal as cautiously in Latin as did General +Jackson when Jack Downing was out of the way; and avoid French as some +fashionable novelists avoid English. + +Thus far, these are elementary and rather technical suggestions, fitted +for the very opening of your literary career. Supposing you fairly in +print, there are needed some further counsels. + +Do not waste a minute, not a second, in trying to demonstrate to others +the merit of your own performance. If your work does not vindicate +itself, you cannot vindicate it, but you can labor steadily on to +something which needs no advocate but itself. It was said of Haydon, +the English artist, that, if he had taken half the pains to paint great +pictures that he took to persuade the public he had painted them, his +fame would have been secure. Similar was the career of poor Horne, who +wrote the farthing epic of "Orion" with one grand line in it, and a +prose work without any, on "The False Medium excluding Men of Genius +from the Public." He spent years in ineffectually trying to repeal the +exclusion in his own case, and has since manfully gone to the grazing +regions in Australia, hoping there at least to find the sheep and the +goats better discriminated. Do not emulate these tragedies. Remember how +many great writers have created the taste by which they were enjoyed, +and do not be in a hurry. Toughen yourself a little, and perform +something better. Inscribe above your desk the words of Rivarol, "Genius +is only great patience." It takes less time to build an avenue of +shingle palaces than to hide away unseen, block by block, the vast +foundation-stones of an observatory. Most by-gone literary fames have +been very short-lived in America, because they have lasted no longer +than they deserved. Happening the other day to recur to a list of +Cambridge lyceum-lecturers in my boyish days, I find with dismay that +the only name now popularly remembered is that of Emerson: death, +oblivion, or a professorship has closed over all the rest, while the +whole standard of American literature has been vastly raised meanwhile, +and no doubt partly through their labors. To this day, some of our most +gifted writers are being dwarfed by the unkind friendliness of too early +praise. It was Keats, the most precocious of all great poets, the stock +victim of critical assassination,--though the charge does him utter +injustice,--who declared that "nothing is finer for purposes of +production than a very gradual ripening of the intellectual powers." + +Yet do not be made conceited by obscurity, any more than by notoriety. +Many fine geniuses have been long neglected; but what would become +of us, if all the neglected were to turn out geniuses? It is unsafe +reasoning from either extreme. You are not necessarily writing like +Holmes because your reputation for talent began in college, nor like +Hawthorne because you have been before the public ten years without an +admirer. Above all, do not seek to encourage yourself by dwelling on +the defects of your rivals: strength comes only from what is above you. +Northcote, the painter, said, that, in observing an inferior picture, +he always felt his spirits droop, with the suspicion that perhaps he +deceived himself and his own paintings were no better; but the works of +the mighty masters always gave him renewed strength, in the hope that +perhaps his own had in their smaller way something of the same divine +quality. + +Do not complacently imagine, because your first literary attempt proved +good and successful, that your second will doubtless improve upon it. +The very contrary sometimes happens. A man dreams for years over +one projected composition, all his reading converges to it, all his +experience stands related to it, it is the net result of his existence +up to a certain time, it is the cistern into which he pours his +accumulated life. Emboldened by success, he mistakes the cistern for a +fountain, and instantly taps his brain again. The second production, +as compared with the first, costs but half the pains and attains but +a quarter part of the merit; a little more of fluency and facility +perhaps,--but the vigor, the wealth, the originality, the head of water, +in short, are wanting. One would think that almost any intelligent man +might write one good thing in a lifetime, by reserving himself long +enough: it is the effort after quantity which proves destructive. The +greatest man has passed his zenith, when he once begins to cheapen +his style of work and sink into a book-maker: after that, though the +newspapers may never hint at it, nor his admirers own it, the decline of +his career is begun. + +Yet the author is not alone to blame for this, but also the world which +first tempts and then reproves him. Goethe says, that, if a person once +does a good thing, society forms a league to prevent his doing another. +His seclusion is gone, and therefore his unconsciousness and his +leisure; luxuries tempt him from his frugality, and soon he must toil +for luxuries; then, because he has done one thing well, he is urged +to squander himself and do a thousand things badly. In this country +especially, if one can learn languages, he must go to Congress; if he +can argue a case, he must become agent of a factory: out of this comes +a variety of training which is very valuable, but a wise man must +have strength to call in his resources before middle-life, prune off +divergent activities, and concentrate himself on the main work, be it +what it may. It is shameful to see the indeterminate lives of many of +our gifted men, unable to resist the temptations of a busy land, and so +losing themselves in an aimless and miscellaneous career. + +Yet it is unjust and unworthy in Marsh to disfigure his fine work on the +English language by traducing all who now write that tongue. "None seek +the audience, fit, though few, which contented the ambition of Milton, +and all writers for the press now measure their glory by their gains," +and so indefinitely onward,--which is simply cant. Does Sylvanus Cobb, +Jr., who honestly earns his annual five thousand dollars from the "New +York Ledger," take rank as head of American literature by virtue of his +salary? Because the profits of true literature are rising,--trivial as +they still are beside those of commerce or the professions,--its merits +do not necessarily decrease, but the contrary is more likely to happen; +for in this pursuit, as in all others, cheap work is usually poor work. +None but gentlemen of fortune can enjoy the bliss of writing for nothing +and paying their own printer. Nor does the practice of compensation by +the page work the injury that has often been ignorantly predicted. No +contributor need hope to cover two pages of a periodical with what might +be adequately said in one, unless he assumes his editor to be as foolish +as himself. The Spartans exiled Ctesiphon for bragging that he could +speak the whole day on any subject selected; and a modern magazine is of +little value, unless it has a Spartan at its head. + +Strive always to remember--though it does not seem intended that we +should quite bring it home to ourselves--that "To-Day is a king in +disguise," and that this American literature of ours will be just as +classic a thing, if we do our part, as any which the past has treasured. +There is a mirage over all literary associations. Keats and Lamb seem to +our young people to be existences as remote and legendary as Homer, yet +it is not an old man's life since Keats was an awkward boy at the +door of Hazlitt's lecture-room, and Lamb was introducing Talfourd to +Wordsworth as his own only admirer. In reading Spence's "Anecdotes," +Pope and Addison appear no farther off; and wherever I open Bacon's +"Essays," I am sure to end at last with that one magical sentence, +annihilating centuries, "When I was a child, and Queen Elizabeth was in +the flower of her years." + +And this imperceptible transformation of the commonplace present into +the storied past applies equally to the pursuits of war and to the +serenest works of peace. Be not misled by the excitements of the moment +into overrating the charms of military life. In this chaos of uniforms, +we seem to be approaching times such as existed in England after +Waterloo, when the splenetic Byron declared that the only distinction +was to be a little undistinguished. No doubt, war brings out grand +and unexpected qualities, and there is a perennial fascination in the +Elizabethan Raleighs and Sidneys, alike heroes of pen and sword. But the +fact is patent, that there is scarcely any art whose rudiments are +so easy to acquire as the military; the manuals of tactics have +no difficulties comparable to those of the ordinary professional +text-books; and any one who can drill a boat's crew or a ball-club can +learn in a very few weeks to drill a company or even a regiment. Given +in addition the power to command, to organize, and to execute,--high +qualities, though not rare in this community,--and you have a man +needing but time and experience to make a general. More than this can be +acquired only by an exclusive absorption in this one art; as Napoleon +said, that, to have good soldiers, a nation must be always at war. + +If, therefore, duty and opportunity call, count it a privilege to obtain +your share in the new career; throw yourself into it as resolutely and +joyously as if it were a summer-campaign in the Adirondack, but never +fancy for a moment that you have discovered any grander or manlier life +than you might be leading every day at home. It is not needful here to +decide which is intrinsically the better thing, a column of a newspaper +or a column of attack, Wordsworth's "Lines on Immortality" or +Wellington's Lines of Torres Vedras; each is noble, if nobly done, +though posterity seems to remember literature the longest. The writer +is not celebrated for having been the favorite of the conqueror, but +sometimes the conqueror only for having favored or even for having +spurned the writer. "When the great Sultan died, his power and glory +departed from him, and nothing remained but this one fact, that he knew +not the worth of Ferdousi." There is a slight delusion in this dazzling +glory. What a fantastic whim the young lieutenants thought it, when +General Wolfe, on the eve of battle, said of Gray's "Elegy," "Gentlemen, +I would rather have written that poem than have taken Quebec." Yet, +no doubt, it is by the memory of that remark that Wolfe will live the +longest,--aided by the stray line of another poet, still reminding us, +not needlessly, that "Wolfe's great name's cotemporal with our own." + +Once the poets and the sages were held to be pleasing triflers, fit for +hours of relaxation in the lulls of war. Now the pursuits of peace are +recognized as the real, and war as the accidental. It interrupts +all higher avocations, as does the cry of fire: when the fire is +extinguished, the important affairs of life are resumed. Six years ago +the London "Times" was bewailing that all thought and culture in England +were suspended by the Crimean War. "We want no more books. Give us good +recruits, at least five feet seven, a good model for a floating-battery, +and a gun to take effect at five thousand yards,--and Whigs and Tories, +High and Low Church, the poets, astronomers, and critics, may settle it +among themselves." How remote seems that epoch now! and how remote will +the present soon appear! while art and science will resume their sway +serene, beneath skies eternal. Yesterday I turned from treatises on +gunnery and fortification to open Milton's Latin Poems, which I had +never read, and there, in the "Sylvarum Liber," I came upon a passage +as grand as anything in "Paradise Lost,"--his description of Plato's +archetypal man, the vast ideal of the human race, eternal, incorrupt, +coeval with the stars, dwelling either in the sidereal spaces, or among +the Lethean mansions of souls unborn, or pacing the unexplored confines +of the habitable globe. There stood the majestic image, veiled in a dead +language, yet still visible; and it was as if one of the poet's own +sylvan groves had been suddenly cut down, and opened a view of Olympus. +Then all these present fascinating trivialities of war and diplomacy +ebbed away, like Greece and Rome before them, and there seemed nothing +real in the universe but Plato's archetypal man. + +Indeed, it is the same with all contemporary notorieties. In all free +governments, especially, it is the habit to overrate the _dramatis +personae_ of the hour. How empty to us are now the names of the great +politicians of the last generation, as Crawford and Lowndes!--yet it +is but a few years since these men filled in the public ear as large a +space as Clay or Calhoun afterwards, and when they died, the race of the +giants was thought ended. The path to oblivion of these later idols +is just as sure; even Webster will be to the next age but a mighty +tradition, and all that he has left will seem no more commensurate with +his fame than will his statue by Powers. If anything preserves the +statesmen of to-day, it will be only because we are coming to a contest +of more vital principles, which may better embalm the men. Of all gifts, +eloquence is the most short-lived. The most accomplished orator fades +forgotten, and his laurels pass to some hoarse, inaudible Burke, +accounted rather a bore during his lifetime, and possessed of a faculty +of scattering, not convincing, the members of the House. "After all," +said the brilliant Choate, with melancholy foreboding, "a book is the +only immortality." + +So few men in any age are born with a marked gift for literary +expression, so few of this number have access to high culture, so few +even of these have the personal nobleness to use their powers well, +and this small band is finally so decimated by disease and manifold +disaster, that it makes one shudder to observe how little of the +embodied intellect of any age is left behind. Literature is attar of +roses, one distilled drop from a million blossoms. Think how Spain and +Portugal once divided the globe between them in a treaty, when England +was a petty kingdom of illiterate tribes!--and now all Spain is +condensed for us into Cervantes, and all Portugal into the fading fame +of the unread Camoens. The long magnificence of Italian culture has +left us only _I Quattro Poeti_, the Four Poets. The difference between +Shakspeare and his contemporaries is not that he is read twice, ten +times, a hundred times as much as they: it is an absolute difference; he +is read, and they are only printed. + +Yet, if our life be immortal, this temporary distinction is of little +moment, and we may learn humility, without learning despair, from +earth's evanescent glories. Who cannot bear a few disappointments, if +the vista be so wide that the mute inglorious Miltons of this sphere +may in some other sing their Paradise as Found? War or peace, fame or +forgetfulness, can bring no real injury to one who has formed the fixed +purpose to live nobly day by day. I fancy that in some other realm of +existence we may look back with some kind interest on this scene of our +earlier life, and say to one another,--"Do you remember yonder planet, +where once we went to school?" And whether our elective study here lay +chiefly in the fields of action or of thought will matter little to us +then, when other schools shall have led us through other disciplines. + + * * * * * + + +JOHN LAMAR. + + +The guard-house was, in fact, nothing but a shed in the middle of a +stubble-field. It had been built for a cider-press last summer; but +since Captain Dorr had gone into the army, his regiment had camped over +half his plantation, and the shed was boarded up, with heavy wickets at +either end, to hold whatever prisoners might fall into their hands +from Floyd's forces. It was a strong point for the Federal troops, his +farm,--a sort of wedge in the Rebel Cheat counties of Western Virginia. +Only one prisoner was in the guard-house now. The sentry, a raw +boat-hand from Illinois, gaped incessantly at him through the bars, not +sure if the "Secesh" were limbed and headed like other men; but the +November fog was so thick that he could discern nothing but a short, +squat man, in brown clothes and white hat, heavily striding to and fro. +A negro was crouching outside, his knees cuddled in his arms to keep +warm: a field-hand, you could be sure from the face, a grisly patch of +flabby black, with a dull eluding word of something, you could not tell +what, in the points of eyes,--treachery or gloom. The prisoner stopped, +cursing him about something: the only answer was a lazy rub of the +heels. + +"Got any 'baccy, Mars' John?" he whined, in the middle of the hottest +oath. + +The man stopped abruptly, turning his pockets inside out. + +"That's all, Ben," he said, kindly enough. "Now begone, you black +devil!" + +"Dem's um, Mars'! Goin' 'mediate,"--catching the tobacco, and lolling +down full length as his master turned off again. + +Dave Hall, the sentry, stared reflectively, and sat down. + +"Ben? Who air you next?"--nursing his musket across his knees, +baby-fashion. + +Ben measured him with one eye, polished the quid in his greasy hand, and +looked at it. + +"Pris'ner o' war," he mumbled, finally,--contemptuously; for Dave's +trousers were in rags like his own, and his chilblained toes stuck +through the shoe-tops. Cheap white trash, clearly. + +"Yer master's some at swearin'. Heow many, neow, hes he like you, down +to Georgy?" + +The boatman's bony face was gathering a woful pity. He had enlisted to +free the Uncle Toms, and carry God's vengeance to the Legrees. Here they +were, a pair of them. + +Ben squinted another critical survey of the "miss'able Linkinite." + +"How many wells hev _yer_ poisoned since yer set out?" he muttered. + +The sentry stopped. + +"How many 'longin' to de Lamars? 'Bout as many as der's dam' Yankees in +Richmond 'baccy-houses!" + +Something in Dave's shrewd, whitish eye warned him off. + +"Ki yi! yer white nigger, yer!" he chuckled, shuffling down the stubble. + +Dave clicked his musket,--then, choking down an oath into a grim +Methodist psalm, resumed his walk, looking askance at the coarse-moulded +face of the prisoner peering through the bars, and the diamond studs in +his shirt,--bought with human blood, doubtless. The man was the black +curse of slavery itself in the flesh, in his thought somehow, and he +hated him accordingly. Our men of the Northwest have enough brawny +Covenanter muscle in their religion to make them good haters for +opinion's sake. + +Lamar, the prisoner, watched him with a lazy drollery in his sluggish +black eyes. It died out into sternness, as he looked beyond the sentry. +He had seen this Cheat country before; this very plantation was his +grandfather's a year ago, when he had come up from Georgia here, and +loitered out the summer months with his Virginia cousins, hunting. That +was a pleasant summer! Something in the remembrance of it flashed into +his eyes, dewy, genial; the man's leather-covered face reddened like a +child's. Only a year ago,--and now----The plantation was Charley Dorr's +now, who had married Ruth. This very shed he and Dorr had planned last +spring, and now Charley held him a prisoner in it. The very thought of +Charley Dorr warmed his heart. Why, he could thank God there were such +men. True grit, every inch of his little body! There, last summer, how +he had avoided Ruth until the day when he (Lamar) was going away!--then +he told him he meant to try and win her. "She cared most for you +always," Lamar had said, bitterly; "why have you waited so long?" "You +loved her first, John, you know." That was like a man! He remembered +that even that day, when his pain was breathless and sharp, the words +made him know that Dorr was fit to be her husband. + +Dorr was his friend. The word meant much to John Lamar. He thought less +meanly of himself, when he remembered it. Charley's prisoner! An odd +chance! Better that than to have met in battle. He thrust back the +thought, the sweat oozing out on his face,--something within him +muttering, "For Liberty! I would have killed him, so help me God!" + +He had brought despatches to General Lee, that he might see Charley, and +the old place, and--Ruth again; there was a gnawing hunger in his heart +to see them. Fool! what was he to them? The man's face grew slowly +pale, as that of a savage or an animal does, when the wound is deep and +inward. + +The November day was dead, sunless: since morning the sky had had only +enough life in it to sweat out a few muddy drops, that froze as they +fell: the cold numbed his mouth as he breathed it. This stubbly slope +was where he and his grandfather had headed the deer: it was covered +with hundreds of dirty, yellow tents now. Around there were hills like +uncouth monsters, swathed in ice, holding up the soggy sky; shivering +pine-forests; unmeaning, dreary flats; and the Cheat, coiled about the +frozen sinews of the hills, limp and cold, like a cord tying a dead +man's jaws. Whatever outlook of joy or worship this region had borne on +its face in time gone, it turned to him to-day nothing but stagnation, +a great death. He wondered idly, looking at it, (for the old Huguenot +brain of the man was full of morbid fancies,) if it were winter alone +that had deadened color and pulse out of these full-blooded hills, or if +they could know the colder horror crossing their threshold, and forgot +to praise God as it came. + +Over that farthest ridge the house had stood. The guard (he had been +taken by a band of Snake-hunters, back in the hills) had brought him +past it. It was a heap of charred rafters. "Burned in the night," they +said, "when the old Colonel was alone." They were very willing to +show him this, as it was done by his own party, the Secession +"Bush-whackers"; took him to the wood-pile to show him where his +grandfather had been murdered, (there was a red mark,) and buried, his +old hands above the ground. "Colonel said 't was a job fur us to pay up; +so we went to the village an' hed a scrimmage,"--pointing to gaps in +the hedges where the dead Bush-whackers yet lay unburied. He looked at +them, and at the besotted faces about him, coolly. + +Snake-hunters and Bush-whackers, he knew, both armies used in Virginia +as tools for rapine and murder: the sooner the Devil called home his +own, the better. And yet, it was not God's fault, surely, that there +were such tools in the North, any more than that in the South Ben +was--Ben. Something was rotten in freer States than Denmark, he thought. + +One of the men went into the hedge, and brought out a child's golden +ringlet as a trophy. Lamar glanced in, and saw the small face in its +woollen hood, dimpled yet, though dead for days. He remembered it. Jessy +Birt, the ferryman's little girl. She used to come up to the house every +day for milk. He wondered for which flag _she_ died. Ruth was teaching +her to write. _Ruth!_ Some old pain hurt him just then, nearer than even +the blood of the old man or the girl crying to God from the ground. The +sergeant mistook the look. "They'll be buried," he said, gruffly. "Ye +brought it on yerselves." And so led him to the Federal camp. + +The afternoon grew colder, as he stood looking out of the guard-house. +Snow began to whiten through the gray. He thrust out his arm through the +wicket, his face kindling with childish pleasure, as he looked closer at +the fairy stars and crowns on his shaggy sleeve. If Floy were here! She +never had seen snow. When the flakes had melted off, he took a case out +of his pocket to look at Floy. His sister,--a little girl who had no +mother, nor father, nor lover, but Lamar. The man among his brother +officers in Richmond was coarse, arrogant, of dogged courage, keen +palate at the table, as keen eye on the turf. Sickly little Floy, down +at home, knew the way to something below all this: just as they of the +Rommany blood see below the muddy boulders of the streets the enchanted +land of Boabdil bare beneath. Lamar polished the ivory painting with his +breath, remembering that he had drunk nothing for days. A child's face, +of about twelve, delicate,--a breath of fever or cold would shatter such +weak beauty; big, dark eyes, (her mother was pure Castilian,) out of +which her little life looked irresolute into the world, uncertain what +to do there. The painter, with an unapt fancy, had clustered about the +Southern face the Southern emblem, buds of the magnolia, unstained, as +yet, as pearl. It angered Lamar, remembering how the creamy whiteness of +the full-blown flower exhaled passion of which the crimsonest rose knew +nothing,--a content, ecstasy, in animal life. Would Floy----Well, God +help them both! they needed help. Three hundred souls was a heavy weight +for those thin little hands to hold sway over,--to lead to hell or +heaven. Up North they could have worked for her, and gained only her +money. So Lamar reasoned, like a Georgian: scribbling a letter to +"My Baby" on the wrapper of a newspaper,--drawing the shapes of the +snowflakes,--telling her he had reached their grandfather's plantation, +but "have not seen our Cousin Ruth yet, of whom you may remember I have +told you, Floy. When you grow up, I should like you to be just such a +woman; so remember, my darling, if I"----He scratched the last words +out: why should he hint to her that he could die? Holding his life loose +in his hand, though, had brought things closer to him lately,--God and +death, this war, the meaning of it all. But he would keep his brawny +body between these terrible realities and Floy, yet awhile. "I want +you," he wrote, "to leave the plantation, and go with your old maumer to +the village. It will be safer there." He was sure the letter would reach +her. He had a plan to escape to-night, and he could put it into a post +inside the lines. Ben was to get a small hand-saw that would open the +wicket; the guards were not hard to elude. Glancing up, he saw the negro +stretched by a camp-fire, listening to the gaunt boatman, who was off +duty. Preaching Abolitionism, doubtless: he could hear Ben's derisive +shouts of laughter. "And so, good bye, Baby Florence!" he scrawled. "I +wish I could send you some of this snow, to show you what the floor of +heaven is like." + +While the snow fell faster--without, he stopped writing, and began idly +drawing a map of Georgia on the tan-bark with a stick. Here the Federal +troops could effect a landing: he knew the defences at that point. If +they did? He thought of these Snake-hunters who had found in the war a +peculiar road for themselves downward with no gallows to stumble over, +fancied he saw them skulking through the fields at Cedar Creek, closing +around the house, and behind them a mass of black faces and bloody +bayonets. Floy alone, and he here,--like a rat in a trap! "God keep my +little girl!" he wrote, unsteadily. "God bless you, Floy!" He gasped for +breath, as if he had been writing with his heart's blood. Folding up the +paper, he hid it inside his shirt and began his dogged walk, calculating +the chances of escape. Once out of this shed, he could baffle a +blood-hound, he knew the hills so well. + +His head bent down, he did not see a man who stood looking at him over +the wicket. Captain Dorr. A puny little man, with thin yellow hair, and +womanish face: but not the less the hero of his men,--they having found +out, somehow, that muscle was not the solidest thing to travel on in +war-times. Our regiments of "roughs" were not altogether crowned with +laurel at Manassas! So the men built more on the old Greatheart soul +in the man's blue eyes: one of those souls born and bred pure, sent to +teach, that can find breath only in the free North. His hearty "Hillo!" +startled Lamar. + +"How are you, old fellow?" he said, unlocking the gate and coming in. + +Lamar threw off his wretched thoughts, glad to do it. What need to +borrow trouble? He liked a laugh,--had a lazy, jolly humor of his own. +Dorr had finished drill, and come up, as he did every day, to freshen +himself with an hour's talk to this warm, blundering fellow. In this +dismal war-work, (though his whole soul was in that, too,) it was +like putting your hands to a big blaze. Dorr had no near relations; +Lamar--they had played marbles together--stood to him where a younger +brother might have stood. Yet, as they talked, he could not help his +keen eye seeing him just as he was. + +Poor John! he thought: the same uncouth-looking effort of humanity that +he had been at Yale. No wonder the Northern boys jeered him, with his +sloth-ways, his mouthed English, torpid eyes, and brain shut up in that +worst of mud-moulds,--belief in caste. Even now, going up and down the +tan-bark, his step was dead, sodden, like that of a man in whose life +God had not yet wakened the full live soul. It was wakening, though, +Dorr thought. Some pain or passion was bringing the man in him out of +the flesh, vigilant, alert, aspirant. A different man from Dorr. + +In fact, Lamar was just beginning to think for himself, and of course +his thoughts were defiant, intolerant. He did not comprehend how his +companion could give his heresies such quiet welcome, and pronounce +sentence of death on them so coolly. Because Dorr had gone farther up +the mountain, had he the right to make him follow in the same steps? +The right,--that was it. By brute force, too? Human freedom, eh? +Consequently, their talks were stormy enough. To-day, however, they were +on trivial matters. + +"I've brought the General's order for your release at last, John. It +confines you to this district, however." + +Lamar shook his head. + +"No parole for me! My stake outside is too heavy for me to remain a +prisoner on anything but compulsion. I mean to escape, if I can. Floy +has nobody but me, you know, Charley." + +There was a moment's silence. + +"I wish," said Dorr, half to himself, "the child was with her cousin +Ruth. If she could make her a woman like herself!" + +"You are kind," Lamar forced out, thinking of what might have been a +year ago. + +Dorr had forgotten. He had just kissed little Ruth at the door-step, +coming away: thinking, as he walked up to camp, how her clear thought, +narrow as it was, was making his own higher, more just; wondering if +the tears on her face last night, when she got up from her knees after +prayer, might not help as much in the great cause of truth as the life +he was ready to give. He was so used to his little wife now, that he +could look to no hour of his past life, nor of the future coming ages +of event and work, where she was not present,--very flesh of his flesh, +heart of his heart. A gulf lay between them and the rest of the world. +It was hardly probable he could see her as a woman towards whom another +man looked across the gulf, dumb, hopeless, defrauded of his right. + +"She sent you some flowers, by the way, John,--the last in the +yard,--and bade me be sure and bring you down with me. Your own colors, +you see?--to put you in mind of home,"--pointing to the crimson asters +flaked with snow. + +The man smiled faintly: the smell of the flowers choked him: he laid +them aside. God knows he was trying to wring out this bitter old +thought: he could not look in Dorr's frank eyes while it was there. +He must escape to-night: he never would come near them again, in this +world, or beyond death,--never! He thought of that like a man going to +drag through eternity with half his soul gone. Very well: there was man +enough left in him to work honestly and bravely, and to thank God for +that good pure love he yet had. He turned to Dorr with a flushed face, +and began talking of Floy in hearty earnest,--glancing at Ben coming up +the hill, thinking that escape depended on him. + +"I ordered your man up," said Captain Dorr. "Some canting Abolitionist +had him open-mouthed down there." + +The negro came in, and stood in the corner, listening while they talked. +A gigantic fellow, with a gladiator's muscles. Stronger than that Yankee +captain, he thought,--than either of them: better breathed,--drawing the +air into his brawny chest. "A man and a brother." Did the fool think he +didn't know that before? He had a contempt for Dave and his like. Lamar +would have told you Dave's words were true, but despised the man as a +crude, unlicked bigot. Ben did the same, with no words for the idea. The +negro instinct in him recognized gentle blood by any of its signs,--the +transparent animal life, the reticent eye, the mastered voice: he +had better men than Lamar at home to learn it from. It is a trait of +serfdom, the keen eye to measure the inherent rights of a man to be +master. A negro or a Catholic Irishman does not need "Sartor Resartus" +to help him to see through any clothes. Ben leaned, half-asleep, against +the wall, some old thoughts creeping out of their hiding-places through +the torpor, like rats to the sunshine: the boatman's slang had been hot +and true enough to rouse them in his brain. + +"So, Ben," said his master, as he passed once, "your friend has been +persuading you to exchange the cotton-fields at Cedar Creek for New-York +alleys, eh?" + +"Ki!" laughed Ben, "white darkey. Mind ole dad, Mars' John, as took off +in der swamp? Um asked dat Linkinite ef him saw dad up Norf. Guess him's +free now. Ki! ole dad!" + +"The swamp was the place for him," said Lamar. "I remember." + +"Dunno," said the negro, surlily: "him's dad, af'er all: tink him's free +now,"--and mumbled down into a monotonous drone about + + "Oh yo, bredern, is yer gwine ober Jordern?" + +Half-asleep, they thought,--but with dull questionings at work in his +brain, some queer notions about freedom, of that unknown North, mostly +mixed with his remembrance of his father, a vicious old negro, that in +Pennsylvania would have worked out his salvation in the under cell of +the penitentiary, but in Georgia, whipped into heroism, had betaken +himself into the swamp, and never returned. Tradition among the Lamar +slaves said he had got off to Ohio, of which they had as clear an idea +as most of us have of heaven. At any rate, old Kite became a mystery, to +be mentioned with awe at fish-bakes and barbecues. He was this uncouth +wretch's father,--do you understand? The flabby-faced boy, flogged in +the cotton-field for whining after his dad, or hiding away part of his +flitch and molasses for months in hopes the old man would come back, was +rather a comical object, you would have thought. Very different his, +from the feeling with which you left your mother's grave,--though as yet +we have not invented names for the emotions of those people. We'll grant +that it hurt Ben a little, however. Even the young polypus, when it is +torn from the old one, bleeds a drop or two, they say. As he grew up, +the great North glimmered through his thought, a sort of big field,--a +paradise of no work, no flogging, and white bread every day, where the +old man sat and ate his fill. + +The second point in Ben's history was that he fell in love. Just as +you did,--with the difference, of course: though the hot sun, or the +perpetual foot upon his breast, does not make our black Prometheus less +fierce in his agony of hope or jealousy than you, I am afraid. It was +Nan, a pale mulatto house-servant, that the field-hand took into his +dull, lonesome heart to make life of, with true-love defiance of caste. +I think Nan liked him very truly. She was lame and sickly, and if Ben +was black and a picker, and stayed in the quarters, he was strong, like +a master to her in some ways: the only thing she could call hers in the +world was the love the clumsy boy gave her. White women feel in that +way sometimes, and it makes them very tender to men not their equals. +However, old Mrs. Lamar, before she died, gave her house-servants their +free papers, and Nan was among them. So she set off, with all the finery +little Floy could give her: went up into that great, dim North. She +never came again. + +The North swallowed up all Ben knew or felt outside of his hot, hated +work, his dread of a lashing on Saturday night. All the pleasure left +him was 'possum and hominy for Sunday's dinner. It did not content him. +The spasmodic religion of the field-negro does not teach endurance. So +it came, that the slow tide of discontent ebbing in everybody's heart +towards some unreached sea set in his ignorant brooding towards that +vague country which the only two who cared for him had found. If he +forgot it through the dogged, sultry days, he remembered it when the +overseer scourged the dull tiger-look into his eyes, or when, husking +corn with the others at night, the smothered negro-soul, into which +their masters dared not look, broke out in their wild, melancholy songs. +Aimless, unappealing, yet no prayer goes up to God more keen in its +pathos. You find, perhaps, in Beethoven's seventh symphony the secrets +of your heart made manifest, and suddenly think of a Somewhere to come, +where your hope waits for you with late fulfilment. Do not laugh at Ben, +then, if he dully told in his song the story of all he had lost, or gave +to his heaven a local habitation and a name. + +From the place where he stood now, as his master and Dorr walked up and +down, he could see the purplish haze beyond which the sentry had told +him lay the North. The North! Just beyond the ridge. There was a pain +in his head, looking at it; his nerves grew cold and rigid, as yours do +when something wrings your heart sharply: for there are nerves in these +black carcasses, thicker, more quickly stung to madness than yours. Yet +if any savage longing, smouldering for years, was heating to madness now +in his brain, there was no sign of it in his face. Vapid, with sordid +content, the huge jaws munching tobacco slowly, only now and then the +beady eye shot a sharp glance after Dorr. The sentry had told him the +Northern army had come to set the slaves free; he watched the Federal +officer keenly. + +"What ails you, Ben?" said his master. "Thinking over your friend's +sermon?" + +Ben's stolid laugh was ready. + +"Done forgot dat, Mars'. Wouldn't go, nohow. Since Mars' sold dat cussed +Joe, gorry good times 't home. Dam' Abolitioner say we ums all goin' +Norf,"--with a stealthy glance at Dorr. + +"That's more than your philanthropy bargains for, Charley," laughed +Lamar. + +The men stopped; the negro skulked nearer, his whole senses sharpened +into hearing. Dorr's clear face was clouded. + +"This slave question must be kept out of the war. It puts a false face +on it." + +"I thought one face was what it needed," said Lamar. "You have too many +slogans. Strong government, tariff, Sumter, a bit of bunting, eleven +dollars a month. It ought to be a vital truth that would give soul and +_vim_ to a body with the differing members of your army. You, with your +ideal theory, and Billy Wilson with his 'Blood and Baltimore!' Try human +freedom. That's high and sharp and broad." + +Ben drew a step closer. + +"You are shrewd, Lamar. I am to go below all constitutions or expediency +or existing rights, and tell Ben here that he is free? When once the +Government accepts that doctrine, you, as a Rebel, must be let alone." + +The slave was hid back in the shade. + +"Dorr," said Lamar, "you know I'm a groping, ignorant fellow, but it +seems to me that prating of constitutions and existing rights is surface +talk; there is a broad common-sense underneath, by whose laws the world +is governed, which your statesmen don't touch often. You in the North, +in your dream of what shall be, shut your eyes to what is. You want a +republic where every man's voice shall be heard in the council, and the +majority shall rule. Granting that the free population are educated to a +fitness for this,--(God forbid I should grant it with the Snake-hunters +before my eyes!)--look here!" + +He turned round, and drew the slave out into the light: he crouched +down, gaping vacantly at them. + +"There is Ben. What, in God's name, will you do with him? Keep him a +slave, and chatter about self-government? Pah! The country is paying in +blood for the lie, to-day. Educate him for freedom, by putting a musket +in his hands? We have this mass of heathendom drifted on our shores by +your will as well as mine. Try to bring them to a level with the whites +by a wrench, and you'll waken out of your dream to a sharp reality. Your +Northern philosophy ought to be old enough to teach you that spasms in +the body-politic shake off no atom of disease,--that reform, to be +enduring, must be patient, gradual, inflexible as the Great Reformer. +'The mills of God,' the old proverb says, 'grind surely.' But, Dorr, +they grind exceeding slow!" + +Dorr watched Lamar with an amused smile. It pleased him to see his brain +waking up, eager, vehement. As for Ben, crouching there, if they talked +of him like a clod, heedless that his face deepened in stupor, that his +eyes had caught a strange, gloomy treachery,--we all do the same, you +know. + +"What is your remedy, Lamar? You have no belief in the right of +Secession, I know," said Dorr. + +"It's a bad instrument for a good end. Let the white Georgian come out +of his sloth, and the black will rise with him. Jefferson Davis may not +intend it, but God does. When we have our Lowell, our New York, when we +are a self-sustaining people instead of lazy land-princes, Ben here will +have climbed the second of the great steps of Humanity. Do you laugh at +us?" said Lamar, with a quiet self-reliance. "Charley, it needs only +work and ambition to cut the brute away from my face, and it will leave +traits very like your own. Ben's father was a Guinea fetich-worshipper; +when we stand where New England does, Ben's son will be ready for his +freedom." + +"And while you theorize," laughed Dorr, "I hold you a prisoner, John, +and Ben knows it is his right to be free. He will not wait for the +grinding of the mill, I fancy." + +Lamar did not smile. It was womanish in the man, when the life of great +nations hung in doubt before them, to go back so constantly to little +Floy sitting in the lap of her old black maumer. But he did it,--with +the quick thought that to-night he must escape, that death lay in delay. + +While Dorr talked, Lamar glanced significantly at Ben. The negro was not +slow to understand,--with a broad grin, touching his pocket, from which +projected the dull end of a hand-saw. I wonder what sudden pain made the +negro rise just then, and come close to his master, touching him with a +strange affection and remorse in his tired face, as though he had done +him some deadly wrong. + +"What is it, old fellow?" said Lamar, in his boyish way. "Homesick, eh? +There's a little girl in Georgia that will be glad to see you and your +master, and take precious good care of us when she gets us safe again. +That's true, Ben!" laying his hand kindly on the man's shoulder, while +his eyes went wandering off to the hills lying South. + +"Yes, Mars'," said Ben, in a low voice, suddenly bringing a +blacking-brush, and beginning to polish his master's shoes,--thinking, +while he did it, of how often Mars' John had interfered with the +overseers to save him from a flogging,--(Lamar, in his lazy way, +was kind to his slaves,)--thinking of little Mist' Floy with an odd +tenderness and awe, as a gorilla might of a white dove: trying to think +thus,--the simple, kindly nature of the negro struggling madly with +something beneath, new and horrible. He understood enough of the talk of +the white men to know that there was no help for him,--none. Always a +slave. Neither you nor I can ever know what those words meant to him. +The pale purple mist where the North lay was never to be passed. His +dull eyes turned to it constantly,--with a strange look, such as the +lost women might have turned to the door, when Jesus shut it: they +forever outside. There was a way to help himself? The stubby black +fingers holding the brush grew cold and clammy,--noting withal, the poor +wretch in his slavish way, that his master's clothes were finer than the +Northern captain's, his hands whiter, and proud that it was so,--holding +Lamar's foot daintily, trying to see himself in the shoe, smoothing down +the trousers with a boorish, affectionate touch,--with the same fierce +whisper in his ear, Would the shoes ever be cleaned again? would the +foot move to-morrow? + +It grew late. Lamar's supper was brought up from Captain Dorr's, and +placed on the bench. He poured out a goblet of water. + +"Come, Charley, let's drink. To Liberty! It is a war-cry for Satan or +Michael." + +They drank, laughing, while Ben stood watching. Dorr turned to go, but +Lamar called him back,--stood resting his hand on his shoulder: he never +thought to see him again, you know. + +"Look at Ruth, yonder," said Dorr, his face lighting. "She is coming to +meet us. She thought you would be with me." + +Lamar looked gravely down at the low field-house and the figure at the +gate. He thought he could see the small face and earnest eyes, though it +was far off, and night was closing. + +"She is waiting for you, Charley. Go down. Good night, old chum!" + +If it cost any effort to say it, Dorr saw nothing of it. + +"Good night, Lamar! I'll see you in the morning." + +He lingered. His old comrade looked strangely alone and desolate. + +"John!" + +"What is it, Dorr?" + +"If I could tell the Colonel you would take the oath? For Floy's sake." + +The man's rough face reddened. + +"You should know me better. Good bye." + +"Well, well, you are mad. Have you no message for Ruth?" + +There was a moment's silence. + +"Tell her I say, God bless her!" + +Dorr stopped and looked keenly in his face,--then, coming back, shook +hands again, in a different way from before, speaking in a lower +voice,-- + +"God help us all, John! Good night!"--and went slowly down the hill. + +It was nearly night, and bitter cold. Lamar stood where the snow drifted +in on him, looking out through the horizon-less gray. + +"Come out o' dem cold, Mars' John," whined Ben, pulling at his coat. + +As the night gathered, the negro was haunted with a terrified wish to be +kind to his master. Something told him that the time was short. Here and +there through the far night some tent-fire glowed in a cone of ruddy +haze, through which the thick-falling snow shivered like flakes of +light. Lamar watched only the square block of shadow where Dorr's house +stood. The door opened at last, and a broad, cheerful gleam shot out +red darts across the white waste without; then he saw two figures go +in together. They paused a moment; he put his head against the bars, +straining his eyes, and saw that the woman turned, shading her eyes +with her hand, and looked up to the side of the mountain where the +guard-house lay,--with a kindly look, perhaps, for the prisoner out in +the cold. A kind look: that was all. The door shut on them. Forever: so, +good night, Ruth! + +He stool there for an hour or two, leaning his head against the muddy +planks, smoking. Perhaps, in his coarse fashion, he took the trouble of +his manhood back to the same God he used to pray to long ago. When he +turned at last, and spoke, it was with a quiet, strong voice, like one +who would fight through life in a manly way. There was a grating sound +at the back of the shed: it was Ben, sawing through the wicket, the +guard having lounged off to supper. Lamar watched him, noticing that the +negro was unusually silent. The plank splintered, and hung loose. + +"Done gone, Mars' John, now,"--leaving it, and beginning to replenish +the fire. + +"That's right, Ben. We'll start in the morning. That sentry at two +o'clock sleeps regularly." + +Ben chuckled, heaping up the sticks. + +"Go on down to the camp, as usual. At two, Ben, remember! We will be +free to-night, old boy!" + +The black face looked up from the clogging smoke with a curious stare. + +"Ki! we'll be free to-night, Mars'!"--gulping his breath. + +Soon after, the sentry unlocked the gate, and he shambled off out into +the night. Lamar, left alone, went closer to the fire, and worked busily +at some papers he drew from his pocket: maps and schedules. He intended +to write until two o'clock; but the blaze dying down, he wrapped his +blanket about him, and lay down on the heaped straw, going on sleepily, +in his brain, with his calculations. + +The negro, in the shadow of the shed, watched him. A vague fear beset +him,--of the vast, white cold,--the glowering mountains,--of himself; +he clung to the familiar face, like a man drifting out into an unknown +sea, clutching some relic of the shore. When Lamar fell asleep, he +wandered uncertainly towards the tents. The world had grown new, +strange; was he Ben, picking cotton in the swamp-edge?--plunging his +fingers with a shudder in the icy drifts. Down in the glowing torpor of +the Santilla flats, where the Lamar plantations lay, Ben had slept off +as maddening hunger for life and freedom as this of to-day; but here, +with the winter air stinging every nerve to life, with the perpetual +mystery of the mountains terrifying his bestial nature down, the +strength of the man stood up: groping, blind, malignant, it may be; but +whose fault was that? He was half-frozen: the physical pain sharpened +the keen doubt conquering his thought. He sat down in the crusted snow, +looking vacantly about him, a man, at last,--but wakening, like a +new-born soul, into a world of unutterable solitude. Wakened dully, +slowly; sitting there far into the night, pondering stupidly on his old +life; crushing down and out the old parasite affection for his master, +the old fears, the old weight threatening to press out his thin life; +the muddy blood heating, firing with the same heroic dream that bade +Tell and Garibaldi lift up their hands to God, and cry aloud that they +were men and free: the same,--God-given, burning in the imbruted veins +of a Guinea slave. To what end? May God be merciful to America while +she answers the question! He sat, rubbing his cracked, bleeding feet, +glancing stealthily at the southern hills. Beyond them lay all that was +past; in an hour he would follow Lamar back to--what? He lifted his +hands up to the sky, in his silly way sobbing hot tears. "Gor-a'mighty, +Mars' Lord, I'se tired," was all the prayer he made. The pale purple +mist was gone from the North; the ridge behind which love, freedom +waited, struck black across the sky, a wall of iron. He looked at it +drearily. Utterly alone: he had always been alone. He got up at last, +with a sigh. + +"It's a big world,"--with a bitter chuckle,--"but der's no room in it +fur poor Ben." + +He dragged himself through the snow to a light in a tent where a +voice in a wild drone, like that he had heard at negro camp-meetings, +attracted him. He did not go in: stood at the tent-door, listening. Two +or three of the guard stood around, leaning on their muskets; in the +vivid fire-light rose the gaunt figure of the Illinois boatman, swaying +to and fro as he preached. For the men were honest, God-fearing souls, +members of the same church, and Dave, in all integrity of purpose, read +aloud to them,--the cry of Jeremiah against the foul splendors of the +doomed city,--waving, as he spoke, his bony arm to the South. The shrill +voice was that of a man wrestling with his Maker. The negro's fired +brain caught the terrible meaning of the words,--found speech in it: +the wide, dark night, the solemn silence of the men, were only fitting +audience. + +The man caught sight of the slave, and, laying down his book, began one +of those strange exhortations in the manner of his sect. Slow at first, +full of unutterable pity. There was room for pity. Pointing to the human +brute crouching there, made once in the image of God,--the saddest +wreck on His green foot-stool: to the great stealthy body, the +revengeful jaws, the foreboding eyes. Soul, brains,--a man, wifeless, +homeless, nationless, hawked, flung from trader to trader for a handful +of dirty shinplasters. "Lord God of hosts," cried the man, lifting up +his trembling hands, "lay not this sin to our charge!" There was a scar +on Ben's back where the lash had buried itself: it stung now in the +cold. He pulled his clothes tighter, that they should not see it; the +scar and the words burned into his heart: the childish nature of the man +was gone; the vague darkness in it took a shape and name. The boatman +had been praying for him; the low words seemed to shake the night:-- + +"Hear the prayer of Thy servant, and his supplications! Is not this what +Thou hast chosen: to loose the bands, to undo the heavy burdens, and let +the oppressed go free? O Lord, hear! O Lord, hearken and do! Defer not +for Thine own sake, O my God!" + +"What shall I do?" said the slave, standing up. + +The boatman paced slowly to and fro, his voice chording in its dull +monotone with the smothered savage muttering in the negro's brain. + +"The day of the Lord cometh; it is nigh at hand. Who can abide it? What +saith the prophet Jeremiah? 'Take up a burden against the South. Cry +aloud, spare not. Woe unto Babylon, for the day of her vengeance is +come, the day of her visitation! Call together the archers against +Babylon; camp against it round about; let none thereof escape. +Recompense her: as she hath done unto my people, be it done unto her. +A sword is upon Babylon: it shall break in pieces the shepherd and his +flock, the man and the woman, the young man and the maid. I will render +unto her the evil she hath done in my sight, saith the Lord.'" + +It was the voice of God: the scar burned fiercer; the slave came forward +boldly,-- + +"Mars'er, what shall I do?" + +"Give the poor devil a musket," said one of the men. "Let him come with +us, and strike a blow for freedom." + +He took a knife from his belt, and threw it to him, then sauntered off +to his tent. + +"A blow for freedom?" mumbled Ben, taking it up. + +"Let us sing to the praise of God," said the boatman, "the sixty-eighth +psalm," lining it out while they sang,--the scattered men joining, +partly to keep themselves awake. In old times David's harp charmed away +the demon from a human heart. It roused one now, never to be laid again. +A dull, droning chant, telling how the God of Vengeance rode upon the +wind, swift to loose the fetters of the chained, to make desert the +rebellious land; with a chorus, or refrain, in which Ben's wild, +melancholy cry sounded like the wail of an avenging spirit:-- + + "That in the blood of enemies + Thy foot imbrued may be: + And of thy dogs dipped in the same + The tongues thou mayest see." + +The meaning of that was plain; he sang it lower and more steadily each +time, his body swaying in cadence, the glitter in his eye more steely. + +Lamar, asleep in his prison, was wakened by the far-off plaintive song: +he roused himself, leaning on one elbow, listening with a half-smile. It +was Naomi they sang, he thought,--an old-fashioned Methodist air that +Floy had caught from the negroes, and used to sing to him sometimes. +Every night, down at home, she would come to his parlor-door to say +good-night: he thought he could see the little figure now in its white +nightgown, and hear the bare feet pattering on the matting. When he was +alone, she would come in, and sit on his lap awhile, and kneel down +before she went away, her head on his knee, to say her prayers, as she +called it. Only God knew how many times he had remained alone after +hearing those prayers, saved from nights of drunken debauch. He thought +he felt Floy's pure little hand on his forehead now, as if she were +saying her usual "Good night, Bud." He lay down to sleep again, with a +genial smile on his face, listening to the hymn. + +"It's the same God," he said,--"Floy's and theirs." + +Outside, as he slept, a dark figure watched him. The song of the men +ceased. Midnight, white and silent, covered the earth. He could hear +only the slow breathing of the sleeper. Ben's black face grew ashy pale, +but he did not tremble, as he crept, cat-like, up to the wicket, his +blubber lips apart, the white teeth clenched. + +"It's for Freedom, Mars' Lord!" he gasped, looking up to the sky, as if +he expected an answer. "Gor-a'mighty, it's for Freedom!" And went in. + +A belated bird swooped through the cold moonlight into the valley, and +vanished in the far mountain-cliffs with a low, fearing cry, as though +it had passed through Hades. + +They had broken down the wicket: he saw them lay the heavy body on the +lumber outside, the black figures hurrying over the snow. He laughed +low, savagely, watching them. Free now! The best of them despised him; +the years past of cruelty and oppression turned back, fused in a slow, +deadly current of revenge and hate, against the race that had trodden +him down. He felt the iron muscles of his fingers, looked close at the +glittering knife he held, chuckling at the strange smell it bore. Would +the Illinois boatman blame him, if it maddened him? And if Ben took the +fancy to put it to his throat, what right has he to complain? Has not he +also been a dweller in Babylon? He hesitated a moment in the cleft of +the hill, choosing his way, exultantly. He did not watch the North now; +the quiet old dream of content was gone; his thick blood throbbed and +surged with passions of which you and I know nothing: he had a lost life +to avenge. His native air, torrid, heavy with latent impurity, drew him +back: a fitter breath than this cold snow for the animal in his body, +the demon in his soul, to triumph and wallow in. He panted, thinking of +the saffron hues of the Santilla flats, of the white, stately dwellings, +the men that went in and out from them, quiet, dominant,--feeling the +edge of his knife. It was his turn to be master now! He ploughed his way +doggedly through the snow,--panting, as he went,--a hotter glow in his +gloomy eyes. It was his turn for pleasure now: he would have his fill! +Their wine and their gardens and----He did not need to choose a wife +from his own color now. He stopped, thinking of little Floy, with her +curls and great listening eyes, watching at the door for her brother. +He had watched her climb up into his arms and kiss his cheek. She never +would do that again! He laughed aloud, shrilly. By God! she should keep +the kiss for other lips! Why should he not say it? + +Up on the hill the night-air throbbed colder and holier. The guards +stood about in the snow, silent, troubled. This was not like a death in +battle: it put them in mind of home, somehow. All that the dying man +said was, "Water," now and then. He had been sleeping, when struck, +and never had thoroughly wakened from his dream. Captain Poole, of the +Snake-hunters, had wrapped him in his own blanket, finding nothing more +could be done. He went off to have the Colonel summoned now, muttering +that it was "a damned shame." They put snow to Lamar's lips constantly, +being hot and parched; a woman, Dorr's wife, was crouching on the ground +beside him, chafing his hands, keeping down her sobs for fear they would +disturb him. He opened his eyes at last, and knew Dorr, who held his +head. + +"Unfasten my coat, Charley. What makes it so close here?" + +Dorr could not speak. + +"Shall I lift you up, Captain Lamar?" asked Dave Hall, who stood leaning +on his rifle. + +He spoke in a subdued tone, Babylon being far off for the moment. Lamar +dozed again before he could answer. + +"Don't try to move him,--it is too late," said Dorr, sharply. + +The moonlight steeped mountain and sky in a fresh whiteness. Lamar's +face, paling every moment, hardening, looked in it like some solemn work +of an untaught sculptor. There was a breathless silence. Ruth, kneeling +beside him, felt his hand grow slowly colder than the snow. He moaned, +his voice going fast,-- + +"At two, Ben, old fellow! We'll be free to-night!" + +Dave, stooping to wrap the blanket, felt his hand wet: he wiped it with +a shudder. + +"As he hath done unto My people, be it done unto him!" he muttered, but +the words did not comfort him. + +Lamar moved, half-smiling. + +"That's right, Floy. What is it she says? 'Now I lay me down'----I +forget. Good night. Kiss me, Floy." + +He waited,--looked up uneasily. Dorr looked at his wife: she stooped, +and kissed his lips. Charley smoothed back the hair from the damp face +with as tender a touch as a woman's. Was he dead? The white moonlight +was not more still than the calm face. + +Suddenly the night-air was shattered by a wild, revengeful laugh from +the hill. The departing soul rushed back, at the sound, to life, full +consciousness. Lamar started from their hold,--sat up. + +"It was Ben," he said, slowly. + +In that dying flash of comprehension, it may be, the wrongs of the white +man and the black stood clearer to his eyes than ours: the two lives +trampled down. The stern face of the boatman bent over him: he was +trying to stanch the flowing blood. Lamar looked at him: Hall saw no +bitterness in the look,--a quiet, sad question rather, before which his +soul lay bare. He felt the cold hand touch his shoulder, saw the pale +lips move. + +"Was this well done?" they said. + +Before Lamar's eyes the rounded arch of gray receded, faded into dark; +the negro's fierce laugh filled his ear: some woful thought at the sound +wrung his soul, as it halted at the gate. It caught at the simple faith +his mother taught him. + +"Yea," he said aloud, "though I walk through the valley of the shadow of +death, I will fear no evil; for Thou art with me." + +Dorr gently drew down the uplifted hand. He was dead. + +"It was a manly soul," said the Northern captain, his voice choking, as +he straightened the limp hair. + +"He trusted in God? A strange delusion!" muttered the boatman. + +Yet he did not like that they should leave him alone with Lamar, as +they did, going down for help. He paced to and fro, his rifle on his +shoulder, arming his heart with strength to accomplish the vengeance +of the Lord against Babylon. Yet he could not forget the murdered man +sitting there in the calm moonlight, the dead face turned towards the +North,--the dead face, whereon little Floy's tears should never fall. +The grave, unmoving eyes seemed to the boatman to turn to him with the +same awful question. "Was this well done?" they said. He thought in +eternity they would rise before him, sad, unanswered. The earth, he +fancied, lay whiter, colder,--the heaven farther off; the war, which had +become a daily business, stood suddenly before him in all its terrible +meaning. God, he thought, had met in judgment with His people. Yet he +uttered no cry of vengeance against the doomed city. With the dead face +before him, he bent his eyes to the ground, humble, uncertain,--speaking +out of the ignorance of his own weak, human soul. + +"The day of the Lord is nigh," he said; "it is at hand; and who can +abide it?" + + + + +MOUNTAIN PICTURES. + + +II. + +MONADNOCK FROM WACHUSET. + + + I would I were a painter, for the sake + Of a sweet picture, and of her who led, + A fitting guide, with light, but reverent tread, + Into that mountain mystery! First a lake + Tinted with sunset; next the wavy lines + Of far receding hills; and yet more far, + Monadnock lifting from his night of pines + His rosy forehead to the evening star. + Beside us, purple-zoned, Wachuset laid + His head against the West, whose warm light made + His aureole; and o'er him, sharp and clear, + Like a shaft of lightning in mid launching stayed, + A single level cloud-line, shone upon + By the fierce glances of the sunken sun, + Menaced the darkness with its golden spear! + + So twilight deepened round us. Still and black + The great woods climbed the mountain at our back; + And on their skirts, where yet the lingering day + On the shorn greenness of the clearing lay, + The brown old farm-house like a bird's nest hung. + With home-life sounds the desert air was stirred: + The bleat of sheep along the hill we heard, + The bucket plashing in the cool, sweet well, + The pasture-bars that clattered as they fell; + Dogs barked, fowls fluttered, cattle lowed; the gate + Of the barn-yard creaked beneath the merry weight + Of sun-brown children, listening, while they swung, + The welcome sound of supper-call to hear; + And down the shadowy lane, in tinklings clear, + The pastoral curfew of the cow-bell rung. + Thus soothed and pleased, our backward path we took, + Praising the farmer's home. He only spake, + Looking into the sunset o'er the lake, + Like one to whom the far-off is most near: + "Yes, most folks think it has a pleasant look; + I love it for my good old mother's sake, + Who lived and died here in the peace of God!" + The lesson of his words we pondered o'er, + As silently we turned the eastern flank + Of the mountain, where its shadow deepest sank, + Doubling the night along our rugged road: + We felt that man was more than his abode,-- + The inward life than Nature's raiment more; + And the warm sky, the sundown-tinted hill, + The forest and the lake, seemed dwarfed and dim + Before the saintly soul, whose human will + Meekly in the Eternal footsteps trod, + Making her homely toil and household ways + An earthly echo of the song of praise + Swelling from angel lips and harps of seraphim! + + + + +INDIVIDUALITY. + + +At a certain depth, as has already been intimated in our literature, +all bosoms communicate, all hearts are one. Hector and Ajax, in Homer's +great picture, stand face to face, each with advanced foot, with +levelled spear, and turgid sinew, eager to kill, while on either side +ten thousand slaughterous wishes poise themselves in hot breasts, +waiting to fly with the flying weapons; yet, though the combatants +seem to surrender themselves wholly to this action, there is in each a +profound element that is no party to these hostilities. It is the pure +nature of man. Ajax is not all Greek, nor is Hector wholly Trojan: both +are also men; and to the extent of their mutual participation in this +pure and perpetual element of Manhood, they are more than friends, +more than relatives,--they are of identical spirit. For there is an +imperishable nature of Man, ever and everywhere the same, of which each +particular man is a testimony and representation. As the solid earth +underruns the "dissociating sea"--_Oceano dissociabili_--and joins in +one all sundered lands, so does this nature dip beneath the dividing +parts of our being, and make of all men one simple and inseparable +humanity. In love, in friendship, in true conversation, in all happiness +of communion between men, it is this unchangeable substratum or +substance of man's being that is efficient and supreme: out of +divers bosoms, Same calls, and replies to Same with a great joy +of self-recognition. It is only in virtue of this nature that men +understand, appreciate, admire, trust each other,--that books of the +earliest times remain true in the latest,--that society is possible; and +he in whom the virtue of it dwells divinely is admitted to the secret +confidence of all bosoms, lives in all times, and converses with each +soul and age in its own vernacular. Socrates looked beyond the gates of +death for happy communion with Homer and all the great; but already we +interchange words with these, whenever we are so sweetly prospered as to +become, in some good degree, identical with the absolute nature of man. + +Not only, moreover, is this immortal substance of man's being common and +social, but it is so great and venerable that no one can match it +with an equal report. All the epithets by which we would extol it +are disgraced by it, as the most brilliant artificial lights become +blackness when placed between the eye and the noonday sun. It is older, +it is earlier in existence than the earliest star that shone in heaven; +and it will outlive the fixed stars that now in heaven seem fixed +forever. There is nothing in the created universe of which it was not +the prophecy in its primal conception; there is nothing of which it is +not the interpretation and ultimatum in its final form. The laws which +rule the world as forces are, in it, thoughts and liberties. All the +grand imaginations of men, all the glorified shapes, the Olympian gods, +cherubic and seraphic forms, are but symbols and adumbrations of what it +contains. As the sun, having set, still leaves its golden impress on the +clouds, so does the absolute nature of man throw up and paint, as it +were, on the sky testimonies of its power, remaining itself unseen. +Only, therefore, is one a poet, as he can cause particular traits and +events, without violation of their special character, or concealment +of their peculiar interest, to bear the deep, sweet, and infinite +suggestion of this. All princeliness and imperial worth, all that is +regal, beautiful, pure in men, comes from this nature; and the words +by which we express reverence, admiration, love, borrow from it their +entire force: since reverence, admiration, love, and all other grand +sentiments, are but modes or forms of _noble unification_ between men, +and are therefore shown to spring from that spiritual unity of which +persons are exponents; while, on the other hand, all evil epithets +suggest division and separation. Of this nature all titles of honor, all +symbols that command homage and obedience on earth, are pensioners. How +could the claims of kings survive successions of Stuarts and Georges, +but for a royalty in each peasant's bosom that pleads for its poor image +on the throne? + +In the high sense, no man is great save he that is a large continent of +this absolute humanity. The common nature of man it is; yet those are +ever, and in the happiest sense, uncommon men, in whom it is liberally +present. + +But every man, besides the nature which constitutes him man, has, so to +speak, another nature, which constitutes him a particular individual. He +is not only like all others of his kind, but, at the same time, unlike +all others. By physical and mental feature he is distinguished, +insulated; he is endowed with a quality so purely in contrast with the +common nature of man, that in virtue of it he can be singled out from +hundreds of millions, from all the myriads of his race. So far, now, as +one is representative of absolute humanity, he is a Person; so far +as, by an element peculiar to himself, he is contrasted with absolute +humanity, he is an Individual. And having duly chanted our _Credo_ +concerning man's pure and public nature, let us now inquire respecting +this dividing element of Individuality,--which, with all the force it +has, strives to cut off communication, to destroy unity, and to make of +humanity a chaos or dust of biped atoms. + +Not for a moment must we make this surface nature of equal estimation +with the other. It is secondary, _very_ secondary, to the pure substance +of man. The Person first in order of importance; the Individual next,-- + + "Proximus huic, longo sed proximus intervallo,"-- + + "next with an exceeding wide remove." + +Take from Epaminondas or Luther all that makes him man, and the +rest will not be worth selling to the Jews. Individuality is an +accompaniment, an accessory, a red line on the map, a fence about the +field, a copyright on the book. It is like the particular flavors of +fruits,--of no account but in relation to their saccharine, acid, and +other staple elements. It must therefore keep its place, or become +an impertinence. If it grow forward, officious, and begin to push in +between the pure nature and its divine ends, at once it is a meddling +Peter, for whom there is no due greeting but "Get thee behind me, +Satan." If the fruit have a special flavor of such ambitious pungency +that the sweets and acids cannot appear through it, be sure that to come +at this fruit no young Wilhelm Meister will purloin keys. If one be so +much an Individual that he wellnigh ceases to be a Man, we shall not +admire him. It is the same in mental as in physical feature. Let there, +by all means, be slight divergence from the common type; but by all +means let it be no more than a slight divergence. Too much is monstrous: +even a very slight excess is what we call _ugliness_. Gladly I perceive +in my neighbor's face, voice, gait, manner, a certain charm of +peculiarity; but if in any the peculiarity be so great as to suggest +a doubt whether he be not some other creature than man, may he not be +neighbor of mine! + +A little of this surface nature suffices; yet that little cannot be +spared. Its first office is to guard frontiers. We must not lie quite +open to the inspection or invasion of others: yet, were there no medium +of unlikeness interposed between one and another, privacy would be +impossible, and one's own bosom would not be sacred to himself. But +Nature has secured us against these profanations; and as we have locks +to our doors, curtains to our windows, and, upon occasion, a passport +system on our borders, so has she cast around each spirit this veil to +guard it from intruding eyes, this barrier to keep away the feet of +strangers. Homer represents the divinities as coming invisibly to +admonish their favored heroes; but Nature was beforehand with the poet, +and every one of us is, in like manner, a celestial nature walking +concealed. Who sees _you_, when you walk the street? Who would walk the +street, did be not feel himself fortressed in a privacy that no foreign +eyes can enter? But for this, no cities would be built. Society, +therefore, would be impossible, save for this element, which seems to +hinder society. Each of us, wrapt in his opaque individuality, like +Apollo or Athene in a blue mist, remains hidden, if he will; and +therefore do men dare to come together. + +But this superficial element, while securing privacy to the pure nature, +also aids it to expression. It emphasizes the outlines of Personality by +gentle contrast. It is like the shadow in the landscape, without which +all the sunbeams of heaven could not reveal with precision a single +object. Assured lovers resort to happy banter and light oppositions, to +give themselves a sweeter sense of unity of heart. The child, with a +cunning which only Nature has taught, will sometimes put a little honey +of refusal into its kisses before giving them; the maiden adds to her +virgin blooms the further attraction of virgin coyness and reserve; the +civilizing dinner-table would lose all its dignity in losing its delays; +and so everywhere, delicate denial, withholding reserve have an inverse +force, and add a charm of emphasis to gift, assent, attraction, and +sympathy. How is the word Immortality emphasized to our hearts by the +perpetual spectacle of death! The joy and suggestion of it could, +indeed, never visit us, had not this momentary loud denial been uttered +in our ears. Such, therefore, as have learned to interpret these +oppositions in Nature, hear in the jarring note of Death only a jubilant +proclamation of life eternal; while all are thus taught the longing for +immortality, though only by their fear of the contrary. And so is the +pure universal nature of man affirmed by these provocations of contrast +and insulation on the surface. We feel the personality far more, and far +more sweetly, for its being thus divided from our own. From behind this +veil the pure nature comes to us with a kind of surprise, as out of +another heaven. The joy of truth and delight of beauty are born anew for +us from each pair of chanting lips and beholding eyes; and each new soul +that comes promises another gift of the universe. Whoever, in any time +or under any sky, sees the worth and wonder of existence, sees it for +me; whatever language he speak, whatever star he inhabit, we shall +one day meet, and through the confession of his heart all my ancient +possessions will become a new gain; he shall make for me a natal day of +creation, showing the producing breath, as it goes forth from the lips +of God, and spreads into the blue purity of sky, or rounds into the +luminance of suns; the hills and their pines, the vales and their +blooms, and heroic men and beauteous women, all that I have loved or +reverenced, shall come again, appearing and trooping out of skies never +visible before. Because of these dividing lines between souls, each new +soul is to all the others a possible factor of heaven. + +Such uses does individuality subserve. Yet it is capable of these +ministries only as it does indeed _minister_. All its uses are lost with +the loss of its humility and subordinance. It is the porter at the +gate, furthering the access of lawful, and forbidding the intrusion of +unlawful visitors to the mansion; who becomes worse than useless, if in +surly excess of zeal he bar the gate against all, or if in the excess of +self-importance he receive for himself what is meant for his master, +and turn visitors aside into the porter's lodge. Beautiful is virgin +reserve, and true it is that delicate half-denial reinforces attraction; +yet the maiden who carries only _No_ upon her tongue, and only refusal +in her ways, shall never wake before dawn on the day of espousal, nor +blush beneath her bridal veil, like Morning behind her clouds. This +surface element, we must remember, is not income and resource, but +an item of needful, and, so far as needful, graceful and economical +expenditure. Excess of it is wasteful, by causing Life to pay for +that which he does not need, by increase of social fiction, and by +obstruction of social flow with the fructifications which this brings, +not to be spared by any mortal. Nay, by extreme excess, it may so cut +off and sequester a man, that no word or aspect of another soul can +reach him; he shall see in mankind only himself, he shall hear in the +voices of others only his own echoes. Many and many a man is there, so +housed in his individuality, that it goes, like an impenetrable wall, +over eye and ear; and even in the tramp of the centuries he can find +hint of nothing save the sound of his own feet. It is a frequent +tragedy,--but profound as frequent. + +One great task, indeed _the_ great task of good-breeding is, +accordingly, to induce in this element a delicacy, a translucency, +which, without robbing any action or sentiment of the hue it imparts, +shall still allow the pure human quality perfectly and perpetually to +shine through. The world has always been charmed with fine manners; and +why should it not? For what are fine manners but this: to carry your +soul on your lip, in your eye, in the palm of your hand, and yet to +stand not naked, but clothed upon by your individual quality,--visible, +yet inscrutable,--given to the hearts of others, yet contained in your +own bosom,--nobly and humanly open, yet duly reticent and secured from +invasion? _Polished_ manners often disappoint us; _good_ manners never. + +The former may be taken on by indigent souls: the latter imply a noble +and opulent nature. And wait you not for death, according to the counsel +of Solon, to be named happy, if you are permitted fellowship with a man +of rich mind, whose individual savor you always finely perceive, +and never more than finely,--who yields you the perpetual sense of +community, and never of confusion, with your own spirit. The happiness +is all the greater, if the fellowship be accorded by a mind eminently +superior to one's own; for he, while yet more removed, comes yet nearer, +seeming to be that which our own soul may become in some future life, +and so yielding us the sense of our own being more deeply and powerfully +than it is given by the consciousness in our own bosom. And going +forward to the supreme point of this felicity, we may note that the +worshipper, in the ecstasy of his adoration, feels the Highest to be +also Nearest,--more remote than the borders of space and fringes of +heaven,--more intimate with his own being than the air he breathes or +the thought be thinks; and of this double sense is the rapture of his +adoration, and the joy indeed of every angel, born. + +Divineness appertains to the absolute nature of man; piquancy and charm +to that which serves and modifies this. Infinitude and immortality are +of the one; the strictest finiteness belongs to the other. In the first +you can never be too deep and rich; in the second never too delicate and +measured. Yet you will easily find a man in whom the latter so abounds +as not only to shut him out from others, but to absorb all the vital +resource generated in his own bosom, leaving to the pure personality +nothing. The finite nature fares sumptuously every day; the other is a +heavenly Lazarus sitting at the gate. + +Of such individuals there are many classes; and the majority of +eccentric men constitute one class. If a man have very peculiar ways, we +readily attribute to him a certain depth and force, and think that the +polished citizen wants character in comparison. Probably it is not so. +Singularity may be as shallow as the shallowest conformity. There are +numbers of such from whom if you deduct the eccentricity, it is like +subtracting red from vermilion or six from half a dozen. They are +grimaces of humanity,--no more. In particular, I make occasion to say, +that those oddities, whose chief characteristic it is to slink away from +the habitations of men, and claim companionship with musk-rats, are, +despite Mr. Thoreau's pleasant patronage of them, no whit more manly or +profound than the average citizen, who loves streets and parlors, and +does not endure estrangement from the Post-Office. Mice lurk in holes +and corners; could the cat speak, she would say that they have a genius +_only_ for lurking in holes. Bees and ants are, to say the least, quite +as witty as beetles, proverbially blind; yet they build insect cities, +and are as invincibly social and city-loving as Socrates himself. + +Aside, however, from special eccentricity, there are men, like the Earl +of Essex, Bacon's _soi-disant_ friend, who possess a certain emphatic +and imposing individuality, which, while commonly assumed to indicate +character and force, is really but the _succedaneum_ for these. They +are like oysters, with extreme stress of shell, and only a blind, soft, +acephalous body within. These are commonly great men so long as little +men will serve; and are something less than little ever after. As an +instance of this, I should select the late chief magistrate of this +nation. His whole ability lay in putting a most imposing countenance +upon commonplaces. He made a mere _air_ seem solid as rock. Owing to +this possibility of presenting all force on the outside, and so creating +a false impression of resource, all great social emergencies are +followed by a speedy breaking down of men to whom was generally +attributed an able spirit; while others of less outward mark, and for +this reason hitherto unnoticed, come forward, and prove to be indeed the +large vessels of manhood accorded to that generation. + +Our tendency to assume individual mark as the measure of personality +is flattered by many of the books we read. It is, of course, easier to +depict character, when it is accompanied by some striking individual +hue; and therefore in romances and novels this is conferred upon all the +forcible characters, merely to favor the author's hand: as microscopists +feed minute creatures with colored food to make their circulations +visible. It is only the great master who can represent a powerful +personality in the purest state, that is, with the maximum of character +and the minimum of individual distinction; while small artists, with a +feeble hold upon character, habitually resort to extreme quaintnesses +and singularities of circumstance, in order to confer upon their weak +portraitures some vigor of outline. It takes a Giotto to draw readily +a nearly perfect O; but a nearly perfect triangle any one can draw. +Shakspeare is able to delineate a Gentleman,--one, that is, who, while +nobly and profoundly a man, is so delicately individualized, that the +impression of him, however vigorous and commanding, cannot be harsh: +Shakspeare is equal to this task, but even so very able a painter as +Fielding is not. His Squire Western and Parson Adams are exquisite, his +Allworthy is vapid: deny him strong pigments of individualism, and he is +unable to portray strong character. Scott, among British novelists, is, +perhaps, in this respect most Shakspearian, though the Colonel Esmond of +Thackeray is not to be forgotten; but even Scott's Dandie Dinmonts, or +gentlemen in the rough, sparkle better than his polished diamonds. +Yet in this respect the Waverley Novels are singularly and admirably +healthful, comparing to infinite advantage with the rank and file of +novels, wherein the "characters" are but bundles of quaintnesses, and +the action is impossible. + +Written history has somewhat of the same infirmity with fictitious +literature, though not always by the fault of the historian. Far too +little can it tell us respecting those of whom we desire to know much; +while, on the other hand, it is often extremely liberal of information +concerning those of whom we desire to know nothing. The greatest of men +approach a pure personality, a pure representation of man's imperishable +nature; individual peculiarity they far less abound in; and what they do +possess is held in transparent solution by their manhood, as a certain +amount of vapor is always held by the air. The higher its temperature, +the more moisture can the atmosphere thus absorb, exhibiting it not as +cloud, but only as immortal azure of sky: and so the greater intensity +there is of the pure quality of man, the more of individual peculiarity +can it master and transform into a simple heavenliness of beauty, of +which the world finds few words to say. Men, in general, have, perhaps, +no more genius than novelists in general,--though it seems a hard speech +to make,--and while profoundly _impressed_ by any manifestation of the +pure genius of man, can _observe_ and _relate_ only peculiarities and +exceptional traits. Incongruities are noted; congruities are only felt. +If a two-headed calf be born, the newspapers hasten to tell of it; but +brave boys and beautiful girls by thousands grow to fulness of stature +without mention. We know so little of Homer and Shakspeare partly +because they were Homer and Shakspeare. Smaller men might afford more +plentiful materials for biography, because their action and character +would be more clouded with individualism. The biography of a supreme +poet is the history of his kind. He transmits himself by pure vital +impression. His remembrance is committed, not to any separable faculty, +but to a memory identical with the total being of men. If you would +learn his story, listen to the sprites that ride on crimson steeds along +the arterial highways, singing of man's destiny as they go. + + + + +THE GERMAN BURNS. + + +The extreme southwestern corner of Germany is an irregular right-angle, +formed by the course of the Rhine. Within this angle and an +hypothenuse drawn from the Lake of Constance to Carlsruhe lies a wild +mountain-region--a lateral offshoot from the central chain which +extends through Europe from west to east--known to all readers of +robber-romances as the Black Forest. It is a cold, undulating upland, +intersected with deep valleys which descend to the plains of the Rhine +and the Danube, and covered with great tracts of fir-forest. Here and +there a peak rises high above the general level, the Feldberg attaining +a height of five thousand feet. The aspect of this region is stern and +gloomy: the fir-woods appear darker than elsewhere; the frequent little +lakes are as inky in hue as the pools of the High Alps; and the meadows +of living emerald give but a partial brightness to the scenery. Here, +however, the solitary traveller may adventure without fear. Robbers and +robber-castles have long since passed away, and the people, rough and +uncouth as they may at first seem, are as kindly-hearted as they are +honest. Among them was born--and in their incomprehensible dialect +wrote--Hebel, the German Burns. + +We dislike the practice of using the name of one author as the +characteristic designation of another. It is, at best, the sign of an +imperfect fame, implying rather the imitation of a scholar than the +independent position of a master. We can, nevertheless, in no other way +indicate in advance the place which the subject of our sketch occupies +in the literature of Germany. A contemporary of Burns, and ignorant of +the English language, there is no evidence that he had ever even heard +of the former; but Burns, being the first truly great poet who succeeded +in making classic a local dialect, thereby constituted himself an +illustrious standard, by which his successors in the same path must be +measured. Thus, Bellman and Béranger have been inappropriately invested +with his mantle, from the one fact of their being song-writers of a +democratic stamp. The Gascon, Jasmin, better deserves the title; and +Longfellow, in translating his "Blind Girl of Castèl-Cuillè," says,-- + + "Only the lowland tongue of Scotland might + Rehearse this little tragedy aright":-- + +a conviction which we have frequently shared, in translating our German +author. + +It is a matter of surprise to us, that, while Jasmin's poems have gone +far beyond the bounds of France, the name of John Peter Hebel--who +possesses more legitimate claims to the peculiar distinction which +Burns achieved--is not only unknown outside of Germany, but not +even familiarly known to the Germans themselves. The most probable +explanation is, that the Alemannic dialect, in which he wrote, is spoken +only by the inhabitants of the Black Forest and a portion of Suabia, +and cannot be understood, without a glossary, by the great body of the +North-Germans. The same cause would operate, with greater force, in +preventing a translation into foreign languages. It is, in fact, only +within the last twenty years that the Germans have become acquainted +with Burns,--chiefly through the admirable translations of the poet +Freiligrath. + +To Hebel belongs the merit of having bent one of the harshest of German +dialects to the uses of poetry. We doubt whether the lyre of Apollo was +ever fashioned from a wood of rougher grain. Broad, crabbed, guttural, +and unpleasant to the ear which is not thoroughly accustomed to its +sound, the Alemannic _patois_ was, in truth, a most unpromising +material. The stranger, even though he were a good German scholar, would +never suspect the racy humor, the _naïve_, childlike fancy, and the pure +human tenderness of expression which a little culture has brought to +bloom on such a soil. The contractions, elisions, and corruptions which +German words undergo, with the multitude of terms in common use derived +from the Gothic, Greek, Latin, and Italian, give it almost the character +of a different language. It was Hebel's mother-tongue, and his poetic +faculty always returned to its use with a fresh delight which insured +success. His _German_ poems are inferior in all respects. + +Let us first glance at the poet's life,--a life uneventful, perhaps, yet +interesting from the course of its development. He was born in Basle, +in May, 1760, in the house of Major Iselin, where both his father and +mother were at service. The former, a weaver by trade, afterwards became +a soldier, and accompanied the Major to Flanders, France, and Corsica. +He had picked up a good deal of stray knowledge on his campaigns, and +had a strong natural taste for poetry. The qualities of the son were +inherited from him rather than from the mother, of whom we know nothing +more than that she was a steady, industrious person. The parents lived +during the winter in the little village of Hausen, in the Black Forest, +but with the approach of spring returned to Basle for their summer +service in Major Iselin's house. + +The boy was but a year old when his father died, and the discipline of +such a restless spirit as he exhibited in early childhood seems to have +been a task almost beyond the poor widow's powers. An incorrigible +spirit of mischief possessed him. He was an arrant scape-grace, +plundering cupboards, gardens, and orchards, lifting the gates of +mill-races by night, and playing a thousand other practical and not +always innocent jokes. Neither counsel nor punishment availed, and +the entire weight of his good qualities, as a counterbalance, barely +sufficed to prevent him from losing the patrons whom his bright, +eager, inquisitive mind attracted. Something of this was undoubtedly +congenital, and there are indications that the strong natural impulse, +held in check only by a powerful will and a watchful conscience, was the +torment of his life. In his later years, when he filled the posts of +Ecclesiastical Counsellor and Professor in the Gymnasium at Carlsruhe, +the phrenologist Gall, in a scientific _séance_, made an examination of +his head. "A most remarkable development of"----, said Gall, abruptly +breaking off, nor could he be induced to complete the sentence. +Hebel, however, frankly exclaimed,--"You certainly mean the thievish +propensity. I know I have it by nature, for I continually feel its +suggestions." What a picture is presented by this confession! A pure, +honest, and honorable life, won by a battle with evil desires, which, +commencing with birth, ceased their assaults only at the brink of the +grave! A daily struggle, and a daily victory! + +Hebel lost his mother in his thirteenth year, but was fortunate in +possessing generous patrons, who contributed enough to the slender means +he inherited to enable him to enter the Gymnasium at Carlsruhe. Leaving +this institution with the reputation of a good classical scholar, he +entered the University of Erlangen as a student of theology. Here his +jovial, reckless temperament, finding a congenial atmosphere, so got the +upperhand that he barely succeeded in passing the necessary examination, +in 1780. At the end of two years, during which time he supported himself +as a private tutor, he was ordained, and received a meagre situation +as teacher in the Academy at Lörrach, with a salary of one hundred and +forty dollars a year! Laboring patiently in this humble position for +eight years, he was at last rewarded by being transferred to the +Gymnasium at Carlsruhe, with the rank of Sub-Deacon. Hither, the +Markgraf Frederick of Baden, attracted by the warmth, simplicity, and +genial humor of the man, came habitually to listen to his sermons. He +found himself, without seeking it, in the path of promotion, and his +life thenceforth was a series of sure and moderate successes. His +expectations, indeed, were so humble that they were always exceeded by +his rewards. When Baden became a Grand Duchy, with a constitutional form +of government, it required much persuasion to induce him to accept +the rank of Prelate, with a seat in the Upper House. His friends were +disappointed, that, with his readiness and fluent power of speech, +he took so little part in the legislative proceedings. To one who +reproached him for this timidity he naively wrote,--"Oh, you have a +right to talk: you are the son of Pastor N. in X. Before you were twelve +years old, you heard yourself called _Mr._ Gottlieb; and when you went +with your father down the street, and the judge or a notary met you, +they took off their hats, you waiting for your father to return the +greeting, before you even lifted your cap. But I, as you well know, +grew up as the son of a poor widow in Hausen; and when I accompanied my +mother to Schopfheim or Basle, and we happened to meet a notary, she +commanded, 'Peter, jerk your cap off, there's a gentleman!'--but when +the judge or the counsellor appeared, she called out to me, when they +were twenty paces off, 'Peter, stand still where you are, and off with +your cap quick, the Lord Judge is comin'!' Now you can easily +imagine how I feel, when I recall those times,--and I recall them +often,--sitting in the Chamber among Barons, Counsellors of State, +Ministers, and Generals, with Counts and Princes of the reigning House +before me." Hebel may have felt that rank is but the guinea-stamp, but +he never would have dared to speak it out with the defiant independence +of Burns. Socially, however, he was thoroughly democratic in his tastes; +and his chief objection to accepting the dignity of Prelate was the fear +that it might restrict his intercourse with humbler friends. + +His ambition appears to have been mainly confined to his theological +labors, and he never could have dreamed that his after-fame was to rest +upon a few poems in a rough mountain-dialect, written to beguile his +intense longing for the wild scenery of his early home. After his +transfer to Carlsruhe, he remained several years absent from the Black +Forest; and the pictures of its dark hills, its secluded valleys, and +their rude, warm-hearted, and unsophisticated inhabitants, became more +and more fresh and lively in his memory. Distance and absence turned the +quaint dialect to music, and out of this mild home-sickness grew the +Alemannic poems. A healthy oyster never produces a pearl. + +These poems, written in the years 1801 and 1802, were at first +circulated in manuscript among the author's friends. He resisted the +proposal to collect and publish them, until the prospect of pecuniary +advantage decided him to issue an anonymous edition. The success of +the experiment was so positive that in the course of five years four +editions appeared,--a great deal for those days. Not only among his +native Alemanni, and in Baden and Würtemberg, where the dialect was +more easily understood, but from all parts of Germany, from poets and +scholars, came messages of praise and appreciation. Jean Paul (Richter) +was one of Hebel's first and warmest admirers. "Our Alemannic poet," he +wrote, "has life and feeling for everything,--the open heart, the open +arms of love; and every star and every flower are human in his sight.... +In other, better words,--the evening-glow of a lovely, peaceful soul +slumbers upon all the hills he bids arise; for the flowers of poetry he +substitutes the flower-goddess Poetry herself; he sets to his lips the +Swiss Alp-horn of youthful longing and joy, while pointing with the +other hand to the sunset-gleam of the lofty glaciers, and dissolved +in prayer, as the sound of the chapel-bells is flung down from the +mountains." + +Contrast this somewhat confused rhapsody with the clear, precise, yet +genial words wherewith Goethe welcomed the new poet. He instantly +seized, weighed in the fine balance of his ordered mind, and valued with +nice discrimination, those qualities of Hebel's genius which had but +stirred the splendid chaos of Richter with an emotion of vague delight. +"The author of these poems," says he, in the Jena "Literaturzeitung," +(1804,) "is about to achieve a place of his own on the German Parnassus. +His talent manifests itself in two opposite directions. On the one hand, +he observes with a fresh, cheerful glance those objects of Nature which +express their life in positive existence, in growth and in motion, +(objects which we are accustomed to call _lifeless_,) and thereby +approaches the field of descriptive poetry; yet he succeeds, by his +happy personifications, in lifting his pictures to a loftier plane of +Art. On the other hand, he inclines to the didactic and the allegorical; +but here, also, the same power of personification comes to his aid, and +as, in the one case, he finds a soul for his bodies, so, in the other, +he finds a body for his souls. As the ancient poets, and others who have +been developed through a plastic sentiment for Art, introduce +loftier spirits, related to the gods,--such as nymphs, dryads, and +hamadryads,--in the place of rocks, fountains, and trees: so the author +transforms these objects into peasants, and countrifies [_verbauert_] +the universe in the most _naïve_, quaint, and genial manner, until the +landscape, in which we nevertheless always recognize the human figure, +seems to become one with man in the cheerful enchantment exercised upon +our fancy." + +This is entirely correct, as a poetic characterization. Hebel, however, +possesses the additional merit--no slight one, either--of giving +faithful expression to the thoughts, emotions, and passions of the +simple people among whom his childhood was passed. The hearty native +kindness, the tenderness, hidden under a rough exterior, the lively, +droll, unformed fancy, the timidity and the boldness of love, the +tendency to yield to temptation, and the unfeigned piety of the +inhabitants of the Black Forest, are all reproduced in his poems. To say +that they teach, more or less directly, a wholesome morality, is but +indifferent praise; for morality is the cheap veneering wherewith +would-be poets attempt to conceal the lack of the true faculty. We +prefer to let our readers judge for themselves concerning this feature +of Hebel's poetry. + +The Alemannic dialect, we have said, is at first harsh to the ear. +It requires, indeed, not a little practice, to perceive its especial +beauties; since these consist in certain quaint, playful inflections and +elisions, which, like the speech of children, have a fresh, natural, +simple charm of their own. The changes of pronunciation, in German +words, are curious. _K_ becomes a light guttural _ch_, and a great +number of monosyllabic words--especially those ending in _ut_ and +_üh_--receive a peculiar twist from the introduction of _e_ or _ei_: +as _gut, früh_, which become _guet, früeih_. This seems to be a +characteristic feature of the South-German dialects, though in none is +it so pronounced as in the Alemannic. The change of _ist_ into _isch, +hast_ into _hesch, ich_ into _i, dich_ into _de_, etc., is much more +widely spread, among the peasantry, and is readily learned, even by the +foreign reader. But a good German scholar would be somewhat puzzled by +the consolidation of several abbreviated words into a single one, which +occurs in almost every Alemannic sentence: for instance, in _woni_ he +would have some difficulty in recognizing _wo ich; ságene_ does not +suggest _sage ihnen_, nor _uffeme, auf einem_. + +These singularities of the dialect render the translation of Hebel's +poems into a foreign language a work of great difficulty. In the absence +of any English dialect which possesses corresponding features, the +peculiar quaintness and raciness which they confer must inevitably be +lost. Fresh, wild, and lovely as the Schwarzwald heather, they are +equally apt to die in transplanting. How much they lose by being +converted into classical German was so evident to us (fancy, "Scots who +have with Wallace bled"!) that we at first shrank from the experiment of +reproducing them in a language still farther removed from the original. +Certainly, classical English would not answer; the individual soul of +the poems could never be recognized in such a garb. The tongue of Burns +can be spoken only by a born Scot; and our Yankee, which is rather a +grotesque English than a dialect, is unfortunately so associated +with the coarse and the farcical--Lowell's little poem of "'Zekel's +Courtship" being the single exception--that it seems hardly adapted to +the simple and tender fancies of Hebel. Like the comedian whose one +serious attempt at tragic acting was greeted with roars of laughter, as +an admirable burlesque, the reader might, in such a case, persist in +seeing fun where sentiment was intended. + +In this dilemma, it occurred to us that the common, rude form of the +English language, as it is spoken by the uneducated everywhere, without +reference to provincial idioms, might possibly be the best medium. +It offers, at least, the advantage of simplicity, of a directness +of expression which overlooks grammatical rules, of natural pathos, +even,--and therefore, so far as these traits go, may reproduce them +without detracting seriously from the original. Those other qualities of +the poems which spring from the character of the people of whom and +for whom they were written must depend, for their recognition, on the +sympathetic insight of the reader. We can only promise him the utmost +fidelity in the translation, having taken no other liberty than the +substitution of common idiomatic phrases, peculiar to our language, +for corresponding phrases in the other. The original metre, in every +instance, has been strictly adhered to. + +The poems, only fifty-nine in number, consist principally of short songs +or pastorals, and narratives. The latter are written in hexameter, but +by no means classic in form. It is a rough, irregular metre, in which +the trochees preponderate over the dactyls: many of the lines, in fact, +would not bear a critical scansion. We have not scrupled to imitate this +irregularity, as not inconsistent with the plain, ungrammatical speech +of the characters introduced, and the homely air of even the most +imaginative passages. The opening poem is a charmingly wayward idyl, +called "The Meadow," (_Die Wiese_,) the name of a mountain-stream, +which, rising in the Feldberg, the highest peak of the Black Forest, +flows past Hausen, Hebel's early home, on its way to the Rhine. An +extract from it will illustrate what Jean Paul calls the "hazardous +boldness" of Hebel's personifications:-- + + Beautiful "Meadow," daughter o' Feldberg, I + welcome and greet you. + Listen: I'm goin' to sing a song, and all in + y'r honor, + Makin' a music beside ye, follerin' wherever + you wander. + Born unbeknown in the rocky, hidden heart + o' the mountain, + Suckled o' clouds and fogs, and weaned by + the waters o' heaven, + There you slep' like a babblin' baby, a-kep' + in the bed-room, + Secret, and tenderly cared-for: and eye o' + man never saw you,-- + Never peeked through a key-hole and saw + my little girl sleepin' + Sound in her chamber o' crystal, rocked in + her cradle o' silver. + Neither an ear o' man ever listened to hear + her a-breathin', + No, nor her voice all alone to herself + a-laughin' or cryin'. + Only the close little spirits that know every + passage and entrance, + In and out dodgin', they brought ye up and + teached ye to toddle, + Gev' you a cheerful natur', and larnt you + how to be useful: + Yes, and their words didn't go into one ear + and out at the t'other. + Stand on your slippery feet as soon as may + be, and use 'em, + That you do, as you slyly creep from your + chamber o' crystal + Out o' doors, barefoot, and squint up to + heaven, mischievously smilin'. + Oh, but you're pretty, my darlin', y'r eyes + have a beautiful sparkle! + Isn't it nice, out o' doors? you didn't guess + 't was so pleasant? + Listen, the leaves is rustlin', and listen, the + birdies a-singin'! + "Yes," says you, "but I'm goin' furder, and + can't stay to hear 'm: + Pleasant, truly, 's my way, and more so the + furder I travel." + + Only see how spry my little one is at her + jumpin'! + "Ketch me!" she shouts, in her fun,--"if + you want me, foller and ketch me!" + Every minute she turns and jumps in another + direction. + + There, you'll fall from the bank! You see, + she's done it: I said so. + Didn't I say it? And now she wobbles + furder and furder, + Creepin' along on all-fours, then off on her + legs she's a-toddlin',-- + Slips in the bushes,--"Hunt me!"--and + there, on a sudden, she peeks out. + Wait, I'm a-comin'! Back o' the trees I + hear her a-callin': + "Guess where I am!"--she's whims of her + own, a plenty, and keeps 'em. + But, as you go, you're growin' han'somer, + bigger, and stronger. + Where the breath o' y'r breathin' falls, the + meadows is greener, + Fresher o' color, right and left, and the + weeds and the grasses + Sprout up as juicy as _can_ be, and posies o' + loveliest colors + Blossom as brightly as wink, and bees come + and suck 'em. + Water-wagtails come tiltin',--and, look! + there's the geese o' the village! + All are a-comin' to see you, and all want to + give you a welcome; + Yes, and you're kind o' heart, and you + prattle to all of 'em kindly; + "Come, you well-behaved creeturs, eat and + drink what I bring you,-- + I must be off and away: God bless you, + well-behaved creeturs!"[A] + +[Footnote A: As the reader of German may be curious to see a specimen +of the original, we give this last passage, which contains, in a brief +compass, many distinctive features of the Alemannic dialect:-- + + "Nei so lucg me doch, wie cha mi Meiddeli springe! + 'Chunnsch mi über,' seits und lacht, 'und witt + mi, se hol mi!' + All' wil en andere Weg, und alliwil anderi + Sprüngli! + Fall mer nit sel Reiuli ab!--Do hemmer's, i sags io-- + Hani's denn nit gseit? Doch gauckelet's witers + und witers, + Groblet uf alle Vieren, und stellt si wieder uf + d' Beinli, + Schlieft in d' Hürst--iez such mer's eisl--dört + güggelet's use, + Wart, i chumm! Druf rüefts mer wieder hinter + de Bäume: + 'Roth wo bin i iez!'--und het si urige Phatest. + Aber wie de gosch, wirsch sichtli grösser und + schöner. + Wo di liebligen Othern weiht, so färbt si der Rase + Grüener rechts und links, es stöhn in saftige + Triebe + Gras und Chrüter uf, es stöhn in frischere Gstalte + Farbigi Blüemli do, und d' Immli chömmen und + suge. + 'S Wasserstelzli chunnt, und lueg doch,'s Wuli + vo Todtnau! + Alles will di bschauen, und Alles will di bigrüsse, + Und di fründlig Herz git alle fründligi Rede: + 'Chömmet ihr ordlige Thierli, do hender, esset + und trinket! + Witers goht mi Weg, Gsegott, ihr ordlige Thierli!'" +] + +The poet follows the stream through her whole course, never dropping the +figure, which is adapted, with infinite adroitness, and with the play +of a fancy as wayward and unrestrained as her own waters, to all her +changing aspects. Beside the Catholic chapel of Fair-Beeches she pauses +to listen to the mass; but farther down the valley becomes an apostate, +and attends the Lutheran service in the Husemer church. Stronger and +statelier grown, she trips along with the step of a maiden conscious of +her own beauty, and the poet clothes her in the costume of an Alemannic +bride, with a green kirtle of a hundred folds, and a stomacher of Milan +gauze, "like a loose cloud on a morning sky in spring-time." Thus +equipped, she wanders at will over the broader meadows, around the feet +of vineyard-hills, visits villages and churches, or stops to gossip with +the lusty young millers. But the woman's destiny is before her; she +cannot escape it; and the time is drawing near when her wild, singing, +pastoral being shall be absorbed in that of the strong male stream, the +bright-eyed son of the Alps, who has come so far to woo and win her. + + Daughter o' Feldberg, half-and-half I've got + a suspicion + How as you've virtues and faults enough now + to choose ye a husband. + Castin' y'r eyes down, are you? Pickin' and + plattin' y'r ribbons? + Don't be so foolish, wench!--She thinks I + know nothin' about it, + How she's already engaged, and each is + a-waitin' for t'other. + Don't I know him, my darlin', the lusty + young fellow, y'r sweetheart? + + Over powerful rocks, and through the hedges + and thickets, + Right away from the snowy Swiss mountains + he plunges at Rheineck + Down to the lake, and straight ahead swims + through it to Constance, + Sayin': "'T's no use o' talkin', I'll have + the gal I'm engaged to!" + + + But, as he reaches Stein, he goes a little more slowly, + Leavin' the lake where he's decently washed his feet and his body. + Diessenhofen don't please him,--no, nor the convent beside it. + For'ard he goes to Schaffhausen, onto the rocks at the corner; + There he says: "It's no use o' talkin', I'll git to my sweetheart: + Body and life I'll stake, cravat and embroidered suspenders." + Woop! but he jumps! And now he talks to hisself, goin' furder, + Giddy, belike, in his head, but pushes for'ard to Rheinau, + Eglisau, and Kaiserstuhl, and Zurzach, and Waldshut,-- + All are behind him, passin' one village after another + Down to Grenzach, and out on the broad and beautiful bottoms + Nigh unto Basle; and there he must stop and look after his license. + + * * * * * + + Look! isn't that y'r bridegroom a-comin' down yonder to meet you?-- + Yes, it's him, it's him, I hear't, for his voice is so jolly! + Yes, it's him, it's him,--with his eyes as blue as the heavens, + With his Swiss knee-breeches o' green, and suspenders o' velvet, + With his shirt o' the color o' pearl, and buttons o' crystal, + With his powerful loins, and his sturdy back and his shoulders, + Grand in his gait, commandin', beautiful, free in his motions, + Proud as a Basle Councilman,--yes, it's the big boy o' Gothard![B] + +[Footnote B: The Rhine.] + +The daring with which Hebel _countrifies_ (or, rather, _farmerizes_, to +translate Goethe's--word more literally) the spirit of natural objects, +carrying his personifications to that point where the imaginative +borders on the grotesque, is perhaps his strongest characteristic. His +poetic faculty, putting on its Alemannic costume, seems to abdicate all +ambition of moving in a higher sphere of society, but within the bounds +it has chosen allows itself the utmost range of capricious enjoyment. +In another pastoral, called "The Oatmeal Porridge," he takes the grain +which the peasant has sown, makes it a sentient creature, and carries it +through the processes of germination, growth, and bloom, without once +dropping the figure or introducing an incongruous epithet. It is not +only a child, but a child of the Black Forest, uttering its hopes, its +anxieties, and its joys in the familiar dialect. The beetle, in +his eyes, becomes a gross, hard-headed boor, carrying his sacks of +blossom-meal, and drinking his mug of XX morning-dew; the stork parades +about to show his red stockings; the spider is at once machinist and +civil engineer; and even the sun, moon, and morning-star are not secure +from the poet's familiarities. In his pastoral of "The Field-Watchmen," +he ventures to say,-- + + Mister Schoolmaster Moon, with y'r forehead wrinkled with teachin', + With y'r face full o' larnin', a plaster stuck on y'r cheek-bone, + Say, do y'r children mind ye, and larn their psalm and their texes? + +We much fear that this over-quaintness of fancy, to which the Alemannic +dialect gives such a racy flavor, and which belongs, in a lesser +degree, to the minds of the people who speak that dialect, cannot be +successfully clothed in an English dress. Let us try, therefore, a +little poem, the sentiment whereof is of universal application:-- + + THE CONTENTED FARMER. + + I guess I'll take my pouch, and fill + My pipe just once,--yes, that I will! + Turn out my plough and home'ards go: + _Buck_ thinks, enough's been done, I know. + + Why, when the Emperor's council's done, + And he can hunt, and have his fun, + He stops, I guess, at any tree, + And fills his pipe as well as me. + + But smokin' does him little good: + He can't have all things as he would. + His crown's a precious weight, at that: + It isn't like my old straw hat. + + He gits a deal o' tin, no doubt, + But all the more he pays it out; + And everywheres they beg and cry + Heaps more than he can satisfy. + + And when, to see that nothin' 's wrong, + He plagues hisself the whole day long, + And thinks, "I guess I've fixed it now," + Nobody thanks him, anyhow. + + And so, when in his bloody clo'es + The Gineral out o' battle goes, + He takes his pouch, too, I'll agree, + And fills his pipe as well as me. + + But in the wild and dreadfle fight, + His pipe don't taste ezackly right: + He's galloped here and galloped there, + And things a'n't pleasant, anywhere. + + And sich a cursin': "Thunder!" "Hell!" + And "Devil!" (worse nor I can tell:) + His grannydiers in blood lay down, + And yonder smokes a burnin' town. + + And when, a-travellin' to the Fairs, + The merchant goes with all his wares, + He takes a pouch o' th' best, I guess, + And fills and smokes his pipe, no less. + + Poor devil, 't isn't good for you! + With all y'r gold, you've trouble, too. + Twice two is four, if stocks'll rise: + I see the figgers in your eyes. + + It's hurry, worry, tare and tret; + Ye ha'n't enough, the more ye get,-- + And couldn't use it, if ye had: + No wonder that y'r pipe tastes bad! + + But good, thank God! and wholesome's mine: + The bottom-wheat is growin' fine, + And God, o' mornin's, sends the dew, + And sends his breath o' blessin', too. + + And, home, there's Nancy bustlin' round: + The supper's ready, I'll be bound, + And youngsters waitin'. Lord! I vow + I dunno which is smartest, now. + + My pipe tastes good; the reason's plain: + (I guess I'll fill it once again:) + With cheerful heart, and jolly mood, + And goin' home, all things is good. + +Hebel's narrative poems abound with the wayward pranks of a fancy which +seems a little too restive to be entirely controlled by his artistic +sense; but they possess much dramatic truth and power. He delights in +the supernatural element, but approaches it from the gentler human side. +In "The Carbuncle," only, we find something of that weird, uncanny +atmosphere which casts its glamour around the "Tam O'Shanter" of Burns. +A more satisfactory illustration of his peculiar qualities is "The +Ghost's Visit on the Feldberg,"--a story told by a loafer of Basle to a +group of beer-drinkers in the tavern at Todtnau, a little village at +the foot of the mountain. This is, perhaps, the most popular of Hebel's +poems, and we therefore translate it entire. The superstition that a +child born on Sunday has the power of seeing spirits is universal among +the German peasantry. + + THE GHOST'S VISIT ON THE FELDBERG. + + Hark ye, fellows o' Todtnau, if ever I told + you the Scythe-Ghost[C] + Was a spirit of Evil, I've now got a different + story. + Out of the town am I,--yes, that I'll honestly + own to,-- + Related to merchants, at seven tables free to + take pot-luck. + But I'm a Sunday's child; and wherever the ghosts + at the cross-roads + Stand in the air, in vaults, and cellars, and + out-o'-way places,-- + Guardin' hidden money with eyes like fiery + sauce-pans, + Washin' with bitter tears the spot where + somebody's murdered, + Shovellin' the dirt, and scratchin' it over + with nails all so bloody,-- + Clear as day I can see, when it lightens. + Ugh! how they whimper! + Also, whenever with beautiful blue eyes the + heavenly angels, + Deep in the night, in silent, sleepin' + villages wander, + Peekin' in at the windows, and talkin' + together so pleasant, + Smilin' one at the t'other, and settin' + outside o' the house-doors, + So that the pious folks shall take no harm + while they're sleepin': + Then ag'in, when in couples or threes they + walk in the grave-yard, + Talkin' in this like: "There a faithful + mother is layin'; + And here's a man that was poor, but took no + advantage o' no one: + Take your rest, for you're tired,--we'll waken + ye up when the time comes!" + Clearly I see by the light o' the stars, and I + hear them a-talkin'. + Many I know by their names, and speak to, + whenever I meet 'em, + Give 'em the time o' day, and ask 'em, and + answer their questions. + "How do ye do?" "How's y'r watch?" + "Praise God, it's tolerable, thank you!" + Believe it, or not! Well, once on a time my + cousin, he sent me + Over to Todtnau, on business with all sorts o' + troublesome people, + Where you've coffee to drink, and biscuit + they give you to soak in 't. + "Don't you stop on the road, nor gabble + whatever comes foremost," + Hooted my cousin at startin', "nor don't you + let go o' your snuff-box, + Leavin' it round in the tavern, as gentlemen + do, for the next time." + Up and away I went, and all that my cousin + he'd ordered + Fairly and squarely I fixed. At the sign o' + the Eagle in Todtnau + Set for a while; then, sure o' my way, tramped + off ag'in, home'ards, + Nigh by the village, I reckoned,--but found + myself climbin' the Feldberg, + Lured by the birdies, and down by the brooks + the beautiful posies: + That's a weakness o' mine,--I ran like a fool + after such things. + Now it was dusk, and the birdies hushed up, + settin' still on the branches. + Hither and yonder a starlie stuck its head + through the darkness, + Peekin' out, as oncertain whether the sun was + in bed yet,-- + Whether it mightn't come, and called to the + other ones: "Come now!" + Then I knowed I was lost, and laid myself + down,--I was weary: + There, you know, there's a hut, and I found + an armful o' straw in 't. + "Here's a go!" I thinks to myself, "and I + wish I was safely + Cuddled in bed to home,--or 't was midnight, + and some little spirit + Somewhere popped out, as o' nights when it's + twelve they're accustomed, + Passin' the time with me, friendly, till winds + that blow early o' mornin's + Blow out the heavenly lights, and I see the + way back to the village." + Now, as thinkin' in this like, I felt all over my + watch-face,-- + Dark as pitch all around,--and felt with my + finger the hour-hand, + Found it was nigh onto 'leven, and hauled my + pipe from my pocket, + Thinkin': "Maybe a bit of a smoke'll keep + me from snoozin'": + Thunder! all of a sudden beside me was two + of 'em talkin', + Like as they'd business together! You'd + better believe that I listened. + "Say, a'n't I late a-comin'? Because there + was, over in Mambach, + Dyin', a girl with pains in the bones and terrible + fever: + Now, but she's easy! I held to her mouth the + drink o' departure, + So that the sufferin' ceased, and softly lowered + the eyelids, + Sayin': 'Sleep, and in peace,--I'll waken + thee up when the time comes!' + Do me the favor, brother: fetch in the basin o' + silver + Water, ever so little: my scythe, as you see, + must be whetted." + "Whetted?" says I to myself, "and a spirit?" + and peeked from the window. + Lo and behold, there sat a youngster with + wings that was golden; + White was his mantle, white, and his girdle + the color o' roses, + Fair and lovely to see, and beside him two + lights all a-burnin'. + "All the good spirits," says I, "Mr. Angel, + God have you in keepin'!" + "Praise their Master, the Lord," said the angel; + "God thank you, as I do!" + "Take no offence, Mr. Ghost, and by y'r good + leave and permission, + Tell me, what have you got for to mow?" + "Why, the scythe!" was his answer. + "Yes," says I, "for I see it; and that is my + question exackly, + What you're goin' to do with the scythe." + "Why, to mow!" was his answer. + Then I ventur'd to say: "And that is my question + exackly, + What you're goin' to mow, supposin' you're + willin' to tell me." + "Grass! And what is your business so late up + here in the night-time?" + "Nothin' special," I answered; "I'm burnin' + a little tobacco. + Lost my way, or most likely I'd be at the + Eagle, in Todtnau. + But to come to the subject, supposin' it isn't + a secret, + Tell me, what do you make o' the grass?" + And he answered me: "Fodder!" + "Don't understand it," says I; "for the Lord + has no cows up in heaven." + "Not precisely a cow," he remarked, "but + heifers and asses. + Seest, up yonder, the star?" and he pointed + one out with his finger. + "There's the ass o' the Christmas-Child, and + Fridolin's heifers,[D] + Breathin' the starry air, and waitin' for grass + that I bring 'em: + Grass doesn't grow there,--nothin' grows but + the heavenly raisins, + Milk and honey a-runnin' in rivers, plenty as + water: + But they're particular cattle,--grass they + must have every mornin', + Mouthfuls o' hay, and drink from earthly + fountains they're used to. + So for them I'm a-whettin' my scythe, and + soon must be mowin': + Wouldn't it be worth while, if politely you'd + offer to help me?" + So the angel he talked, and this way I answered + the angel: + "Hark ye, this it is, just: and I'll go wi' the + greatest o' pleasure. + Folks from the town know nothin' about it: + we write and we cipher, + Reckon up money,--that we can do!--and + measure and weigh out, + Unload, and on-load, and eat and drink without + any trouble. + All that we want for the belly, in kitchen, + pantry, and cellar, + Comes in lots through every gate, in baskets + and boxes, + Runs in every street, and cries at every + corner: + 'Buy my cherries!' and 'Buy my butter!' + and 'Look at my salad!' + 'Buy my onions!' and 'Here's your carrots!' + and 'Spinage and parsley!' + 'Lucifer matches! Lucifer matches!' 'Cabbage + and turnips!' + 'Here's your umbrellas!' 'Caraway-seed and + juniper-berries! + Cheap for cash, and all to be traded for sugar + and coffee!' + Say, Mr. Angel, didst ever drink coffee? + how do you like it?" + "Stop with y'r nonsense!" then he said, but + he couldn't help laughin'; + "No, we drink but the heavenly air, and eat + nothin' but raisins, + Four on a day o' the week, and afterwards five + on a Sunday. + Come, if you want to go with me, now, for + I'm off to my mowin', + Back o' Todtnau, there on the grassy holt by + the highway." + "Yes, Mr. Angel, that will I truly, seein' + you're willin': + Seems to me that it's cooler: give me y'r + scythe for to carry: + Here's a pipe and a pouch,--you're welcome + to smoke, if you want to." + While I was talkin', "Poohoo!" cried the + angel. A fiery man stood, + Quicker than lightnin', beside me. "Light us + the way to the village!" + Said he. And truly before us marched, a-burnin', + the Poohoo, + Over stock and rock, through the bushes, a + travellin' torch-light. + "Handy, isn't it?" laughin', the angel said. + --"What are ye doin'? + Why do you nick at y'r flint? You can light + y'r pipe at the Poohoo. + Use him whenever you like: but it seems to + me you're a-frightened,-- + You, and a Sunday's-child, as you are: do you + think he will bite you?" + "No, he ha'n't bit me; but this you'll allow + me to say, Mr. Angel,-- + Half-and-half I mistrust him: besides, my tobacco's + a-burnin'. + That's a weakness o' mine,--I'm afeard o' + them fiery creeturs: + Give me seventy angels, instead o' this big + burnin' devil!" + "Really, it's dreadfle," the angel says he, + "that men is so silly, + Fearful o' ghosts and spectres, and skeery + without any reason. + Two of 'em only is dangerous, two of 'em hurtful + to mankind: + One of 'em's known by the name o' Delusion, + and Worry the t'other. + Him, Delusion, 's a dweller in wine: from + cans and decanters + Up to the head he rises, and turns your sense + to confusion. + This is the ghost that leads you astray in forest + and highway: + Undermost, uppermost, hither and yon the + ground is a-rollin', + Bridges bendin', and mountains movin', and + everything double. + Hark ye, keep out of his way!" "Aha!" + I says to the angel, + "There you prick me, but not to the blood: I + see what you're after. + Sober am I, as a judge. To be sure, I emptied + my tankard + Once, at the Eagle,--_once_,--and the landlord + 'll tell you the same thing, + S'posin' you doubt me. And now, pray, tell + me who is the t'other?" + "Who is the t'other? Don't know without + askin'?" answered the angel. + "He's a terrible ghost: the Lord forbid you + should meet him! + When you waken early, at four or five in the + mornin', + There he stands a-waitin' with burnin eyes + at y'r bed-side, + Gives you the time o' day with blazin switches + and pinchers: + Even prayin' don't help, nor helps all your + _Ave Marias!_ + When you begin 'em, he takes your jaws and + claps 'em together; + Look to heaven, he comes and blinds y'r eyes + with his ashes; + Be you hungry, and eat, he pizons y'r soup + with his wormwood; + Take you a drink o' nights, he squeezes gall + in the tankard; + Run like a stag, he follows as close on y'r trail + as a blood-hound; + Creep like a shadow, be whispers: 'Good! we + had best take it easy'; + Kneels at y'r side in the church, and sets at + y'r side in the tavern. + Go wherever you will, there's ghosts a-hoverin' + round you. + Shut your eyes in y'r bed, they mutter: + 'There 's no need o' hurry; + By-and-by you can sleep, but listen! we've + somethin' to tell you: + Have you forgot how you stoled? and how + you cheated the orphans? + Secretly sinned?'--and this, and t'other; + and when they have finished, + Say it over ag'in, and you get little good o' + your slumber." + So the angel he talked, and, like iron under + the hammer, + Sparked and spirited the Poohoo. "Surely," + I says to the angel, + "Born on a Sunday was I, and friendly with + many a preacher, + Yet the Father protect me from these!" Says + he to me, smilin': + "Keep y'r conscience pure; it is better than + crossin' and blessin'. + Here we must part, for y'r way turns off and + down to the village. + Take the Poohoo along, but mind! put him + out, in the meadow, + Lest he should run in the village, settin' fire + to the stables. + God be with you and keep you!" And then + says I: "Mr. Angel, + God, the Father, protect you! Be sure, when + you come to the city, + Christmas evenin', call, and I'll hold it an + honor to see you: + Raisins I'll have at your service, and hippocras, + if you like it. + Chilly 's the air, o' evenin's, especially down + by the river." + Day was breakin' by this, and right there was + Todtnau before me! + Past, and onward to Basle I wandered, i' the + shade and the coolness. + When into Mambach I came, they bore a dead + girl to the grave-yard, + After the Holy Cross, and the faded banner o' + Heaven, + With the funeral garlands upon her, with sobbin' + and weepin'. + Ah, but she 'd heard what he said! he'll + waken her up when the time comes. + Afterwards, Tuesday it was, I got safely back + to my cousin; + But it turned out as he said,--I'd somewhere + forgotten my snuff-box! + +[Footnote C: _Dengle-Geist_, literally, "Whetting-Spirit." The exact +meaning of _dengeln_ is to sharpen a scythe by hammering the edge of the +blade, which was practised before whetstones came in use.] + +[Footnote D: According to an old legend, Fridolin (a favorite saint with +the Catholic population of the Black Forest) harnessed two young heifers +to a mighty fir-tree, and hauled it into the Rhine near Säckingen, +thereby damming the river and forcing it to take a new course, on the +other side of the town.] + +In this poem the hero of the story unconsciously describes himself by +his manner of telling it,--a reflective action of the dramatic faculty, +which Browning, among living poets, possesses in a marked degree. The +"moral" is so skilfully inwoven into the substance of the narrative as +to conceal the appearance of design, and the reader has swallowed the +pill before its sugar-coating of fancy has dissolved in his mouth. There +are few of Hebel's poems which were not written for the purpose of +inculcating some wholesome lesson, but in none does this object +prominently appear. Even where it is not merely implied, but directly +expressed, he contrives to give it the air of having been accidentally +suggested by the theme. In the following, which is the most pointedly +didactic of all his productions, the characteristic fancy still betrays +itself:-- + + THE GUIDE-POST. + + D' ye know the road to th' bar'l o' flour? + At break o' day let down the bars, + And plough y'r wheat-field, hour by hour, + Till sundown,--yes, till shine o' stars. + + You peg away, the livelong day, + Nor loaf about, nor gape around; + And that's the road to the thrashin'-floor, + And into the kitchen, I'll be bound! + + D' ye know the road where dollars lays? + Follow the red cents, here and there: + For if a man leaves them, I guess, + He won't find dollars anywhere. + + D' ye know the road to Sunday's rest? + Jist don't o' week-days be afeard; + In field and workshop do y'r best, + And Sunday comes itself, I've heerd. + On Saturdays it's not fur off, + And brings a basketful o' cheer,-- + A roast, and lots o' garden-stuff, + And, like as not, a jug o' beer! + + D' ye know the road to poverty? + Turn in at any tavern-sign: + Turn in,--it's temptin' as can be: + There's bran'-new cards and liquor fine. + + In the last tavern there's a sack, + And, when the cash y'r pocket quits, + Jist hang the wallet on y'r back,-- + You vagabond! see how it fits! + + D' ye know what road to honor leads, + And good old age?--a lovely sight! + By way o' temperance, honest deeds, + And tryin' to do y'r dooty right. + + And when the road forks, ary side, + And you're in doubt which one it is, + Stand still, and let y'r conscience guide: + Thank God, it can't lead much amiss! + + And now, the road to church-yard gate + You needn't ask! Go anywhere! + For, whether roundabout or straight, + All roads, at last, 'll bring you there. + + Go, fearin' God, but lovin' more!-- + I've tried to be an honest guide,-- + You'll find the grave has got a door, + And somethin' for you t'other side. + +We could linger much longer over our simple, brave old poet, were we +sure of the ability of the reader approximately to distinguish his +features through the veil of translation. In turning the leaves of the +smoky book, with its coarse paper and rude type,--which suggests to us, +by-the-by, the fact that Hebel was accustomed to hang a book, which he +wished especially to enjoy, in the chimney, for a few days,--we are +tempted by "The Market-Women in Town," by "The Mother on Christmas-Eve," +"The Morning-Star," and the charming fairy-story of "Riedliger's +Daughter," but must be content to close our specimens, for the present, +with a song of love,--"_Hans und Verene_,"--under the equivalent title +of + + JACK AND MAGGIE. + + There's only one I'm after, + And she's the one, I vow! + If she was here, and standin' by, + She is a gal so neat and spry, + So neat and spry, + I'd be in glory now! + + It's so,--I'm hankerin' for her, + And want to have her, too. + Her temper's always gay, and bright, + Her face like posies red and white, + Both red and white, + And eyes like posies blue. + + And when I see her comin', + My face gits red at once; + My heart feels chokin'-like, and weak, + And drops o' sweat run down my cheek, + Yes, down my cheek,-- + Confound me for a dunce! + + She spoke so kind, last Tuesday, + When at the well we met: + "Jack, give a lift! What ails you? Say! + I see that somethin' 's wrong to-day: + What's wrong to-day?" + No, that I can't forget! + + I know I'd ought to tell her, + And wish I'd told her then; + And if I wasn't poor and low, + And sayin' it didn't choke me so, + (It chokes me so,) + I'd find a chance again. + + Well, up and off I'm goin': + She's in the field below: + I'll try and let her know my mind; + And if her answer isn't kind, + If 't isn't kind, + I'll jine the ranks, and go! + + I'm but a poor young fellow, + Yes, poor enough, no doubt: + But ha'n't, thank God, done nothin' wrong, + And be a man as stout and strong, + As stout and strong, + As any roundabout. + + What's rustlin' in the bushes? + I see a movin' stalk: + The leaves is openin': there's a dress! + O Lord, forbid it! but I guess-- + I guess--I guess + Somebody's heard me talk! + + "Ha! here I am! you've got me! + So keep me, if you can! + I've guessed it ever since last Fall, + And Tuesday morn I saw it all, + _I_ saw it all! + Speak out, then, like a man! + + "Though rich you a'n't in money, + Nor rich in goods to sell, + An honest heart is more than gold, + And hands you've got for field and fold, + For house and fold, + And--Jack--I love you well!" + + "O Maggie, say it over! + O Maggie, is it so? + I couldn't longer bear the doubt: + 'Twas hell,--but now you've drawed me out, + You've drawed me out! + And will I? _Won't_ I, though!" + +The later years of Hebel's life quietly passed away in the circle of his +friends at Carlsruhe. After the peculiar mood which called forth the +Alemannic poems had passed away, he seems to have felt no further +temptation to pursue his literary success. His labors, thenceforth, were +chiefly confined to the preparation of a Biblical History, for schools, +and the editing of the "Rhenish House-Friend," an illustrated calendar +for the people, to which he gave a character somewhat similar to that of +Franklin's "Poor Richard." His short, pithy narratives, each with its +inevitable, though unobtrusive moral, are models of style. The calendar +became so popular, under his management, that forty thousand copies were +annually printed. He finally discontinued his connection with it, in +1819, in consequence of an interference with his articles on the part of +the censor. + +In society Hebel was a universal favorite. Possessing, in his personal +appearance, no less than in his intellect, a marked individuality, he +carried a fresh, vital, inspiring element into every company which he +visited. His cheerfulness was inexhaustible, his wit keen and lambent +without being acrid, his speech clear, fluent, and genial, and his fund +of anecdote commensurate with his remarkable narrative power. He was +exceedingly frank, joyous, and unconstrained in his demeanor; fond of +the pipe and the beer-glass; and as one of his maxims was, "Not to close +any door through which Fortune might enter," he not only occasionally +bought a lottery-ticket, but was sometimes to be seen, during the +season, at the roulette-tables of Baden-Baden. One of his friends +declares, however, that he never obtruded "the clergyman" at +inappropriate times! + +In person he was of medium height, with a body of massive Teutonic +build, a large, broad head, inclined a little towards one shoulder, the +eyes small, brown, and mischievously sparkling, the hair short, crisp, +and brown, the nose aquiline, and the mouth compressed, with the +commencement of a smile stamped in the corners. He was careless in +his gait, and negligent in his dress. Warm-hearted and tender, and +especially attracted towards women and children, the cause of his +celibacy always remained a mystery to his friends. + +The manner of his death, finally, illustrated the genuine humanity of +his nature. In September, 1826, although an invalid at the time, he made +a journey to Mannheim for the sake of procuring a mitigation of the +sentence of a condemned poacher, whose case appealed strongly to his +sympathy. His exertions on behalf of the poor man so aggravated his +disease that he was soon beyond medical aid. Only his corpse, crowned +with laurel, returned to Carlsruhe. Nine years afterwards a monument was +erected to his memory in the park attached to the Ducal palace. Nor have +the inhabitants of the Black Forest failed in worthy commemoration of +their poet's name. A prominent peak among the mountains which inclose +the valley of his favorite "Meadow" has been solemnly christened +"Hebel's Mount"; and a flower of the Forest--the _Anthericum_ of +Linnaeus--now figures in German botanies as the _Hebelia Alemannica_. + + + +THE FORESTER. + + Then bless thy secret growth, nor catch + At noise, but thrive unseen and dumb, + Keep clean, bear fruit, earn life, and watch + Till the white-winged reapers come.--Henry Vaughan + + +I had never thought of knowing a man so thoroughly of the country as +this friend of mine, and so purely a son of Nature. Perhaps he has +the profoundest passion for it of any one living; and had the human +sentiment been as tender from the first, and as pervading, we might have +had pastorals of which Virgil and Theocritus would have envied him the +authorship, had they chanced to be his contemporaries. As it is, he has +come nearer the antique spirit than any of our native poets, and touched +the fields and groves and streams of his native town with a classic +interest that shall not fade. Some of his verses are suffused with an +elegiac tenderness, as if the woods and fields bewailed the absence +of their forester, and murmured their griefs meanwhile to one +another,--responsive like idyls. Living in close companionship with +Nature, his Muse breathes the spirit and voice of poetry; his excellence +lying herein: for when the heart is once divorced from the senses and +all sympathy with common things, then poetry has fled, and the love that +sings. + +The most welcome of companions, this plain countryman. One shall not +meet with thoughts invigorating like his often; coming so scented of +mountain and field breezes and rippling springs, so like a luxuriant +clod from under forest-leaves, moist and mossy with earth-spirits. His +presence is tonic, like ice-water in dog-days to the parched citizen +pent in chambers and under brazen ceilings. Welcome as the gurgle of +brooks, the dripping of pitchers,--then drink and be cool! He seems one +with things, of Nature's essence and core, knit of strong timbers, most +like a wood and its inhabitants. There are in him sod and shade, woods +and waters manifold, the mould and mist of earth and sky. Self-poised +and sagacious as any denizen of the elements, he has the key to every +animal's brain, every plant, every shrub; and were an Indian to flower +forth, and reveal the secrets hidden in his cranium, it would not be +more surprising than the speech of our Sylvanus. He must belong to the +Homeric age,--is older than pastures and gardens, as if he were of the +race of heroes, and one with the elements. He, of all men, seems to be +the native New-Englander, as much so as the oak, the granite ledge, our +best sample of an indigenous American, untouched by the Old Country, +unless he came down from Thor, the Northman; as yet unfathered by any, +and a nondescript in the books of natural history. + +A peripatetic philosopher, and out of doors for the best parts of his +days and nights, he has manifold weather and seasons in him, and the +manners of an animal of probity and virtues unstained. Of our moralists +he seems the wholesomest; and the best republican citizen in the +world,--always at home, and minding his own affairs. Perhaps a little +over-confident sometimes, and stiffly individual, dropping society clean +out of his theories, while standing friendly in his strict sense of +friendship, there is in him an integrity and sense of justice that make +possible and actual the virtues of Sparta and the Stoics, and all the +more welcome to us in these times of shuffling and of pusillanimity. +Plutarch would have made him immortal in his pages, had he lived before +his day. Nor have we any so modern as be,--his own and ours; too purely +so to be appreciated at once. A scholar by birthright, and an author, +his fame has not yet travelled far from the banks of the rivers he has +described in his books; but I hazard only the truth in affirming of his +prose, that in substance and sense it surpasses that of any naturalist +of his time, and that he is sure of a reading in the future. There are +fairer fishes in his pages than any now swimming in our streams, and +some sleep of his on the banks of the Merrimack by moonlight that Egypt +never rivalled; a morning of which Memnon might have envied the music, +and a greyhound that was meant for Adonis; some frogs, too, better than +any of Aristophanes. Perhaps we have had no eyes like his since Pliny's +time. His senses seem double, giving him access to secrets not easily +read by other men: his sagacity resembling that of the beaver and the +bee, the dog and the deer; an instinct for seeing and judging, as by +some other or seventh sense, dealing with objects as if they were +shooting forth from his own mind mythologically, thus completing Nature +all round to his senses, and a creation of his at the moment. I am sure +he knows the animals, one by one, and everything else knowable in our +town, and has named them rightly as Adam did in Paradise, if he be +not that ancestor himself. His works are pieces of exquisite sense, +celebrations of Nature's virginity, exemplified by rare learning and +original observations. Persistently independent and manly, he criticizes +men and times largely, urging and defending his opinions with the spirit +and pertinacity befitting a descendant of him of the Hammer. A head +of mixed genealogy like his, Franco-Norman crossed by Scottish and +New-England descent, may be forgiven a few characteristic peculiarities +and trenchant traits of thinking, amidst his great common sense and +fidelity to the core of natural things. Seldom has a head circumscribed +so much of the sense of Cosmos as this footed intelligence,--nothing +less than all out-of-doors sufficing his genius and scopes, and, day by +day, through all weeks and seasons, the year round. + +If one would find the wealth of wit there is in this plain man, the +information, the sagacity, the poetry, the piety, let him take a walk +with him, say of a winter's afternoon, to the Blue Water, or anywhere +about the outskirts of his village-residence. Pagan as he shall +outwardly appear, yet he soon shall be seen to be the hearty worshipper +of whatsoever is sound and wholesome in Nature,--a piece of russet +probity and sound sense that she delights to own and honor. His talk +shall be suggestive, subtile, and sincere, under as many masks and +mimicries as the shows he passes, and as significant,--Nature choosing +to speak through her chosen mouth-piece,--cynically, perhaps, sometimes, +and searching into the marrows of men and times he chances to speak of, +to his discomfort mostly, and avoidance. Nature, poetry, life,--not +politics, not strict science, not society as it is,--are his preferred +themes: the new Pantheon, probably, before he gets far, to the naming of +the gods some coming Angelo, some Pliny, is to paint and describe. The +world is holy, the things seen symbolizing the Unseen, and worthy of +worship so, the Zoroastrian rites most becoming a nature so fine as ours +in this thin newness, this worship being so sensible, so promotive of +possible pieties,--calling us out of doors and under the firmament, +where health and wholesomeness are finely insinuated into our +souls,--not as idolaters, but as idealists, the seekers of the Unseen +through images of the Invisible. + +I think his religion of the most primitive type, and inclusive of all +natural creatures and things, even to "the sparrow that falls to the +ground,"--though never by shot of his,--and, for whatsoever is manly +in man, his worship may compare with that of the priests and heroes +of pagan times. Nor is he false to these traits under any +guise,--worshipping at unbloody altars, a favorite of the Unseen, +Wisest, and Best. Certainly he is better poised and more nearly +self-reliant than other men. + +Perhaps he deals best with matter, properly, though very adroitly with +mind, with persons, as he knows them best, and sees them from Nature's +circle, wherein he dwells habitually. I should say he inspired the +sentiment of love, if, indeed, the sentiment he awakens did not seem to +partake of a yet purer sentiment, were that possible,--but nameless from +its excellency. Friendly he is, and holds his friends by bearings as +strict in their tenderness and consideration as are the laws of his +thinking,--as prompt and kindly equitable,--neighborly always, and as +apt for occasions as he is strenuous against meddling with others in +things not his. + +I know of nothing more creditable to his greatness than the thoughtful +regard, approaching to reverence, by which he has held for many years +some of the best persons of his time, living at a distance, and wont +to make their annual pilgrimage, usually on foot, to the master,--a +devotion very rare in these times of personal indifference, if not of +confessed unbelief in persons and ideas. + +He has been less of a housekeeper than most, has harvested more wind and +storm, sun and sky; abroad night and day with his leash of keen scents, +bounding any game stirring, and running it down, for certain, to be +spread on the dresser of his page, and served as a feast to the sound +intelligences, before he has done with it. We have been accustomed to +consider him the salt of things so long that they must lose their savor +without his to season them. And when he goes hence, then Pan is dead, +and Nature ailing throughout. + +His friend sings him thus, with the advantages of his Walden to show him +in Nature:-- + + "It is not far beyond the Village church, + After we pass the wood that skirts the road, + A Lake,--the blue-eyed Walden, that doth smile + Most tenderly upon its neighbor Pines; + And they, as if to recompense this love, + In double beauty spread their branches forth. + This Lake has tranquil loveliness and breadth, + And, of late years, has added to its charms; + For one attracted to its pleasant edge + Has built himself a little Hermitage, + Where with much piety he passes life. + + "More fitting place I cannot fancy now, + For such a man to let the line run off + The mortal reel,--such patience hath the Lake, + Such gratitude and cheer is in the Pines. + But more than either lake or forest's depths + This man has in himself: a tranquil man, + With sunny sides where well the fruit is ripe, + Good front and resolute bearing to this life, + And some serener virtues, which control + This rich exterior prudence,--virtues high, + That in the principles of Things are set, + Great by their nature, and consigned to him, + Who, like a faithful Merchant, does account + To God for what he spends, and in what way. + Thrice happy art thou, Walden, in thyself! + Such purity is in thy limpid springs,-- + In those green shores which do reflect in thee, + And in this man who dwells upon thy edge, + A holy man within a Hermitage. + May all good showers fall gently into thee, + May thy surrounding forests long be spared, + And may the Dweller on thy tranquil marge + There lead a life of deep tranquillity, + Pure as thy Waters, handsome as thy Shores, + And with those virtues which are like the Stars!" + + + + +METHODS OF STUDY IN NATURAL HISTORY. + + +VII. + + +I come now to an obscure part of my subject, very difficult to present +in a popular form, and yet so important in the scientific investigations +of our day that I cannot omit it entirely. I allude to what are called +by naturalists Collateral Series or Parallel Types. These are by +no means difficult to trace, because they are connected by seeming +resemblances, which, though very likely to mislead and perplex the +observer, yet naturally suggest the association of such groups. Let me +introduce the subject with the statement of some facts. + +There are in Australia numerous Mammalia, occupying the same relation +and answering the same purposes as the Mammalia of other countries. Some +of them are domesticated by the natives, and serve them with meat, milk, +wool, as our domesticated animals serve us. Representatives of almost +all types, Wolves, Foxes, Sloths, Bears, Weasels, Martens, Squirrels, +Rats, etc., are found there; and yet, though all these animals resemble +ours so closely that the English settlers have called many of them by +the same names, there are no genuine Wolves, Foxes, Sloths, Bears, +Weasels, Martens, Squirrels, or Rats in Australia. The Australian +Mammalia are peculiar to the region where they are found, and are all +linked together by two remarkable structural features which distinguish +them from all other Mammalia and unite them under one head as the +so-called Marsupials. They bring forth their young in an imperfect +condition, and transfer them to a pouch, where they remain attached to +the teats of the mother till their development is as far advanced as +that of other Mammalia at the time of their birth; and they are further +characterized by an absence of that combination of transverse fibres +forming the large bridge which unites the two hemispheres of the brain +in all the other members of their class. Here, then, is a series of +animals parallel with ours, separated from them by anatomical features, +but so united with them by form and external features that many among +them have been at first associated together. + +This is what Cuvier has called subordination of characters, +distinguishing between characters that control the organization and +those that are not essentially connected with it. The skill of the +naturalist consists in detecting the difference between the two, so +that he may not take the more superficial features as the basis of his +classification, instead of those important ones which, though often less +easily recognized, are more deeply rooted in the organization. It is a +difference of the same nature as that between affinity and analogy, to +which I have alluded before, when speaking of the ingrafting of certain +features of one type upon animals of another type, thus producing a +superficial resemblance, not truly characteristic. In the Reptiles, for +instance, there are two groups,--those devoid of scales, with naked +skin, laying numerous eggs, but hatching their young in an imperfect +state, and the Scaly Reptiles, which lay comparatively few eggs, but +whose young, when hatched, are completely developed, and undergo no +subsequent metamorphosis. Yet, notwithstanding this difference in +essential features of structure, and in the mode of reproduction and +development, there is such an external resemblance between certain +animals belonging to the two groups that they were associated together +even by so eminent a naturalist as Linnaeus. Compare, for instance, the +Serpents among the Scaly Reptiles with the Caecilians among the Naked +Reptiles. They have the same elongated form, and are both destitute +of limbs; the head in both is on a level with the body, without any +contraction behind it, such as marks the neck in the higher Reptiles, +and moves only by the action of the back-bone; they are singularly alike +in their external features, but the young of the Serpent are hatched in +a mature condition, while the young of the type to which the Caecilians +belong undergo a succession of metamorphoses before attaining to a +resemblance to the parent. Or compare the Lizard and the Salamander, in +which the likeness is perhaps even more striking; for any inexperienced +observer would mistake one for the other. Both are superior to the +Serpents and Caecilians, for in them the head moves freely on the neck +and they creep on short imperfect legs. But the Lizard is clothed with +scales, while the body of the Salamander is naked, and the young of +the former is complete when hatched, while the Tadpole born from the +Salamander has a life of its own to live, with certain changes to pass +through before it assumes its mature condition; during the early part of +its life it is even destitute of legs, and has gills like the Fishes. +Above the Lizards and Salamanders, highest in the class of Reptiles, +stand two other collateral types,--the Turtles at the head of the Scaly +Reptiles, the Toads and Frogs at the Lead of the Naked Reptiles. The +external likeness between these two groups is perhaps less striking than +between those mentioned above, on account of the large shield of the +Turtle. But there are Turtles with a soft covering, and there are some +Toads with a hard shield over the head and neck at least, and both +groups are alike distinguished by the shortness and breadth of the body +and by the greater development of the limbs as compared with the lower +Reptiles. But here again there is the same essential difference in the +mode of development of their young as distinguishes all the rest. The +two series may thus be contrasted:-- + +_Naked Reptiles_. Toads and Frogs, Salamanders, Caecilians. + +_Scaly Reptiles._ Turtles, Lizards, Serpents. + +Such corresponding groups or parallel types, united only by external +resemblance, and distinguished from each other by essential elements of +structure, exist among all animals, though they are less striking among +Birds on account of the uniformity of that class. Yet even there we may +trace such analogies,--as between the Palmate or Aquatic Birds, for +instance, and the Birds of Prey, or between the Frigate Bird and the +Kites. Among Fishes such analogies are very common, often suggesting a +comparison even with land animals, though on account of the scales and +spines of the former the likeness may not be easily traced. But the +common names used by the fishermen often indicate these resemblances, +--as, for instance, Sea-Vulture, Sea-Eagle, Cat-Fish, Flying-Fish, +Sea-Porcupine, Sea-Cow, Sea-Horse, and the like. In the branch of +Mollusks, also, the same superficial analogies are found. In the lowest +class of this division of the Animal Kingdom there is a group so similar +to the Polyps, that, until recently, they have been associated with +them,--the Bryozoa. They are very small animals, allied to the Clams by +the plan of their structure, but they have a resemblance to the Polyps +on account of a radiating wreath of feelers around the upper part of +their body: yet, when examined closely, this wreath is found to be +incomplete; it does not, form a circle, but leaves an open space between +the two ends, where they approach each other, so that it has a horseshoe +outline, and partakes of the bilateral symmetry characteristic of its +type and on which its own structure is based. These series have not yet +been very carefully traced, and young naturalists should turn their +attention to them, and be prepared to draw the nicest distinction +between analogies and true affinities among animals. + + +VIII. + + +After this digression, let us proceed to a careful examination of the +natural groups of animals called Families by naturalists,--a subject +already briefly alluded to in a previous chapter. Families are natural +assemblages of animals of less extent than Orders, but, like Orders, +Classes, and Branches, founded upon certain categories of structure, +which are as distinct for this kind of group as for all the other +divisions in the classification of the Animal Kingdom. + +That we may understand the true meaning of these divisions, we must not +be misled by the name given by naturalists to this kind of group. Here, +as in so many other instances, a word already familiar, and that had +become, as it were, identified with the special sense in which it +had been used, has been adopted by science and has received a new +signification. When naturalists speak of Families among animals, they do +not allude to the progeny of a known stock, as we designate, in common +parlance, the children or the descendants of known parents by the word +family; they understand by Families natural groups of different kinds +of animals, having no genetic relations so far as we know, but agreeing +with one another closely enough to leave the impression of a more +or less remote common parentage. The difficulty here consists in +determining the natural limits of such groups, and in tracing the +characteristic features by which they may be defined; for individual +investigators differ greatly as to the degree of resemblance existing +between the members of many Families, and there is no kind of +group which presents greater diversity of circumscription in the +classifications of animals proposed by different naturalists than these +so-called Families. + +It should be remembered, however, that, unless a sound criterion be +applied to the limitation of Families, they, like all other groups +introduced into zoölogical systems, must forever remain arbitrary +divisions, as they have been hitherto. A retrospective glance at the +progress of our science during the past century, in this connection, +may perhaps help us to solve the difficulty. Linnaeus, in his System +of Nature, does not admit Families; he has only four kinds of +groups,--Classes, Orders, Genera, and Species. It was among plants that +naturalists first perceived those general traits of resemblance which +exist everywhere among the members of natural families, and added this +kind of group to the framework of their system. In France, particularly, +this method was pursued with success; and the improvements thus +introduced by the French botanists were so great, and rendered their +classification so superior to that of Linnaeus, that the botanical +systems in which Families were introduced were called natural systems, +in contradistinction especially to the botanical classification of +Linnaeus, which was founded upon the organs of reproduction, and which +received thenceforth the name of the sexual system of plants. The same +method so successfully used by botanists was soon introduced +into Zoölogy by the French naturalists of the beginning of this +century,--Lamarck, Latreille, and Cuvier. But, to this day, the +limitation of Families among animals has not yet reached the precision +which it has among plants, and I see no other reason for the difference +than the absence of a leading principle to guide us in Zoölogy. + +Families, as they exist in Nature, are based upon peculiarities of form +as related to structure; but though a very large number of them have +been named and recorded, very few are characterized with anything like +scientific accuracy. It has been a very simple matter to establish such +groups according to the superficial method that has been pursued, for +the fact that they are determined by external outline renders the +recognition of them easy and in many instances almost instinctive; but +it is very difficult to characterize them, or, in other words, to trace +the connection between form and structure. Indeed, many naturalists do +not admit that Families are based upon form; and it was in trying to +account for the facility with which they detect these groups, while they +find it so difficult to characterize them, that I perceived that they +are always associated with peculiarities of form. Naturalists have +established Families simply by bringing together a number of animals +resembling each other more or less closely, and, taking usually the name +of the Genus to which the best known among them belongs, they have given +it a patronymic termination to designate the Family, and allowed the +matter to rest there, sometimes without even attempting any description +corresponding to those by which Genus and Species are commonly defined. + +For instance, from _Canis_, the Dog, _Canidae_ has been formed, to +designate the whole Family of Dogs, Wolves, Foxes, etc. Nothing can be +more superficial than such a mode of classification; and if these +groups actually exist in Nature, they must be based, like all the other +divisions, upon some combination of structural characters peculiar to +them. We have seen that Branches are founded upon the general plan of +structure, Classes on the mode of executing the plan, Orders upon the +greater or less complication of a given mode of execution, and we shall +find that form, as _determined by structure_, characterizes Families. I +would call attention to this qualification of my definition; since, of +course, when speaking of form in this connection, I do not mean those +superficial resemblances in external features already alluded to in +my remarks upon Parallel or Collateral Types. I speak now of form as +controlled by structural elements; and unless we analyze Families in +this way, the mere distinguishing and naming them does not advance our +science at all. Compare, for instance, the Dogs, the Seals, and the +Bears. These are all members of one Order,--that of the Carnivorous +Mammalia. Their dentition is peculiar and alike in all, (cutting teeth, +canine teeth, and grinders,) adapted for tearing and chewing their +food; and their internal structure bears a definite relation to their +dentition. But look at these animals with reference to form. The Dog is +comparatively slender, with legs adapted for running and hunting his +prey; the Bear is heavier, with shorter limbs; while the Seal has a +continuous uniform outline adapted for swimming. They form separate +Families, and are easily recognized as such by the difference in their +external outline; but what is the anatomical difference which produces +the peculiarity of form in each, by which they have been thus +distinguished? It lies in the structure of the limbs, and especially in +that of the wrist and fingers. In the Seal the limbs are short, and the +wrists are on one continuous line with them, so that it has no power of +bending the wrist or the fingers, and the limbs, therefore, act like +flappers or oars. The Bear has a well-developed paw with a flexible +wrist, but it steps on the whole sole of the foot, from the wrist to the +tip of the toe, giving it the heavy tread so characteristic of all the +Bears. The Dogs, on the contrary, walk on tip-toe, and their step, +though firm, is light, while the greater slenderness and flexibility of +their legs add to their nimbleness and swiftness. By a more extensive +investigation of the anatomical structure of the limbs in their +connection with the whole body, it could easily be shown that the +peculiarity of form in these animals is essentially determined by, or at +least stands in the closest relation to, the peculiar structure of the +wrist and fingers. + +Take the Family of Owls as distinguished from the Falcons, Kites, etc. +Here the difference of form is in the position of the eyes. In the +Owl, the sides of the head are prominent and the eye-socket is brought +forward. In the Falcons and Kites, on the contrary, the sides of the +head are flattened and the eyes are set back. The difference in the +appearance of the birds is evident to the most superficial observer; but +to call the one Strigidae and the other Falconidae tells us nothing of +the anatomical peculiarities on which this difference is founded. + +These few examples, selected purposely among closely allied and +universally known animals, may be sufficient to show, that, beyond the +general complication of the structure which characterizes the Orders, +there is a more limited element in the organization of animals, bearing +chiefly upon their form, which, if it have any general application as +a principle of classification, may well be considered as essentially +characteristic of the Families. There are certainly closely allied +natural groups of animals, belonging to the same Order, but including +many Genera, which differ from each other chiefly in their form, while +that form is determined by peculiarities of structure which do not +influence the general structural complication upon which Orders are +based, or relate to the minor details of structure on which Genera are +founded. I am therefore convinced that form is the criterion by which +Families may be determined. The great facility with which animals may +be combined together in natural groups of this kind without any special +investigation of their structure, a superficial method of classification +in which zoölogists have lately indulged to a most unjustifiable degree, +convinces me that it is the similarity of form which has unconsciously +led such shallow investigators to correct results, since upon close +examination it is found that a large number of the Families so +determined, and to which no characters at all are assigned, nevertheless +bear the severest criticism founded upon anatomical investigation. + +The questions proposed to themselves by all students who would +characterize Families should be these: What are, throughout the +Animal Kingdom, the peculiar patterns of form by which Families are +distinguished? and on what structural features are these patterns based? +Only the most patient investigations can give us the answer, and it will +be very long before we can write out the formulae of these patterns with +mathematical precision, as I believe we shall be able to do in a more +advanced stage of our science. But while the work is in progress, it +ought to be remembered that a mere general similarity of outline is not +yet in itself evidence of identity of form or pattern, and that, while +seemingly very different forms may be derived from the same formula, the +most similar forms may belong to entirely different systems, when their +derivation is properly traced. Our great mathematician, in a lecture +delivered at the Lowell Institute last winter, showed that in his +science, also, similarity of outline does not always indicate identity +of character. Compare the different circles,--the perfect circle, in +which every point of the periphery is at the same distance from the +centre, with an ellipse in which the variation from the true circle is +so slight as to be almost imperceptible to the eye; yet the latter, like +all ellipses, has its two _foci_ by which it differs from a circle, +and to refer it to the family of circles instead of the family of +ellipses would be overlooking its true character on account of its +external appearance; and yet ellipses may be so elongated, that, far +from resembling a circle, they make the impression of parallel lines +linked at their extremities. Or we may have an elastic curve in which +the appearance of a circle is produced by the meeting of the two ends; +nevertheless it belongs to the family of elastic curves, in which may +even be included a line actually straight, and is formed by a process +entirely different from that which produces the circle or the ellipse. + +But it is sometimes exceedingly difficult to find the relation between +structure and form in Families, and I remember a case which I had taken +as a test of the accuracy of the views I entertained upon this subject, +and which perplexed and baffled me for years. It was that of our +fresh-water Mussels, the Family of Unios. There is a great variety of +outline among them,--some being oblong and very slender, others broad +with seemingly square outlines, others having a nearly triangular form, +while others again are almost circular; and I could not detect among +them all any feature of form that was connected with any essential +element of their structure. At last, however, I found this +test-character, and since that time I have had no doubt left in my mind +that form, determined by structure, is the true criterion of Families. +In the Unios it consists of the rounded outline of the anterior end of +the body reflected in a more or less open curve of the shell, bending +more abruptly along the lower side with an inflection followed by a +bulging, corresponding to the most prominent part of the gills, to which +alone, in a large number of American Species of this Family, the eggs +are transferred, giving to this part of the shell a prominence which it +has not in any of the European Species. At the posterior end of the body +this curve then bends upwards and backwards again, the outline meeting +the side occupied by the hinge and ligament, which, when very short, may +determine a triangular form of the whole shell, or, when equal to the +lower side and connected with a great height of the body, gives it a +quadrangular form, or, if the height is reduced, produces an elongated +form, or, finally, a rounded form, if the passage from one side to the +other is gradual. A comparison of the position of the internal organs of +different Species of Unios with the outlines of their shells will leave +no doubt that their form is determined by the structure of the animal. + +A few other and more familiar examples may complete this discussion. +Among Climbing Birds, for instance, which are held together as a +more comprehensive group by the structure of their feet and by other +anatomical features, there are two Families so widely different in +their form that they may well serve as examples of this principle. The +Woodpeckers (_Picidae_) and the Parrots (_Psittacidae_), once considered +as two Genera only, have both been subdivided, in consequence of a more +intimate knowledge of their generic characters, into a large number of +Genera; but all the Genera of Woodpeckers and all the Genera of the +Parrots are still held together by their form as Families, corresponding +as such to the two old Genera of _Picus_ and _Psittacus_. They are now +known as the Families of Woodpeckers and Parrots; and though each group +includes a number of Genera combined upon a variety of details in the +finish of special parts of the structure, such as the number of toes, +the peculiarities of the bill, etc., it is impossible to overlook the +peculiar form which is characteristic of each. No one who is familiar +with the outline of the Parrot will fail to recognize any member of +that Family by a general form which is equally common to the diminutive +Nonpareil, the gorgeous Ara, and the high-crested Cockatoo. Neither will +any one, who has ever observed the small head, the straight bill, the +flat back, and stiff tail of the Woodpecker, hesitate to identify the +family form in any of the numerous Genera into which this group is now +divided. The family characters are even more invariable than the generic +ones; for there are Woodpeckers which, instead of the four toes, two +turning forward and two backward, which form an essential generic +character, have three toes only, while the family form is always +maintained, whatever variations there may be in the characters of the +more limited groups it includes. + +The Turtles and Terrapins form another good illustration of family +characters. They constitute together a natural Order, but are +distinguished from each other as two Families very distinct in general +form and outline. Among Fishes I may mention the Family of Pickerels, +with their flat, long snout, and slender, almost cylindrical body, as +contrasted with the plump, compressed body and tapering tail of the +Trout Family. Or compare, among Insects, the Hawk-Moths with the Diurnal +Butterfly, or with the so-called Miller,--or, among Crustacea, the +common Crab with the Sea-Spider, or the Lobsters with the Shrimps,--or, +among Worms, the Leeches with the Earth-Worms,--or, among Mollusks, +the Squids with the Cuttle-Fishes, or the Snails with the Slugs, or the +Periwinkles with the Limpets and Conchs, or the Clam with the so-called +Venus, or the Oyster with the Mother-of-Pearl shell,--everywhere, +throughout the Animal Kingdom, difference of form points at difference +of Families. + +There is a chapter in the Natural History of Animals that has hardly +been touched upon as yet, and that will be especially interesting with +reference to Families. The voices of animals have a family character not +to be mistaken. All the Canidae bark and howl: the Fox, the Wolf, the +Dog have the same kind of utterance, though on a somewhat different +pitch. All the Bears growl, from the White Bear of the Arctic snows to +the small Black Bear of the Andes. All the Cats _miau_, from our quiet +fireside companion to the Lions and Tigers and Panthers of the forest +and jungle. This last may seem a strange assertion; but to any one who +has listened critically to their sounds and analyzed their voices, +the roar of the Lion is but a gigantic _miau_, bearing about the same +proportion to that of a Cat as its stately and majestic form does to the +smaller, softer, more peaceful aspect of the Cat. Yet, notwithstanding +the difference in their size, who can look at the Lion, whether in his +more sleepy mood as he lies curled up in the corner of his cage, or in +his fiercer moments of hunger or of rage, without being reminded of a +Cat? And this is not merely the resemblance of one carnivorous animal to +another; for no one was ever reminded of a Dog or Wolf by a Lion. Again, +all the Horses and Donkeys neigh; for the bray of the Donkey is only a +harsher neigh, pitched on a different key, it is true, but a sound of +the same character,--as the Donkey himself is but a clumsy and dwarfish +Horse. All the Cows low, from the Buffalo roaming the prairie, the +Musk-Ox of the Arctic ice-fields, or the Jack of Asia, to the Cattle +feeding in our pastures. Among the Birds, this similarity of voice in +Families is still more marked. We need only recall the harsh and noisy +Parrots, so similar in their peculiar utterance. Or take as an example +the web-footed Family,--do not all the Geese and the innumerable host +of Ducks quack? Does not every member of the Crow Family caw, whether it +be the Jackdaw, the Jay, the Magpie, the Rook in some green rookery of +the Old World, or the Crow of our woods, with its long, melancholy caw +that seems to make the silence and solitude deeper? Compare all the +sweet warblers of the Songster Family,--the Nightingales, the Thrushes, +the Mocking-Birds, the Robins; they differ in the greater or less +perfection of their note, but the same kind of voice runs through the +whole group. These affinities of the vocal systems among animals form a +subject well worthy of the deepest study, not only as another character +by which to classify the Animal Kingdom correctly, but as bearing +indirectly also on the question of the origin of animals. Can we suppose +that characteristics like these have been communicated from one animal +to another? When we find that all the members of one zoological Family, +however widely scattered over the surface of the earth, inhabiting +different continents and even different hemispheres, speak with one +voice, must we not believe that they have originated in the places where +they now occur with all their distinctive peculiarities? Who taught the +American Thrush to sing like his European relative? He surely did not +learn it from his cousin over the waters. Those who would have us +believe that all animals have originated from common centres and single +pairs, and have been distributed from such common centres over the +world, will find it difficult to explain the tenacity of such characters +and their recurrence and repetition under circumstances that seem to +preclude the possibility of any communication, on any other supposition +than that of their creation in the different regions where they are now +found. We have much yet to learn in this kind of investigation, with +reference not only to Families among animals, but to nationalities among +men also. I trust that the nature of languages will teach us as much +about the origin of the races as the vocal systems of the animals may +one day teach us about the origin of the different groups of animals. +At all events, similarity of vocal utterance among animals is not +indicative of identity of Species; I doubt, therefore, whether +similarity of speech proves community of origin among men. + +The similarity of motion in Families is another subject well worth the +consideration of the naturalist: the soaring of the Birds of Prey,--the +heavy flapping of the wings in the Gallinaceous Birds,--the floating of +the Swallows, with their short cuts and angular turns,--the hopping +of the Sparrows,--the deliberate walk of the Hens and the strut of the +Cocks,--the waddle of the Ducks and Geese,--the slow, heavy creeping +of the Land-Turtle,--the graceful flight of the Sea-Turtle under the +water,--the leaping and swimming of the Frog,--the swift run of the +Lizard, like a flash of green or red light in the sunshine,--the +lateral undulation of the Serpent,--the dart of the Pickerel,--the +leap of the Trout,--the rush of the Hawk-Moth through the air,--the +fluttering flight of the Butterfly,--the quivering poise of the +Humming-Bird,--the arrow-like shooting of the Squid through the water, +--the slow crawling of the Snail on the land,--the sideway movement +of the Sand-Crab,--the backward walk of the Crawfish,--the almost +imperceptible gliding of the Sea-Anemone over the rock,--the graceful, +rapid motion of the Pleurobrachia, with its endless change of curve and +spiral. In short, every Family of animals has its characteristic action +and its peculiar voice; and yet so little is this endless variety +of rhythm and cadence both of motion and sound in the organic world +understood, that we lack words to express one-half its richness and +beauty. + + +IX. + + +The well-known meaning of the words _generic_ and _specific_ may serve, +in the absence of a more precise definition, to express the relative +importance of those groups of animals called Genera and Species in our +scientific systems. The Genus is the more comprehensive of the two kinds +of groups, while the Species is the most precisely defined, or at least +the most easily recognized, of all the divisions of the Animal Kingdom. +But neither the term Genus nor Species has always been taken in the same +sense. Genus especially has varied in its acceptation, from the time +when Aristotle applied it indiscriminately to any kind of comprehensive +group, from the Classes down to what we commonly call Genera, till the +present day. But we have already seen, that, instead of calling all the +various kinds of more comprehensive divisions by the name of Genera, +modern science has applied special names to each of them, and we have +now Families, Orders, Classes, and Branches above Genera proper. If +the foregoing discussion upon the nature of these groups is based upon +trustworthy principles, we must admit that they are all founded upon +distinct categories of characters,--the primary divisions, or the +Branches, on plan of structure, the Classes upon the manner of its +execution, the Orders upon the greater or less complication of a given +mode of execution, the Families upon form; and it now remains to be +ascertained whether Genera also exist in Nature, and by what kind of +characteristics they may be distinguished. Taking the practice of the +ablest naturalists in discriminating Genera as a guide in our estimation +of their true nature, we must, nevertheless, remember that even now, +while their classifications of the more comprehensive groups usually +agree, they differ greatly in their limitation of Genera, so that the +Genera of some authors correspond to the Families of others, and vice +versa. This undoubtedly arises from the absence of a definite standard +for the estimation of these divisions. But the different categories of +structure which form the distinctive criteria of the more comprehensive +divisions once established, the question is narrowed down to an inquiry +into the special category upon which Genera may be determined; and if +this can be accurately defined, no difference of opinion need interfere +hereafter with their uniform limitation. Considering all these divisions +of the Animal Kingdom from this point of view, it is evident that the +more comprehensive ones must be those which are based on the broadest +characters,--Branches, as united upon plan of structure, standing of +course at the head; next to these the Classes, since the general mode +of executing the plan presents a wider category of characters than +the complication of structure on which Orders rest; after Orders come +Families, or the patterns of form in which these greater or less +complications of structure are clothed; and proceeding in the same way +from more general to more special considerations, we can have no other +category of structure as characteristic of Genera than the details of +structure by which members of the same Family may differ from each +other, and this I consider as the only true basis on which to limit +Genera, while it is at the same time in perfect accordance with the +practice of the most eminent modern zoologists. It is in this way that +Cuvier has distinguished the large number of Genera he has characterized +in his great Natural History of the Fishes, in connection with +Valenciennes. Latreille has done the same for the Crustacea and Insects; +and Milne Edwards, with the coöperation of Haime, has recently proceeded +upon the same principle in characterizing a great number of Genera among +the Corals. Many others have followed this example, but few have kept +in view the necessity of a uniform mode of proceeding, or, if they have +done their researches have covered too limited a ground, to be taken +into consideration in a discussion of principles. It is, in fact, only +when extending over a whole Class that the study of Genera acquires a +truly scientific importance, as it then shows in a connected manner, in +what way, by what features, and to what extent a large number of animals +are closely linked together in Nature. Considering the Animal Kingdom as +a single complete work of one Creative Intellect, consistent throughout, +such keen analysis and close criticism of all its parts have the same +kind of interest, in a higher degree, as that which attaches to other +studies undertaken in the spirit of careful comparative research. +These different categories of characters are, as it were, different +peculiarities of style in the author, different modes of treating the +same material, new combinations of evidence bearing on the same general +principles. The study of Genera is a department of Natural History which +thus far has received too little attention even at the hands of our best +zoologists, and has been treated in the most arbitrary manner; it +should henceforth be made a philosophical investigation into the closer +affinities which naturally bind in minor groups all the representatives +of a natural Family. + +Genera, then, are groups of a more restricted character than any of +those we have examined thus far. Some of them include only one Species, +while others comprise hundreds; since certain definite combinations of +characters may be limited to a single Species, while other combinations +may be repeated in many. We have striking examples of this among Birds: +the Ostrich stands alone in its Genus, while the number of Species among +the Warblers is very great. Among Mammalia the Giraffe also stands +alone, while Mice and Squirrels include many Species. Genera are +founded, not, as we have seen, on general structural characters, but on +the finish of special parts, as, for instance, on the dentition. The +Cats have only four grinders in the upper jaw and three in the lower, +while the Hyenas have one more above and below, and the Dogs and Wolves +have two more above and two more below. In the last, some of the teeth +have also flat surfaces for crushing the food, adapted especially to +their habits, since they live on vegetable as well as animal substances. +The formation of the claws is another generic feature. There is a +curious example with reference to this in the Cheetah, which is again +a Genus containing only one Species. It belongs to the Cat Family, +but differs from ordinary Lions and Tigers in having its claws so +constructed that it cannot draw them back under the paws, though in +every other respect they are like the claws of all the Cats. But while +it has the Cat-like claw, its paws are like those of the Dog, and this +singular combination of features is in direct relation to its habits, +for it does not lie in wait and spring upon its prey like the Cat, but +hunts it like the Dog. + +While Genera themselves are, like Families, easily distinguished, the +characters on which they are founded, like those of Families, are +difficult to trace. There are often features belonging to these groups +which attract the attention and suggest their association, though they +are not those which may be truly considered generic characters. It is +easy to distinguish the Genus Fox, for instance, by its bushy tail, and +yet that is no true generic character; the collar of feathers round the +neck of the Vultures leads us at once to separate them from the Eagles, +but it is not the collar that truly marks the Genus, but rather the +peculiar structure of the feathers which form it. No Bird has a more +striking plumage than the Peacock, but it is not the appearance merely +of its crest and spreading fan that constitutes a Genus, but the +peculiar structure of the feathers. Thousands of examples might be +quoted to show how easily Genera may be singled out, named, and entered +in our systems, without being duly characterized, and it is much to be +lamented that there is no possibility of checking the loose work of this +kind with which the annals of our science are daily flooded. + +It would, of course, be quite inappropriate to present here any +general revision of these groups; but I may present a few instances to +illustrate the principle of their classification, and to show on what +characters they are properly based. Among Reptiles, we find, for +instance, that the Genera of our fresh-water Turtles differ from each +other in the cut of their bill, in the arrangement of their scales, +in the form of their claws, etc. Among Fishes, the different Genera +included under the Family of Perches are distinguished by the +arrangement of their teeth, by the serratures of their gill-covers, and +of the arch to which the pectoral fins are attached, by the nature and +combination of the rays of their fins, by the structure of their scales, +etc. Among Insects, the various Genera of the Butterflies differ in the +combination of the little rods which sustain their wings, in the form +and structure of their antennae, of their feet, of the minute scales +which cover their wings, etc. Among Crustacea, the Genera of Shrimps +vary in the form of the claws, in the structure of the parts of the +mouth, in the articulations of their feelers, etc. Among Worms, the +different Genera of the Leech Family are combined upon the form of the +disks by which they attach themselves, upon the number and arrangement +of their eyes, upon the structure of the hard parts with which the mouth +is armed, etc. Among Cephalopods, the Family of Squids contains several +Genera distinguished by the structure of the solid shield within the +skin of the back, by the form and connection of their fins, by the +structure of the suckers with which their arms are provided, by the +form of their beak, etc. In every Class, we find throughout the Animal +Kingdom that there is no sound basis for the discrimination of Genera +except the details of their structure; but in order to define them +accurately an extensive comparison of them is indispensable, and in +characterizing them only such features should be enumerated as are truly +generic; whereas in the present superficial method of describing them, +features are frequently introduced which belong not only to the whole +Family, but even to the whole Class which includes them. + + +X. + + +There remains but one more division of the Animal Kingdom for our +consideration, the most limited of all in its circumscription,--that +of Species. It is with the study of this kind of group that naturalists +generally begin their investigations. I believe, however, that the study +of Species as the basis of a scientific education is a great mistake. +It leads us to overrate the value of Species, and to believe that they +exist in Nature in some different sense from other groups; as if there +were something more real and tangible in Species than in Genera, +Families, Orders, Classes, or Branches. The truth is, that to study a +vast number of Species without tracing the principles that combine +them under more comprehensive groups is only to burden the mind with +disconnected facts, and more may be learned by a faithful and careful +comparison of a few Species than by a more cursory examination of a +greater number. When one considers the immense number of Species already +known, naturalists might well despair of becoming acquainted with them +all, were they not constructed on a few fundamental patterns, so that +the study of one Species teaches us a great deal for all the rest. De +Candolle, who was at the same time a great botanist and a great teacher, +told me once that he could undertake to illustrate the fundamental +principles of his science with the aid of a dozen plants judiciously +selected, and that it was his unvarying practice to induce students to +make a thorough study of a few minor groups of plants, in all their +relations to one another, rather than to attempt to gain a superficial +acquaintance with a large number of species. The powerful influence he +has had upon the progress of Botany vouches for the correctness of his +views. Indeed, every profound scholar knows that sound learning can be +attained only by this method, and the study of Nature makes no exception +to the rule. I would therefore advise every student to select a few +representatives from all the Classes, and to study these not only with +reference to their specific characters, but as members also of a Genus, +of a Family, of an Order, of a Class, and of a Branch. He will soon +convince himself that Species have no more definite and real existence +in Nature than all the other divisions of the Animal Kingdom, and that +every animal is the representative of its Branch, Class, Order, Family, +and Genus as much as of its Species, Specific characters are only +those determining size, proportion, color, habits, and relations to +surrounding circumstances and external objects. How superficial, then, +must be any one's knowledge of an animal who studies it only with +relation to its specific characters! He will know nothing of the finish +of special parts of the body,--nothing of the relations between its +form and its structure,--nothing of the relative complication of its +organization as compared with other allied animals,--nothing of the +general mode of execution,--nothing of the plan expressed in that mode +of execution. Yet, with the exception of the ordinal characters, which, +since they imply relative superiority and inferiority, require, of +course, a number of specimens for comparison, his one animal would tell +him all this as well as the specific characters. + +All the more comprehensive groups, equally with Species, have a +positive, permanent, specific principle, maintained generation after +generation with all its essential characteristics. Individuals are +the transient representatives of all these organic principles, which +certainly have an independent, immaterial existence, since they outlive +the individuals that embody them, and are no less real after the +generation that has represented them for a time has passed away than +they were before. + +From a comparison of a number of well-known Species belonging to a +natural Genus, it is not difficult to ascertain what are essentially +specific characters. There is hardly among Mammalia a more natural Genus +than that which includes the Rabbits and Hares, or that to which the +Rats and Mice are referred. Let us see how the different Species differ +from one another. Though we give two names in the vernacular to +the Genus Hare, both Hares and Rabbits agree in all the structural +peculiarities which constitute a Genus; but the different Species are +distinguished by their absolute size when full-grown,--by the nature and +color of their fur,--by the size and form of the ear,--by the relative +length of their legs and tail,--by the more or less slender build of +their whole body,--by their habits, some living in open grounds, +others among the bushes, others in swamps, others burrowing under the +earth,--by the number of young they bring forth,--by their different +seasons of breeding,--and by still minor differences, such as the +permanent color of the hair throughout the year in some, while in others +it turns white in winter. The Rats and Mice differ in a similar way: +there being large and small Species,--some gray, some brown, others +rust-colored,--some with soft, others with coarse hair; they differ also +in the length of the tail, and in having it more or less covered with +hair,--in the cut of the ears, and their size,--in the length of +their limbs, which are slender and long in some, short and thick in +others,--in their various ways of living,--in the different substances +on which they feed,--and also in their distribution over the surface +of the earth, whether circumscribed within certain limited areas +or scattered over a wider range. What is now the nature of these +differences by which we distinguish Species? They are totally distinct +from any of the categories on which Genera, Families, Orders, Classes, +or Branches are founded, and may readily be reduced to a few heads. They +are differences in the proportion of the parts and in the absolute size +of the whole animal, in the color and general ornamentation of the +surface of the body, and in the relations of the individuals to one +another and to the world around. A farther analysis of other Genera +would show us that among Birds, Reptiles, Fishes, and, in fact, +throughout the Animal Kingdom, Species of well-defined natural Genera +differ in the same way. We are therefore justified in saying that the +category of characters on which Species are based implies no structural +differences, but presents the same structure combined under certain +minor differences of size, proportion, and habits. All the specific +characters stand in direct reference to the generic structure, the +family form, the ordinal complication of structure, the mode of +execution of the Class, and the plan of structure of the Branch, all of +which are embodied in the frame of each individual in each Species, even +though all these individuals are constantly dying away and reproducing +others; so that the specific characters have no more permanency in the +individuals than those which characterize the Genus, the Family, the +Order, the Class, and the Branch. I believe, therefore, that naturalists +have been entirely wrong in considering the more comprehensive groups +to be theoretical and in a measure arbitrary, an attempt, that is, of +certain men to classify the Animal Kingdom according to their individual +views, while they have ascribed to Species, as contrasted with the other +divisions, a more positive existence in Nature. No further argument +is needed to show that it is not only the Species that lives in the +individual, but that every individual, though belonging to a distinct +Species, is built upon a precise and definite plan which characterizes +its Branch,--that that plan is executed in each individual in a +particular way which characterizes its Class,--that every individual +with its kindred occupies a definite position in a series of structural +complications which characterizes its Order,--that in every individual +all these structural features are combined under a definite pattern of +form which characterizes its Family,--that every individual exhibits +structural details in the finish of its parts which characterize its +Genus,--and finally that every individual presents certain peculiarities +in the proportion of its parts, in its color, in its size, in its +relations to its fellow-beings and surrounding things, which constitute +its specific characters; and all this is repeated in the same kind of +combination, generation after generation, while the individuals die. +If we accept these propositions, which seem to me self-evident, it is +impossible to avoid the conclusion that Species do not exist in Nature +in any other sense than the more comprehensive groups of the zoological +systems. + +There is one question respecting Species that gives rise to very earnest +discussions in our day, not only among naturalists, but among all +thinking people. How far are they permanent, and how far mutable? With +reference to the permanence of Species, there is much to be learned from +the geological phenomena that belong to our own period, and that bear +witness to the invariability of types during hundreds of thousands of +years at least. I hope to present a part of this evidence in a future +article upon Coral Reefs, but in the mean time I cannot leave this +subject without touching upon a point of which great use has been made +in recent discussions. I refer to the variability of Species as shown in +domestication. + +The domesticated animals with their numerous breeds are constantly +adduced as evidence of the changes which animals may undergo, and as +furnishing hints respecting the way in which the diversity now observed +among animals has already been produced. It is my conviction that such +inferences are in no way sustained by the facts of the case, and that, +however striking the differences may be between the breeds of our +domesticated animals, as compared with the wild Species of the same +Genus, they are of a peculiar character entirely distinct from those +that prevail among the latter, and are altogether incident to the +circumstances under which they occur. By this I do not mean the natural +action of physical conditions, but the more or less intelligent +direction of the circumstances under which they live. The inference +drawn from the varieties introduced among animals in a state of +domestication, with reference to the origin of Species, is usually this: +that what the farmer does on a small scale Nature may do on a large one. +It is true that man has been able to produce certain changes in the +animals under his care, and that these changes have resulted in a +variety of breeds. But in doing this, he has, in my estimation, in no +way altered the character of the Species, but has only developed its +pliability to the will of man, that is, to a power similar in its +nature and mode of action to that power to which animals owe their very +existence. The influence of man upon Animals is, in other words, the +action of mind upon them; and yet the ordinary mode of arguing upon +this subject is, that, because the intelligence of man has been able to +produce certain varieties in domesticated animals, therefore physical +causes have produced all the diversities among wild ones. Surely, the +sounder logic would be to infer, that, because our finite intelligence +can cause the original pattern to vary by some slight shades of +difference, therefore an infinite intelligence must have established +all the boundless diversity of which our boasted varieties are but the +faintest echo. It is the most intelligent farmer that has the greatest +success in improving his breeds; and if the animals he has so fostered +are left to themselves without that intelligent care, they return +to their normal condition. So with plants: the shrewd, observing, +thoughtful gardener will obtain many varieties from his flowers; but +those varieties will fade out, if left to themselves. There is, as it +were, a certain degree of pliability and docility in the organization +both of animals and plants, which may be developed by the fostering care +of man, and within which he can exercise a certain influence; but the +variations which he thus produces are of a peculiar kind, and do not +correspond to the differences of the wild Species. Let us take some +examples to illustrate this assertion. + +Every Species of wild Bull differs from the others in its size; but +all the individuals correspond to the average standard of size +characteristic of their respective Species, and show none of those +extreme differences of size so remarkable among our domesticated +Cattle. Every Species of wild Bull has its peculiar color, and all the +individuals of one Species share in it: not so with our domesticated +Cattle, among which every individual may differ in color from every +other. All the individuals of the same Species of wild Bull agree in the +proportion of their parts, in the mode of growth of the hair, in its +quality, whether fine or soft: not so with our domesticated Cattle, +among which we find in the same Species overgrown and dwarfish +individuals, those with long and short legs, with slender and stout +build of the body, with horns or without, as well as the greatest +variety in the mode of twisting the horns,--in short, the widest +extremes of development which the degree of pliability in that Species +will allow. + +A curious instance of the power of man, not only in developing the +pliability of an animal's organization, but in adapting it to suit his +own caprices, is that of the Golden Carp, so frequently seen in bowls +and tanks as the ornament of drawing-rooms and gardens. Not only an +infinite variety of spotted, striped, variegated colors has been +produced in these Fishes, but, especially among the Chinese, so famous +for their morbid love of whatever is distorted and warped from its +natural shape and appearance, all sorts of changes have been brought +about in this single Species. A book of Chinese paintings showing the +Golden Carp in its varieties represents some as short and stout, +others long and slender,--some with the ventral side swollen, others +hunch-backed,--some with the mouth greatly enlarged, while in others +the caudal fin, which in the normal condition of the Species is placed +vertically at the end of the tail and is forked like those of other +Fishes, has become crested and arched, or is double, or crooked, or has +swerved in some other way from its original pattern. But in all these +variations there is nothing which recalls the characteristic specific +differences among the representatives of the Carp Family, which in their +wild state are very monotonous in their appearance all the world over. + +Were it appropriate to accumulate evidence here upon this subject, I +could bring forward many more examples quite as striking as those above +mentioned. The various breeds of our domesticated Horses present the +same kind of irregularities, and do not differ from each other in the +same way as the wild Species differ from one another. Or take the Genus +Dog: the differences between its wild Species do not correspond in the +least with the differences observed among the domesticated ones. Compare +the differences between the various kinds of Jackals and Wolves with +those that exist between the Bull-Dog and Greyhound, for instance, or +between the St. Charles and the Terrier, or between the Esquimaux and +the Newfoundland Dog. I need hardly add that what is true of the Horses, +the Cattle, the Dogs, is true also of the Donkey, the Goat, the Sheep, +the Pig, the Cat, the Rabbit, the different kinds of barn-yard fowl,--in +short, of all those animals that are in domesticity the chosen +companions of man. + +In fact, all the variability among domesticated Species is due to the +fostering care, or, in its more extravagant freaks, to the fancies of +man, and it has never been observed in the wild Species, where, on +the contrary, everything shows the closest adherence to the distinct, +well-defined, and invariable limits of the Species. It surely does +not follow, that, because the Chinese can, under abnormal conditions, +produce a variety of fantastic shapes in the Golden Carp, therefore +water, or the physical conditions established in the water, can create a +Fish, any more than it follows, that, because they can dwarf a tree, or +alter its aspect by stunting its growth in one direction and forcing it +in another, therefore the earth, or the physical conditions connected +with their growth, can create a Pine, an Oak, a Birch, or a Maple. +I confess that in all the arguments derived from the phenomena of +domestication, to prove that all animals owe their origin and diversity +to the natural action of the conditions under which they live, the +conclusion does not seem to me to follow logically from the premises. +And the fact that the domesticated animals of all races of men, equally +with the white race, vary among themselves in the same way and differ +in the same way from the wild Species, makes it still more evident that +domesticated varieties do not explain the origin of Species, except, as +I have said, by showing that the intelligent will of man can produce +effects which physical causes have never been known to produce, and that +we must therefore look to some cause outside of Nature, corresponding in +kind, though so different in degree, to the intelligence of man, for +all the phenomena connected with the existence of animals in their wild +state. So far from attributing these original differences among animals +to natural influences, it would seem, that, while a certain freedom of +development is left, within the limits of which man can exercise his +intelligence and his ingenuity, not even this superficial influence is +allowed to physical conditions unaided by some guiding power, since in +their normal state the wild Species remain, so far as we have been able +to discover, entirely unchanged,--maintained, it is true, in their +integrity by the circumstances that were established for their support +by the power that created both, but never altered by them. Nature holds +inviolable the stamp that God has set upon his creatures; and if man +is able to influence their organization in some slight degree, it is +because the Creator has given to his relations with the animals he has +intended for his companions the same plasticity which he has allowed to +every other side of his life, in virtue of which he may in some sort +mould and shape it to his own ends, and be held responsible also for its +results. + +The common sense of a civilized community has already pointed out the +true distinction in applying another word to the discrimination of the +different kinds of domesticated animals. They are called Breeds, and +Breeds among animals are the work of man;--Species were created by God. + + * * * * * + + +THE STRASBURG CLOCK. + + + Many and many a year ago,-- + To say how many I scarcely dare,-- + Three of us stood in Strasburg streets, + In the wide and open square, + Where, quaint and old and touched with the gold + Of a summer morn, at stroke of noon + The tongue of the great Cathedral tolled, + And into the church with the crowd we strolled + To see their wonder, the famous Clock. + Well, my love, there are clocks a many, + As big as a house, as small as a penny; + And clocks there be with voices as queer + As any that torture human ear,-- + Clocks that grunt, and clocks that growl, + That wheeze like a pump, and hoot like an owl, + From the coffin shape with its brooding face + That stands on the stair, (you know the place,) + Saying, "Click, cluck," like an ancient hen, + A-gathering the minutes home again, + To the kitchen knave with its wooden stutter, + Doing equal work with double splutter, + Yelping, "Click, clack," with a vulgar jerk, + As much as to say, "Just see me work!" + + But of all the clocks that tell Time's bead-roll, + There are none like this in the old Cathedral; + Never a one so bids you stand + While it deals the minutes with even hand: + For clocks, like men, are better and worse, + And some you dote on, and some you curse; + And clock and man may have such a way + Of telling the truth that you can't say nay. + + So in we went and stood in the crowd + To hear the old clock as it crooned aloud, + With sound and symbol, the only tongue + The maker taught it while yet 't was young. + And we saw Saint Peter clasp his hands, + And the cock crow hoarsely to all the lands, + And the Twelve Apostles come and go, + And the solemn Christ pass sadly and slow; + And strange that iron-legged procession, + And odd to us the whole impression, + As the crowd beneath, in silence pressing, + Bent to that cold mechanic blessing. + + But I alone thought far in my soul + What a touch of genius was in the whole, + And felt how graceful had been the thought + Which for the signs of the months had sought, + Sweetest of symbols, Christ's chosen train; + And much I pondered, if he whose brain + Had builded this clock with labor and pain + Did only think, twelve months there are, + And the Bible twelve will fit to a hair; + Or did he say, with a heart in tune, + Well-loved John is the sign of June, + And changeful Peter hath April hours, + And Paul the stately, October bowers, + And sweet, or faithful, or bold, or strong, + Unto each one shall a month belong. + + But beside the thought that under it lurks, + Pray, do you think clocks are saved by their works? + + + + +ARTHUR HUGH CLOUGH. + + +To win such love as Arthur Hugh Clough won in life, to leave so dear a +memory as he has left, is a happiness that falls to few men. In America, +as in England, his death is mourned by friends whose affection is better +than fame, and who in losing him have met with an irreparable loss. +Outside the circle of his friends his reputation had no large extent; +but though his writings are but little known by the great public of +readers, they are prized by all those of thoughtful and poetic temper +to whose hands they have come, as among the most precious and original +productions of the time. To those who knew him personally his poems had +a special worth and charm, as the sincere expression of a character of +the purest stamp, of rare truthfulness and simplicity, not less tender +than strong, and of a genius thoroughly individual in its form, and full +of the promise of a large career. He was by Nature endowed with subtile +and profound powers of thought, with feeling at once delicate and +intense, with lively and generous sympathies, and with conscientiousness +so acute as to pervade and control his whole intellectual disposition. +Loving, seeking, and holding fast to the truth, he despised all +falseness and affectation. With his serious and earnest thinking was +joined the play of a genial humor and the brightness of poetic fancy. +Liberal in sentiment, absolutely free from dogmatism and pride of +intellect, of a questioning temper, but of reverent spirit, faithful in +the performance not only of the larger duties, but also of the lesser +charities and the familiar courtesies of life, he has left a memory of +singular consistency, purity, and dignity. He lived to conscience, not +for show, and few men carry through life so white a soul. + +A notice of Mr. Clough understood to be written by one who knew him well +gives the outline of his life. + +"Arthur Hugh Clough was educated at Rugby, to which school he went +very young, soon after Dr. Arnold had been elected head-master. He +distinguished himself at once by gaining the only scholarship which +existed at that time, and which was open to the whole school under the +age of fourteen. Before he was sixteen he was at the head of the fifth +form, and, as that was the earliest age at which boys were then admitted +into the sixth, had to wait for a year before coming under the personal +tuition of the headmaster. He came in the next (school) generation to +Stanley and Vaughan, and gained a reputation, if possible, even greater +than theirs. At the yearly speeches, in the last year of his residence, +when the prizes are given away in the presence of the school and the +friends who gather on such occasions, Arnold took the almost unexampled +course of addressing him, (when he and two fags went up to carry off his +load of splendidly bound books,) and congratulating him on having +gained every honor which Rugby could bestow, and having also already +distinguished himself and done the highest credit to his school at the +University. He had just gained a scholarship at Balliol, then, as now, +the blue ribbon of undergraduates. + +"At school, although before all things a student, he had thoroughly +entered into the life of the place, and before he left had gained +supreme influence with the boys. He was the leading contributor to the +'Rugby Magazine'; and though a weakness in his ankles prevented him from +taking a prominent part in the games of the place, was known as the +best goal-keeper on record, a reputation which no boy could have gained +without promptness and courage. He was also one of the best swimmers in +the school, his weakness of ankle being no drawback here, and in his +last half passed the crucial test of that day, by swimming from Swift's +(the bathing-place of the sixth) to the mill on the Leicester road, and +back again, between callings over. + +"He went to reside at Oxford when the whole University was in a ferment. +The struggle of Alma Mater to humble or cast out the most remarkable +of her sons was at its height. Ward had not yet been arraigned for his +opinions, and was a fellow and tutor of Balliol, and Newman was in +residence at Oriel, and incumbent of St. Mary's. + +"Clough's was a mind which, under any circumstances, would have thrown +itself into the deepest speculative thought of its time. He seems soon +to have passed through the mere ecclesiastical debatings to the deep +questions which lay below them. There was one lesson--probably one +only--which he had never been able to learn from his great master, +namely, to acknowledge that there are problems which intellectually are +not to be solved by man, and before these to sit down quietly. Whether +it were from the harass of thought on such matters which interfered with +his regular work, or from one of those strange miscarriages in the most +perfect of examining machines, which every now and then deprive the best +men of the highest honors, to the surprise of every one Clough missed +his first class. But he completely retrieved this academical mishap +shortly afterwards by gaining an Oriel fellowship. In his new college, +the college of Pusey, Newman, Keble, Marriott, Wilberforce, presided +over by Dr. Hawkins, and in which the influence of Whately, Davidson, +and Arnold had scarcely yet died out, he found himself in the very +centre and eye of the battle. His own convictions were by this time +leading him far away from both sides in the Oxford contest; he, however, +accepted a tutorship at the college, and all who had the privilege of +attending them will long remember his lectures on logic and ethics. +His fault (besides a shy and reserved manner) was that he was much too +long-suffering to youthful philosophic coxcombry, and would rather +encourage it by his gentle 'Ah! you think so?' or, 'Yes, but might not +such and such be the case?'" + +Clough was at Oxford in 1847,--the year of the terrible Irish famine, +and with others of the most earnest men at the University he took part +in an association which had for its object "Retrenchment for the sake +of the Irish." Such a society was little likely to be popular with the +comfortable dignitaries or the luxurious youth of the University. Many +objections, frivolous or serious as the case might be, were raised +against so subversive a notion as that of the self-sacrifice of the rich +for the sake of the poor. Disregarding all personal considerations, +Clough printed a pamphlet entitled, "A Consideration of Objections +against the Retrenchment Association," in which he met the careless or +selfish arguments of those who set themselves against the efforts of +the society. It was a characteristic performance. His heart was deeply +stirred by the harsh contrast between the miseries of the Irish poor and +the wasteful extravagance of living prevalent at Oxford. He wrote with +vehement indignation against the selfish pleas of the indifferent and +the thoughtless possessors of wealth, wasters of the goods given them as +a trust for others. His words were chiefly addressed to the young men +at the University,--and they were not without effect. Such views of the +rights and duties of property as he put forward, of the claims of labor, +and of the responsibilities of the aristocracy, had not been often heard +at Oxford. He was called a Socialist and a Radical, but it mattered +little to him by what name he was known to those whose consciences were +not touched by his appeal. "Will you say," he writes toward the end of +this pamphlet, "this is all rhetoric and declamation? There is, I dare +say, something too much in that kind. What with criticizing style and +correcting exercises, we college tutors perhaps may be likely, in the +heat of composition, to lose sight of realities, and pass into the limbo +of the factitious,--especially when the thing must be done at odd times, +in any case, and, if at all, quickly. But if I have been obliged to +write hurriedly, believe me, I have obliged myself to think not hastily. +And believe me, too, though I have desired to succeed in putting vividly +and forcibly that which vividly and forcibly I felt and saw, still the +graces and splendors of composition were thoughts far less present to my +mind than Irish poor men's miseries, English poor men's hardships, and +your unthinking indifference. Shocking enough the first and the second, +almost more shocking the third." + +It was about this time that the most widely known of his works, "The +Bothie of Toper-na-Fuosich, a Long-Vacation Pastoral," was written. It +was published in 1848, and though it at once secured a circle of warm +admirers, and the edition was very soon exhausted, it "is assuredly +deserving of a far higher popularity than it has ever attained." The +poem was reprinted in America, at Cambridge, in 1849, and it may be +safely asserted that its merit was more deeply felt and more generously +acknowledged by American than by English readers. The fact that its +essential form and local coloring were purely and genuinely English, and +thus gratified the curiosity felt in this country concerning the social +habits and ways of life in the mother-land, while on the other hand its +spirit was in sympathy with the most liberal and progressive thought +of the age, may sufficiently account for its popularity here. But +the lovers of poetry found delight in it, apart from these +characteristics,--in its fresh descriptions of Nature, its healthy +manliness of tone, its scholarly construction, its lively humor, its +large thought quickened and deepened by the penetrating imagination of +the poet. + +"Any one who has read it will acknowledge that a tutorship at Oriel was +not the place for the author. The intense love of freedom, the deep and +hearty sympathy with the foremost thought of the time, the humorous +dealing with old formulas and conventionalisms grown meaningless, which +breathe in every line of the 'Bothie,' show this clearly enough. He +would tell in after-life, with much enjoyment, how the dons of the +University, who, hearing that he had something in the press, and knowing +that his theological views were not wholly sound, were looking for a +publication on the Articles, were astounded by the appearance of that +fresh and frolicsome poem. Oxford (at least the Oriel common room) +and he were becoming more estranged daily. How keenly he felt the +estrangement, not from Oxford, but from old friends, about this time, +can be read only in his own words." It is in such poems as the "Qua +Cursum Ventus," or the sonnet beginning, "Well, well,--Heaven bless you +all from day to day!" that it is to be read. These, with a few other +fugitive pieces, were printed, in company with verses by a friend, as +one part of a small volume entitled, "Ambarvalia," which never attained +any general circulation, although containing some poems which will take +their place among the best of English poetry of this generation. + + "_Qua Cursum Ventus_. + + "As ships, becalmed at eve, that lay + With canvas drooping, side by side, + Two towers of sail at dawn of day, + Are scarce long leagues apart descried: + + "When fell the night, upsprung the breeze, + And all the darkling hours they plied, + Nor dreamt but each the self-same seas + By each was cleaving side by side: + + "E'en so----But why the tale reveal + Of those whom, year by year unchanged, + Brief absence joined anew to feel, + Astounded, soul from soul estranged? + + "At dead of night their sails were filled, + And onward each rejoicing steered: + Ah, neither blame, for neither willed, + Or wist, what first with dawn appeared! + + "To veer, how vain! On, onward strain, + Brave barks! In light, in darkness too, + Through winds and tides one compass guides: + To that, and your own selves, be true! + + "But, O blithe breeze! and O great seas! + Though ne'er, that earliest parting past, + On your wide plain they join again, + Together lead them home at last! + + "One port, methought, alike they sought, + One purpose hold where'er they fare: + O bounding breeze! O rushing seas! + At last, at last, unite them there!" + +"In 1848-49 the revolutionary crisis came on Europe, and Clough's +sympathies drew him with great earnestness into the struggles which were +going on. He was in Paris directly after the barricades, and in Rome +during the siege, where he gained the friendship of Saffi and other +leading Italian patriots." A part of his experiences and his thoughts +while at Rome are interwoven with the story in his "Amours de Voyage," a +poem which exhibits in extraordinary measure the subtilty and delicacy +of his powers, and the fulness of his sympathy with the intellectual +conditions of the time. It was first published in the "Atlantic Monthly" +for 1858, and was at once established in the admiration of readers +capable of appreciating its rare and refined excellence. The spirit +of the poem is thoroughly characteristic of its author, and the +speculative, analytic turn of his mind is represented in many passages +of the letters of the imaginary hero. Had he been writing in his own +name, he could not have uttered his inmost conviction more distinctly, +or have given the clue to his intellectual life more openly than in the +following verses:-- + + "I will look straight out, see things, not try to + evade them: + Fact shall be Fact for me; and the Truth the + Truth as ever, + Flexible, changeable, vague, and multiform + and doubtful." + +Or, again,-- + + "Ah, the key of our life, that passes all wards, + opens all locks, + Is not _I will_, but _I must_. I must,--I must, + --and I do it." + +And still again,-- + + "But for the steady fore-sense of a freer and + larger existence, + Think you that man could consent to be + circumscribed here into action? + But for assurance within of a limitless ocean + divine, o'er + Whose great tranquil depths unconscious + the wind-tost surface + Breaks into ripples of trouble that come and + change and endure not,-- + But that in this, of a truth, we have our + being, and know it, + Think you we men could submit to live and + move as we do here?" + +"To keep on doing right,--not to speculate only, but to act, not to +think only, but to live,"--was, it has been said, characteristic of the +leading men at Oxford during this period. "It was not so much a part of +their teaching as a doctrine woven into their being." And while they +thus exercised a moral not less than an intellectual influence over +their contemporaries and their pupils, they themselves, according to +their various tempers and circumstances, were led on into new paths of +inquiry or of life. Some of them fell into the common temptations of +an English University career, and lost the freshness of energy and the +honesty of conviction which first inspired them; others, holding their +places in the established order of things, were able by happy faculties +of character to retain also the vigor and simplicity of their early +purposes; while others again, among whom was Clough, finding the +restraints of the University incompatible with independence, gave up +their positions at Oxford to seek other places in which they could more +freely search for the truth and express their own convictions. + +It was not long after his return from Italy that he became Professor of +English Language and Literature at University College, London. He filled +this place, which was not in all respects suited to him, until 1852. +After resigning it, he took various projects into consideration, and +at length determined to come to America with the intention of settling +here, if circumstances should prove favorable. In November, 1852, +he arrived in Boston. He at once established himself at Cambridge, +proposing to give instruction to young men preparing for college, or to +take on in more advanced studies those who had completed the collegiate +course. He speedily won the friendship of those whose friendship +was best worth having in Boston and its neighborhood. His thorough +scholarship, the result of the best English training, and his intrinsic +qualities caused his society to be sought and prized by the most +cultivated and thoughtful men. He had nothing of insular narrowness, and +none of the hereditary prejudices which too often interfere with the +capacity of English travellers or residents among us to sympathize with +and justly understand habits of life and of thought so different from +those to which they have been accustomed. His liberal sentiments and his +independence of thought harmonized with the new social conditions in +which he found himself, and with the essential spirit of American life. +The intellectual freedom and animation of this country were congenial +to his disposition. From the beginning he took a large share in the +interests of his new friends. He contributed several remarkable articles +to the pages of the "North American Review" and of "Putnam's Magazine," +and he undertook a work which was to occupy his scanty leisure for +several years, the revision of the so-called Dryden's Translation of +Plutarch's Lives. Although the work was undertaken simply as a revision, +it turned out to involve little less labor than a complete new +translation, and it was so accomplished that henceforth it must remain +the standard version of this most popular of the ancient authors. + +But all that made the presence of such a man a great gain to his new +friends made his absence felt by his old ones as a great loss. In July, +1853, he received the announcement that a place had been obtained for +him by their efforts in the Education Department of the Privy Council, +and he was so strenuously urged to return to England, that, although +unwilling to give up the prospect of a final settlement in America, +he felt that it was best to go home for a time. Some months after his +return he was married to the granddaughter of the late Mr. William +Smith, M.P. for Norwich. He established himself in a house in London, +and settled down to the hard routine-work of his office. In a private +letter written not long after his return, he said,--"As for myself, whom +you ask about, there is nothing to tell about me. I live on contentedly +enough, but feel rather unwilling to be re-Englished, after once +attaining that higher transatlantic development. However, _il faut s'y +soumettre_, I presume,--though I fear I am embarked in the foundering +ship. I hope to Heaven you'll get rid of slavery, and then I shouldn't +fear but you would really 'go ahead' in the long run. As for us and our +inveterate feudalism, it is not hopeful." + +In another letter about this time, he wrote,--"I like America all the +better for the comparison with England on my return. Certainly I think +you are more right than I was willing to admit, about the position of +the poorer classes here. Such is my first reimpression. However, it +will wear off soon enough, I dare say; so you must make the most of my +admissions." + +Again, a little later, he wrote,--"I do truly hope that you will get the +North erelong thoroughly united against any further encroachments. I +don't by any means feel that the slave-system is an intolerable crime, +nor do I think that our system here is so much better; but it is clear +to me that the only safe ground to go upon is that of your Northern +States. I suppose the rich-and-poor difficulties must be creeping in at +New York, but one would fain hope that European analogies will not be +quite accepted even there." + +His letters were reflections of himself,--full of thought, fancy, and +pleasant humor, as well as of affectionateness and true feeling. Their +character is hardly to be given in extracts, but a few passages may +serve to illustrate some of these qualities. + +"Ambrose Philips, the Roman Catholic, who set up the new St. Bernard +Monastery at Charnwood Forest, has taken to spirit-rappings. He avers, +_inter alia_, that a Buddhist spirit in misery held communication with +him through the table, and entreated his confessor, Father Lorraine, to +say three masses for him. Pray, convey this to T---- for his warning. +For, moreover, it remains uncertain whether Father Lorraine did say the +masses; so that perhaps T----'s deceased co-religionist is still in the +wrong place." + +Some time after his return, he wrote,--"Really, I may say I am only +just beginning to recover my spirits after returning from the young and +hopeful and humane republic, to this cruel, unbelieving, inveterate old +monarchy. There are deeper waters of ancient knowledge and experience +about one here, and one is saved from the temptation of flying off into +space; but I think you have, beyond all question, the happiest country +going. Still, the political talk of America, as one hears it here, is +not always true to the best intentions of the country, is it?" + +Writing on a July day from his office in Whitehall, he says, after +speaking of the heat of the weather,--"Time has often been compared to +a river: if the Thames at London represent the stream of traditional +wisdom, the comparison will indeed be of an ill odor; the accumulated +wisdom of the past will be proved upon analogy to be as it were the +collected sewage of the centuries; and the great problem, how to get rid +of it." + +In March, 1854, he wrote,--"People talk a good deal about that book of +Whewell's on the Plurality of Worlds. I recommend Fields to pirate it. +Have you seen it? It is to show that Jupiter, Venus, Saturn, etc., are +all pretty certainly uninhabitable,--being (Jupiter, Saturn, etc., to +wit) strange washy limbos of places, where at the best only mollusks +(or, in the case of Venus, salamanders) could exist. Hence we conclude +we are the only rational creatures, which is highly satisfactory, and, +what is more, quite Scriptural. Owen, on the other hand, I believe, +and other scientific people, declare it a most presumptuous essay,-- +conclusions audacious, and reasoning fallacious, though the facts are +allowed; and in that opinion I, on the ground that there are more things +in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in the inductive philosophy, +incline to concur." + +Of his work he wrote,--"Well, I go on in the office, _operose nihil +agenda_, very _operose_, and very _nihil_ too. For lack of news, I send +you a specimen of my labors."--"We are here going on much as usual, +--occupied with nothing else but commerce and the money-market. I do not +think any one is thinking audibly of anything else."--"I have read with +more pleasure than anything else that I have read lately Kane's Arctic +Explorations, i.e., his second voyage, which is certainly a wonderful +story. The whole narrative is, I think, very characteristic of the +differences between the English and the American-English habits of +command and obedience." + +In the autumn of 1857, after speaking of some of the features of the +Sepoy revolt, he said,--"I don't believe Christianity can spread far in +Asia, unless it will allow men more than one wife,--which isn't likely +yet out of Utah. But I believe the old Brahmin 'Touch not and taste not, +and I am holier than thou, because I don't touch and taste,' may be got +rid of. As for Mahometanism, it is a crystallized monotheism, out of +which no vegetation can come. I doubt its being good even for the +Central negro." + +March, 1859. "Excuse this letter all about my own concerns. I am pretty +busy, and have time for little else: such is our fate after forty. My +figure 40 stands nearly three months behind me on the roadway, unwept, +unhonored, and unsung, an _octavum lustrum_ bound up and laid on the +shelf. 'So-and-so is dead,' said a friend to Lord Melbourne of some +author. 'Dear me, how glad I am! Now I can bind him up.'" + +It was not until 1859 that the translation of Plutarch, begun six years +before, was completed and published. It had involved much wearisome +study, and gave proof of patient, exact, and elegant scholarship. +Clough's life in the Council-Office was exceedingly laborious, and +for several years his work was increased by services rendered to Miss +Nightingale, a near relative of his wife. He employed "many hours, both +before and after his professional duties were over, to aid her in those +reforms of the military administration to which she has devoted the +remaining energies of her overtasked life." For this work he was the +better fitted from having acted, during a period of relief from his +regular employment, as Secretary to a Military Commission appointed by +Government shortly after the Crimean War to examine and report upon the +military systems of some of the chief Continental nations. But at length +his health gave way under the strain of continuous overwork. He had for +a long time been delicate, and early in 1861 he was obliged to give +up work, and was ordered to travel abroad. He went to Greece and +Constantinople, and enjoyed greatly the charms of scenery and of +association which he was so well fitted to appreciate. But the release +from work had come too late. He returned to England in July, his health +but little improved. In a letter written at that time he spoke of Lord +Campbell's death, which had just occurred. "Lord Campbell's death is +rather the characteristic death of the English political man. In the +Cabinet, on the Bench, and at a dinner-party, busy, animated, and full +of effort to-day, and in the early morning a vessel has burst. It is a +wonder they last so long." But of himself he says, in words of striking +contrast,--"My nervous energy is pretty nearly spent for to-day, so I +must come to a stop. I have leave till November, and by that time I hope +I shall be strong again for another good spell of work." After a happy +three weeks in England, he went abroad again, and spent some time +with his friends the Tennysons in Auvergne and among the Pyrenees. In +September he was joined by his wife in Paris, and thence went with her +through Switzerland to Italy. He had scarcely reached Florence before +he became alarmingly ill with symptoms of a low malaria fever. His +exhausted constitution never rallied against its attack. He sank +gradually away, and died on the 13th of November. "I have leave till +November, and by that time I hope I shall be strong again for another +good spell of work." That hope is accomplished;-- + + "For sure in the wide heaven there is room + For love, and pity, and for helpful deeds." + +He was buried in the little Protestant cemetery at Florence, a fit +resting-place for a poet, the Protestant Santa Croce, where the tall +cypresses rise over the graves, and the beautiful hills keep guard +around. + +"Every one who knew Clough even slightly," says one of his oldest +friends, "received the strongest impression of the unusual breadth +and massiveness of his mind. Singularly simple and genial, he was +unfortunately cast upon a self-questioning age, which led him to worry +himself with constantly testing the veracity of his own emotions. He has +delineated in four lines the impression which his habitual reluctance to +converse on the deeper themes of life made upon those of his friends who +were attracted by his frank simplicity. In one of his shorter poems he +writes,-- + + 'I said, My heart is all too soft; + He who would climb and soar aloft + Must needs keep ever at his side + The tonic of a wholesome pride.' + +That expresses the man in a very remarkable manner. He had a kind of +proud simplicity about him singularly attractive, and often singularly +disappointing to those who longed to know him well. He had a fear, which +many would think morbid, of leaning much on the approbation of the +world. And there is one remarkable passage in his poems in which he +intimates that men who live on the good opinion of others might even be +benefited by a crime which would rob them of that evil stimulant:-- + + 'Why, so is good no longer good, but crime + Our truest, best advantage, since it lifts us + Out of the stifling gas of men's opinion + Into the vital atmosphere of Truth, + Where He again is visible, though in anger.' + +"So eager was his craving for reality and perfect sincerity, so morbid +his dislike even for the unreal conventional forms of life, that a mind +quite unique in simplicity and truthfulness represents _itself_ in his +poems as + + 'Seeking in vain, in all my store, + One feeling based on truth.' + +"Indeed, he wanted to reach some guaranty for simplicity deeper than +simplicity itself. We remember his principal criticism on America, +after returning from his residence in Massachusetts, was, that the +New-Englanders were much simpler than the English, and that this was +the great charm of New-England society. His own habits were of the same +kind, sometimes almost austere in their simplicity. Luxury he disliked, +and sometimes his friends thought him even ascetic. + +"This almost morbid craving for a firm base on the absolute realities +of life was very wearing in a mind so self-conscious as Clough's, and +tended to paralyze the expression of a certainly great genius. He heads +some of his poems with a line from Wordsworth's great ode, which depicts +perfectly the expression often written in the deep furrows which +sometimes crossed and crowded his massive forehead:-- + + 'Blank misgivings of a creature moving about + in worlds not realized.' + +"Nor did Clough's great powers ever realize themselves to his +contemporaries by any outward sign at all commensurate with the profound +impression which they produced in actual life. But if his powers did +not, there was much in his character that did produce its full effect +upon all who knew him. He never looked, even in time of severe trial, to +his own interest or advancement. He never flinched from the worldly loss +which his deepest convictions brought on him. Even when clouds were +thick over his own head, and the ground beneath his feet seemed +crumbling away, he could still bear witness to an eternal light behind +the cloud, and tell others that there is solid ground to be reached in +the end by the weary feet of all who will wait to be strong. Let him +speak his own farewell:-- + + 'Say not the struggle nought availeth, + The labor and the wounds are vain, + The enemy faints not nor faileth, + And as things have been things remain. + + 'Though hopes were dupes, fears may be liars; + It may be, in yon smoke concealed, + Your comrades chase e'en now the fliers, + And but for you possess the field. + + 'For though the tired wave, idly breaking, + Seems here no tedious inch to gain, + Far back, through creek and inlet making, + Came, silent flooding in, the main. + + 'And not through eastern windows only, + When daylight comes, comes in the light; + In front the sun climbs slow,--how slowly! + But westward--look! the land is bright.'" + + + + +WHAT SHALL WE DO WITH THEM? + + +We have many precedents upon the part of the "Guardian of Civilization," +which may or may not guide us. Not to return to that age "whereunto the +memory of man runneth not to the contrary," "the day of King Richard our +grandfather," and to the Wars of the Roses, we will begin with the happy +occasion of the Restoration of King Charles of merry and disreputable +fame. Since he came back to his kingdoms on sufferance and as a +convenient compromise between anarchy and despotism, he could hardly +afford the luxury of wholesale proscription. What the returning +Royalists could, they did. It was obviously unsafe, as well as +ungrateful, to hang General Monk in presence of his army, many of whom +had followed the "Son of the Man" from Worcester Fight in hot pursuit, +and had hunted him from thicket to thicket of Boscobel Wood. But to dig +up the dead Cromwell and Ireton, to suspend them upon the gallows, to +mark out John Milton, old and blind, for poverty and contempt, was both +safe and pleasant. And civilization was guarded accordingly. One little +bit of comfort, however, was permitted. Scotland had been the Virginia +of his day, and Charles had the satisfaction of hearing that the Whigs, +who had betrayed and sold his father, and who had (a far worse offence) +made himself listen to three-hours' sermons, were chased like wild +beasts among the hills, after the defeat of Bothwell Brigg. But what +Charles could not do was permitted to his brother. After the rebellion +of Monmouth was put down, the West of England was turned to mourning. +From the princely bastard who sued in agony and vain humiliation, to the +clown of Devon forced into the rebel ranks,--from the peer who plotted, +to the venerable and Christian woman whose sole crime was sheltering the +houseless and starving fugitive, there was given to the vanquished no +mercy but the mercy of Jeffreys, no tenderness but the tenderness of +Kirk. + +But the House of Stuart was not always to represent the side of victory. +Thirty years after the Rout of Sedgemoor, the son of James, whose name +was clouded by rumor with the same stain of spuriousness as that of his +unfortunate cousin, was proclaimed by the Earl of Mar. The Jacobites +were forced to drink to the dregs the cup of bitterness they had so +gladly administered to others. Over Temple Bar and London Bridge the +heads of the defeated rebels bore witness to the guardianship of +civilization as understood in the eighteenth century. + +Another thirty years brings us to the landing of Moidart, the rising +of the clans, the fall of Edinburgh and Carlisle, the "Bull's Run" at +Prestonpans, and the panic of London. If we are anxious to guard our +civilization according to Hanoverian precedents, there is one name +commonly given to the Commander-in-chief at Culloden which Congress +should add to the titles it is preparing against McClellan's successful +advance. The "Butcher Cumberland" not only hounded on his troops with +the tempting price of thirty thousand pounds for the Pretender _dead or +alive_, but every adherent of the luckless Jefferson Davis of that day +was in peril of life and wholesale confiscation. The House of Hanover +not only broke the backbone of the Rebellion, but mangled without mercy +its remains. + +We come now, in another thirty years, to the next struggle of England +with a portion of her people. It is impossible, as well as unfair, +to say what might have been done with "Mr. Washington, the Virginia +colonel," and Mr. Franklin, the Philadelphia printer, had they not been +able to determine their own destiny. We can only surmise, by referring +to two well-known localities in New York, the "Old Sugar-House" and the +"Jersey Prison-Ship," how paternally George III was disposed then to +resume his rights. And without disposition to press historic parallels, +we cannot but compare Arnold and Tryon's raid along the south shore of +Connecticut with a certain sail recently made up the Tennessee River to +the foot of the Muscle Shoals by the command of a modern Connecticut +officer. + +But as we were spared the necessity of testing the royal clemency to the +submitted Provinces of North America, we had better pass on twenty years +to the era of the Act of Union between Great Britain and Ireland. In +this country the Irishman need not "fear to speak of '98," and in this +country he still treasures the memory of the whippings and pitch-caps of +Major Beresford's riding-house, and other pleasant souvenirs of the way +in which, sixty years ago, loyalty dealt with rebellion. There is no +inherent proneness to treason in the Hibernian nature, as Corcoran and +the Sixty-Ninth can bear witness; nor is Pat so fond of a riot that he +cannot with fair play be a--well, a good citizen. Yet at home he has +been so "civilized" by his British guardian as to be in a chronic state +of discontent and fretfulness. + +We must, however, hasten to our latest precedent,--England in India. +The Sepoy Rebellion had some features in common with our own. It was +inaugurated by premeditated military treachery. It seized upon a large +quantity of Government munitions of war. It only asked "to be let +alone." It found the Government wholly unprepared. But it was the +uprising of a conquered people. The rebels were in circumstances, as in +complexion, much nearer akin to that portion of our Southern citizens +which has _not_ rebelled, and which has lost no opportunity of seeking +our lines "to take the oath of allegiance" or any other little favor +which could be found there. We do not defend their atrocities, although +a plea in mitigation might be put in, that these "were wisely planned to +break the spell which British domination had woven over the native mind +of India," and that they were part of that decided and desperate policy +which was designed to forever bar the way of reconstruction. But toward +the recaptured rebels there was used a course for which the only +precedent, so far as we know, was furnished by that highly civilized +guardian, the Dey of Algiers. These prisoners of war were in cold blood +tied to the muzzles of cannon and blown into fragments. The illustrated +papers of that most Christian land which is overcome with the barbarity +of sinking old hulks in a channel through which privateers were wont to +escape our blockade furnished effective engravings "by our own artist" +of the scene. Wholesale plunder and devastation of the chief city of the +revolt followed. The rebellion was put down, and put down, we may say, +without any unnecessary tenderness, any womanish weakness for the +rebels. + +We have thus established what we believe is called by theologians a +_catena_ of precedents, coming down from the days of the Commonwealth to +our own time. It covers about the whole period of New England history. +And we next propose to ask the question, how far it may be desirable to +be bound by such indisputable authority. + +Is it too late to reopen the question, and to retry the issue between +sovereign and rebel, less with respect to ancient and immemorial usage, +and more according to eternal principle? We answer, No. The same power +that enables us to master this rebellion will give us original and final +jurisdiction over it. + +But one principle asserts itself out of the uniform coarse of history. +The restoration of the lawful authority over rebels does not restore +them to their old _status_. They are at the pleasure of the conquering +power. Rights of citizenship, having been abjured, do not return +with the same coercion which demands duties of citizenship. Thus, to +illustrate on an individual scale, every wrong-doer is _ipso facto_ a +rebel. He forfeits, according to due course of law, a measure of his +privileges, while constrained to the same responsibility of obedience. +His property is not exempt from taxes because he is in prison, but his +right of voting is gone; he cannot bear arms, but he must keep the +peace, he must labor compulsorily, and attend such worship as the State +provides. In short, he becomes a ward of the State, while not ceasing to +be a member. His inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of +happiness were inalienable only so long as he remained obedient and true +to the sovereign. Now this is equally true on the large scale as on the +small. The only difficulty is to apply it to broad masses of men and to +States. + +It may not be expedient to try South Carolina collectively, but we +contend that the application of the principle gives us the right. +Corporate bodies have again and again been punished by suspension of +franchise, while held to allegiance and duties. + +The simple question for us is, What will it be best to do? The South +may save us the trouble of deciding for the present a part of the many +questions that occur. We may put down the Confederate Government, and +take military occupation. We cannot compel the Southerners to hold +elections and resume their share in the Government. It can go on without +them. The same force which reopens the Mississippi can collect taxes or +exact forfeitures along its banks. If Charleston is sullen, the National +Government, having restored its flag to Moultrie and Sumter, can take +its own time in the matter of clearing out the channel and rebuilding +the light-houses. If a secluded neighborhood does not receive a +Government postmaster, but is disposed to welcome him with tarry hands +to a feathery bed, it can be left without the mails. The rebel we can +compel to return to his duties; if necessary, we can leave him to get +back his rights as he best may. + +But we are the representatives of a great political discovery. The +American Union is founded on a fact unknown to the Old World. That fact +is the direct ratio of the prosperity of the parts to the prosperity of +the whole. It is the principle upon which in every community our life +is built. We cannot, therefore, afford to have any part of the land +languishing and suffering. We are fighting, not for conquest, for we +mean to abjure our power the moment we safely can,--not for vengeance, +for those with whom we fight are our brethren. We are compelled by a +necessity, partly geographical and partly social, into restoring a Union +politically which never for a day has actually ceased. + +Let us advert to one fact very patent and significant. We have heard +of nearly all our successes through Rebel sources. Even where it made +against them, they could not help telling us (we do not say the _truth_, +for that is rather strong, but) the _news_. Never did two nations at war +know one-tenth part as much of each other's affairs. Like husband and +wife, the two parts of the country cannot keep secrets from one another, +let them try ever so hard. And the end of all will be that we shall know +and respect one another a great deal better for our sharp encounter. + +But this necessity of union demands of the Government, imperatively +demands, that it take whatever step is necessary to its own +preservation. It is as with a ship at sea,--all must pull together, or +somebody must go overboard. There can be no such order of things as an +_agreed state of mutiny_,--forecastle seceding from cabin, and steerage +independent of both. + +Not only is rebellion to be put down, therefore, but to be kept from +coming up again. It is obvious to every one, not thoroughly blinded by +party, how it did come up. The Gulf States were coaxed out, the Border +States were bullied or conjured out. A few leading men, who had made +the science of political management their own, got the control of the +popular mind. One great secret of their success was their constant +assumption that what was to be done had been done already. It is the +very art of the veteran seducer, who ever persuades his victim that +return is impossible, in order that he may actually make it so. North +Carolina, as one expressively said, "found herself out of the Union she +hardly knew how." Virginia was dragged out. Tennessee was forced out. +Missouri was declared out. Kentucky was all but out. Maryland hung in +the crisis of life and death under the guns of Fort McHenry. In South +Carolina alone can it be said that any fair expression of the popular +will was on the Secession side. The Rebellion was the work of a +governing class, all whose ideas and hopes were the aggrandizement of +their own order. Terrorism opened the way, reckless lying made the game +sure. If any one is inclined to doubt this, let him look at the sway +which Robespierre and his few associates exercised in Paris. Some +seventy executions delivered that great city from its nightmare agony of +months. A dozen resolute, united men, with arms and without scruples, +could seize almost any New England village for a time, provided they +knew just what they wanted to do. Decision and energy are master-keys to +almost most all doors not fortified by Hobbs's patent locks. A party of +tipsy Americans one night stormed a Parisian guard-house, disarmed the +sentry, and sent the guard flying in desperate fear, thinking that a +general _émente_ was in progress. Now one issue of the Rebellion must +be to put down, not only this governing class, but also the system from +which it springs. We have no such class at the North. We can have no +such class. The very collision of interests, the rivalries of trade, the +thousand-and-one social relations, all neutralize each other, are checks +and counterchecks, which, like the particles in a vessel of water, +always tend toward the level of an equilibrium. Two men meet in their +lodge as Odd-Fellows, but they are opponents on "town-meeting day." Two +partners in business are, one the most bitter of Calvinists, and the +other the most progressive of Universalists. Dr. A. and the Rev. Mr. B. +pull asunder the men whom 'Change unites. But with the Southerner of the +governing class it is not so. One sympathy, more potent than any other +can be, leagues them all. All are masters of the Helot race upon which +their success and station are built. It is a living relation, the most +powerful and vital which can bind men together, that sense of authority +borne by the few over the many. + +The Norman barons after the Conquest, the Spanish conquerors in Mexico +and Peru, the Englishmen of the days of Clive and Hastings in India, are +all examples of that thorough concentration of strength which must arise +in the conflicts of races. Republics have fallen through their standing +armies. The proprietary class at the South was the most dangerous of +standing armies, for it was disciplined to the use of power night and +day. The overthrow of the Rebellion will to a great degree ruin this +class. But since it is one not founded on birth or culture, but simply +on white blood and circumstance, (for no Secessionist is so fierce as +your converted Northerner,) it cannot fall like the Norman nobility in +the Wars of the Roses, or waste by operation of climate like the +masters of Mexico and Hindostan. It renews itself whenever it touches +slave-soil. That gives it life. We contend that Government must for its +own preservation go to the root of the matter. And we cannot see that +there is any Constitutional difficulty. There are probably not ten +slave-proprietors in the South whom it has not the right to arrest, try, +and hang, for high-treason. Of course, every one can see the practical +difficulty, as well as the manifest folly, of doing this. But if it has +that right toward these individuals, it certainly may say, by Act of +Congress, if we choose, that it will not waive it except upon conditions +which shall secure it from any further trouble. It seems to us fully +within our power. And we will use an illustration that may help to show +what we mean. President Lincoln has no right to require of any citizen +of the United States that he take the temperance-pledge. But suppose a +murderer who has taken life in a fit of drunkenness applies for pardon +to the Executive. The Executive, Governor or President, as the case may +be, may surely then impose that condition before commuting the sentence +or releasing the prisoner. Now the Nation stands toward the Rebels in a +like attitude. It may be good policy to take them back as fast as they +submit, it may be Christian magnanimity to make the way as easy as +possible for their return, but they have no right to come back to +anything but a prison and hard labor for life. Many of them have trebly +forfeited their lives,--as traitors, as deserters from the naval and +military service, and as paroled prisoners who have broken their parole. +And therefore we say, since we cannot deal with all the individuals, +we must deal with the masses, and that in their corporate capacity. If +South Carolina is a sovereign State, is in the Union as a feudal chief +in his king's court, with power to carry from York to Lancaster and from +Lancaster to York his subject vassals, then South Carolina has dared the +hazard of rebellion, and her political head is forfeit. + +It is next to be asked, what these conditions are to be. And that is +not to be answered in a breath. That they can have but one result, +emancipation, is a foregone conclusion; but the mode of reaching it is +not so easily determined. A cotton-loaded ship took fire at sea. It +would have been easy to pump in water enough to drown the fire. But the +captain said, "No," for that would swell the bales to such an extent +as to open every seam and start every timber. So with, the ship now +carrying King Cotton: you may indeed quench the fire, but you may +possibly turn the ship inside out into the bargain. + +But something we have a right to insist on. We have it, over and above +the Constitutional right shown just now, upon the broad principle of +necessity. Slavery has proved itself a nuisance. Just as we say to the +owner of a bone-boiling establishment, "You poison the air; we cannot +live here; you must go farther off,"--and if a fever break out which can +be clearly traced to that source, we say it emphatically: so now Slavery +having proved itself pestilential, we say, "March!" + +We are not disposed, _à la_ Staten Island, to burn down our +yellow-feverish neighbor's house. We will give everybody time to pack +up. We will make up a little purse for any specially hard case which the +removal may show. But stay and be plague-stricken we will no longer; nor +are we disposed to spend our whole income in burning sulphur, saltpetre, +and charcoal to keep out infection. And certainly, when by neglect to +pay ground-rent, or other illegality, the owner of our nuisance has +_forfeited_ his right to stay, no mortal can blame us for taking the +strictest and most decisive steps known to the law to remove him. + + + + +AGNES OF SORRENTO. + + +CHAPTER XXVII. + +THE SAINT'S REST. + + +Agnes entered the city of Rome in a trance of enthusiastic emotion, +almost such as one might imagine in a soul entering the heavenly +Jerusalem above. To her exalted ideas she was approaching not only the +ground hallowed by the blood of apostles and martyrs, not merely the +tombs of the faithful, but the visible "general assembly and church of +the first-born which are written in heaven." Here reigned the appointed +representative of Jesus,--and she imagined a benignant image of a prince +clothed with honor and splendor, who was yet the righter of all wrongs, +the redresser of all injuries, the friend and succorer of the poor and +needy; and she was firm in a secret purpose to go to this great and +benignant father, and on her knees entreat him to forgive the sins of +her lover, and remove the excommunication that threatened at every +moment his eternal salvation. For she trembled to think of it,--a sudden +accident, a thrust of a dagger, a fall from his horse might put him +forever beyond the pale of repentance,--he might die unforgiven, and +sink to eternal pain. + +If any should wonder that a Christian soul could preserve within itself +an image so ignorantly fair, in such an age, when the worldliness and +corruption in the Papal chair were obtruded by a thousand incidental +manifestations, and were alluded to in all the calculations of simple +common people, who looked at facts with a mere view to the guidance of +their daily conduct, it is necessary to remember the nature of Agnes's +religious training, and the absolute renunciation of all individual +reasoning which from infancy had been laid down before her as the first +and indispensable prerequisite of spiritual progress. To believe,--to +believe utterly and blindly,--not only without evidence, but against +evidence,--to reject the testimony even of her senses, when set against +the simple affirmation of her superiors,--had been the beginning, +middle, and end of her religious instruction. When a doubt assailed her +mind on any point, she had been taught to retire within herself and +repeat a prayer; and in this way her mental eye had formed the habit +of closing to anything that might shake her faith as quickly as the +physical eye closes at a threatened blow. Then, as she was of a poetic +and ideal nature, entirely differing from the mass of those with whom +she associated, she had formed that habit of abstraction and mental +reverie which prevented her hearing or perceiving the true sense of a +great deal that went on around her. The conversations that commonly +were carried on in her presence had for her so little interest that +she scarcely heard them. The world in which she moved was a glorified +world,--wherein, to be sure, the forms of every-day life appeared, +but appeared as different from what they were in reality as the old +mouldering daylight view of Rome is from the warm translucent glory of +its evening transfiguration. + +So in her quiet, silent heart she nursed this beautiful hope of finding +in Rome the earthly image of her Saviour's home above, of finding in the +head of the Church the real image of her Redeemer,--the friend to whom +the poorest and lowliest may pour out their souls with as much freedom +as the highest and noblest. The spiritual directors who had formed the +mind of Agnes in her early days had been persons in the same manner +taught to move in an ideal world of faith. The Mother Theresa had never +seen the realities of life, and supposed the Church on earth to be all +that the fondest visions of human longing could paint it. The hard, +energetic, prose experience of old Jocunda, and the downright way with +which she sometimes spoke of things as a trooper's wife must have seen +them, were repressed and hushed, down, as the imperfect faith of a +half-reclaimed worldling,--they could not be allowed to awaken her +from the sweetness of so blissful a dream. In like manner, when Lorenzo +Sforza became Father Francesco, he strove with earnest prayer to bury +his gift of individual reason in the same grave with his family name +and worldly experience. As to all that transpired in the real world, he +wrapped himself in a mantle of imperturbable silence; the intrigues of +popes and cardinals, once well known to him, sank away as a forbidden +dream; and by some metaphysical process of imaginative devotion he +enthroned God in the place of the dominant powers, and taught himself to +receive all that came from them in uninquiring submission, as proceeding +from unerring wisdom. Though he had begun his spiritual life under the +impulse of Savonarola, yet so perfect had been his isolation from all +tidings of what transpired in the external world that the conflict which +was going on between that distinguished man and the Papal hierarchy +never reached his ear. He sought and aimed as much as possible to make +his soul like the soul of one dead, which adores and worships in ideal +space, and forgets forever the scenes and relations of earth; and he +had so long contemplated Rome under the celestial aspects of his faith, +that, though the shock of his first confession there had been painful, +still it was insufficient to shake his faith. It had been God's will, he +thought, that where he looked for aid he should meet only confusion, +and he bowed to the inscrutable will, and blindly adored the mysterious +revelation. If such could be the submission and the faith of a strong +and experienced man, who can wonder at the enthusiastic illusions of an +innocent, trustful child? + +Agnes and her grandmother entered the city of Rome just as the twilight +had faded into night; and though Agnes, full of faith and enthusiasm, +was longing to begin immediately the ecstatic vision of shrines and holy +places, old Elsie commanded her not to think of anything further that +night. They proceeded, therefore, with several other pilgrims who had +entered the city, to a church specially set apart for their reception, +connected with which were large dormitories and a religious order whose +business was to receive and wait upon them, and to see that all their +wants were supplied. This religious foundation is one of the oldest in +Rome; and it is esteemed a work of especial merit and sanctity among the +citizens to associate themselves temporarily in these labors in Holy +Week. Even princes and princesses come, humble and lowly, mingling with +those of common degree, and all, calling each other brother and sister, +vie in kind attentions to these guests of the Church. + +When Agnes and Elsie arrived, several of these volunteer assistants were +in waiting. Agnes was remarked among all the rest of the company for her +peculiar beauty and the rapt enthusiastic expression of her face. + +Almost immediately on their entrance into the reception-hall connected +with the church, they seemed to attract the attention of a tall lady +dressed in deep mourning, and accompanied by a female servant, with whom +she was conversing on those terms of intimacy which showed confidential +relations between the two. + +"See!" she said, "my Mona, what a heavenly face is there!--that sweet +child has certainly the light of grace shining through her. My heart +warms to her." + +"Indeed," said the old servant, looking across, "and well it +may,--dear lamb come so far! But, Holy Virgin, how my head swims! How +strange!--that child reminds me of some one. My Lady, perhaps, may think +of some one whom she looks like." + +"Mona, you say true. I have the same strange impression that I have seen +a face like hers, but who or where I cannot say." + +"What would my Lady say, if I said it was our dear Prince?--God rest his +soul!" + +"Mona, it _is_ so,--yes," added the lady, looking more intently,--"how +singular!--the very traits of our house in a peasant-girl! She is of +Sorrento, I judge, by her costume,--what a pretty one it is! That old +woman is her mother, perhaps. I must choose her for my care,--and, Mona, +you shall wait on her mother." + +So saying, the Princess Paulina crossed the hall, and, bending affably +over Agnes, took her hand and kissed her, saying,-- + +"Welcome, my dear little sister, to the house of our Father!" + +Agnes looked up with strange, wondering eyes into the face that was bent +to hers. It was sallow and sunken, with deep lines of ill-health and +sorrow, but the features were noble, and must once have been, beautiful; +the whole action, voice, and manner were dignified and impressive. +Instinctively she felt that the lady was of superior birth and breeding +to any with whom she had been in the habit of associating. + +"Come with me," said the lady; "and this--your mother"--she added. + +"She is my grandmother," said Agnes. + +"Well, then, your grandmother, sweet child, shall be attended by my good +sister Mona here." + +The Princess Paulina drew the hand of Agnes through her arm, and, laying +her hand affectionately on it, looked down and smiled tenderly on her. + +"Are you very tired, my dear?" + +"Oh, no! no!" said Agnes,--"I am so happy, so blessed to be here!" + +"You have travelled a long way?" + +"Yes, from Sorrento; but I am used to walking,--I did not feel it to be +long,--my heart kept me up,--I wanted to come home so much." + +"Home?" said the Princess. + +"Yes, to my soul's home,--the house of our dear Father the Pope." + +The Princess started, and looked incredulously down for a moment; then +noticing the confiding, whole-hearted air of the child, she sighed and +was silent. + +"Come with me above," she said, "and let me attend a little to your +comfort." + +"How good you are, dear lady!" said Agnes. + +"I am not good, my child,--I am only your unworthy sister in Christ"; +and as the lady spoke, she opened the door into a room where were a +number of other female pilgrims seated around the wall, each attended by +a person whose peculiar care she seemed to be. + +At the feet of each was a vessel of water, and when the seats were all +full, a cardinal in robes of office entered, and began reading prayers. +Each lady present, kneeling at the feet of her chosen pilgrim, divested +them carefully of their worn and travel-soiled shoes and stockings, and +proceeded to wash them. It was not a mere rose-water ceremony, but a +good hearty washing of feet that for the most part had great need of the +ablution. While this service was going on, the cardinal read from the +Gospel how a Greater than they all had washed the feet of His disciples, +and said, "If I, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet, ye also +ought to wash one another's feet." Then all repeated in concert the +Lord's Prayer, while each humbly kissed the feet she had washed, and +proceeded to replace the worn and travel-soiled shoes and stockings with +new and strong ones, the gift of Christian love. Each lady then led her +charge into a room where tables were spread with a plain and wholesome +repast of all such articles of food as the season of Lent allowed. Each +placed her _protégée_ at table, and carefully attended to all her wants +at the supper, and afterwards dormitories were opened for their repose. + +The Princess Paulina performed all these offices for Agnes with a tender +earnestness which won upon her heart. The young girl thought herself +indeed in that blessed society of which she had dreamed, where the +high-born and the rich become through Christ's love the servants of the +poor and lowly,--and through all the services she sat in a sort of dream +of rapture. How lovely this reception into the Holy City! how sweet thus +to be taken to the arms of the great Christian family, bound together in +the charity which is the bond of perfectness! + +"Please tell me, dear lady," said Agnes, after supper, "who is that holy +man that prayed with us?" + +"Oh, he--he is the Cardinal Capello," said the Princess. + +"I should like to have spoken with him," said Agnes. + +"Why, my child?" + +"I wanted to ask him when and how I could get speech with our dear +Father the Pope,--for there is somewhat on my mind that I would lay +before him." + +"My poor little sister," said the Princess, much perplexed, "you do not +understand things. What you speak of is impossible. The Pope is a great +king." + +"I know he is," said Agnes,--"and so is our Lord Jesus,--but every soul +may come to him." + +"I cannot explain to you now," said the Princess,--"there is not time +to-night. But I shall see you again. I will send for you to come to my +house, and there talk with you about many things which you need to know. +Meanwhile, promise me, dear child, not to try to do anything of the kind +you spoke of until I have talked with you." + +"Well, I will not," said Agnes, with a glance of docile affection, +kissing the hand of the Princess. + +The action was so pretty,--the great, soft, dark eyes looked so +fawn-like and confiding in their innocent tenderness, that the lady +seemed much moved. + +"Our dear Mother bless thee, child!" she said, laying her hand on her +head, and stooping to kiss her forehead. + +She left her at the door of the dormitory. + +The Princess and her attendant went out of the church-door, where her +litter stood in waiting. The two took their seats in silence, and +silently pursued their way through the streets of the old dimly-lighted +city and out of one of its principal gates to the wide Campagna beyond. +The villa of the Princess was situated on an eminence at some distance +from the city, and the night-ride to it was solemn and solitary. They +passed along the old Appian Way over pavements that had rumbled under +the chariot-wheels of the emperors and nobles of a by-gone age, while +along their way, glooming up against the clear of the sky, were vast +shadowy piles,--the tombs of the dead of other days. All mouldering and +lonely, shaggy and fringed with bushes and streaming wild vines through +which the night-wind sighed and rustled, they might seem to be pervaded +by the restless spirits of the dead; and as the lady passed them, she +shivered, and, crossing herself, repeated an inward prayer against +wandering demons that walk in desolate places. + +Timid and solitary, the high-born lady shrank and cowered within herself +with a distressing feeling of loneliness. A childless widow in delicate +health, whose paternal family had been for the most part cruelly robbed, +exiled, or destroyed by the reigning Pope and his family, she felt her +own situation a most unprotected and precarious one, since the least +jealousy or misunderstanding might bring upon her, too, the ill-will +of the Borgias, which had proved so fatal to the rest of her race. No +comfort in life remained to her but her religion, to whose practice she +clung as to her all; but even in this her life was embittered by facts +to which, with the best disposition in the world, she could not shut her +eyes. Her own family had been too near the seat of power not to see all +the base intrigues by which that sacred and solemn position of Head of +the Christian Church had been traded for as a marketable commodity. The +pride, the indecency, the cruelty of those who now reigned in the name +of Christ came over her mind in contrast with the picture painted by +the artless, trusting faith of the peasant-girl with whom she had just +parted. Her mind had been too thoroughly drilled in the non-reflective +practice of her faith to dare to put forth any act of reasoning upon +facts so visible and so tremendous,--she rather trembled at herself for +seeing what she saw and for knowing what she knew, and feared somehow +that this very knowledge might endanger her salvation; and so she rode +homeward cowering and praying like a frightened child. + +"Does my Lady feel ill?" said the old servant, anxiously. + +"No, Mona, no,--not in body." + +"And what is on my Lady's mind now?" + +"Oh, Mona, it is only what is always there. To-morrow is Palm Sunday, +and how can I go to see the murderers and robbers of our house in holy +places? Oh, Mona, what can Christians do, when such men handle holy +things? It was a comfort to wash the feet of those poor simple pilgrims, +who tread in the steps of the saints of old; but how I felt when that +poor child spoke of wanting to see the Pope!" + +"Yes," said Mona, "it's like sending the lamb to get spiritual counsel +of the wolf." + +"See what sweet belief the poor infant has! Should not the head of the +Christian Church be such as she thinks? Ah, in the old days, when the +Church here in Rome was poor and persecuted, there were popes who were +loving fathers and not haughty princes." + +"My dear Lady," said the servant, "pray, consider, the very stones have +ears. We don't know what day we may be turned out, neck and heels, to +make room for some of their creatures." + +"Well, Mona," said the lady, with some spirit, "I'm sure I haven't said +any more than you have." + +"Holy Mother! and so you haven't, but somehow things look more dangerous +when other people say them.--A pretty child that was, as you say; but +that old thing, her grandmother, is a sharp piece. She is a Roman, +and lived here in her early days. She says the little one was born +hereabouts; but she shuts up her mouth like a vice, when one would get +more out of her." + +"Mona, I shall not go out to-morrow; but you go to the services, and +find the girl and her grandmother, and bring them out to me. I want to +counsel the child." + +"You may be sure," said Mona, "that her grandmother knows the ins and +outs of Rome as well as any of us, for all she has learned to screw up +her lips so tight" + +"At any rate, bring her to me, because she interests me." + +"Well, well, it shall be so," said Mona. + + +CHAPTER XXVIII. + +PALM SUNDAY. + + +The morning after her arrival in Rome, Agnes was awakened from sleep +by a solemn dropping of bell-tones which seemed to fill the whole air, +intermingled dimly at intervals with long-drawn plaintive sounds of +chanting. She had slept profoundly, overwearied with her pilgrimage, and +soothed by that deep lulling sense of quiet which comes over one, when, +after long and weary toils, some auspicious goal is at length reached. +She had come to Rome, and been received with open arms into the +household of the saints, and seen even those of highest degree imitating +the simplicity of the Lord in serving the poor. Surely, this was indeed +the house of God and the gate of heaven; and so the bell-tones and +chants, mingling with her dreams, seemed naturally enough angel-harpings +and distant echoes of the perpetual adoration of the blessed. She rose +and dressed herself with a tremulous joy. She felt full of hope that +somehow--in what way she could not say--this auspicious beginning +would end in a full fruition of all her wishes, an answer to all her +prayers. + +"Well, child," said old Elsie, "you must have slept well; you look fresh +as a lark." + +"The air of this holy place revives me," said Agnes, with enthusiasm. + +"I wish I could say as much," said Elsie. "My bones ache yet with the +tramp, and I suppose nothing will do but we must go out now to all the +holy places, up and down and hither and yon, to everything that goes on. +I saw enough of it all years ago when I lived here." + +"Dear grandmother, if you are tired, why should you not rest? I can go +forth alone in this holy city. No harm can possibly befall me here. I +can join any of the pilgrims who are going to the holy places where I +long to worship." + +"A likely story!" said Elsie. "I know more about old Rome than you do, +and I tell you, child, that you do not stir out a step without me; so if +you must go, I must go too,--and like enough it's for my soul's health. +I suppose it is," she added, after a reflective pause. + +"How beautiful it was that we were welcomed so last night!" said +Agnes,--"that dear lady was so kind to me!" + +"Ay, ay, and well she might be!" said Elsie, nodding her head. "But +there's no truth in the kindness of the nobles to us, child. They don't +do it because they love us, but because they expect to buy heaven by +washing our feet and giving us what little they can clip and snip off +from their abundance." + +"Oh, grandmother," said Agnes, "how can you say so? Certainly, if any +one ever spoke and looked lovingly, it was that dear lady." + +"Yes, and she rolls away in her carriage, well content, and leaves you +with a pair of new shoes and stockings,--you, as worthy of a carriage +and a palace as she." + +"No, grandmamma; she said she should send for me to talk more with her." + +"_She_ said she should send for you?" said Elsie. "Well, well, that is +strange, to be sure!--that is wonderful!" she added, reflectively. "But +come, child, we must hasten through our breakfast and prayers, and go to +see the Pope, and all the great birds with fine feathers that fly after +him." + +"Yes, indeed!" said Agnes, joyfully. "Oh, grandmamma, what a blessed +sight it will be!" + +"Yes, child, and a fine sight enough he makes with his great canopy and +his plumes and his servants and his trumpeters;--there isn't a king in +Christendom that goes so proudly as he." + +"No other king is worthy of it," said Agnes. "The Lord reigns in him." + +"Much you know about it!" said Elsie, between her teeth, as they started +out. + +The streets of Rome through which they walked were damp and cellar-like, +filthy and ill-paved; but Agnes neither saw nor felt anything of +inconvenience in this: had they been floored, like those of the New +Jerusalem, with translucent gold, her faith could not have been more +fervent. + +Rome is at all times a forest of quaint costumes, a pantomime of +shifting scenic effects of religious ceremonies. Nothing there, however +singular, strikes the eye as out-of-the-way or unexpected, since no +one knows precisely to what religious order it may belong, or what +individual vow or purpose it may represent. Neither Agnes nor Elsie, +therefore, was surprised, when they passed through the door-way to the +street, at the apparition of a man covered from head to foot in a long +robe of white serge, with a high-peaked cap of the same material drawn +completely down over his head and face. Two round holes cut in this +ghostly head-gear revealed simply two black glittering eyes, which shone +with that singular elfish effect which belongs to the human eye when +removed from its appropriate and natural accessories. As they passed +out, the figure rattled a box on which was painted an image of +despairing souls raising imploring hands from very red tongues of flame, +by which it was understood at once that he sought aid for souls in +Purgatory. Agnes and her grandmother each dropped therein a small coin +and went on their way; but the figure followed them at a little distance +behind, keeping carefully within sight of them. + +By means of energetic pushing and striving, Elsie contrived to secure +for herself and her grandchild stations in the piazza in front of the +church, in the very front rank, where the procession was to pass. A +motley assemblage it was, this crowd, comprising every variety of +costume of rank and station and ecclesiastical profession,--cowls +and hoods of Franciscan and Dominican,--picturesque headdresses of +peasant-women of different districts,--plumes and ruffs of more +aspiring gentility,--mixed with every quaint phase of foreign costume +belonging to the strangers from different parts of the earth;--for, +like the old Jewish Passover, this celebration of Holy Week had its +assemblage of Parthians, Medes, Elamites, dwellers in Mesopotamia, +Cretes, and Arabians, all blending in one common memorial. + +Amid the strange variety of persons among whom they were crowded, Elsie +remarked the stranger in the white sack, who had followed them, and who +had stationed himself behind them,--but it did not occur to her that his +presence there was other than merely accidental. + +And now came sweeping up the grand procession, brilliant with scarlet +and gold, waving with plumes, sparkling with gems,--it seemed as if +earth had been ransacked and human invention taxed to express the +ultimatum of all that could dazzle and bewilder,--and, with a rustle +like that of ripe grain before a swaying wind, all the multitude went +down on their knees as the cortege passed. Agnes knelt, too, with +clasped hands, adoring the sacred vision enshrined in her soul; and as +she knelt with upraised eyes, her cheeks flushed with enthusiasm, her +beauty attracted the attention of more than one in the procession. + +"There is the model which our master has been looking for," said a young +and handsome man in a rich dress of black velvet, who, by his costume, +appeared to hold the rank of first chamberlain in the Papal suite. + +The young man to whom he spoke gave a bold glance at Agnes and +answered,-- + +"Pretty little rogue, how well she does the saint!" + +"One can see, that, with judicious arrangement, she might make a nymph +as well as a saint," said the first speaker. + +"A Daphne, for example," said the other, laughing. + +"And she wouldn't turn into a laurel, either," said the first. "Well, +we must keep our eye on her." And as they were passing into the +church-door, he beckoned to a servant in waiting and whispered +something, indicating Agnes with a backward movement of his hand. + +The servant, after this, kept cautiously within observing distance of +her, as she with the crowd pressed into the church to assist at the +devotions. + +Long and dazzling were those ceremonies, when, raised on high like an +enthroned God, Pope Alexander VI. received the homage of bended knee +from the ambassadors of every Christian nation, from heads of all +ecclesiastical orders, and from generals and chiefs and princes and +nobles, who, robed and plumed and gemmed in all the brightest and +proudest that earth could give, bowed the knee humbly and kissed his +foot in return for the palm-branch which he presented. Meanwhile, voices +of invisible singers chanted the simple event which all this splendor +was commemorating,--how of old Jesus came into Jerusalem meek and lowly, +riding on an ass,--how His disciples cast their garments in the way, +and the multitude took branches of palm-trees to come forth and meet +Him,--how He was seized, tried, condemned to a cruel death,--and +the crowd, with dazzled and wondering eyes following the gorgeous +ceremonial, reflected little how great was the satire of the contrast, +how different the coming of that meek and lowly One to suffer and to +die from this triumphant display of worldly-pomp and splendor in His +professed representative. + +But to the pure all things are pure, and Agnes thought only of the +enthronement of all virtues, of all celestial charities and unworldly +purities in that splendid ceremonial, and longed within herself to +approach so near as to touch the hem of those wondrous and sacred +garments. It was to her enthusiastic imagination like the unclosing of +celestial doors, where the kings and priests of an eternal and heavenly +temple move to and fro in music, with the many-colored glories of +rainbows and sunset clouds. Her whole nature was wrought upon by the +sights and sounds of that gorgeous worship,--she seemed to burn and +brighten like an altar-coal, her figure appeared to dilate, her eyes +grew deeper and shone with a starry light, and the color of her cheeks +flushed up with a vivid glow,--nor was she aware how often eyes were +turned upon her, nor how murmurs of admiration followed all her +absorbed, unconscious movements. "_Ecco! Eccola_!" was often repeated +from mouth to mouth around her, but she heard it not. + +When at last the ceremony was finished, the crowd rushed again out of +the church to see the departure of various dignitaries. There was +a perfect whirl of dazzling equipages, and glittering lackeys, and +prancing horses, crusted with gold, flaming in scarlet and purple, +retinues of cardinals and princes and nobles and ambassadors all in one +splendid confused jostle of noise and brightness. + +Suddenly a servant in a gorgeous scarlet livery touched Agnes on the +shoulder, and said, in a tone of authority,-- + +"Young maiden, your presence is commanded." + +"Who commands it?" said Elsie, laying her hand on her grandchild's +shoulder fiercely. + +"Are you mad?" whispered two or three women of the lower orders to Elsie +at once; "don't you know who that is? Hush, for your life!" + +"I shall go with you, Agnes," said Elsie, resolutely. + +"No, you will not," said the attendant, insolently. "This maiden is +commanded, and none else." + +"He belongs to the Pope's nephew," whispered a voice in Elsie's ear. +"You had better have your tongue torn out than say another word." +Whereupon, Elsie found herself actually borne backward by three or four +stout women. + +Agnes looked round and smiled on her,--a smile full of innocent +trust,--and then, turning, followed the servant into the finest of the +equipages, where she was lost to view. + +Elsie was almost wild with fear and impotent rage; but a low, impressive +voice now spoke in her ear. It came from the white figure which had +followed them in the morning. + +"Listen," it said, "and be quiet; don't turn your head, but hear what +I tell you. Your child is followed by those who will save her. Go your +ways whence you came. Wait till the hour after the Ave Maria, then come +to the Porta San Sebastiano, and all will be well." + +When Elsie turned to look she saw no one, but caught a distant glimpse +of a white figure vanishing in the crowd. + +She returned to her asylum, wondering and disconsolate, and the first +person whom she saw was old Mona. + +"Well, good morrow, sister!" she said. "Know that I am here on a strange +errand. The Princess has taken such a liking to you that nothing will +do but we must fetch you and your little one out to her villa. I +looked everywhere for you in church this morning. Where have you hid +yourselves?" + +"We were there," said Elsie, confused, and hesitating whether to speak +of what had happened. + +"Well, where is the little one? Get her ready; we have horses in +waiting. It is a good bit out of the city." + +"Alack!" said Elsie, "I know not where she is." + +"Holy Virgin!" said Mona, "how is this?" + +Elsie, moved by the necessity which makes it a relief to open the heart +to some one, sat down on the steps of the church and poured forth the +whole story into the listening ear of Mona. + +"Well, well, well!" said the old servant, "in our days, one does +not wonder at anything,--one never knows one day what may come the +next,--but this is bad enough!" + +"Do you think," said Elsie, "there is any hope in that strange promise?" + +"One can but try it," said Mona. + +"If you could but be there then," said Elsie, "and take us to your +mistress." + +"Well, I will wait, for my mistress has taken an especial fancy to your +little one, more particularly since this morning, when a holy Capuchin +came to our house and held a long conference with her, and after he was +gone I found my lady almost in a faint, and she would have it that we +should start directly to bring her out here, and I had much ado to let +her see that the child would do quite as well after services were over. +I tired myself looking about for you in the crowd." + +The two women then digressed upon various gossiping particulars, as they +sat on the old mossy, grass-grown steps, looking up over house-tops +yellow with lichen, into the blue spring air, where flocks of white +pigeons were soaring and careering in the soft, warm sunshine. +Brightness and warmth and flowers seemed to be the only idea natural to +that charming weather, and Elsie, sad-hearted and foreboding as she was, +felt the benign influence. Rome, which had been so fatal a place to her +peace, yet had for her, as it has for every one, potent spells of a +lulling and soothing power. Where is the grief or anxiety that can +resist the enchantment of one of Rome's bright, soft, spring days? + + +CHAPTER XXIX. + +THE NIGHT-RIDE. + + +The villa of the Princess Paulina was one of those soft, idyllic +paradises which lie like so many fairy-lands around the dreamy solitudes +of Rome. They are so fair, so wild, so still, these villas! Nature in +them seems to run in such gentle sympathy with Art that one feels as if +they had not been so much the product of human skill as some indigenous +growth of Arcadian ages. There are quaint terraces shadowed by clipped +ilex-trees whose branches make twilight even in the sultriest noon; +there are long-drawn paths, through wildernesses where cyclamens blossom +in crimson clouds among crushed fragments of sculptured marble green +with the moss of ages, and glossy-leaved myrtles put forth their pale +blue stars in constellations under the leafy shadows. Everywhere is the +voice of water, ever lulling, ever babbling, and taught by Art to run in +many a quaint caprice,--here to rush down marble steps slippery with +sedgy green, there to spout up in silvery spray, and anon to spread into +a cool, waveless lake, whose mirror reflects trees and flowers far down +in some visionary underworld. Then there are wide lawns, where the +grass in spring is a perfect rainbow of anemones, white, rose, crimson, +purple, mottled, streaked, and dappled with ever varying shade of sunset +clouds. There are soft, moist banks where purple and white violets grow +large and fair, and trees all interlaced with ivy, which runs and twines +everywhere, intermingling its dark, graceful leaves and vivid young +shoots with the bloom and leafage of all shadowy places. + +In our day, these lovely places have their dark shadow ever haunting +their loveliness: the malaria, like an unseen demon, lies hid in their +sweetness. And in the time we are speaking of, a curse not less deadly +poisoned the beauties of the Princess's villa,--the malaria of fear. + +The gravelled terrace in front of the villa commanded, through the +clipped arches of the ilex-trees, the Campagna with its soft, undulating +bands of many-colored green, and the distant city of Rome, whose bells +were always filling the air between with a tremulous vibration. Here, +during the long sunny afternoon while Elsie and Monica were crooning +together on the steps of the church, the Princess Paulina walked +restlessly up and down, looking forth on the way towards the city for +the travellers whom she expected. + +Father Francesco had been there that morning and communicated to her +the dying message of the aged Capuchin, from which it appeared that the +child who had so much interested her was her near kinswoman. Perhaps, +had her house remained at the height of its power and splendor, she +might have rejected with scorn the idea of a kinswoman whose existence +had been owing to a _mésalliance_; but a member of an exiled and +disinherited family, deriving her only comfort from unworldly sources, +she regarded this event as an opportunity afforded her to make expiation +for one of the sins of her house. The beauty and winning graces of her +young kinswoman were not without their influence in attracting a lonely +heart deprived of the support of natural ties. The Princess longed for +something to love, and the discovery of a legitimate object of family +affection was an event in the weary monotony of her life; and therefore +it was that the hours of the afternoon seemed long while she looked +forth towards Rome, listening to the ceaseless chiming of its bells, and +wondering why no one appeared along the road. + +The sun went down, and all the wide plain seemed like the sea at +twilight, lying in rosy and lilac and purple shadowy bands, out of +which rose the old city, solemn and lonely as some enchanted island of +dream-land, with a flush of radiance behind it and a tolling of weird +music filling all the air around. Now they are chanting the Ave Maria in +hundreds of churches, and the Princess worships in distant accord, and +tries to still the anxieties of her heart with many a prayer. Twilight +fades and fades, the Campagna becomes a black sea, and the distant city +looms up like a dark rock against the glimmering sky, and the Princess +goes within and walks restlessly through the wide halls, stopping first +at one open window and then at another to listen. Beneath her feet she +treads a cool mosaic pavement where laughing Cupids are dancing. Above, +from the ceiling, Aurora and the Hours look down in many-colored clouds +of brightness. The sound of the fountains without is so clear in the +intense stillness that the peculiar voice of each one can be told. That +is the swaying noise of the great jet that rises from marble shells and +falls into a wide basin, where silvery swans swim round and round in +enchanted circles; and the other slenderer sound is the smaller jet that +rains down its spray into the violet-borders deep in the shrubbery; and +that other, the shallow babble of the waters that go down the marble +steps to the lake. How dreamlike and plaintive they all sound in the +night stillness! The nightingale sings from the dark shadows of the +wilderness; and the musky odors of the cyclamen come floating ever +and anon through the casement, in that strange, cloudy way in which +flower-scents seem to come and go in the air in the night season. + +At last the Princess fancies she hears the distant tramp of horses' +feet, and her heart beats so that she can scarcely listen: now she hears +it,--and now a rising wind, sweeping across the Campagna, seems to bear +it moaning away. She goes to a door and looks out into the darkness. +Yes, she hears it now, quick and regular,--the beat of many horses' feet +coming in hot haste along the road. Surely the few servants whom she has +sent cannot make all this noise! and she trembles with vague affright. +Perhaps it is a tyrannical message, bringing imprisonment and death. She +calls a maid, and bids her bring lights into the reception-hall. A +few moments more, and there is a confused stamping of horses' feet +approaching the house, and she hears the voices of her servants. She +runs into the piazza, and sees dismounting a knight who carries Agnes in +his arms pale and fainting. Old Elsie and Monica, too, dismount, with +the Princess's men-servants; but, wonderful to tell, there seems besides +them to be a train of some hundred armed horsemen. + +The timid Princess was so fluttered and bewildered that she lost all +presence of mind, and stood in uncomprehending wonder, while Monica +pushed authoritatively into the house, and beckoned the knight to bring +Agnes and lay her on a sofa, when she and old Elsie busied themselves +vigorously with restoratives. + +The Lady Paulina, as soon as she could collect her scattered senses, +recognized in Agostino the banished lord of the Sarelli family, a race +who had shared with her own the hatred and cruelty of the Borgia tribe; +and he in turn had recognized a daughter of the Colonnas. + +He drew her aside into a small boudoir adjoining the apartment. + +"Noble lady," he said, "we are companions in misfortune, and so, I +trust, you will pardon what seems a tumultuous intrusion on your +privacy. I and my men came to Rome in disguise, that we might watch over +and protect this poor innocent, who now finds asylum with you." + +"My Lord," said the Princess, "I see in this event the wonderful working +of the good God. I have but just learned that this young person is my +near kinswoman; it was only this morning that the fact was certified to +me on the dying confession of a holy Capuchin, who privately united my +brother to her mother. The marriage was an indiscretion of his youth; +but afterwards he fell into more grievous sin in denying the holy +sacrament, and leaving his wife to die in misery and dishonor, and +perhaps for this fault such great judgments fell upon him. I wish to +make atonement in such sort as is yet possible by acting as a mother to +this child." + +"The times are so troublous and uncertain," said Agostino, "that she +must have stronger protection than that of any woman. She is of a most +holy and religious nature, but as ignorant of sin as an angel who never +has seen anything out of heaven; and so the Borgias enticed her into +their impure den, from which, God helping, I have saved her. I tried +all I could to prevent her coming to Rome, and to convince her of the +vileness that ruled here; but the poor little one could not believe me, +and thought me a heretic only for saying what she now knows from her own +senses." + +The Lady Paulina shuddered with fear. + +"Is it possible that you have come into collision with the dreadful +Borgias? What will become of us?" + +"I brought a hundred men into Rome in different disguises," said +Agostino, "and we gained over a servant in their household, through whom +I entered and carried her off. Their men pursued us, and we had a fight +in the streets, but for the moment we mustered more than they. Some of +them chased us a good distance. But it will not do for us to remain +here. As soon as she is revived enough, we must retreat towards one +of our fastnesses in the mountains, whence, when rested, we shall go +northward to Florence, where I have powerful friends, and she has also +an uncle, a holy man, by whose counsels she is much guided." + +"You must take me with you," said the Princess, in a tremor of anxiety. + +"Not for the world would I stay, if it be known you have taken refuge +here. For a long time their spies have been watching about me; they +only wait for some occasion to seize upon my villa, as they have on the +possessions of all my father's house. Let me flee with you. I have a +brother-in-law in Florence who hath often urged me to escape to him till +times mend,--for, surely, God will not allow the wicked to bear rule +forever." + +"Willingly, noble lady, will we give you our escort,--the more so that +this poor child will then have a friend with her beseeming her father's +rank. Believe me, lady, she will do no discredit to her lineage. She was +trained in a convent, and her soul is a flower of marvellous beauty. I +must declare to you here that I have wooed her honorably to be my wife, +and she would willingly be so, had not some scruples of a religious +vocation taken hold on her, to dispel which I look for the aid of the +holy father, her uncle." + +"It would be a most fit and proper thing," said the Princess, "thus to +ally our houses, in hope of some good time to come which shall restore +their former standing and possessions. Of course some holy man must +judge of the obstacle interposed by her vocation; but I doubt not the +Church will be an indulgent mother in a case where the issue seems so +desirable." + +"If I be married to her," said Agostino, "I can take her out of all +these strifes and confusions which now agitate our Italy to the court of +France, where I have an uncle high in favor with the King, and who will +use all his influence to compose these troubles in Italy, and bring +about a better day." + +While this conversation was going on, bountiful refreshments had been +provided for the whole party, and the attendants of the Princess +received orders to pack all her jewels and valuable effects for a sudden +journey. + +As soon as preparations could be made, the whole party left the villa of +the Princess for a retreat in the Alban Mountains, where Agostino +and his band had one of their rendezvous. Only the immediate female +attendants of the Princess, and one or two men-servants, left with her. +The silver plate, and all objects of particular value, were buried in +the garden. This being done, the keys of the house were intrusted to a +gray-headed servant, who with his wife had grown old in the family. + +It was midnight before everything was ready for starting. The moon cast +silver gleams through the ilex-avenues, and caused the jet of the great +fountain to look like a wavering pillar of cloudy brightness, when the +Princess led forth Agnes upon the wide veranda. Two gentle, yet spirited +little animals from the Princess's stables were there awaiting them, and +they were lifted into their saddles by Agostino. + +"Fear nothing, Madam," he said, observing how the hands of the Princess +trembled; "a few hours will put us in perfect safety, and I shall be at +your side constantly." + +Then lifting Agnes to her seat, he placed the reins in her hand. + +"Are you rested?" he asked. + +It was the first time since her rescue that he had spoken to Agnes. The +words were brief, but no expressions of endearment could convey more +than the manner in which they were spoken. + +"Yes, my Lord," said Agnes, firmly, "I am rested." + +"You think you can bear the ride?" + +"I can bear anything, so I escape," she said. + +The company were now all mounted, and were marshalled in regular order. +A body of armed men rode in front; then came Agnes and the Princess, +with Agostino between them, while two or three troopers rode on either +side; Elsie, Monica, and the servants of the Princess followed close +behind, and the rear was brought up in like manner by armed men. + +The path wound first through the grounds of the villa, with its plats +of light and shade, its solemn groves of stone-pines rising like +palm-trees high in air above the tops of all other trees, its terraces +and statues and fountains,--all seeming so lovely in the midnight +stillness. + +"Perhaps I am leaving all this forever," said the Princess. + +"Let us hope for the best," said Agostino. "It cannot be that God will +suffer the seat of the Apostles to be subjected to such ignominy +and disgrace much longer. I am amazed that no Christian kings have +interfered before for the honor of Christendom. I have it from the best +authority that the King of Naples burst into tears when he heard of the +election of this wretch to be Pope. He said that it was a scandal which +threatened the very existence of Christianity. He has sent me secret +messages divers times expressive of sympathy, but he is not of himself +strong enough. Our hope must lie either in the King of France or the +Emperor of Germany: perhaps both will engage. There is now a most holy +monk in Florence who has been stirring all hearts in a wonderful way. It +is said that the very gifts of miracles and prophecy are revived in him, +as among the holy Apostles, and he has been bestirring himself to have +a General Council of the Church to look into these matters. When I left +Florence, a short time ago, the faction opposed to him broke into the +convent and took him away. I myself was there." + +"What!" said Agnes, "did they break into the convent of the San Marco? +My uncle is there." + +"Yes, and he and I fought side by side with the mob who were rushing +in." + +"Uncle Antonio fight!" said Agnes, in astonishment. + +"Even women will fight, when what they love most is attacked," said the +knight. + +He turned to her, as he spoke, and saw in the moonlight a flash from her +eye, and an heroic expression on her face, such as he had never remarked +before; but she said nothing. The veil had been rudely torn from her +eyes; she had seen with horror the defilement and impurity of what she +had ignorantly adored in holy places, and the revelation seemed to have +wrought a change in her whole nature. + +"Even you could fight, Agnes," said the knight, "to save your religion +from disgrace." + +"No," said she; "but," she added, with gathering firmness, "I could die. +I should be glad to die with and for the holy men who would save the +honor of the true faith. I should like to go to Florence to my uncle. If +he dies for his religion, I should like to die with him." + +"Ah, live to teach it to me!" said the knight, bending towards her, as +if to adjust her bridle-rein, and speaking in a voice scarcely audible. +In a moment he was turned again towards the Princess, listening to her. + +"So it seems," she said, "that we shall be running into the thick of the +conflict in Florence." + +"Yes, but my uncle hath promised that the King of France shall +interfere. I have hope something may even now have been done. I hope to +effect something myself." + +Agostino spoke with the cheerful courage of youth. Agnes glanced timidly +up at him. How great the change in her ideas! No longer looking on him +as a wanderer from the fold, an enemy of the Church, he seemed now in +the attitude of a champion of the faith, a defender of holy men and +things against a base usurpation. What injustice had she done him, and +how patiently had he borne that injustice! Had he not sought to warn +her against the danger of venturing into that corrupt city? Those words +which so much shocked her, against which she had shut her ears, were all +true; she had found them so; she could doubt no longer. And yet he had +followed her, and saved her at the risk of his life. Could she help +loving one who had loved her so much, one so noble and heroic? Would +it be a sin to love him? She pondered the dark warnings of Father +Francesco, and then thought of the cheerful, fervent piety of her old +uncle. How warm, how tender, how life-giving had been his presence +always! how full of faith and prayer, how fruitful of heavenly words and +thoughts had been all his ministrations!--and yet it was for him and +with him and his master that Agostino Sarelli was fighting, and against +him the usurping head of the Christian Church. Then there was another +subject for pondering during this night-ride. The secret of her birth +had been told her by the Princess, who claimed her as kinswoman. It had +seemed to her at first like the revelations of a dream; but as she rode +and reflected, gradually the idea shaped itself in her mind. She was, in +birth and blood, the equal of her lover, and henceforth her life would +no more be in that lowly plane where it had always moved. She thought of +the little orange-garden at Sorrento, of the gorge with its old bridge, +the Convent, the sisters, with a sort of tender, wondering pain. Perhaps +she should see them no more. In this new situation she longed once more +to see and talk with her old uncle, and to have him tell her what were +her duties. + +Their path soon began to be a wild clamber among the mountains, now lost +in the shadow of groves of gray, rustling olives, whose knotted, serpent +roots coiled round the rocks, and whose leaves silvered in the moonlight +whenever the wind swayed them. Whatever might be the roughness and +difficulties of the way, Agnes found her knight ever at her bridle-rein, +guiding and upholding, steadying her in her saddle when the horse +plunged down short and sudden descents, and wrapping her in his mantle +to protect her from the chill mountain-air. When the day was just +reddening in the sky, the whole troop made a sudden halt before a square +stone tower which seemed to be a portion of a ruined building, and here +some of the men dismounting knocked at an arched door. It was soon swung +open by a woman with a lamp in her hand, the light of which revealed +very black hair and eyes, and heavy gold earrings. + +"Have my directions been attended to?" said Agostino, in a tone of +command. "Are there places made ready for these ladies to sleep?" + +"There are, my Lord," said the woman, obsequiously,--"the best we could +get ready on so short a notice." + +Agostino came up to the Princess. "Noble Madam," he said, "you will +value safety before all things; doubtless the best that can be done here +is but poor, but it will give you a few hours for repose where you may +be sure of being in perfect safety." + +So saying, he assisted her and Agnes to dismount, and Elsie and Monica +also alighting, they followed the woman into a dark stone passage and up +some rude stone steps. She opened at last the door of a brick-floored +room, where beds appeared to have been hastily prepared. There was no +furniture of any sort except the beds. The walls were dusty and hung +with cobwebs. A smaller apartment opening into this had beds for Elsie +and Monica. + +The travellers, however, were too much exhausted with their night-ride +to be critical, the services of disrobing and preparing for rest were +quickly concluded, and in less than an hour all were asleep, while +Agostino was busy concerting the means for an immediate journey to +Florence. + + +CHAPTER XXX. + +"LET US ALSO GO, THAT WE MAY DIE WITH HIM." + + +Father Antonio sat alone in his cell in the San Marco in an attitude of +deep dejection. The open window looked into the garden of the convent, +from which steamed up the fragrance of violet, jasmine, and rose, and +the sunshine lay fair on all that was without. On a table beside him +were many loose and scattered sketches, and an unfinished page of +the Breviary he was executing, rich in quaint tracery of gold and +arabesques, seemed to have recently occupied his attention, for his +palette was wet and many loose brushes lay strewed around. Upon the +table stood a Venetian glass with a narrow neck and a bulb clear +and thin as a soap-bubble, containing vines and blossoms of the +passion-flower, which he had evidently been using as models in his work. + +The page he was illuminating was the prophetic Psalm which describes the +ignominy and sufferings of the Redeemer. It was surrounded by a wreathed +border of thorn-branches interwoven with the blossoms and tendrils of +the passion-flower, and the initial letters of the first two words were +formed by a curious combination of the hammer, the nails, the spear, the +crown of thorns, the cross, and other instruments of the Passion; and +clear, in red letter, gleamed out those wonderful, mysterious words, +consecrated by the remembrance of a more than mortal anguish,--"My God, +my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" + +The artist-monk had perhaps fled to his palette to assuage the +throbbings of his heart, as a mourning mother flies to the cradle of her +child; but even there his grief appeared to have overtaken him, for the +work lay as if pushed from him in an access of anguish such as comes +from the sudden recurrence of some overwhelming recollection. He was +leaning forward with his face buried in his hands, sobbing convulsively. + +The door opened, and a man advancing stealthily behind laid a hand +kindly on his shoulder, saying softly, "So, so, brother!" + +Father Antonio looked up, and, dashing his hand hastily across his +eyes, grasped that of the new-comer convulsively, and saying only, "Oh, +Baccio! Baccio!" hid his face again. + +The eyes of the other filled with tears, as he answered gently,-- + +"Nay, but, my brother, you are killing yourself. They tell me that you +have eaten nothing for three days, and slept not for weeks; you will die +of this grief." + +"Would that I might! Why could not I die with him as well as Fra +Domenico? Oh, my master! my dear master!" + +"It is indeed a most heavy day to us all," said Baccio della Porta, +the amiable and pure-minded artist better known to our times by his +conventual name of Fra Bartolommeo. "Never have we had among us such a +man; and if there be any light of grace in my soul, his preaching first +awakened it, brother. I only wait to see him enter Paradise, and then +I take farewell of the world forever. I am going to Prato to take the +Dominican habit, and follow him as near as I may." + +"It is well, Baccio, it is well," said Father Antonio; "but you must not +put out the light of your genius in those shadows,--you must still paint +for the glory of God." + +"I have no heart for painting now," said Baccio, dejectedly. "He was my +inspiration, he taught me the holier way, and he is gone." + +At this moment the conference of the two was interrupted by a knocking +at the door, and Agostino Sarelli entered, pale and disordered. + +"How is this?" he said, hastily. "What devils' carnival is this which +hath broken loose in Florence? Every good thing is gone into dens and +holes, and every vile thing that can hiss and spit and sting is crawling +abroad. What do the princes of Europe mean to let such things be?" + +"Only the old story," said Father Antonio,--"_Principes convenerunt in +unum adversus Dominum, adversus Christum ejus_." + +So much were all three absorbed in the subject of their thoughts, that +no kind of greeting or mark of recognition passed among them, such as is +common when people meet after temporary separation. Each spoke out from +the fulness of his soul, as from an overflowing bitter fountain. + +"Was there no one to speak for him,--no one to stand up for the pride of +Italy,--the man of his age?" said Agostino. + +"There was one voice raised for him in the council," said Father +Antonio. "There was Agnolo Niccolini: a grave man is this Agnolo, and of +great experience in public affairs, and he spoke out his mind boldly. He +told them flatly, that, if they looked through the present time or the +past ages, they would not meet a man of such a high and noble order as +this, and that to lay at our door the blood of a man the like of whom +might not be born for centuries was too impious and execrable a thing to +be thought of. I'll warrant me, he made a rustling among them when he +said that, and the Pope's commissary--old Romalino--then whispered +and frowned; but Agnolo is a stiff old fellow when he once begins a +thing,--he never minded it, and went through with his say. It seems to +me he said that it was not for us to quench a light like this, capable +of giving lustre to the faith even when it had grown dim in other parts +of the world,--and not to the faith alone, but to all the arts and +sciences connected with it. If it were needed to put restraint on him, +he said, why not put him into some fortress, and give him commodious +apartments, with abundance of books, and pen, ink, and paper, where he +would write books to the honor of God and the exaltation of the holy +faith? He told them that this might be a good to the world, whereas +consigning him to death without use of any kind would bring on our +republic perpetual dishonor." + +"Well said for him!" said Baccio, with warmth; "but I'll warrant me, he +might as well have preached to the north wind in March, his enemies are +in such a fury." + +"Yes, yes," said Antonio, "it is just as it was of old: the chief +priests and Scribes and Pharisees were instant with loud voices, +requiring he should be put to death; and the easy Pilates, for fear of +the tumult, washed their hands of it." + +"And now," said Agostino, "they are putting up a great gibbet in the +shape of a cross in the public square, where they will hang the three +holiest and best men of Florence!" + +"I came through there this morning," said Baccio, "and there were young +men and boys shouting, and howling, and singing indecent songs, and +putting up indecent pictures, such as those he used to preach against. +It is just as you say. All things vile have crept out of their lair, and +triumph that the man who made them afraid is put down; and every house +is full of the most horrible lies about him,--things that they said he +confessed." + +"Confessed!" said Father Antonio,--"was it not enough that they tore +and tortured him seven times, but they must garble and twist the very +words that he said in his agony? The process they have published is +foully falsified,--stuffed full of improbable lies; for I myself have +read the first draught of all he did say, just as Signor Ceccone took it +down as they were torturing him. I had it from Jacopo Manelli, canon of +our Duomo here, and he got it from Ceccone's wife herself. They not only +can torture and slay him, but they torture and slay his memory with +lies." + +"Would I were in God's place for one day!" said Agostino, speaking +through his clenched teeth. "May I be forgiven for saying so." + +"We are hot and hasty," said Father Antonio, "ever ready to call down +fire from heaven,--but, after all, 'the Lord reigneth, let the earth +rejoice.' 'Unto the upright there ariseth light in the darkness.' Our +dear father is sustained in spirit and full of love. Even when they +let him go from the torture, he fell on his knees, praying for his +tormentors." + +"Good God! this passes me!" said Agostino, striking his hands together. +"Oh, wherefore hath a strong man arms and hands, and a sword, if he +must stand still and see such things done? If I had only my hundred +mountaineers here, I would make one charge for him to-morrow. If I could +only _do_ something!" he added, striding impetuously up and down the +cell and clenching his fists. "What! hath nobody petitioned to stay this +thing?" + +"Nobody for him," said Father Antonio. "There was talk in the city +yesterday that Fra Domenico was to be pardoned; in fact, Romalino was +quite inclined to do it, but Battista Albert talked violently against +it, and so Romalino said, 'Well, a monk more or less isn't much matter,' +and then he put his name down for death with the rest. The order was +signed by both commissaries of the Pope, and one was Frà Turiano, the +general of our order, a mild man, full of charity, but unable to stand +against the Pope." + +"Mild men are nuisances in such places", said Agostino, hastily; "our +times want something of another sort." + +"There be many who have fallen away from him even in our house here," +said Father Antonio,--"as it was with our blessed Lord, whose disciples +forsook him and fled. It seems to be the only thought with some how they +shall make their peace with the Pope." + +"And so the thing will be hurried through to-morrow," said Agostino, +"and when it's done and over, I'll warrant me there will be found kings +and emperors to say they meant to have saved him. It's a vile, evil +world, this of ours; an honorable man longs to see the end of it. But," +he added, coming up and speaking to Father Antonio, "I have a private +message for you." + +"I am gone this moment," said Baccio, rising with ready courtesy; "but +keep up heart, brother." + +So saying, the good-hearted artist left the cell, and Agostino said,-- + +"I bring tidings to you of your kindred. Your niece and sister are here +in Florence, and would see you. You will find them at the house of one +Gherardo Rosselli, a rich citizen of noble blood." + +"Why are they there?" said the monk, lost in amazement. + +You must know, then, that a most singular discovery hath been made +by your niece at Rome. The sister of her father, being a lady of the +princely blood of Colonna, hath been assured of her birth by the +confession of the priest that married him; and being driven from Rome by +fear of the Borgias, they came hither under my escort, and wait to see +you. So, if you will come with me now, I will guide you to them." + +"Even so," said Father Antonio. + + +CHAPTER XXXI. + +MARTYRDOM. + + +In a shadowy chamber of a room overlooking the grand square of Florence +might be seen, on the next morning, some of the principal personages of +our story. Father Antonio, Baccio della Porta, Agostino Sarelli, the +Princess Paulina, Agnes, with her grandmother, and mixed crowd of +citizens and ecclesiastics who all spoke in hushed and tremulous voices, +as men do in the chamber of mourners at a funeral. The great, mysterious +bell of the Campanile was swinging with dismal, heart-shaking toll, like +a mighty voice from the spirit-world; and it was answered by the +tolling of all the bells in the city, making such wavering clangors and +vibrating circles in the air over Florence that it might seem as if it +were full of warring spirits wrestling for mastery. + +Toll! toll! toll! O great bell of the fair Campanile! for this day the +noblest of the wonderful men of Florence is to offered up. Toll! for an +era is going out,--the era of her artists, her statesmen, her poets, and +her scholars. Toll! for an era is coming in,--the era of her disgrace +and subjugation and misfortune! + +The stepping of the vast crowd in the square was like the patter of a +great storm, and the hum of voices rose up like the murmur of the ocean; +but in the chamber all was so still that one could have heard the +dropping of a pin. + +Under the balcony of this room were seated in pomp and state the Papal +commissioners, radiant in gold and scarlet respectability; and Pilate +and Herod, on terms of the most excellent friendship, were ready to act +over again the part they had acted fourteen hundred years by before. Now +has arrived the moment when the three followers of the Man of Calvary +are to be degraded from the fellowship of His visible Church. + +Father Antonio, Agostino, and Baccio stood forth in the balcony, and, +drawing in their breath, looked down, as the three men of the hour, pale +and haggard with imprisonment and torture, were brought up amid the +hoots and obscene jests of the populace. Savonarola first was led before +the tribunal, and there, with circumstantial minuteness, endued with +all his priestly vestments, which again, with separate ceremonies of +reprobation and ignominy, were taken from him. He stood through it all +serene as stood his Master when stripped of His garments on Calvary. +There is a momentary hush of voices and drawing in of breaths in the +great crowd. The Papal legate takes him by the hand and pronounces the +words, "Jerome Savonarola, I separate thee from the Church Militant and +the Church Triumphant." + +He is going to speak. + +"What says he?" said Agostino, leaning over the balcony. + +Solemnly and clear that impressive voice which so often had thrilled the +crowds in that very square made answer,-- + +"From the Church Militant you _may_ divide me; but from the Church +Triumphant, _no,--that_ is above your power!"--and a light flashed out +in his face as if a smile from Christ had shone down upon him. + +"Amen!" said Father Antonio; "he hath witnessed a good confession,"--and +turning, he went in, and, burying his face in his hands, remained in +prayer. + +"When like ceremonies had been passed through with the others, the three +martyrs were delivered to the secular executioner, and, amid the scoffs +and jeers of the brutal crowd, turned their faces to the gibbet. + +"Brothers, let us sing the Te Deum," said Savonarola. + +"Do not so infuriate the mob," said the executioner,--"for harm might be +done." + +"At least let us repeat it together," said he, "lest we forget it." + +And so they went forward, speaking to each other of the glorious company +of the apostles, the goodly fellowship of the prophets, the noble army +of martyrs, and giving thanks aloud in that great triumphal hymn of the +Church of all Ages. + +When the lurid fires were lighted which blazed red and fearful through +that crowded square, all in that silent chamber fell on their knees, and +Father Antonio repeated prayers for departing souls. + +To the last, that benignant right hand which had so often pointed the +way of life to that faithless city was stretched out over the crowd +in the attitude of blessing; and so loving, not hating, praying with +exaltation, and rendering blessing for cursing, the souls of the martyrs +ascended to the great cloud of witnesses above. + + +CHAPTER XXXII. + +CONCLUSION. + + +A few days after the death of Savonarola, Father Antonio was found one +morning engaged in deep converse with Agnes. + +The Princess Paulina, acting for her family, desired to give her hand to +the Prince Agostino Sarelli, and the interview related to the religious +scruples which still conflicted with the natural desires of the child. + +"Tell me, my little one," said Father Antonio, "frankly and truly, dost +thou not love this man with all thy heart?" + +"Yes, my father, I do," said Agnes; "but ought I not to resign this love +for the love of my Saviour?" + +"I see not why," said the monk. "Marriage is a sacrament as well as holy +orders, and it is a most holy and venerable one, representing the divine +mystery by which the souls of the blessed are united to the Lord. I do +not hold with Saint Bernard, who, in his zeal for a conventual life, +seemed to see no other way of serving God but for all men and women to +become monks and nuns. The holy order is indeed blessed to those souls +whose call to it is clear and evident, like mine; but if there be a +strong and virtuous love for a worthy object, it is a vocation unto +marriage, which should not be denied." + +"So, Agnes," said the knight, who had stolen into the room unperceived, +and who now boldly possessed himself of one of her hands--"Father +Antonio hath decided this matter," he added, turning to the Princess +and Elsie, who entered, "and everything having been made ready for +my journey into France, the wedding ceremony shall take place on the +morrow, and, for that we are in deep affliction, it shall be as private +as may be." + +And so on the next morning the wedding ceremony took place, and the +bride and groom went on their way to France, where preparations +befitting their rank awaited them. + +Old Elsie was heard to observe to Monica, that there was some sense in +making pilgrimages, since this to Rome, which she had undertaken so +unwillingly, had turned out so satisfactory. + +In the reign of Julius II., the banished families who had been plundered +by the Borgias were restored to their rights and honors at Rome; and +there was a princess of the house of Sarelli then at Rome, whose +sanctity of life and manners was held to go back to the traditions of +primitive Christianity, so that she was renowned not less for goodness +than for rank and beauty. + +In those days, too, Raphael, the friend of Frà Bartolommeo, placed in +one of the grandest halls of the Vatican, among the Apostles and Saints, +the image of the traduced and despised martyr whose ashes had been cast +to the winds and waters in Florence. His memory lingered long in Italy, +so that it was even claimed that miracles were wrought in his name and +by his intercession. Certain it is, that the living words he spoke were +seeds of immortal flowers which blossomed in secret dells and obscure +shadows of his beautiful Italy. + + * * * * * + + +EXODUS. + + + Hear ye not how, from all high points of Time,-- + From peak to peak adown the mighty chain + That links the ages,--echoing sublime + A Voice Almighty,--leaps one grand refrain, + Wakening the generations with a shout, + And trumpet-call of thunder,--Come ye out! + + Out from old forms and dead idolatries; + From fading myths and superstitious dreams; + From Pharisaic rituals and lies, + And all the bondage of the life that seems! + Out,--on the pilgrim path, of heroes trod, + Over earth's wastes, to reach forth after God! + + The Lord hath bowed His heaven, and come down! + Now, in this latter century of time, + Once more His tent is pitched on Sinai's crown! + Once more in clouds must Faith to meet Him climb! + Once more His thunder crashes on our doubt + And fear and sin,--"My people! come ye out! + + "From false ambitions and base luxuries; + From puny aims and indolent self-ends; + From cant of faith, and shams of liberties, + And mist of ill that Truth's pure daybeam bends: + Out, from all darkness of the Egypt-land, + Into My sun-blaze on the desert sand! + + "Leave ye your flesh-pots; turn from filthy greed + Of gain that doth the thirsting spirit mock; + And heaven shall drop sweet manna for your need, + And rain clear rivers from the unhewn rock! + Thus saith the Lord!" And Moses--meek, unshod-- + Within the cloud stands hearkening to his God! + + Show us our Aaron, with his rod in flower! + Our Miriam, with her timbrel-soul in tune! + And call some Joshua, in the Spirit's power, + To poise our sun of strength at point of noon! + God of our fathers! over sand and sea, + Still keep our struggling footsteps close to Thee! + + * * * * * + + +THEN AND NOW IN THE OLD DOMINION. + + +The history of Virginia opens with a romance. No one will be surprised +at this, for it is a habit histories have. There is Plymouth Rock, for +example; it would be hard to find anything more purely romantic than +that. Well do we remember the sad day when a friend took us to the +perfectly flat wharf at Plymouth, and recited Mrs. Hemans's humorous +verse,-- + + "The breaking waves dashed high, + On a stern and rock-bound coast." + +"Such, then," we reflected, "is History! If Plymouth Rock turns out to +be a myth, why may not Columbus or Santa Claus or Napoleon, or anything +or anybody?" Since then we have been skeptical about history even where +it seems most probable; at times doubt whether Rip Van Winkle really +slept twenty years without turning over; are annoyed with misgivings as +to whether our Western pioneers Boone, Crockett, and others, _did_ keep +bears in their stables for saddle-horses, and harness alligators as we +do oxen. So we doubted the story of John Smith and Pocahontas with which +Virginia opens. In one thing we had already caught that State making a +mythical statement: it was named by Queen Elizabeth Virginia in honor of +her own virgin state,--which, if Cobbett is to be believed, was also a +romance. Well, America was named after a pirate, and Sir Walter Raleigh, +who suggested the name of the Virgin Queen, was fond of a joke. + +But notwithstanding the suspicion with which we entered upon the +investigation, we are convinced that the romance of Pocahontas is true. +As only a portion of the story of this Indian maiden, "the colonial +angel," as she was termed by the settlers, is known, and that not +generally with exactness, we will reproduce it here. + +It will be remembered that Pocahontas, when about thirteen years of age, +saved the young English captain, John Smith, from the death which her +father, Powhatan, had resolved he should suffer. As the tomahawk was +about to descend on his head, the girl rushed forward and clasped that +head in her arms. The stern heart of Powhatan relented, and he consented +that the captive should live to make tomahawks for him and beads and +bells for Pocahontas. Afterward Powhatan agreed that Smith should return +to Jamestown, on condition of his sending him two guns and a grindstone. +Soon, after this Jamestown with all its stores was destroyed by fire, +and the colonists came near perishing from cold and hunger. Half of them +died; and the rest were saved only by Pocahontas, who appeared in the +midst of their distress, bringing bread, raccoons, and venison. + +John Smith and his companions after this explored a large portion of the +State, and a second time came to rest at the home of Powhatan and his +beautiful daughter. The name of the place was Werowocomoco. His visit +this time fell on the eve of the coronation of Powhatan. The king, +being absent when Smith came, was sent for; meanwhile Pocahontas called +together a number of Indian maidens to get up a dramatic entertainment +and ballet for the handsome young Englishman and his companions. They +made a fire in a level field, and Smith sat on a mat before it. A +hideous noise and shrieking were suddenly heard in the adjoining woods. +The English snatched up their arms, apprehending foul play. Pocahontas +rushed forward, and asked Smith to slay her rather than suspect her of +perfidy; so their apprehensions were quieted. Then thirty young Indian +maidens issued suddenly from the wood, all naked except a cincture of +green leaves, their bodies painted. Pocahontas was a complete picture of +an Indian Diana: a quiver hung on her shoulder, and she held a bow and +arrow in her hand; she wore, also, on her head a beautiful pair of +buck's horns, an otter's skin at her girdle, and another on her arm. The +other nymphs had antlers on their heads and various savage decorations. +Bursting from the forest, they circled around the fire and John Smith, +singing and dancing for an hour. They then disappeared into the wood as +suddenly as they had come forth. When they reappeared, it was to invite +Smith to their habitations, where they danced around him again, singing, +"Love you not me? Love you not me?" They then feasted him richly, and, +lastly, with pine-knot torches lighted him to his finely decorated +apartments. + +Captain John Smith was, without doubt, an imperial kind of man. His +personal appearance was fine, his sense and tact excellent, his manners +both cordial and elegant. There is no doubt, as there is no wonder, that +the Indian maiden felt some tender palpitations on his account. Once +again, when, owing to some misunderstanding, Powhatan had decreed the +death of all the whites, Pocahontas spent the whole pitch-dark night +climbing hills and toiling through pathless thickets, to save Smith and +his friends by warning them of the imminent danger. Smith offered her +many beautiful presents on this occasion, evidently not appreciating the +sentiment that was animating her. To this offer of presents she replied +with tears; and when their acceptance was urged, Smith himself relates, +that, "with the teares running downe her cheeks, she said she durst not +be seen to have any, for, if Powhatan should know it, she were but dead; +and so she ran away by herself, as she came." + +There is no doubt what the Muse of History ought to do here: were she a +dame of proper sensibilities, she would have Mr. John Smith married to +Miss P. Powhatan as soon as a parson could be got from Jamestown. Were +it a romance, this would be the result. As it is, we find Smith going +off to England in two years, and living unmarried until his death; and +Pocahontas married to the Englishman John Rolfe, for reasons of state, +we fear,--a link of friendship between the Reds and the Whites being +thought desirable. She was of course Christianized and baptized, as any +one may see by Chapman's picture in the Rotunda at Washington, unless +Zouave criticism has demolished it. Immediately she went with her +husband to England. At Brentford, where she was staying,. Captain John +Smith went to visit her. Their meeting was significant and affecting. +"After a modest salutation, without uttering a word, she turned away and +hid her face as if displeased.". She remained thus motionless for two or +three hours. Who can know what struggles passed through the heart of +the Indian bride at this moment,--emotions doubly unutterable to this +untaught stranger? It seems that she had been deceived by Rolfe and his +friends into thinking that Smith was dead, under the conviction that she +could not be induced to marry him, if she thought Smith alive. After +her long, sad silence, before mentioned, she came forward to Smith and +touchingly reminded him, there in the presence of her husband and a +large company, of the kindness she had shown him in her own country, +saying, "You did promise Powhatan what was yours should be his, and he +the like to you; you called him 'Father,' being in his land a stranger, +and for the same reason so I must call you." After a pause, during which +she seemed to be under the influence of strong emotion, she said, "I +will call you Father, and you shall call me Child, and so I will be +forever and ever your countrywoman." Then she added, slowly and with +emphasis, "_They did tell us always you were dead, and I knew no other +till I came to Plimoth; yet Powhatan did command Uttamattomakin to seeke +you and know the truth, because your countrymen will lie much_." It was +not long after this interview that Pocahontas died: she never returned +to Virginia. Her death occurred in 1617. The issue of her marriage was +one child, Thomas Rolfe; so it is through him that the First Families of +Virginia are so invariably descended from the Indian Princess. Captain +Smith lived until 1631, and, as we have said, never married. He was a +noble and true man, and Pocahontas was every way worthy to be his wife; +and one feels very ill-natured at Rolfe and Company for the cruel +deception which, we must believe, was all that kept them asunder, and +gave to the story of the lovely maiden its almost tragic close. + +One can scarcely imagine a finer device for Virginia to have adopted +than that of the Indian maiden protecting the white man from the +tomahawk. But, alas! with the departure of Smith the soul seems to have +left the Colony. The beautiful lands became a prey to the worn-out +English gentry, who spent their time cheating the simple-hearted red +men. These called themselves gentlemen, because they could do nothing. +In a classification of seventy-eight persons at Jamestown we are +informed that there were "four carpenters, twelve laborers, one +blacksmith, one bricklayer, one sailor, one barber, one mason, one +tailor, one drummer, one chirurgeon, and fifty-four gentlemen." To this +day there seems to be a large number in that vicinity who have no other +occupation than that of being gentlemen, and it is evidently in many +cases just as much as they can do. + +When Pocahontas died, the last link was broken between the Indian and +the settler. Unprovoked wars of extermination were begun to dispossess +these children of Nature of the very breasts of their mother, which had +sustained them so long and so peacefully. For a century the Indian's +name for Virginian was "Longknife." The very missionaries robbed him +with one hand whilst baptizing him with the other. One story concerning +the missionaries strikes us as sufficiently characteristic of the wit +of the Indian and the temper of the period to be preserved. There was a +branch of the Catawbas on the Potomac, in which river are to be found +the best shad in the world. The missionaries who settled among +this tribe taught them that it would be a good investment in their +soul-assurance to catch large quantities of the shad for them, the +missionaries. The Indians earnestly set themselves to the work; their +reverend teachers taking the fish and sending them off secretly to +various settlements in Virginia and Maryland, and making thereby +large sums of money. The Indians worked on for several months without +receiving any compensation, and the missionaries were getting richer and +richer,--when by some means the red men discovered the trick, and routed +the holy men from their neighborhood. Many years afterward the Catholics +made an effort to establish a mission with this same tribe. The +priest who first addressed them took as his text, "Ho, every one that +thirsteth, come ye to the waters,"--and went on in figurative style to +describe the waters of life. When the sermon was ended, the Indians held +a council to consider what they had just heard, and finally sent three +of their number to the missionaries, who said, "White men, you speak in +fine words of the waters of life; but before we decide on what we have +heard, we wish to know _whether any shad swim in those waters_." + +It is very certain that Christianity, as illustrated by the Virginians, +did not make a good impression on these savages. They were always +willing to compare their own religion with that of the whites, and +generally regarded the contrast as in their favor. One of them said to +Colonel Barnett, the commissioner to run the boundary-line of lands +ceded by the Indians, "As to religion, you go to your churches, sing +loud, pray loud, and make great noise. The red people meet once a year +at the feast of New Corn, extinguish all their fires and kindle up a +new one, the smoke of which ascends to the Great Spirit as a grateful +incense and sacrifice. Now what better is your religion than ours?" One +of the chiefs, it is said, received an Episcopal divine who wished to +indoctrinate him into the mystery of the Trinity. The Indian, who was +a "model of deportment," heard his argument; and then, when he was +through, began in turn to indoctrinate the divine in _his_ faith, +speaking of the Great Spirit, whose voice was the thunder, whose eye was +the sun. The clergyman interrupted him rather rudely, saying, "But +that is not true,--that is all heathen trash!" The chief turned to his +companions and said gravely, "This is the most impolite man I have ever +met; he has just declared that he has three gods, and now will not let +me have one!" + +The valley of Virginia, its El Dorado in every sense, had a different +settlement, and by a different people. They were, for the most part, +Germans, of the same class with those that settled in the great valleys +of Pennsylvania, and who have made so large a portion of that State into +a rich ingrain-carpet of cultivation upon a floor of limestone. One day +the history of the Germans of Pennsylvania and Virginia will be written, +and it will be full of interest and value. They were the first strong +sinews strung in the industrial arm of the Colonies to which they came; +and although mingled with nearly every European race, they remain to +this day a distinct people. A partition-wall rarely broken down has +always inclosed them, and to this, perhaps, is due that slowness of +progress which marks them. The restless ambition of _Le Grand Monarque_ +and the cruelties of Turenne converted the beautiful valley of the Rhine +into a smoking desert, and the wretched peasantry of the Palatinate fled +from their desolated firesides to seek a more hospitable home in the +forests of New York and Pennsylvania, and thence, somewhat later, +found their way into Virginia. The exodus of the Puritans has had more +celebrity, but was scarcely attended with more hardship and heroism. The +greater part of the German exiles landed in America stripped of their +all. They came to the forests of the Susquehanna and the Shenandoah +armed only with the woodman's axe. They were ignorant and superstitious, +and brought with them the legends of their fatherland. The spirits +of the Hartz Mountains and the genii of the Black Forest, which +Christianity had not been able entirely to exorcise, were transferred to +the wild mountains and dark caverns of the Old Dominion, and the same +unearthly visitants which haunted the old castles of the Rhine continued +their gambols in some deserted cabin on the banks of the Sherandah (as +the Shenandoah was then called). Since these men left their fatherland, +a great Literature and Philosophy have breathed like a tropic upon that +land, and the superstitions have been wrought into poetry and thought; +but that raw material of legend which in Germany has been woven into +finest tissues on the brain-looms of Wieland, Tieck, Schiller, and +Goethe, has remained raw material in the great valley that stretches +from New York to Upper Alabama. Whole communities are found which in +manners and customs are much the same with their ancestors who crossed +the ocean. The horseshoe is still nailed above the door as a protection +against the troublesome spook, and the black art is still practised. +Rough in their manners, and plain in their appearance, they yet conceal +under this exterior a warm hospitality, and the stranger will much +sooner be turned away from the door of the "chivalry" than from that of +the German farmer. Seated by his blazing fire, with plenty of apples and +hard cider, the Dutchman of the Kanawha enjoys his condition with gusto, +and is contented with the limitations of his fence. We have seen one +within two miles of the great Natural Bridge who could not direct us to +that celebrated curiosity; his wife remarking, that "a great many people +passed that way to the hills, but for what she could not see: for her +part, give her a level country." + +The first German settler who came to Virginia was one Jacob Stover, who +went there from Pennsylvania, and obtained a grant of five thousand +acres of land on the Shenandoah. Stover was very shrewd, and does not at +all justify the character we have ascribed to his race: there is a story +that casts a suspicion on his proper Teutonism. The story runs, that, +on his application to the colonial governor of Virginia for a grant of +land, he was refused, unless he could give satisfactory assurance that +he would have the land settled with the required number of families +within a given time. Being unable to do this, he went over to England, +and petitioned the King himself to direct the issuing of his grant; and +in order to insure success, had given human names to every horse, cow, +hog, and dog he owned, and which he represented as heads of families, +ready to settle the land. His Majesty, ignorant that the Williams, +Georges, and Susans seeking royal consideration were some squeaking +in pig-pens, others braying in the luxuriant meadows for which they +petitioned, issued the huge grant; and to-day there is serious reason +to suppose that many of the wealthiest and oldest families around +Winchester are enjoying their lands by virtue of titles given to +ancestral flocks and herds. + +The condition of Virginia for the period immediately preceding the +Revolution was one which well merits the consideration of political +philosophers. For many years the extent of the territory of the Old +Dominion was undecided, no lines being fixed between that State and Ohio +and Pennsylvania. Virginia claimed a large part of both these States +as hers; and, indeed, there seems to be in that State an hereditary +unconsciousness of the limits of her dominion. The question of +jurisdiction superseded every other for the time, and the formal +administration of the law itself ceased. There is a period lasting +through a whole generation in which society in the western part of the +State went on without courts or authorities. There was no court but of +public opinion, no administration but of the mob. Judges were ermined +and juries impanelled by the community when occasion demanded. +Kercheval, who grew from that vicinity and state of things, and whose +authority is excellent, says,--"They had no civil, military, or +ecclesiastical laws,--at least, none were enforced; yet we look in vain +for any period, before or since, when property, life, and morals were +any better protected." A statement worth pondering by those who tell +us that man is nought, government all. The tongue-lynchings and other +punishments inflicted by the community upon evil-doers were adapted to +the reformation of the culprit or his banishment from the community. The +punishment for idleness, lying, dishonesty, and ill-fame generally, was +that of "hating the offender out," as they expressed it. This was about +equivalent to the [Greek: atimia] among the Greeks. It was a public +expression, in various ways, of the general indignation against any +transgressor, and commonly resulted either in the profound repentance or +the voluntary exile of the person against whom it was directed: it was +generally the fixing of any epithet which was proclaimed by each tongue +when the sinner appeared,--_e.g.,_ Foultongue, Lawrence, Snakefang. +The name of Extra-Billy Smith is a quite recent case of this +"tongue-lynching." It was in these days of no laws, however, that the +practice of duelling was imported into Virginia. With this exception, +the State can trace no evil results to the period when society was +resolved into its simplest elements. Indeed, it was at this time +that there began to appear there signs of a sturdy and noble race of +Americanized Englishmen. The average size of the European Englishman was +surpassed. A woman was equal to an Indian. A young Virginian one day +killed a buffalo on the Alleghany Mountains, stretched its skin over +ribs of wood, and on the boat so made sailed the full length of the Ohio +and Mississippi Rivers. But this development was checked by the influx +of "English gentry," who brought laws and fashions from London. The old +books are full of the conflicts which these fastidious gentlemen and +ladies had with the rude pioneer customs and laws. The fine ladies found +that there was an old statute of the Colony which read,--"It shall be +permitted to none but the Council and Heads of Hundreds to wear gold +in their clothes, or to wear silk till they make it themselves." What, +then, could Miss Softdown do with the silks and breastpins brought from +London? "Let her wear deer-skin and arrow-head," said the natives. But +Miss Softdown soon had her way. Still more were these new families +shocked, when, on ringing for some newly purchased negro domestic, the +said negro came into the parlor nearly naked. Then began one of the most +extended controversies in the history of Virginia,--the question being, +whether out-door negroes should wear clothes, and domestics dress like +other people. The popular belief, in which it seems the negroes shared, +was, that the race would perish, if subjected to clothing the year +round. The custom of negro men going about _in puris naturalibus_ +prevailed to a much more recent period than is generally supposed. + +One by one, the barbarisms of Old Virginia were eradicated, and the +danger was then that effeminacy would succeed; but a better class of +families began to come from England, now that the Colony was somewhat +prepared for them. These aimed to make Virginia repeat England: it might +have repeated something worse, and in the end has. About one or two old +mansions in Maryland and Virginia the long silvery grass characteristic +of the English park is yet found: the seed was carefully brought from +England by those gentlemen who came under Raleigh's administration, +and who regarded their residence in these Colonies as patriotic +self-devotion. On one occasion, the writer, walking through one of +these fields, startled an English lark, which rose singing and soaring +skyward. It sang a theme of the olden time. Governor Spottswood brought +with him, when he came, a number of these larks, and made strenuous +efforts to domesticate them in the neighborhood of Fredericksburg, +Virginia. He did not succeed. Now and then we have heard of one's being +seen, companionless. It is a sad symbol of that nobler being who tried +to domesticate himself in Virginia, the fine old English gentleman. He +is now seen but little oftener than the silver grass and the lark which +he brought with him. But let no one think, whilst ridiculing those who +can now only hide their poor stature under the lion-skin of F-F-V-ism, +that the race of old Virginia gentlemen is a mythic race. Through +the fair slopes of Eastern Virginia we have wandered and counted the +epitaphs of as princely men and women as ever trod this continent. +Yonder is the island, floating on the crystal Rappahannock, which, +instead of, as now, masking the guns which aim at Freedom's heart, +once bore witness to the noble Spottswood's effort to realize for the +working-man a Utopia in the New World. Yonder is the house, on the same +river, frowning now with the cannon which defend the slave-shamble, (for +the Richmond railroad passes on its verge,) where Washington was reared +to love justice and honor; and over to the right its porch commands +a marble shaft on which is written, "Here lies Mary, the Mother of +Washington." A little lower is the spot where John Smith gave the right +hand to the ambassadors of King Powhatan. In that old court-house the +voice of Patrick Henry thundered for Liberty and Union. Time was when +the brave men on whose hearts rested the destinies of the New World made +this the centre of activity and rule upon the continent; they lived and +acted here as Anglo-Saxon blood should live and act, wherever it bears +its rightful sceptre; but now one walks here as through the splendid +ruins of some buried Nineveh, and emerges to find the very sunlight sad, +as it reveals those who garnish the sepulchres of their ancestors with +one hand, whilst with the other they stone and destroy the freedom and +institutions which their fathers lived to build and died to defend. + +And this, alas! is the first black line in the sketch of Virginia as +it now is. The true preface to the present edition of Virginia, which, +unhappily, has been for many years stereotyped, may be found in a single +entry of Captain John Smith's journal:-- + +"August, 1619. A Dutch man-of-war visited Jamestown and sold the +settlers twenty negroes, the first that have ever touched the soil of +Virginia." + +They have scarcely made it "sacred soil." A little entry it is, of what +seemed then, perhaps, an unimportant event,--but how pregnant with +evil! + +The very year in which that Dutch ship arrived with its freight of +slaves at Jamestown, the Mayflower sailed with its freight of freemen +for Plymouth. + +Let us pause a moment and consider the prospects and opportunities which +opened before the two bands of pilgrim. How hard and bleak were the +shores that received the Mayflower pilgrims! Winter seemed the only +season of the land to which they had come; when the snow disappeared, it +was only to reveal a landscape of sand and rock. To have soil they must +pulverize rock. Nature said to these exiles from a rich soil, with her +sternest voice,--"Here is no streaming breast: sand with no gold mined: +all the wealth you get must be mined from your own hearts and coined by +your own right hands!" + +How different was it in Virginia! Old John Rolfe, the husband of +Pocahontas, writing to the King in 1616, said,--"Virginia is the same as +it was, I meane for the goodness of the scate, and the fertilenesse of +the land, and will, no doubt, so continue to the worlds end,--a countrey +as worthy of good report as can be declared by the pen of the best +writer; a countrey spacious and wide, capable of many hundred thousands +of inhabitants." It must be borne in mind that Rolfe's idea of an +inhabitant's needs was that he should own a county or two to begin with, +which will account for his moderate estimate of the number that could be +accommodated upon a hundred thousand square miles. He continues,--"For +the soil, most fertile to plant in; for ayre, fresh and temperate, +somewhat hotter in summer, and not altogether so cold in winter as in +England, yet so agreable is it to our constitutions that now 't is more +rare to hear of a man's death than in England; for water, most wholesome +and verie plentifull; and for fayre navigable rivers and good harbors, +no countrey in Christendom, in so small a circuite, is so well stored." +Any one who has passed through the State, or paid any attention to its +resources, may go far beyond the old settler's statement. Virginia is a +State combining, as in some divinely planned garden, every variety of +soil known on earth, resting under a sky that Italy alone can match, +with a Valley anticipating in vigor the loam of the prairies: up to that +Valley and Piedmont stretch throughout the State navigable rivers, like +fingers of the Ocean-hand, ready to bear to all marts the produce of +the soil, the superb vein of gold, and the iron which, unlocked from +mountain-barriers, could defy competition. But in her castle Virginia is +still, a sleeping beauty awaiting the hero whose kiss shall recall her +to life. Comparing what free labor has done for the granite rock called +Massachusetts, and what slave labor has done for the enchanted garden +called Virginia, one would say, that, though the Dutch ship that brought +to our shores the Norway rat was bad, and that which brought the Hessian +fly was worse, the most fatal ship that ever cast anchor in American +waters was that which brought the first twenty negroes to the settlers +of Jamestown. Like the Indian in her own aboriginal legend, on whom a +spell was cast which kept the rain from falling on him and the sun from +shining on him, Virginia received from that Dutch ship a curse which +chained back the blessings which her magnificent resources would have +rained upon her, and the sun of knowledge shining everywhere has left +her to-day more than eighty thousand white adults who cannot read or +write. + +It was at an early period as manifest as now that a slave population +implied and rendered necessary a large poor-white population. And whilst +the pilgrims of Plymouth inaugurated the free-school system in their +first organic law, which now renders it impossible for one sane person +born in their land to be unable to read and write, Virginia was boasting +with Lord Douglas in "Marmion," + + "Thanks to Saint Bothan, son of mine + Could never pen a written line." + +Sir William Berkeley, Governor of Virginia for thirty-six years, +beginning with 1641, wrote to the King as follows:--"I thank God, there +are no free schools nor printing, and I hope we shall not have these +hundred years; for learning has brought disobedience and heresy and +sects into the world, and printing has divulged them, and libels upon +the best governments. God keep us from both!" Most fearfully has the +prayer been answered. In Berkeley's track nearly all the succeeding ones +went on. Henry A. Wise boasted in Congress that no newspaper was printed +in his district, and he soon became governor. + +It gives but a poor description of the "poor-white trash" to say that +they cannot read. The very slaves cannot endure to be classed on their +level. They are inconceivably wretched and degraded. For every rich +slave-owner there are some eight or ten families of these miserable +tenants. Both sexes are almost always drunk. + +There is no better man than the Anglo-Saxon man who labors; there is no +worse animal than the same man when bred to habits of idleness. When +Watts wrote, + + "Satan finds some mischief still + For idle hands to do," + +he wrote what is much truer of his own race than of any other. This +law has been the Nemesis of the young Virginian. His descent demands +excitement and activity; and unless he becomes emasculated into a +clay-eater, he obtains the excitement that his ancestors got in war, and +the New-Englander gets in work, in gaming, horse-racing, and all manner +of dissipation. His life verifies the proverb, that the idle brain is +the Devil's workshop. He is trained to despise labor, for it puts him on +a level with his father's slaves. At the University of Virginia one may +see the extent of demoralization to which eight generations of idleness +can bring English blood. There the spree, the riot, and we might almost +say the duel, are normal. About five years ago we spent some time +at Charlottesville. The evening of our arrival was the occasion of +witnessing some of the ways of the students. A hundred or more of them +with blackened or masked faces were rushing about the college yard; a +large fire was burning around a stake, upon which was the effigy of a +woman. A gentleman connected with the University, with whom we were +walking, informed us that the special occasion of this affair was, that +a near relative of Mrs. Stowe's, a sister, perhaps, had that day arrived +to visit her relative, Mrs. McGuffey. The effigy of Mrs. Stowe was +burned for her benefit. The lady and her friends were very much alarmed, +and left on the early train next morning, without completing their +visit. + +"They will close up by all getting dead-drunk," said our friend, the +Professor. + +"But," we asked, "why does not the faculty at once interfere in this +disgraceful procedure?" + +"They have got us lately," he replied, "where we are powerless. Whenever +they wish a spree, they tackle it on to the slavery question, and know +that their parents will pardon everything to the spirit of the South +when it is burning the effigy of Mrs. Stowe or Charles Sumner, or the +last person who furnishes a chance for a spree. To arrest them ends only +in casting suspicion of unsoundness on the professor who does it." + +Virginia has had, for these same causes, no religious development +whatever. The people spend four-and-a-half fifths of their time arguing +about politics and religion,--questions of the latter being chiefly as +to the best method of being baptized, or whether sudden conversions are +the safest,--but they never take a step forward in either. Archbishop +Purcell, of Cincinnati, stated to us, that, once being in Richmond, +he resolved to give a little religious exploration to the surrounding +country. About seven miles out from the city he saw a man lying +down,--the Virginian's natural posture,--and approaching, he made +various inquiries, and received lazy Yes and No replies. Presently he +inquired to what churches the people in that vicinity usually went. + +"Well, not much to any." + +"What are their religious views?" + +"Well, not much of any." + +"Well, my friend, may I inquire what are _your_ opinions on religious +subjects?" + +"The man, yet reclining," said the Archbishop, "looked at me sleepily a +moment, and replied,-- + +"'My opinion is that them as made me will take care of me.'" + +The Archbishop came off discouraged; but we assured him that the man +was far ahead of many specimens we had met. We never see an opossum in +Virginia--a fossil animal in most other places--but it seems the sign +of the moral stratification around. There are many varieties of +opossum in Virginia,--political and religious: Saturn, who devours his +offspring, has not come to Virginia yet. + +Old formulas have, doubtless, to a great extent, lost their power there +also, but there is not vitality enough to create a higher form. For no +new church can ever be anywhere inaugurated in this world until the +period has come when its chief corner-stone can be Humanity. Till then +the old creeds in Virginia must wander like ghosts, haunting the old +ruins which their once exquisite churches have become. Nothing can be +more picturesque, nothing more sad, than these old churches,--every +brick in them imported from Old England, every prayer from the past +world and its past need: the high and wide pews where the rich sat +lifted some feet above the seats of the poor represent still the faith +in a God who subjects the weak to the strong. These old churches, rarely +rebuilt, are ready now to become rocks imbedding fossil creeds. In these +old aisles one walks, and the snake glides away on the pavement, and the +bat flutters in the high pulpit, whilst moss and ivy tenderly enshroud +the lonely walls; and over all is written the word DESOLATION. Symbol it +is of the desolation which caused it, even the trampled fanes and altars +of the human soul,--the temple of God, whose profanation the church has +suffered to go on unrebuked, till now both must crumble into the same +grave. + + * * * * * + + +AMERICAN CIVILIZATION. + + +A certain degree of progress from the rudest state in which man is +found,--a dweller in caves, or on trees, like an ape, a cannibal, an +eater of pounded snails, worms, and offal,--a certain degree of progress +from this extreme is called Civilization. It is a vague, complex name, +of many degrees. Nobody has attempted a definition. Mr. Guizot, writing +a book on the subject, does not. It implies the evolution of a highly +organized man, brought to supreme delicacy of sentiment, as in practical +power, religion, liberty, sense of honor, and taste. In the hesitation +to define what it is, we usually suggest it by negations. A nation that +has no clothing, no alphabet, no iron, no marriage, no arts of peace, no +abstract thought, we call barbarous. And after many arts are invented or +imported, as among the Turks and Moorish nations, it is often a little +complaisant to call them civilized. + +Each nation grows after its own genius, and has a civilization of its +own. The Chinese and Japanese, though each complete in his way, is +different from the man of Madrid or the man of New York. The term +imports a mysterious progress. In the brutes is none; and in mankind, +the savage tribes do not advance. The Indians of this country have not +learned the white man's work; and in Africa, the negro of to-day is the +negro of Herodotus. But in other races the growth is not arrested; but +the like progress that is made by a boy, "when he cuts his eye-teeth," +as we say,--childish illusions pricing daily away, and he seeing things +really and comprehensively,--is made by tribes. It is the learning the +secret of cumulative power, of advancing on one's self. It implies a +facility of association, power to compare, the ceasing from fixed ideas. +The Indian is gloomy and distressed, when urged to depart from his +habits and traditions. He is overpowered by the gaze of the white, and +his eye sinks. The occasion of one of these starts of growth is always +some novelty that astounds the mind, and provokes it to dare to change. +Thus there is a Manco Capac at the beginning of each improvement, some +superior foreigner importing new and wonderful arts, and teaching them. +Of course, he must not know too much, but must have the sympathy, +language, and gods of those he would inform. But chiefly the sea-shore +has been the point of departure to knowledge, as to commerce. The most +advanced nations are always those who navigate the most. The power which +the sea requires in the sailor makes a man of him very fast, and the +change of shores and population clears his head of much nonsense of his +wigwam. + +Where shall we begin or end the list of those feats of liberty and wit, +each of which feats made an epoch of history? Thus, the effect of +a framed or stone house is immense on the tranquillity, power, and +refinement of the builder. A man in a cave, or in a camp, a nomad, will +die with no more estate than the wolf or the horse leaves. But so simple +a labor as a house being achieved, his chief enemies are kept at bay. +He is safe from the teeth of wild animals, from frost, sunstroke, and +weather; and fine faculties begin to yield their fine harvest. Invention +and art are born, manners and social beauty and delight. 'T is wonderful +how soon a piano gets into a log-hut on the frontier. You would think +they found it under a pine-stump. With it comes a Latin grammar, and one +of those towhead boys has written a hymn on Sunday. Now let colleges, +now let senates take heed! for here is one, who, opening these fine +tastes on the basis of the pioneer's iron constitution, will gather all +their laurels in his strong hands. + +When the Indian trail gets widened, graded, and bridged to a good +road,--there is a benefactor, there is a missionary, a pacificator, a +wealth-bringer, a maker of markets, a vent for industry. The building +three or four hundred miles of road in the Scotch Highlands in 1726 +to 1749 effectually tamed the ferocious clans, and established public +order. Another step in civility is the change from war, hunting, and +pasturage, to agriculture. Our Scandinavian forefathers have left us a +significant legend to convey their sense of the importance of this step. +"There was once a giantess who had a daughter, and the child saw a +husbandman ploughing in the field. Then she ran and picked him up with +her finger and thumb, and put him and his plough and his oxen into her +apron, and carried them to her mother, and said, 'Mother, what sort of a +beetle is this that I found wriggling in the sand?' But the mother said, +'Put it away, my child; we must begone out of this land, for these +people will dwell in it.'" Another success is the post-office, with +its educating energy, augmented by cheapness, and guarded by a certain +religious sentiment in mankind, so that the power of a wafer or a drop +of wax or gluten to guard a letter, as it flies over sea, over land, and +comes to its address as if a battalion of artillery brought it, I look +upon as a fine metre of civilization. + +The division of labor, the multiplication of the arts of peace, which is +nothing but a large allowance to each man to choose his work according +to his faculty, to live by his better hand, fills the State with useful +and happy laborers,--and they, creating demand by the very temptation +of their productions, are rapidly and surely rewarded by good sale: and +what a police and ten commandments their work thus becomes! So true is +Dr. Johnson's remark, that "men are seldom more innocently employed than +when they are making money." + +The skilful combinations of civil government, though they usually +follow natural leadings, as the lines of race, language, religion, and +territory, yet require wisdom and conduct in the rulers, and in their +result delight the imagination. "We see insurmountable multitudes +obeying, in opposition to their strongest passions, the restraints of +a power which they scarcely perceive, and the crimes of a single +individual marked and punished at the distance of half the earth."[A] + +[Footnote A: Dr. Thomas Brown.] + +Right position of woman in the State is another index. Poverty and +industry with a healthy mind read very easily the laws of humanity, and +love them: place the sexes in right relations of mutual respect, and a +severe morality gives that essential charm to woman which educates all +that is delicate, poetic, and self-sacrificing, breeds courtesy and +learning, conversation and wit, in her rough mate; so that I have +thought it a sufficient definition of civilization to say, it is the +influence of good women. + +Another measure of culture is the diffusion of knowledge, overrunning +all the old barriers of caste, and, by the cheap press, bringing the +university to every poor man's door in the newsboy's basket. Scraps of +science, of thought, of poetry are in the coarsest sheet, so that in +every house we hesitate to tear a newspaper until we have looked it +through. + +The ship, in its latest complete equipment, is an abridgment and compend +of a nation's arts: the ship steered by compass and chart, longitude +reckoned by lunar observation, and, when the heavens are hid, by +chronometer; driven by steam; and in wildest sea-mountains, at vast +distances from home, + + "The pulses of her iron heart + Go beating through the storm." + +No use can lessen the wonder of this control, by so weak a creature, of +forces so prodigious. I remember I watched, in crossing the sea, the +beautiful skill whereby the engine in its constant working was made to +produce two hundred gallons of fresh water out of salt water, every +hour,--thereby supplying all the ship's want. + +The skill that pervades complex details; the man that maintains himself; +the chimney taught to burn its own smoke; the farm made to produce all +that is consumed on it; the very prison compelled to maintain itself +and yield a revenue, and, better than that, made a reform school, and a +manufactory of honest men out of rogues, as the steamer made fresh +water out of salt: all these are examples of that tendency to combine +antagonisms, and utilize evil, which is the index of high civilization. + +Civilization is the result of highly complex organization. In the snake, +all the organs are sheathed: no hands, no feet, no fins, no wings. In +bird and beast, the organs are released, and begin to play. In man, they +are all unbound, and full of joyful action. With this unswaddling, he +receives the absolute illumination we call Reason, and thereby true +liberty. + +Climate has much to do with this melioration. The highest civility has +never loved the hot zones. Wherever snow falls, there is usually civil +freedom. Where the banana grows, the animal system is indolent and +pampered at the cost of higher qualities: the man is grasping, sensual, +and cruel. But this scale is by no means invariable. For high degrees of +moral sentiment control the unfavorable influences of climate; and some +of our grandest examples of men and of races come from the equatorial +regions,--as the genius of Egypt, of India, and of Arabia. + +These feats are measures or traits of civility; and temperate climate is +an important influence, though not quite indispensable, for there have +been learning, philosophy, and art in Iceland, and in the tropics. But +one condition is essential to the social education of man,--namely, +morality. There can be no high civility without a deep morality, though +it may not always call itself by that name, but sometimes the point +of honor, as in the institution of chivalry; or patriotism, as in the +Spartan and Roman republics; or the enthusiasm of some religious sect +which imputes its virtue to its dogma; or the cabalism, or _esprit du +corps_, of a masonic or other association of friends. + +The evolution of a highly destined society must be moral; it must run in +the grooves of the celestial wheels. It must be catholic in aims. What +is moral? It is the respecting in action catholic or universal ends. +Hear the definition which Kant gives of moral conduct: "Act always so +that the immediate motive of thy will may become a universal rule for +all intelligent beings." + +Civilization depends on morality. Everything good in man leans on what +is higher. This rule holds in small as in great. Thus, all our strength +and success in the work of our hands depend on our borrowing the aid of +the elements. You have seen a carpenter on a ladder with a broad-axe +chopping upward chips and slivers from a beam. How awkward! at what +disadvantage he works! But see him on the ground, dressing his timber +under him. Now, not his feeble muscles, but the force of gravity brings +down the axe; that is to say, the planet itself splits his stick. The +farmer had much ill-temper, laziness, and shirking to endure from his +hand-sawyers, until, one day, he bethought him to put his saw-mill on +the edge of a waterfall; and the river never tires of turning his wheel: +the river is good-natured, and never hints an objection. + +We had letters to send: couriers could not go fast enough, nor far +enough; broke their wagons, foundered their horses; bad roads in spring, +snow-drifts in winter, heats in summer; could not get the horses out +of a walk. But we found out that the air and earth were full of +electricity; and it was always going our way,--just the way we wanted to +send. _Would he take a message?_ Just as lief as not; had nothing +else to do; would carry it in no time. Only one doubt occurred, one +staggering objection,--he had no carpet-bag, no visible pockets, no +hands, not so much as a mouth, to carry a letter. But, after much +thought and many experiments, we managed to meet the conditions, and to +fold up the letter in such invisible compact form as he could carry in +those invisible pockets of his, never wrought by needle and thread,--and +it went like a charm. + +I admire still more than the saw-mill the skill which, on the sea-shore, +makes the tides drive the wheels and grind corn, and which thus engages +the assistance of the moon, like a hired hand, to grind, and wind, and +pump, and saw, and split stone, and roll iron. + +Now that is the wisdom of a man, in every instance of his labor, +to hitch his wagon to a star, and see his chore done by the gods +themselves. That is the way we are strong, by borrowing the might of the +elements. The forces of steam, gravity, galvanism, light, magnets, wind, +fire, serve us day by day, and cost us nothing. + +Our astronomy is full of examples of calling in the aid of these +magnificent helpers. Thus, on a planet so small as ours, the want of +an adequate base for astronomical measurements is early felt, as, for +example, in detecting the parallax of a star. But the astronomer, having +by an observation fixed the place of a star, by so simple an expedient +as waiting six months, and then repeating his observation, contrived +to put the diameter of the earth's orbit, say two hundred millions of +miles, between his first observation and his second, and this line +afforded him a respectable base for his triangle. + +All our arts aim to win this vantage. We cannot bring the heavenly +powers to us, but, if we will only choose our jobs in directions in +which they travel, they will undertake them with the greatest pleasure. +It is a peremptory rule with them, that _they never go out of their +road_. We are dapper little busybodies, and run this way and that +way superserviceably; but they swerve never from their fore-ordained +paths,--neither the sun, nor the moon, nor a bubble of air, nor a mote +of dust. + +And as our handiworks borrow the elements, so all our social and +political action leans on principles. To accomplish anything excellent, +the will must work for catholic and universal ends. A puny creature +walled in on every side, as Donne wrote,-- + + ------"unless above himself he can + Erect himself, how poor a thing is man!" + +but when his will leans on a principle, when he is the vehicle of ideas, +he borrows their omnipotence. Gibraltar may be strong, but ideas are +impregnable, and bestow on the hero their invincibility. "It was a great +instruction," said a saint in Cromwell's war, "that the best courages +are but beams of the Almighty." Hitch your wagon to a star. Let us not +fag in paltry works which serve our pot and bag alone. Let us not lie +and steal. No god will help. We shall find all their teams going the +other way,--Charles's Wain, Great Bear, Orion, Leo, Hercules:--every +god will leave us. Work rather for those interests which the divinities +honor and promote,--justice, love, freedom, knowledge, utility. + +If we can thus ride in Olympian chariots by putting our works in the +path of the celestial circuits, we can harness also evil agents, the +powers of darkness, and force them to serve against their will the ends +of wisdom and virtue. Thus, a wise Government puts fines and penalties +on pleasant vices. What a benefit would the American Government, now +in the hour of its extreme need, render to itself, and to every city, +village, and hamlet in the States, if it would tax whiskey and rum +almost to the point of prohibition! Was it Bonaparte who said that he +found vices very good patriots?--"he got five millions from the love of +brandy, and he should be glad to know which of the virtues would pay him +as much." Tobacco and opium have broad backs, and will cheerfully carry +the load of armies, if you choose to make them pay high for such joy as +they give and such harm as they do. + +These are traits, and measures, and modes; and the true test of +civilization is, not the census, nor the size of cities, nor the +crops,--no, but the kind of man the country turns out. I see the vast +advantages of this country, spanning the breadth of the temperate zone. +I see the immense material prosperity,--towns on towns, states on +states, and wealth piled in the massive architecture of cities, +California quartz-mountains dumped down in New York to be re-piled +architecturally along-shore from Canada to Cuba, and thence westward to +California again. But it is not New-York streets built by the confluence +of workmen and wealth of all nations, though stretching out towards +Philadelphia until they touch it, and northward until they touch New +Haven, Hartford, Springfield, Worcester, and Boston,--not these that +make the real estimation. But, when I look over this constellation of +cities which animate and illustrate the land, and see how little +the Government has to do with their daily life, how self-helped and +self-directed all families are,--knots of men in purely natural +societies,--societies of trade, of kindred blood, of habitual +hospitality, house and house, man acting on man by weight of opinion, of +longer or better-directed industry, the refining influence of women, +the invitation which experience and permanent causes open to youth and +labor,--when I see how much each virtuous and gifted person whom all men +consider lives affectionately with scores of excellent people who are +not known far from home, and perhaps with great reason reckons these +people his superiors in virtue, and in the symmetry and force of their +qualities, I see what cubic values America has, and in these a better +certificate of civilization than great cities or enormous wealth. + +In strictness, the vital refinements are the moral and intellectual +steps. The appearance of the Hebrew Moses, of the Indian Buddh,--in +Greece, of the Seven Wise Masters, of the acute and upright Socrates, +and of the Stoic Zeno,--in Judea, the advent of Jesus,--and in modern +Christendom, of the realists Huss, Savonarola, and Luther, are causal +facts which carry forward races to new convictions, and elevate the rule +of life. In the presence of these agencies, it is frivolous to insist +on the invention of printing or gunpowder, of steam-power or gas-light, +percussion-caps and rubber-shoes, which are toys thrown off from that +security, freedom, and exhilaration which a healthy morality creates in +society. These arts add a comfort and smoothness to house and +street life; but a purer morality, which kindles genius, civilizes +civilization, casts backward all that we held sacred into the profane, +as the flame of oil throws a shadow when shined upon by the flame of the +Bude-light. Not the less the popular measures of progress will ever be +the arts and the laws. + +But if there be a country which cannot stand any one of these tests,--a +country where knowledge cannot be diffused without perils of mob-law +and statute-law,--where speech is not free,--where the post-office is +violated, mail-bags opened, and letters tampered with,--where public +debts and private debts outside of the State are repudiated,--where +liberty is attacked in the primary institution of their social +life,--where the position of the white woman is injuriously affected by +the outlawry of the black woman,--where the arts, such as they have, +are all imported, having no indigenous life,--where the laborer is not +secured in the earnings of his own hands,--where suffrage is not free +or equal,--that country is, in all these respects, not civil, but +barbarous, and no advantages of soil, climate, or coast can resist these +suicidal mischiefs. + +Morality is essential, and all the incidents of morality,--as, justice +to the subject, and personal liberty. Montesquieu says,--"Countries are +well cultivated, not as they are fertile, but as they are free"; and the +remark holds not less, but more, true of the culture of men than of the +tillage of land. And the highest proof of civility is, that the whole +public action of the State is directed on securing the greatest good of +the greatest number. + +Our Southern States have introduced confusion into the moral sentiments +of their people, by reversing this rule in theory and practice, and +denying a man's right to his labor. The distinction and end of a soundly +constituted man is his labor. Use is inscribed on all his faculties. Use +is the end to which he exists. As the tree exists for its fruit, so a +man for his work. A fruitless plant, an idle animal, is not found in +the universe. They are all toiling, however secretly or slowly, in the +province assigned them, and to a use in the economy of the world,--the +higher and more complex organizations to higher and more catholic +service; and man seems to play a certain part that tells on the general +face of the planet,--as if dressing the globe for happier races of +his own kind, or, as we sometimes fancy, for beings of superior +organization. + +But thus use, labor of each for all, is the health and virtue of all +beings. ICH DIEN, _I serve_, is a truly royal motto. And it is the mark +of nobleness to volunteer the lowest service,--the greatest spirit only +attaining to humility. Nay, God is God because he is the servant of +all. Well, now here comes this conspiracy of slavery,--they call it an +institution, I call it a destitution,--this stealing of men and setting +them to work,--stealing their labor, and the thief sitting idle himself; +and for two or three ages it has lasted, and has yielded a certain +quantity of rice, cotton, and sugar. And standing on this doleful +experience, these people have endeavored to reverse the natural +sentiments of mankind, and to pronounce labor disgraceful, and the +well-being of a man to consist in eating the fruit of other men's labor. +Labor: a man coins himself into his labor,--turns his day, his strength, +his thought, his affection into some product which remains as the +visible sign of his power; and to protect that, to secure that to +him, to secure his past self to his future self, is the object of all +government. There is no interest in any country so imperative as that +of labor; it covers all, and constitutions and governments exist for +that,--to protect and insure it to the laborer. All honest men are daily +striving to earn their bread by their industry. And who is this who +tosses his empty head at this blessing in disguise, the constitution of +human nature, and calls labor vile, and insults the faithful workman at +his daily toil? I see for such madness no hellebore,--for such calamity +no solution but servile war, and the Africanization of the country that +permits it. + +At this moment in America the aspects of political society absorb +attention. In every house, from Canada to the Gulf, the children ask +the serious father,--"What is the news of the war to-day? and when will +there be better times?" The boys have no new clothes, no gifts, no +journeys; the girls must go without new bonnets; boys and girls find +their education, this year, less liberal and complete. All the little +hopes that heretofore made the year pleasant are deferred. The state of +the country fills us with anxiety and stern duties. We have attempted to +hold together two states of civilization: a higher state, where labor +and the tenure of land and the right of suffrage are democratical; and +a lower state, in which the old military tenure of prisoners or slaves, +and of power and land in a few hands, makes an oligarchy: we have +attempted to hold these two states of society under one law. But the +rude and early state of society does not work well with the later, +nay, works badly, and has poisoned politics, public morals, and social +intercourse in the Republic, now for many years. + +The times put this question,--Why cannot the best civilization be +extended over the whole country, since the disorder of the less +civilized portion menaces the existence of the country? Is this secular +progress we have described, this evolution of man to the highest powers, +only to give him sensibility, and not to bring duties with it? Is he +not to make his knowledge practical? to stand and to withstand? Is not +civilization heroic also? Is it not for action? has it not a will? +"There are periods," said Niebuhr, "when something much better than, +happiness and security of life is attainable." We live in a new and +exceptional age. America is another word for Opportunity. Our whole +history appears like a last effort of the Divine Providence in behalf of +the human race; and a literal slavish following of precedents, as by +a justice of the peace, is not for those who at this hour lead the +destinies of this people. The evil you contend with has taken alarming +proportions, and you still content yourself with parrying the blows it +aims, but, as if enchanted, abstain from striking at the cause. + +If the American people hesitate, it is not for want of warning or +advices. The telegraph has been swift enough to announce our disasters. +The journals have not suppressed the extent of the calamity. Neither +was there any want of argument or of experience. If the war brought +any surprise to the North, it was not the fault of sentinels on the +watch-towers, who had furnished full details of the designs, the muster, +and the means of the enemy. Neither was anything concealed of the theory +or practice of slavery. To what purpose make more big books of these +statistics? There are already mountains of facts, if any one wants them. +But people do not want them. They bring their opinions into the world. +If they have a comatose tendency in the brain, they are pro-slavery +while they live; if of a nervous sanguineous temperament, they are +abolitionists. Then interests were never persuaded. Can you convince the +shoe interest, or the iron interest, or the cotton interest, by reading +passages from Milton or Montesquieu? You wish to satisfy people that +slavery is bad economy. Why, the "Edinburgh Review" pounded on that +string, and made out its case forty years ago. A democratic statesman +said to me, long since, that, if he owned the State of Kentucky, he +would manumit all the slaves, and be a gainer by the transaction. Is +this new? No, everybody knows it. As a general economy it is admitted. +But there is no one owner of the State, but a good many small owners. +One man owns land and slaves; another owns slaves only. Here is a woman +who has no other property,--like a lady in Charleston I knew of, who +owned fifteen chimney-sweeps and rode in her carriage. It is clearly a +vast inconvenience to each of these to make any change, and they are +fretful and talkative, and all their friends are; and those less +interested are inert, and, from want of thought, averse to innovation. +It is like free trade, certainly the interest of nations, but by no +means the interest of certain towns and districts, which tariff feeds +fat; and the eager interest of the few overpowers the apathetic general +conviction of the many. Banknotes rob the public, but are such a daily +convenience that we silence our scruples, and make believe they are +gold. So imposts are the cheap and right taxation; but by the dislike of +people to pay out a direct tax, governments are forced to render life +costly by making them pay twice as much, hidden in the price of tea and +sugar. + +In this national crisis, it is not argument that we want, but that rare +courage which dares commit itself to a principle, believing that Nature +is its ally, and will create the instruments it requires, and more than +make good any petty and injurious profit which it may disturb. There +never was such a combination as this of ours, and the rules to meet it +are not set down in any history. We want men of original perception and +original action, who can open their eyes wider than to a nationality, +namely, to considerations of benefit to the human race, can act in the +interest of civilization. Government must not be a parish clerk, a +justice of the peace. It has, of necessity, in any crisis of the State, +the absolute powers of a Dictator. The existing Administration is +entitled to the utmost candor. It is to be thanked for its angelic +virtue, compared with any executive experiences with which we have been +familiar. But the times will not allow us to indulge in compliment. I +wish I saw in the people that inspiration which, if Government would not +obey the same, it would leave the Government behind, and create on the +moment the means and executors it wanted. Better the war should more +dangerously threaten us,--should threaten fracture in what is still +whole, and punish us with burned capitals and slaughtered regiments, and +so exasperate the people to energy, exasperate our nationality. There +are Scriptures written invisibly on men's hearts, whose letters do not +come out until they are enraged. They can be read by war-fires, and by +eyes in the last peril. + +We cannot but remember that there have been days in American history, +when, if the Free States had done their duty, Slavery had been blocked +by an immovable barrier, and our recent calamities forever precluded. +The Free States yielded, and every compromise was surrender, and invited +new demands. Here again is a new occasion which Heaven offers to sense +and virtue. It looks as if we held the fate of the fairest possession +of mankind in our hands, to be saved by our firmness or to be lost by +hesitation. + +The one power that has legs long enough and strong enough to cross the +Potomac offers itself at this hour; the one strong enough to bring all +the civility up to the height of that which is best prays now at the +door of Congress for leave to move. Emancipation is the demand of +civilization. That is a principle; everything else is an intrigue. This +is a progressive policy,--puts the whole people in healthy, productive, +amiable position,--puts every man in the South in just and natural +relations with every man in the North, laborer with laborer. + +We shall not attempt to unfold the details of the project of +emancipation. It has been stated with great ability by several of its +leading advocates. I will only advert to some leading points of the +argument, at the risk of repeating the reasons of others.[B] + +[Footnote B: I refer mainly to a Discourse by the Rev. M.D. Conway, +delivered before the "Emancipation League," in Boston, in January last.] + +The war is welcome to the Southerner: a chivalrous sport to him, like +hunting, and suits his semi-civilized condition. On the climbing scale +of progress, he is just up to war, and has never appeared to such +advantage as in the last twelve-month. It does not suit us. We are +advanced some ages on the war-state,--to trade, art, and general +cultivation. His laborer works for him at home, so that he loses no +labor by the war. All our soldiers are laborers; so that the South, with +its inferior numbers, is almost on a footing in effective war-population +with the North. Again, as long as we fight without any affirmative step +taken by the Government, any word intimating forfeiture in the rebel +States of their old privileges under the law, they and we fight on the +same side, for Slavery. Again, if we conquer the enemy,--what then? We +shall still have to keep him under, and it will cost as much to hold him +down as it did to get him down. Then comes the summer, and the fever +will drive our soldiers home; next winter, we must begin at the +beginning, and conquer him over again. What use, then, to take a fort, +or a privateer, or get possession of an inlet, or to capture a regiment +of rebels? + +But one weapon we hold which is sure. Congress can, by edict, as a part +of the military defence which it is the duty of Congress to provide, +abolish slavery, and pay for such slaves as we ought to pay for. Then +the slaves near our armies will come to us: those in the interior will +know in a week what their rights are, and will, where opportunity +offers, prepare to take them. Instantly, the armies that now confront +you must run home to protect their estates, and must stay there, and +your enemies will disappear. + +There can be no safety until this step is taken. We fancy that the +endless debate, emphasized by the crime and by the cannons of this war, +has brought the Free States to some conviction that it can never go well +with us whilst this mischief of Slavery remains in our politics, and +that by concert or by might we must put an end to it. But we have too +much experience of the futility of an easy reliance on the momentary +good dispositions of the public. There does exist, perhaps, a popular +will that the Union shall not be broken,--that our trade, and therefore +our laws, must have the whole breadth of the continent, and from Canada +to the Gulf. But, since this is the rooted belief and will of the +people, so much the more are they in danger, when impatient of defeats, +or impatient of taxes, to go with a rush for some peace, and what kind +of peace shall at that moment be easiest attained: they will make +concessions for it,--will give up the slaves; and the whole torment of +the past half-century will come back to be endured anew. + +Neither do I doubt, if such a composition should take place, that the +Southerners will come back quietly and politely, leaving their haughty +dictation. It will be an era of good feelings. There will be a lull +after so loud a storm; and, no doubt, there will be discreet men from +that section who will earnestly strive to inaugurate more moderate and +fair administration of the Government, and the North will for a time +have its full share and more, in place and counsel. But this will not +last,--not for want of sincere good-will in sensible Southerners, but +because Slavery will again speak through them its harsh necessity. It +cannot live but by injustice, and it will be unjust and violent to the +end of the world. + +The power of Emancipation is this, that it alters the atomic social +constitution of the Southern people. Now their interest is in keeping +out white labor; then, when they must pay wages, their interest will be +to let it in, to get the best labor, and, if they fear their blacks, to +invite Irish, German, and American laborers. Thus, whilst Slavery makes +and keeps disunion, Emancipation removes the whole objection to union. +Emancipation at one stroke elevates the poor white of the South, and +identifies his interest with that of the Northern laborer. + +Now, in the name of all that is simple and generous, why should not +this great right be done? Why should not America be capable of a second +stroke for the well-being of the human race, as eighty or ninety years +ago she was for the first? an affirmative step in the interests of human +civility, urged on her, too, not by any romance of sentiment, but by +her own extreme perils? It is very certain that the statesman who shall +break through the cobwebs of doubt, fear, and petty cavil that lie +in the way, will be greeted by the unanimous thanks of mankind. Men +reconcile themselves very fast to a bold and good measure, when once it +is taken, though they condemned it in advance. A week before the two +captive commissioners were surrendered to England, every one thought it +could not be done: it would divide the North. It was done, and in two +days all agreed it was the right action. And this action which costs so +little (the parties injured by it being such a handful that they can +very easily be indemnified) rids the world, at one stroke, of this +degrading nuisance, the cause of war and ruin to nations. This measure +at once puts all parties right. This is borrowing, as I said, the +omnipotence of a principle. What is so foolish as the terror lest the +blacks should be made furious by freedom and wages? It is denying these +that is the outrage, and makes the danger from the blacks. But justice +satisfies everybody,--white man, red man, yellow man, and black man. All +like wages, and the appetite grows by feeding. + +But this measure, to be effectual, must come speedily. The weapon is +slipping out of our hands. "Time," say the Indian Scriptures, "drinketh +up the essence of every great and noble action which ought to be +performed, and which is delayed in the execution." + +I hope it is not a fatal objection to this policy that it is simple and +beneficent thoroughly, which is the attribute of a moral action. An +unprecedented material prosperity has not tended to make us Stoics or +Christians. But the laws by which the universe is organized reappear at +every point, and will rule it. The end of all political struggle is +to establish morality as the basis of all legislation. It is not free +institutions, 't is not a republic, 't is not a democracy, that is the +end,--no, but only the means. Morality is the object of government. +We want a state of things in which crime shall not pay. This is the +consolation on which we rest in the darkness of the future and the +afflictions of to-day, that the government of the world is moral, and +does forever destroy what is not. + +It is the maxim of natural philosophers, that the natural forces wear +out in time all obstacles, and take place: and 't is the maxim of +history, that victory always falls at last where it ought to fall; or, +there is perpetual march and progress to ideas. But, in either case, +no link of the chain can drop out. Nature works through her appointed +elements; and ideas must work through the brains and the arms of good +and brave men, or they are no better than dreams. + + * * * * * + +Since the above pages were written, President Lincoln has proposed to +Congress that the Government shall coöperate with any State that shall +enact a gradual abolishment of Slavery. In the recent series of national +successes, this Message is the best. It marks the happiest day in the +political year. The American Executive ranges itself for the first time +on the side of freedom. If Congress has been backward, the President has +advanced. This state-paper is the more interesting that it appears to be +the President's individual act, done under a strong sense of duty. He +speaks his own thought in his own style. All thanks and honor to the +Head of the State! The Message has been received throughout the country +with praise, and, we doubt not, with more pleasure than has been spoken. +If Congress accords with the President, it is not yet too late to begin +the emancipation; but we think it will always be too late to make it +gradual. All experience agrees that it should be immediate. More and +better than the President has spoken shall, perhaps, the effect of this +Message be,--but, we are sure, not more or better than he hoped in his +heart, when, thoughtful of all the complexities of his position, he +penned these cautious words. + + * * * * * + + + COMPENSATION. + + + In the strength of the endeavor, + In the temper of the giver, + In the loving of the lover, + Lies the hidden recompense. + + In the sowing of the sower, + In the fleeting of the flower, + In the fading of each hour, + Lurks eternal recompense. + + + + +A MESSAGE OF JEFF DAVIS IN SECRET SESSION. + +CONJECTURALLY REPORTED BY H. BIGLOW. + + +_To the Editors of the_ ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + +Jaalam, 10th March, 1862. + +GENTLEMEN,--My leisure has been so entirely occupied with the hitherto +fruitless endeavour to decypher the Runick inscription whose fortunate +discovery I mentioned in my last communication, that I have not found +time to discuss, as I had intended, the great problem of what we are to +do with slavery, a topick on which the publick mind in this place is at +present more than ever agitated. What my wishes and hopes are I need +not say, but for safe conclusions I do not conceive that we are yet +in possession of facts enough on which to bottom them with certainty. +Acknowledging the hand of Providence, as I do, in all events, I am +sometimes inclined to think that they are wiser than we, and am willing +to wait till we have made this continent once more a place where +freemen can live in security and honour, before assuming any further +responsibility. This is the view taken by my neighbour Habakkuk +Sloansure, Esq., the president of our bank, whose opinion in the +practical affairs of life has great weight with me, as I have generally +found it to be justified by the event, and whose counsel, had I followed +it, would have saved me from an unfortunate investment of a considerable +part of the painful economies of half a century in the Northwest-Passage +Tunnel. After a somewhat animated discussion with this gentleman, a +few days since, I expanded, on the _audi alteram partem_ principle, +something which he happened to say by way of illustration, into the +following fable. + + FESTINA LENTE. + + Once on a time there was a pool + Fringed all about with flag-leaves cool + And spotted with cow-lilies garish, + Of frogs and pouts the ancient parish. + Alders the creaking redwings sink on, + Tussocks that house blithe Bob o' Lincoln. + Hedged round the unassailed seclusion, + Where muskrats piled their cells Carthusian; + And many a moss-embroidered log, + The watering-place of summer frog, + Slept and decayed with patient skill, + As watering-places sometimes will. + + Now in this Abbey of Theleme, + Which realized the fairest dream + That ever dozing bull-frog had, + Sunned on a half-sunk lily-pad, + There rose a party with a mission + To mend the polliwogs' condition, + Who notified the selectmen + To call a meeting there and then. + "Some kind of steps." they said, "are needed; + They don't come on so fast as we did: + Let's dock their tails; if that don't make 'em + Frogs by brevet, the Old One take 'em! + That boy, that came the other day + To dig some flag-root down this way, + His jack-knife left, and 't is a sign + That Heaven approves of our design: + 'T were wicked not to urge the step on, + When Providence has sent the weapon." + + Old croakers, deacons of the mire, + That led the deep batrachiain choir, + _Uk! Uk! Caronk!_ with bass that might + Have left Lablache's out of sight, + Shook knobby heads, and said, "No go! + You'd better let 'em try to grow: + Old Doctor Time is slow, but still + He does know how to make a pill." + + But vain was all their hoarsest bass, + Their old experience out of place, + And, spite of croaking and entreating, + The vote was carried in marsh-meeting. + + "Lord knows," protest the polliwogs, + "We're anxious to be grown-up frogs; + But do not undertake the work + Of Nature till she prove a shirk; + 'T is not by jumps that she advances, + But wins her way by circumstances: + Pray, wait awhile, until you know + We're so contrived as not to grow; + Let Nature take her own direction, + And she'll absorb our imperfection; + _You_ mightn't like 'em to appear with, + But we must have the things to steer with." + + "No," piped the party of reform, + "All great results are ta'en by storm; + Fate holds her best gifts till we show + We've strength to make her let them go: + No more reject the Age's chrism, + Your cues are an anachronism; + No more the Future's promise mock, + But lay your tails upon the block, + Thankful that we the means have voted + To have you thus to frogs promoted." + + The thing was done, the tails were cropped, + And home each philotadpole hopped, + In faith rewarded to exult, + And wait the beautiful result. + Too soon it came; our pool, so long + The theme of patriot bull-frogs' song, + Next day was reeking, fit to smother, + With heads and tails that missed each other,-- + Here snoutless tails, there tailless snouts: + The only gainers were the pouts. + + MORAL. + + From lower to the higher next, + Not to the top, is Nature's text; + And embryo Good, to reach full stature, + Absorbs the Evil in its nature. + +I think that nothing will ever give permanent peace and security to +this continent but the extirpation of Slavery therefrom, and that the +occasion is nigh; but I would do nothing hastily or vindictively, nor +presume to jog the elbow of Providence. No desperate measures for me +till we are sure that all others are hopeless,--_flectere si nequeo +SUPEROS, Acheronta movebo_. To make Emancipation a reform instead of +a revolution is worth a little patience, that we may have the Border +States first, and then the non-slaveholders of the Cotton States with us +in principle,--a consummation that seems to me nearer than many imagine. +_Fiat justitia, ruat coelum,_ is not to be taken in a literal sense by +statesmen, whose problem is to get justice done with as little jar as +possible to existing order, which has at least so much of heaven in it +that it is not chaos. I rejoice in the President's late Message, which +at last proclaims the Government on the side of freedom, justice, and +sound policy. + +As I write, comes the news of our disaster at Hampton Roads. I do not +understand the supineness which, after fair warning, leaves wood to an +unequal conflict with iron. It is not enough merely to have the right +on our side, if we stick to the old flint-lock of tradition. I have +observed in my parochial experience (_haud ignarus mali_) that the Devil +is prompt to adopt the latest inventions of destructive warfare, and may +thus take even such a three-decker as Bishop Butler at an advantage. It +is curious, that, as gunpowder made armour useless on shore, so armour +is having its revenge by baffling its old enemy at sea,--and that, while +gunpowder robbed land-warfare of nearly all its picturesqueness to give +even greater stateliness and sublimity to a sea-fight, armour bids fair +to degrade the latter into a squabble between two iron-shelled turtles. + +Yours, with esteem and respect, + +HOMER WILBUR, A.M. + +P.S. I had wellnigh forgotten to say that the object of this letter is +to inclose a communication from the gifted pen of Mr. Biglow. + + I sent you a messige, my friens, t' other day, + To tell you I'd nothin' pertickler to say: + 'T wuz the day our new nation gut kin' o' stillborn, + So't wuz my pleasant dooty t' acknowledge the corn, + An' I see clearly then, ef I didn't before, + Thet the _augur_ in inauguration means _bore_. + I needn't tell _you_ thet my messige wuz written + To diffuse correc' notions in France an' Gret Britten, + An' agin to impress on the poppylar mind + The comfort an' wisdom o' goin' it blind,-- + To say thet I didn't abate not a hooter + O' my faith in a happy an' glorious futur', + Ez rich in each soshle an' p'litickle blessin' + Ez them thet we now hed the joy o' possessin', + With a people united, an' longin' to die + For wut _we_ call their country, without askin' why, + An' all the gret things we concluded to slope for + Ez much within reach now ez ever--to hope for. + We've all o' the ellermunts, this very hour, + Thet make up a fus'-class, self-governin' power: + We've a war, an' a debt, an' a flag; an' ef this + Ain't to be inderpendunt, why, wut on airth is? + An' nothin' now henders our takin' our station + Ez the freest, enlightenedest, civerlized nation, + Built up on our bran'-new politickle thesis + Thet a Guv'ment's fust right is to tumble to pieces,-- + I say nothin' henders our takin' our place + Ez the very fus'-best o' the whole human race, + A-spittin' tobacker ez proud ez you please + On Victory's bes' carpets, or loafin' at ease + In the Tool'ries front-parlor, discussin' affairs + With our heels on the backs o' Napoleon's new chairs, + An' princes a-mixin' our cocktails an' slings,-- + Excep', wal, excep' jest a very few things, + Sech ez navies an' armies an' wherewith to pay, + An' gittin' our sogers to run t' other way, + An' not be too over-pertickler in tryin' + To hunt up the very las' ditches to die in. + + Ther' are critters so base thet they want it explained + Jes' wut is the totle amount thet we've gained, + Ez ef we could maysure stupenjious events + By the low Yankee stan'ard o' dollars an' cents: + They seem to forgit, thet, sence last year revolved, + We've succeeded in gittin' seceshed an' dissolved, + An' thet no one can't hope to git thru dissolootion + 'Thout sonic kin' o' strain on the best Constitootion. + Who asks for a prospec' more flettrin' an' bright, + When from here clean to Texas it's all one free fight? + Hain't we rescued from Seward the gret leadin' featurs + Thet makes it wuth while to be reasonin' creaturs? + Hain't we saved Habus Coppers, improved it in fact, + By suspending the Unionists 'stid o' the Act? + Ain't the laws free to all? Where on airth else d' ye see + Every freeman improvin' his own rope an' tree? + + It's ne'ssary to take a good confident tone + With the public; but here, jest amongst us, I own + Things looks blacker 'n thunder. Ther' 's no use denyin' + We're clean out o' money, an' 'most out o' lyin',-- + Two things a young nation can't mennage without, + Ef she wants to look wal at her fust comin' out; + For the fust supplies physickle strength, while the second + Gives a morril edvantage thet's hard to be reckoned: + For this latter I'm willin' to du wut I can; + For the former you'll hev to consult on a plan,-- + Though our _fust_ want (an' this pint I want your best views on) + Is plausible paper to print I.O.U.s on. + Some gennlemen think it would cure all our cankers + In the way o' finance, ef we jes' hanged the bankers; + An' I own the proposle 'ud square with my views, + Ef their lives wuzn't all thet we'd left 'em to lose. + Some say thet more confidence might be inspired, + Ef we voted our cities an' towns to be fired,-- + A plan thet 'ud suttenly tax our endurance, + Coz 't would be our own bills we should git for th' insurance; + But cinders, no metter how sacred we think 'em, + Mightn't strike furrin minds ez good sources of income, + Nor the people, perhaps, wouldn't like the eclaw + O' bein' all turned into paytriots by law. + Some want we should buy all the cotton an' burn it, + On a pledge, when we've gut thru the war, to return it,-- + Then to take the proceeds an' hold _them_ ez security + For an issue o' bonds to be met at maturity + With an issue o' notes to be paid in hard cash + On the fus' Monday follerin' the 'tarnal Allsmash: + This hez a safe air, an', once hold o' the gold, + 'Ud leave our vile plunderers out in the cold, + An' _might_ temp' John Bull, ef it warn't for the dip he + Once gut from the banks o' my own Massissippi. + Some think we could make, by arrangin' the figgers, + A hendy home-currency out of our niggers; + But it wun't du to lean much on ary sech staff, + For they're gittin' tu current a'ready, by half. + One gennleman says, ef we lef' our loan out + Where Floyd could git hold on 't, _he_'d take it, no doubt; + But 't ain't jes' the takin', though 't hez a good look, + We mus' git sunthin' out on it arter it's took, + An' we need now more 'n ever, with sorrer I own, + Thet some one another should let us a loan, + Sence a soger wun't fight, on'y jes' while he draws his + Pay down on the nail, for the best of all causes, + 'Thout askin' to know wut the quarrel's about,-- + An' once come to thet, why, our game is played out. + It's ez true ez though I shouldn't never hev said it + Thet a hitch hez took place in our system o' credit; + I swear it's all right in my speeches an' messiges, + But ther' 's idees afloat, ez ther' is about sessiges: + Folks wun't take a bond ez a basis to trade on, + Without nosin' round to find out wut it's made on, + An' the thought more an' more thru the public min' crosses + Thet our Treshry hez gut 'mos' too many dead hosses. + Wut's called credit, you see, is some like a balloon, + Thet looks while it's up 'most ez harnsome 'z a moon, + But once git a leak in 't an' wut looked so grand + Caves righ' down in a jiffy ez flat ez your hand. + Now the world is a dreffle mean place, for our sins, + Where ther' ollus is critters about with long pins + A-prickin' the globes we've blowcd up with sech care, + An' provin' ther' 's nothin' inside but bad air: + They're all Stuart Millses, poor-white trash, an' sneaks, + Without no more chivverlry 'n Choctaws or Creeks, + Who think a real gennleman's promise to pay + Is meant to be took in trade's ornery way: + Them fellers an' I couldn' never agree; + They're the nateral foes o' the Southun Idee; + I'd gladly take all of our other resks on me + To be red o' this low-lived politikle 'con'my! + + Now a dastardly notion is gittin' about + Thet our bladder is bust an' the gas oozin' out, + An' onless we can mennage in some way to stop it, + Why, the thing's a gone coon, an' we might ez wal drop it. + Brag works wal at fust, but it ain't jes' the thing + For a stiddy inves'ment the shiners to bring, + An' votin' we're prosp'rous a hundred times over + Wun't change bein' starved into livin' on clover. + Manassas done sunthin' tow'rds drawin' the wool + O'er the green, anti-slavery eyes o' John Bull: + Oh, _warn't_ it a godsend, jes' when sech tight fixes + Wuz crowdin' us mourners, to throw double-sixes! + I wuz tempted to think, an' it wuzn't no wonder, + Ther' wuz reelly a Providence,--over or under,-- + When, all packed for Nashville, I fust ascertained + From the papers up North wut a victory we'd gained, + 'T wuz the time for diffusin' correc' views abroad + Of our union an' strength an' relyin' on God; + An', fact, when I'd gut thru my fust big surprise, + I much ez half b'lieved in my own tallest lies, + An' conveyed the idee thet the whole Southun popperlace + Wuz Spartans all on the keen jump for Thermopperlies, + Thet set on the Lincolnites' bombs till they bust, + An' fight for the priv'lege o' dyin' the fust; + But Roanoke, Bufort, Millspring, an' the rest + Of our recent starn-foremost successes out West, + Hain't left us a foot for our swellin' to stand on,-- + + We've showed _too_ much o' wut Buregard calls _abandon_, + For all our Thermopperlies (an' it's a marcy + We hain't hed no more) hev ben clean vicy-varsy, + An' wut Spartans wuz lef' when the battle wuz done + Wuz them thet wuz too unambitious to run. + + Oh, ef we hed on'y jes' gut Reecognition, + Things now would ha' ben in a different position! + You'd ha' hed all you wanted: the paper blockade + Smashed up into toothpicks,--unlimited trade + In the one thing thet's needfle, till niggers, I swow, + Hed ben thicker 'n provisional shinplasters now,-- + Quinine by the ton 'ginst the shakes when they seize ye,-- + Nice paper to coin into C.S.A. specie; + The voice of the driver'd be heerd in our land, + An' the univarse scringe, ef we lifted our hand: + Wouldn't _thet_ be some like a fulfillin' the prophecies, + With all the fus' fem'lies in all the best offices? + 'T wuz a beautiful dream, an' all sorrer is idle,-- + But _ef_ Lincoln _would_ ha' hanged Mason an' Slidell! + They ain't o' no good in European pellices, + But think wut a help they'd ha' ben on their gallowses! + They'd ha' felt they wuz truly fulfillin' their mission, + An', oh, how dog-cheap we'd ha' gut Reecognition! + + But somehow another, wutever we've tried, + Though the the'ry's fust-rate, the facs _wun't_ coincide: + Facs are contrary 'z mules, an' ez hard in the mouth, + An' they allus hev showed a mean spite to the South. + Sech bein' the case, we hed best look about + For some kin' o' way to slip _our_ necks out: + Le''s vote our las' dollar, ef one can be found, + (An', at any rate, votin' it hez a good sound,)-- + Le''s swear thet to arms all our people is flyin', + (The critters can't read, an' wun't know how we're lyin',)-- + Thet Toombs is advancin' to sack Cincinnater, + With a rovin' commission to pillage an' slarter,-- + Thet we've throwed to the winds all regard for wut's lawfle, + An' gone in for sunthin' promiscu'sly awfle. + Ye see, hitherto, it's our own knaves an' fools + Thet we've used,--those for whetstones, an't' others ez tools,-- + An' now our las' chance is in puttin' to test + The same kin' o' cattle up North an' out West. + I----But, Gennlemen, here's a despatch jes' come in + Which shows thet the tide's begun turnin' agin,-- + Gret Cornfedrit success! C'lumbus eevacooated! + I mus' run down an' hev the thing properly stated, + An' show wut a triumph it is, an' how lucky + To fin'lly git red o' thet cussed Kentucky,-- + An' how, sence Fort Donelson, winnin' the day + Consists in triumphantly gittin' away. + + + + +REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES. + + +_The Sisters, Inisfail, and other Poems._ By AUBREY DE VERE. London. + +Whatever Mr. De Vere writes is welcomed by a select audience. Not taking +rank among the great masters of English poetry, he yet possesses a +genuine poetic faculty which distinguishes him from "the small harpers +with their glees" who counterfeit the true gift of Nature. In refined +and delicate sensibility, in purity of feeling, in elevation of tone, +there is no English writer of verse at the present day who surpasses +him. The fine instinct of a poet is united in him with the cultivated +taste of a scholar. There is nothing forced or spasmodic in his verse; +it is the true expression of character disciplined by thought and study, +of fancy quickened by ready sympathies, of feeling deepened and calmed +by faith. As is the case with most English poets since Wordsworth, he +invests the impressions received from the various aspects of Nature with +moral associations, and with fine spiritual insight he seeks out the +inner meaning of the external life of the earth. No one describes more +truthfully than he those transient beauties of Nature which in their +briefness and their exquisite variety of change elude the coarse grasp +of the common observer, and too frequently pass half unnoticed and +unfelt even by those whose temperament is susceptive of their inspiring +influences, but whose thoughts are occupied with the cares and business +of living. But it is especially as the poet of Ireland, and of the Roman +Church, that Mr. De Vere presents himself to us in this last volume; +and while, consequently, the subject and treatment of many of the poems +contained in it give to them a special rather than a universal interest, +the patriotic spirit and the fervor of faith manifest in them appeal +powerfully to the sympathies of readers in other countries and of other +creeds. "'Inisfail' may be regarded as a sort of National Chronicle, +cast in a form partly lyrical, partly narrative.... Its aim is to record +the past alone, and that chiefly as its chances might have been sung by +those old bards, who, consciously or unconsciously, uttered the voice +which comes from a people's heart." In this attempt Mr. De Vere has had +an uncommon measure of success. The strings of the Irish harp sound with +the cadences of fitting harmonies under his hand, as he sings of the +sorrows and the joys of Ireland, of the wild storms and the rare +sunshine of her pathetic history,--as he denounces vengeance on her +oppressors, or blesses the saints and the heroes who have made the land +dear and beautiful to its children. The key-note of the series of poems +which form this poetic chronicle is struck in the fine verses with which +it begins, entitled "History," and of which our space allows us to quote +but the opening stanza:-- + + "At my casement I sat by night, while the wind far off in dark valleys + Voluminous gathered and grew, and waxing swelled to a gale; + An hour I heard it, or more, ere yet it sobbed on my lattice: + Far off, 't was a People's moan; hard by, but a widow's wail. + Atoms we are, we men: of the myriad sorrow around us + Our littleness little grasps; and the selfish in that have no part: + Yet time with the measureless chain of a world-wide mourning hath + wound us; + History but counts the drops as they fall from a Nation's heart." + +One of the most vigorous poems in the volume is that called "The Bard +Ethell," and which represents this bard of the thirteenth century +telling in his old age of himself and his country, of his memories, and +of the wrongs that he and his land had alike suffered:-- + + "I am Ethell, the son of Conn; + Here I live at the foot of the hill; + I am clansman to Brian, and servant to none; + Whom I hated, I hate; whom I loved, love still." + +Here is a passage from near the end of this poem:-- + + "Ah me, that man who is made of dust + Should have pride toward God! 'T is an angel's sin! + I have often feared lest God, the All-Just, + Should bend from heaven and sweep earth clean, + Should sweep us all into corners and holes, + Like dust of the house-floor, both bodies and + souls; + I have often feared He would send some + wind + In wrath, and the nation wake up stone-blind! + In age or youth we have all wrought ill." + +But a large part of the volume before us is made up of poems that do not +belong to this Irish series, and the readers of the "Atlantic" will find +in it several pieces which they will recognize with pleasure as having +first appeared in our own pages, and which, once read, were not to be +readily forgotten. Mr. De Vere has expressed in several passages his +warm sympathy in our national affairs, and his clear appreciation of +the great cause, so little understood abroad, which we of the North are +engaged in upholding and maintaining. And although in these days of war +there is little reading of poetry, and little chance that this volume +will find the welcome it deserves and would receive in quieter times in +America, we yet trust that it will meet with worthy readers among those +who possess their souls in quietness in the midst of the noise of arms, +and to such we heartily commend it. + + +_A Book about Doctors_. By J. CORDY JEAFFRESON, Author of "Novels and +Novelists," "Crewe Else," etc., etc. New York: Rudd & Carleton. 12mo. + +Mr. Jeaffreson is not usually either a brilliant or a sensible man with +pen in hand, albeit he dates from "Rolls Chambers, Chancery Lane." He is +apt to select slow coaches, whenever he attempts a ride. His "Novels +and Novelists" is a sad move in the "deadly lively" direction, and his +"Crewe Rise" has not risen to much distinction among the reading crew. +In those volumes of departed rubbish he sinks very low, whenever he +essays to mount; but his dulness is innoxious, for few there be who can +say, "We have read him." His "Book about Doctors" is the best literary +venture he has yet made. It is not a dull volume. The anecdotes so +industriously collected keep attention alert, and one feels inclined to +applaud Mr. Jeaffreson as the leaves of his book are turned. + +Everything about Doctors is interesting. Here are a few Bible verses +which it will do no harm to quote in connection with Mr. Jeaffreson's +volume:-- + + "Honor a physician with the honor due + unto him for the uses which you have made + of him: for the Lord hath created him." + + "For of the Most High cometh healing, and + he shall receive honor of the king." + + "The skill of the physician shall lift up his + head; and in the sight of great men he shall + be in admiration." + + "The Lord hath created medicines out of + the earth; and he that is wise will not abhor + them." + +It was no unwise thing in Mr. Jeaffreson to bring so many noble men +together, as it were into one family. What "names embalmed" one meets +with in the collection! Here are Sydenham, Goldsmith, Smollett, Sir +Thomas Browne, and a golden line of other Doctors, nearly all the +way down to our own time. (Our well-beloved M.D. [Monthly Diamond] +contributor is too young to be included.) Keats is among the worthies, +although he got no farther into the mysteries than the apothecary's +counter. Meeting with this interesting series of splendid medicine-men +leads us to muse a good deal about the Faculty, and to re-read several +good anecdotes about the great symptom-watchers of the past and the +present day. + +When Sir Richard Blackmore asked the great Sydenham, "Prince of English +physicians," what he would advise him for medical reading, he is said to +have replied, "Read Don Quixote, Sir." Sensible and witty old man! + +We are struck with the cheerful character of nearly all the M.D.s +mentioned in the volume, and are constantly reminded of the advice we +once read of an old Doctor to a young one:--"Moreover, let me tell you, +my young doctor friend, that a cheerful face, and step, and neckcloth, +and button-hole, and an occasional hearty and kindly joke, a power of +executing and setting a-going a good laugh, are stock in our trade not +to be despised." + +"I may give an instance," says the same good-natured physician, "when +a joke was more and better than itself. A comely young wife, the +'cynosure' of her circle, was in bed, apparently dying from swelling and +inflammation of the throat, an inaccessible abscess stopping the way; +she could swallow nothing; everything had been tried. Her friends were +standing round the bed in misery and helplessness. '_Try her wi' a +compliment_,' said her husband, in a not uncomic despair. She had +genuine humor, as well as he; and an physiologists know, there is a sort +of mental tickling which is beyond and above control, being under the +reflex system, and instinctive as well as sighing. She laughed with her +whole body, and burst the abscess, and was well." + +Mr. Jeaffreson's book might be better, but it might be worse. We cannot +forgive him for his "Novels and Novelists" and his "Crewe Rise," two +works which go far to prove their author a person of indefatigable +incoherency; but we thank him for the industry which brought together so +much that is very readable about Doctors. + + +_John Brent_. By THEODORE WINTHROP, Author of "Cecil Dreeme." Boston: +Ticknor & Fields. 16mo. + +It is probable that we have not yet completely appreciated the value +of the bright and noble life which a wretched Rebel sharp-shooter +extinguished in the disastrous fight of Great Bethel. "John Brent" is +a book which gives us important aid in the attempt to form an adequate +conception of Winthrop's character. Its vivid pages shine throughout +with the author's brave and tender spirit. "Cecil Dreeme" was an +embodiment of his thoughts, observations, and imaginations; "John Brent" +shows us the inbred poetry and romance of the man in the grander form of +action. The scene is placed in the wild Western plains of America, among +men entirely free from the restraints of conventional life; and the +book has a buoyancy and brisk vitality, a dashing, daring, and jubilant +vigor, such as we are not accustomed to in ordinary romances of American +life. Sir Philip Sidney is the type of the Anglo-Saxon hero; but we +think that Winthrop was fully his match in delicacy and intrepidity, in +manly courage, and in sweet, instinctive tenderness. As to style, the +American far exceeds the Englishman. A certain conventional artifice and +dainty affectation clouded the clear and beautiful nature of Sidney, +when he wrote. The elaborate embroidery of thought, the stiff and +cumbrous Elizabethan _dress_ of language, with all its ruffles and +laces, make the "Arcadia" an imperfect exponent of Sidney's nature. +His intense thoughts, delicate emotions, and burning passions are half +concealed in the form he adopts for their expression. But Winthrop is as +fresh, natural, strong, and direct in his language as in his life. +He used words, not for ornament, but for expression. Every phrase is +stamped by a die supplied by reflection or feeling, and not a paragraph +in "John Brent" differs in spirit from the practical heroism which urged +the author to expose himself to certain death at Great Bethel. The +condensed, lucid, picturesque, and sharp-cut sentences, flooded with +will, show the nature of the man,--a man who announced no sentiments and +principles he was not willing to sacrifice himself to disseminate or +defend. A living energy of soul glows over the whole book,--swift, +fiery, brave, wholesome, sincere, impatient of all physical obstacles to +the operation of thought and affection, and eager to make stubborn facts +yield to the impatient pressure of spiritual purpose. + +We cannot say much in praise of the plot of "John Brent," but it at +least enables the author to supply a good framework for his incidents, +descriptions, and characters. The plot is based rather on possibilities +than probabilities; but the men and women he depicts are thoroughly +natural. It would be difficult to point to any other American novel +which furnishes incidents that can compare in vigor and vividness +with some of the incidents in this romance. The ride to rescue Helen +Clitheroe from her kidnappers is a masterpiece, worthy to rank with the +finest passages of Cooper or Scott. The fierce, swift black stallion, +"Don Fulano," a horse superior to any which Homer has immortalized, is +almost the hero of the romance. That Winthrop, with all his sympathy +with the "advanced" ideas and sentiments of the reformers and +philanthropists of the time, was not a mere prattling and scribbling +sentimentalist, is proved by his glorious idealization of this +magnificent horse. He raises the beast into a moral and intellectual +sympathy with his human rider, and there is a poetic justice in making +him die at last in an attempt to further the escape of a fugitive slave. + +The characterization of the book is original. Gerrian, Jake Shamberlain, +Armstrong, Sizzum, the Mormon preacher, are absolutely new creations. +Hugh Clitheroe may suggest Dickens's Skimpole and Hawthorne's Clifford, +but the character is developed under entirely new circumstances. As for +Wade and Brent, they are persons whom we all recognize as the old heroes +of romance, though the conditions under which they act are changed. +Helen, the heroine of the story, is a more puzzling character to the +critic; but, on the whole, we are bound to say that she is a new +development of womanhood. The author exhausts all the resources of his +genius in giving a "local habitation and a name" to this fond creation +of his imagination, and he has succeeded. Helen Clitheroe promises to be +one of those "beings of the mind" which will he permanently remembered. + +Heroism, active or passive, is the lesson taught by this romance, and +we know that the author, in his life, illustrated both phases of the +quality. His novels, which, when he was alive, the booksellers refused +to publish, are now passing through their tenth and twelfth editions. +Everybody reads "Cecil Dreeme" and "John Brent," and everybody must +catch a more or less vivid glimpse of the noble nature of their author. +But these books give but an imperfect expression of the soul of Theodore +Winthrop. They have great merits, but they are still rather promises +than performances. They hint of a genius which was denied full +development. The character, however, from which they derive their +vitality and their power to please, shines steadily through all the +imperfections of plot and construction. The novelist, after all, only +suggests the power and beauty of the man; and the man, though dead, will +keep the novels alive. Through them we can commune with a rare and noble +spirit, called away from earth before all its capacities of invention +and action were developed, but still leaving brilliant traces in +literature of the powers it was denied the opportunity adequately to +unfold. + + * * * * * + + +FOREIGN LITERATURE. + + +To keep pace with the productions of foreign literature is a task beyond +the possibilities of any reader. The bibliographical journals of France, +Germany, Italy, and Spain weekly present such copious lists of new +works, that a mere mention of only the principal ones would far exceed +the limits we have proposed to ourselves. However, from the chaos of +contemporary productions it is our intention to sift, as far as lies in +our power, such works as may with justice be styled _representative_ of +the country in which they are produced. Ranging in this introductory +article through the year 1861, we shall limit ourselves to a few of the +contributions upon French literary history. + +No branch of letters is richer at the present time than that in which +the writer, laying aside all thought of direct creativeness, confines +himself to the criticism of the works of the past or present, analyzing +and studying the influences that have been brought to hear upon the +poet, historian, or novelist, anatomizing literature and resolving it +into its elements, pointing out the action exercised upon thought and +expression by the age, and seeking the effects of these upon society +and politics as well as upon the general tastes and moral being of a +generation. Methods of writing are now discussed rather than put in +practice. We are in a transition age more than politically. Creative +genius seems to be resting for more marked and permanent channels to be +formed; so that, though every year gives birth to numberless works in +every branch of art, original production is rarer than the activity, the +restlessness of the time might lead us to expect. + +In no country has literary criticism more life than in France. It +engages the attention of the best minds. No writer, whatever be his +speciality, thinks it derogatory to give long and elaborate notices +in the daily press of new books or new editions of old books. Thus, +Sainte-Beuve in the "Moniteur," De Sacy, Saint-Marc Girardin, Philarète +Chasles, Prévost-Paradol in the "Journal des Débats," not to mention the +numerous writers of the "Revue des Deux Mondes," the "Européenne," and +the "Nationale," vie with each other in extracting from all that appears +what is most acceptable to the general reader. + +M. Sainte-Beuve may be taken as a type of the avowedly professional +critic. Whatever he may accomplish as the historian of Port-Royal, it is +to his weekly articles, informal and disconnected as they are, that he +owes his high rank among French authors. These "Causeries du Lundi" have +now reached the fourteenth volume.[A] In the last we find the same easy +admiration, facility of approbation, and suppleness that enable him to +praise the "Fanny" of Feydeau, calling it a poem, and on the next page +to do justice to the last volume of Thiers's "Consulate and Empire," +or to the recent publication of the Correspondence of Buffon. The most +important articles in the volume are those on Vauvenargues, on the Abbé +de Marolles, and on Bonstetten. + +[Footnote A: _Causeries du Lundi_. Par C.A. Sainte-Beuve, de l'Académie +Française. Tome Quatorziéme. Paris: Garnier Frères. 12mo. pp. 480.] + +Of quite a different school is M. Armand de Pontmartin, who, under the +titles of "Causeries du Samedi," "Causeries Littéraires," etc., has +now issued over a dozen volumes touching on all points of contemporary +letters, often very severe in their strictures. The last, "Les Semaines +Littéraires,"[B] contains notices of late works by Cousin, About, +Quinet, Laprade, and others, and concludes with an article on Scribe. +Pontmarlin represents the Catholic sentiment in literature. He measures +everything as it agrees or disagrees with Legitimacy and Ultramontanism. +His works are a continual defence of the Bourbons and the Pope. Modern +democracy he cannot pardon. Without seeking to deny the excesses and +shortcomings of his own party, he finds an explanation for all in the +levelling tendencies of the age. He cannot be too severe on the first +French Revolution and its results. "In letters," he tells us, "it has +led to materialism and anarchy, while the Bourbons personify for France +peace, glory," etc. + +[Footnote B: _Les Semaines Littéraires_. Troisième Série des Causeries +Littéraires. Par Armand de Pontmartin. Paris: Michel Lévy Frères. 12mo. +pp. 364.] + +Pontmartin is an able representative of the side he has taken. He +believes in and ably defends those heroes of literature so well +characterized as "Prophets of the Past," Chateaubriand, De Bonald, +and J. de Maistre. His special objects of antipathy are writers +like Michelet and Quinet, pamphleteers like About, and critics like +Sainte-Beuve. + +The last he cannot pardon for his work on Chateaubriand,[C] published in +the early part of the year 1861. The time is past for giving a fuller +account of this remarkable production of the historian of Port-Royal. +Suffice it to say, that, though it deals in very small criticism indeed, +though its author seems to have made it his task to sum up all the +weaknesses of one the prestige of whose name fills, in France at least, +the first half of this century, yet there exists no more valuable +contribution to the history of literature under the first Empire. It has +been called "a work no one would wish to have written, yet which is read +by all with exquisite pleasure." Nothing could be truer. + +[Footnote C: _Chateaubriand et son Groupe Littéraire sous l'Empire_. +Cours professé à Liége en 1848-1849, par C.A. Sainte-Beuve, de +l'Académie Française. Paris: Garnier Frères. 2 vols. 8vo. pp. 410, 457.] + +"Chateaubriand and his Literary Group under the Empire" is a course +of twenty-one lectures delivered by Sainte-Beuve at Liège, whither he +repaired soon after the Revolution of 1848 broke out in Paris. Fragments +of the work appeared in the "Revue des Deux Mondes," among others the +paper on Chênedollé, which forms the most interesting portion of the +second division. In this are to be found several original letters, now +published for the first time, casting much new light on the life of that +unfortunate poet. + +Of more general interest, however, are the pages on Chateaubriand +himself. It was the fate of this writer to be flattered beyond measure +in his lifetime, and now come the first judgments of posterity, which +deals with him no less harshly than it has already begun to deal +with another idol of the French people, Béranger. Sainte-Beuve has +constituted himself judge, reversing even his own adulatory articles, +as they may be read in the earlier volumes of the "Causeries." It is at +best an ungrateful task to dissect a reputation in the way in which we +find it done in the present work. It must seem strange to many a reader +that the very man who in early life could utter such sweet flattery, who +long was the foremost to bear incense, should now consider it his duty +"to seek the foot of clay beneath the splendid drapery, and to replace +about the statue the aromas of the sanctuary by the perfumes of the +boudoir." In spite of this, "Chateaubriand and his Literary Group" must +be ranked among the most remarkable of literary biographies. Here the +critic gives full scope to his inclination for minute analysis; the +history of the author of "René" explains his works, and these in turn +are made to tell his life,--that life so full of love of effect, and +constant painstaking to seem rather than to be. Even in his religious +sentiments the author of the "Genius of Christianity" appears lukewarm, +not to say more. + +In comprehensive works on literary history France is far from being +as rich as Germany. Beyond the native literature little has been +accomplished; and even in this, works of importance may be counted on +the fingers. The past year saw the conclusion of Nisard's work, the most +comprehensive history of French literature. The fourth volume[D] is +devoted to the eighteenth century, and concludes with a few general +chapters on the nineteenth. + +[Footnote D: _Histoire de la Literature Française_. Par D. Nisard, de +l'Académie Française, Inspecteur-Général de l'Enseignement Supérieur. +Tome Quatrième, Paris: Firmin Didot Frères, Fils, et Cie. 8vo. pp. 584.] + +The work of M. Gerusez, "History of French Literature from its Origin to +the Devolution,"[E] although it had the honor of being considered worthy +of the _prix Gobert_ by the French Academy, is far from satisfying the +requirements of general literary history. It may rather be considered +a systematic series of essays, beginning with the "Chansons de Geste," +analyzing several poems of the cycle of Charlemagne, and followed by +successive independent chapters on the Middle Ages, the revival of +letters, and modern times down to the Revolution. It will be remembered +that in 1859 M. Gerusez published a "History of Literature during the +French Revolution, 1789-1800." This also obtained a prize from the +Academy,--much more deservedly, we think, than the last production, when +we consider the interest he cast over the literary efforts of a period +much more marked by action than by artistic productiveness of any kind. +The German writer Schmidt-Weiszenfels in the same year issued a work +with the pretentious title, "History of the Revolution-Literature of +France."[F] This is little more than a declamatory production, wanting +in what is most characteristic of the German mind, original research. +The "Literary History of the National Convention," [G] by E. Maron, is +devoted more to politics than to letters. + +[Footnote E: Histoire de la Littérature Française, depuis ses Origines +jusqu'à la Revolution. Par Eugène Gerusez. Paris: Didier et Cie. 2 vols. +8vo. pp. 488, 507.] + +[Footnote F: _Geschichte der Französischen Revolutions-Literatur_, +1789-1795. Von Schmidt-Weiszenfels. Prague: Kober und Markgraf. 8vo. pp. +395.] + +[Footnote G: _Histoire Littéraire de la Convention Nationale_. Par +Eugène Maron. Paris: Poulet-Malassis et De Boise. 12mo. pp. 359.] + +To return to the volumes of M. Gerusez. It is rather a sign of poverty +in general literary history, that detached sketches, with little +connection beyond their chronological order, should have been deemed +worthy of the prize and the praises awarded to them. However, though +lacking in comprehensive views such as we have a right to expect from an +author who attempts to portray the rise, growth, and full expansion of +a literature, the work of M. Gerusez may be perused with pleasure and +profit by the student. It is clear and satisfactory in the details. +Thus, the pages devoted to the writers of the "Encyclopédie," though +few, may vie with any that have been written to set in their true light +men whose influence was so great on the generation that succeeded them. +If impartiality consisted in always steering in the _juste-milieu_, M. +Gerusez would be the most impartial of historians. As it is, we have to +thank him for a good book, regretting only that he has gone no farther. + +Far otherwise is it with M. Saint-Marc Girardin. The eloquent Sorbonne +professor has seen his fame increase with every new volume of his +"Course of Dramatic Literature." We have now the fourth volume.[H] "A +Course of Dramatic Literature";--it is more. It is the history of the +expression of Passion among the ancients and the moderns, by no means +confined to the drama. The present volume, as well as the third, +published several years ago, is devoted to the analysis of Love as +expressed in different ages and by different nations, under the two +divisions of _L'Amour Ingénu_ and _L'Amour Conjugal_. + +[Footnote H: _Cours de Littérature Dramatique._ Par Saint-Marc Girardin, +de l'Académie Française, Professeur à la Faculté des Lettres de Paris, +Membre du Conseil Impérial de l'Instruction Publique. Tome IV. Paris: +Charpentier.] + +The first he had studied in the authors of antiquity in his third +volume, beginning in this with the episode of Cupid and Psyche in +Apuleius; then following up, through the moderns, the expression +of Ingenuous Love in Corneille, La Fontaine, Sédaine, Bernardin de +Saint-Pierre, Milton, Gessner, Voss, André Chénier, and Chateaubriand. +For the last he finds more blame than praise. Indeed, this +effect-seeking writer, with all his genius, seemed less fitted than any +one to express the natural and spontaneous. His Atala, who charms us so +at the first reading, deals in studied emotions. As to René, his is the +vain sentimentality parading its own impotency for higher feelings, +a virtual boasting of want of soul,--the sickly dissatisfaction of +Werther, without his passion for an excuse. M. Saint-Marc Girardin then +follows up his subject through later authors, even in Madame George +Sand and in Madame Émile de Girardin. He is particularly severe upon +Lamartine, that poet "who for more than thirty years seemed best to +express love as our century understands it," but who in Raphael +and Graziella destroyed, by disclosing too much, the power of his +"Méditations Poétiques." + +On Conjugal Love the classic models are first consulted,--Oenone, +Evadne, Medea,--these characters being followed through the delineation +of modern dramatists. We know of no more exquisite criticism than +the pages devoted to Griseldis. Analyzing the accounts of Boccaccio, +Chaucer, and Perault, our author concludes with the play of "Munck +Bellinghausen." The last chapters, on "Love and Duty," are among the +most eloquently written in the volume. For style, M. Saint-Marc Girardin +is second to no living author of France. + +In this course we find an evident predilection for the models of +antiquity. When a comparison is instituted between the ancients and the +moderns, we feel pretty certain of the result before the writer has +proceeded very far. Not that we ever find a systematic idolizing of all +that is classic merely. Far from it. Modern writers are not neglected. +In this particular a genuine service is done to critical literature. It +often seems as if literary lecturers and historians were attacked by an +aesthetic presbyopy. For them the present age never produces anything +worth even a passing remark. The masterpieces they notice must be old +and time-honored. Not so in the present studies on the passions. Ponsard +finds his place side by side with older names. After an appreciative +notice of the Lucretia of Livy, we find a comment on the Lucretia which +may have been played the week before at the Théâtre Français. Nor is +it a slight service done to contemporary letters, when a master-critic +turns his thoughts to works which, if they do not hold the first rank, +yet, by the talent of their authors and the nature of their subjects, +have attracted all eyes for a time. Such are the writings of Madame +George Sand. Of these, "André," "La Mare au Diable," and "La Petite +Fadette" are reviewed with praise in the work under consideration, while +the force of criticism is expended on "Indiana," "Lelia," and "Jacques." + + * * * * * + +Whatever claims the academician Victor de Laprade may have to poetic +talent, he certainly sinks below mediocrity when he attempts to +discuss the principles of the art he practises. Since it has been his +good-fortune to be numbered among the illustrious Forty he has several +times attempted literary criticism, but never so extensively as in +his last work, "Questions d'Art et de Morale."[I] This is a series of +discursive essays, a few upon art in general, the greater part, however, +restricted to letters; the whole written in a poetic prose not without a +certain charm, but wearisome for continuous reading. + +[Footnote I: _Questions d'Art et de Morale._ Par Victor de Laprade, de +l'Académie Française. Paris: Didier et Cie. 8vo.] + +The object of M. de Laprade is to defend what he calls "Spiritualism in +Art." He wages an unrelenting war against the modern school of Realism. +It is not the representation of visible Nature that the artist must +seek; his aim must be "the representation of the invisible." He grows +eloquent when he develops his favorite theories, and always succeeds in +interesting when he applies them successively to all the arts. As to the +author's political opinions, he takes no pains to conceal them. His work +is an outcry against equality and universal suffrage. He traces the +apathy of poetic creativeness in France to the sovereignty usurped +everywhere "by the inferior elements of intelligence in the State." He +seems to think, that, as humanity grows older, art falls from its divine +ideal. Of contemporary architecture, he says that it can produce nothing +original save railroad depots and crystal palaces. "A glass architecture +is the only one that fully belongs to our age." Music, the "vaguest and +most sensuous of all the arts," he regards as the art of the present. +The religious worship of the future appears to him "a symphony with a +thousand instruments executed under a dome of glass." + +As to the purely literary essays of M. de Laprade, they may be read both +with more pleasure and more profit than those in which he attempts to +discuss the principles of aesthetics. "French Tradition in Literature," +and "Poetry, and Industrialism," are full of suggestive thoughts, and, +coming in the latter half of the volume, make us forget the pretentious +nature of the first. + + * * * * * + +M. Gustave Merlet is a more modest opponent of some of the tendencies +of the age. He presents his first book to the public under the title, +"Réalisme et Fantaisie,"[J] earnestly and loyally attacking the two +extremes of literature. + +[Footnote J: _Le Réalisme et la Fantaisie dans la Littérature_. Par +Gustave Merlet. Paris: Didier et Cie. 12mo. pp. 431.] + +Two styles of writing, diametrically opposed in every particular, have +of late years flourished in the lighter productions of France. Some +there are who would seek to incarnate in letters Nature as it is, +without adornings, without ideal additions. The cry of the upholders +of this doctrine is: Truth in art, war against the freaks of the +imagination that colors all in unreal tints. The writers who have +adopted such sentiments have been termed "Realists," much to their +dissatisfaction. Balzac was the greatest of them. Champfleury may be +called the most strenuous supporter of the system. There is a certain +force, a false air of truth, in this daguerreotype process of writing, +that seduces at first sight. When a man of some genius, as Gustave +Flaubert in "Madame Bovary," undertakes to paint Nature, he sets details +otherwise revolting in such relief that the very novelty and boldness of +the attempt put us off our guard, and we are in danger of admitting as +beauties what, after all, are only audacities. + +The other extreme into which the literature of the day in France has +fallen is an excess of fancy. A writer like Arsène Houssaye will write +his "King Voltaire" or his "Madame de Pompadour," or Capefigue his +"Madame de la Vallière," in which the judgment seems to have been +set aside, and historical facts accumulated in some opium-dream are +strangely woven into a narrative representing reality, with about as +much truth as Oriental arabesques, or the adornings of richly wrought +tapestry. This extreme is even more dangerous than the former, for it +makes of letters a mere plaything, and recommends itself to many by its +very faults. Paradox and overdrawn scenes usurp the place of the real. +The world presented by the exclusive worshippers of fancy is +little better than that "Pompadour" style of painting in which the +carnation-tipped checks of shepherds and shepherdesses take the place of +a too healthy Rubens-like portraiture. There are dainty, well-trimmed +lambs, with pretty blue favors tied about their necks, just like +_dragées_ and _bonbons_. As we wander among those opera-swains in silk +hose and those shepherdesses in satin bodices, their perfumes tire +and nauseate, till we fairly wish for a good breeze wafted from some +farm-yard, reconciled in a measure to the extravagances of the so-called +"school of Nature." + +M. Merlet's subject, it may be seen, is of interest merely to the +student of the latest French literature. A more comprehensive study +would not have been out of place in his volume. To those who may be +interested in writers like Murger, Feydeau, Houssaye, and Brifaut, the +book is full of interesting matter. To the general reader it may be of +value as characterizing with fidelity some of the tendencies of French +thought. + + * * * * * + +We must not omit mentioning a work published in Germany on the +"Literature of the Second Empire since the _Coup d'État_ of the Second +of December, 1852."[K] The nature of this sketch could almost be +predicated with certainty from the state of feeling towards France in +the capital in which it was issued, and the encomiums it received from +the Prussian political press. The author, William Reymond, who has +proved himself no mean critic in some of his former essays upon the +modern productions of France, addresses himself almost exclusively to a +German public. His work, as he himself seemed to fear, is not calculated +for the taste of Paris, even if it were considered unobjectionable there +on the score of the political strictures that are introduced, whether in +the discussion of the last play or in the analysis of the last volume of +poems. + +[Footnote K: _Études sur la Littérature du Second Empire Français, +depuis le Coup d'État du deux Decembre._ Par William Reymond. Berlin: A. +Charisius. 12mo. pp. 227.] + +The truth is, M. Reymond, with much apparent praise, very nearly comes +to the conclusion that the second Empire has no literature, and very +little philosophy is granted to it in the chapter, "What remains of +Philosophy in France." The Novel and the Theatre fare little better at +his hands. He has literally made a police investigation of what is most +objectionable in French letters, citing now and then some great name, +but dwelling with complacency on what is deserving of censure. The +influence of France, and of Paris in particular, on the tastes of the +Continent, irritates him. He seeks to impress upon his readers the +venality of letters and the general debasement of character and of +talent that are prevalent in that capital. Such is the spirit of these +"Études." The author has, unfortunately, not to seek far for a practical +corroboration of his theory, though it is but justice to say that the +verses he quotes as characteristic are far from being so. It is to be +feared that M. Reymond has rather sought out the blemishes. He has found +many, we admit. His readers will thank him for his clever exposition of +them, satisfied in many cases to accept the results he presents, without +feeling inclined to make such a personal investigation into the lower +regions of letters. + + * * * * * + +"The Political and Literary History of the Press in France,"[L] by +Eugene Hatin, is now concluded. As early as 1846, this author published +a small work, "Histoire du Journal en France." Since that time he has +devoted himself exclusively to the study of French journalism. Though +liberal in his views, he is not in favor of unlimited liberty of the +press. He believes it to be the interest of society that a curb should +be put on its excesses. "What we must hope for is a liberty that may +have full power for good, but not for evil." + +[Footnote L: _Histoire Politique et Littéraire de la Presse en France._ +Avec une Introduction Historique sur les Origines du Journal et la +Bibliographie Générale des Journaux, depuis leur Origine. Par Eugène +Hatin. Paris: Poulet-Malassis et De Boise. 8 vols. 12mo.] + +The two volumes published in 1861 contain the history of journalism +during the latter part of the French Revolution, under the first Empire, +the Restoration, and the Government of July. The work may be said to +conclude with 1848, as less than twenty pages are devoted to the twelve +years following. In this, however, the writer has done all he could be +expected to do. This is no time for the candid historian to utter his +thoughts of the present _régime_ in France. Since the fatal decree of +the 17th of February, 1852, the press has had only so much of life as +the present sovereign has thought fit to grant it. Then it was that a +representative of the people uttered the words,--"We must overthrow the +press, as we have overthrown the barricades." Such were the sentiments +of the National Assembly,--not understanding, that, when it struck at +such an ally, it destroyed itself. And, indeed, it was but a short time +before the tribune shared the fate of journalism. Better things had been +hoped on the accession of the present Minister of the Interior, but as +yet they have not been realized. + + + + +RECENT AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS + +RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS OF THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + + +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 of the U.S. +Army. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & Brothers. 16mo. paper, pp. 63. 25 +cts. + +The Artist's Married Life; being that of Albert Dürer. Translated from +the German of Leopold Scheffer, by Mrs. J.R. Stoddart. Revised Edition, +with Memoir. Boston and Cambridge. J. Munroe & Co. 16mo. pp. xxviii., +204. $1.00. + +Young Benjamin Franklin; or, The Right Road through Life. A Boy's Book +on a Boy's Own Subject. By Henry Mayhew, Author of "The Peasant-Boy +Philosopher," etc. With Illustrations by John Gilbert. New York. Harper +& Brothers. 16mo. pp. 561. $1.00. + +The Stokesley Secret; or, How the Pig paid the Rent. By the Author of +"The Heir of Redclyffe," etc. New York. D. Appleton & Co. 18mo. pp. 245. +50 cts. + +Chinese and Indo-European Roots and Analogues. First Number. By Pliny +Earle Chase, A.M. Philadelphia. Butler & Co. 8vo. paper, pp. 48. 50 cts. + +The Works of Charles Dickens. Household Edition. Illustrated from +Drawings by F.O.C. Darley and John Gilbert. Christmas Stories. In Two +Volumes. New York. J.G. Gregory. 16mo. pp. 300, 300. $1.50. + +Hickory Hall; or, The Outcast. A Romance of the Blue Ridge. By Mrs. Emma +D.E.N. Southworth. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & Brothers. 8vo. paper, +pp. 136. 50 cts. + +Alleghania: A Geographical and Statistical Memoir, exhibiting the +Strength of the Union and the Weakness of Slavery in the Mountain +Districts of the South. By James W. Taylor. St. Paul. J. Davenport. 8vo. +paper, pp. 24. 10 cts. + +A Treatise on Ordnance and Naval Gunnery. Compiled and arranged as a +Text-Book for the U.S. Naval Academy. By Lieutenant Edward Simpson, U.S. +Navy. Second Edition, revised and enlarged. New York. D. Van Nostrand. +8vo. pp. 493. $4.00. + +The Constitutional History of England, since the Accession of George the +Third. 1760-1860. By Thomas Erskine May, C.B. In Two Volumes. Vol. I. +Boston. Crosby & Nichols. 12mo. pp. 484. $1.25. + +Dinah. New York. C. Scribner. 12mo. pp. 466. $1.25. + +Tom Tiddler's Ground. Christmas and New-Year's Story for 1862. From +"All the Year Round." By Charles Dickens. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & +Brothers. 8vo. paper. pp. 64. 25 cts. + +A Pedestrian Tour of Thirty-Seven Days in the Alps of Switzerland and +Savoy. By Charles Henry Jones. Reading, Pa. J.L. Getz. 18mo. paper. pp. +118. 25 cts. + +Practical Christianity. A Treatise specially designed for Young Men. By +John S.C. Abbott. New York. Harper & Brothers. 16mo. pp. 302. 50 cts. + +The Sutherlands. By the Author of "Rutledge." New York. G.W. Carleton. +12mo. pp. 474. $1.25. + +Memoir of the Duchess of Orléans. By the Marquess de H. Together with +Biographical Souvenirs and Original Letters. Collected by Professor G.H. +de Schubert. Translated from, the French. Second Edition. New York. C. +Scribner. 12mo. pp. 391. $1.00. + +The Uprising of a Great People. The United States in 1861. To which is +added, A Word of Peace on the Difference between England and the United +States. From the French of Count Agénor de Gasparin. By Mary L. Booth. +New American Edition, from the Author's Revised Edition. New York. C. +Scribner. 12mo. pp. xiv., 298. 75 cts. + +Fort Lafayette; or, Love and Secession. A Novel. By Benjamin Wood. New +York. G.W. Carleton. 12mo. pp. 300. $1.00. + +The National School for the Soldier. An Elementary Work on Military +Tactics, in Question and Answer. Conforming to the Army-Regulations +adopted and approved by the War Department of the United States. By +Captain W.W. Van Ness. New York. G.W. Carleton. 24mo. pp. 75. 50 cts. + +The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus under the Constitution. By +Horace Binney. Philadelphia. T.B. Pugh. 16mo. pp. 52. 25 cts. + +The Army-Officer's Pocket-Companion; principally designed for +Staff-Officers in the Field. Partly translated from the French of M. de +Rouvre, Lieutenant-Colonel of the French Staff-Corps; with Additions +from Standard American, English, and French Authorities. By William P. +Craighill, First Lieutenant U.S. Corps of Engineers, Assistant Professor +of Engineering at the U.S. Military Academy. New York. D. Van Nostrand. +18mo. pp. 314. $1.50. + +Saint Gildas; or, The Three Paths. By Julia Kavanagh, Author of +"Nathalie," etc. Concord, N.H. E.C. Eastman. 16mo. pp. 219. 63 cts. + +Infantry Tactics, for the Instruction, Exercise, and Manoeuvres of the +Soldier, a Company, Line of Skirmishers, Battalion, Brigade, or Corps +d'Armée. By Brigadier-General Silas Casey, U.S. Army. In Three Volumes. +New York. D. Van Nostrand. 18mo. pp. 279, 272, 183. $2.50. + +A Text-Book of the History of Doctrines. By Dr. K.R. Hagenbach, +Professor of Theology in the University of Basle. The Edinburgh +Translation of C.W. Buch, revised, with Large Additions from the Fourth +German Edition, and other Sources. By Henry B. Smith, D.D., Professor in +the Union Theological Seminary of the City of New York. Volume II. New +York. Sheldon & Co. 8vo. pp. 558. $2.50. + +The True Story of the Barons of the South; or, The Rationale of the +American Conflict. By E.W. Reynolds, Author of "The Records of Bubbleton +Parish," etc. Boston. Walker, Wise, & Co. 16mo. pp. xii., 240. 75 cts. + +Charles O'Malley, the Irish Dragoon. By Charles Lever. Philadelphia. +T.B. Peterson & Brothers. 8vo. paper, pp. 324. 50 cts. + +The Flower of the Prairie. By Gustave Aimard. Philadelphia. T.B. +Peterson & Brothers. 8vo. paper, pp. 165. 50 cts. + +Mistakes of Educated Men. By John S. Hart, LL.D. Philadelphia. J.C. +Garrigues. 16mo. paper, pp. 77. 25 cts. + +A Strange Story. A Novel. By Sir E. Bulwer Lytton, Author of "The +Caxtons." With Illustrations. New York. Harper & Brothers. 8vo. paper, +pp. 195. 25 cts. + +Teach Us to Pray; being Experimental, Doctrinal, and Practical +Observations on the Lord's Prayer. By the Rev. John Cumming, D.D., +F.R.S.E., Author of "The Great Tribulation," etc. New York. G.W. +Carleton. 12mo. pp. 303. $1.00. + +The Law of Freedom and Bondage in the United States. By John Codman +Kurd, Counsellor-at-Law. In Two Volumes. Vol. II. Boston. Little, Brown, +& Co. New York. D. Van Nostrand. 8vo. pp. xliv., 800. $3.50. + +The Young Step-Mother; or, A Chronicle of Mistakes. By the Author of +"The Heir of Redclyffe," "Heartsease," etc. In Two Volumes. New York. D. +Appleton & Co. 16mo. pp. 294, 307. $1.50. + +A Primary Geography, on the Basis of the Object Method of Instruction. +Illustrated with Numerous Engravings and Pictorial Maps. By Fordyce A. +Allen, Principal of the Chester-County Normal School, West Chester, Pa. +Philadelphia. Lippincott & Co. 4to. pp. 56. 50 cts. + +Report of the Superintendent of Common Schools of Pennsylvania, for the +Year ending June 3, 1861. Harrisburg. Printed for the State. 8vo. pp. +254. + +The Works of Francis Bacon, Baron of Verulam, Viscount St. Albans, and +Lord High Chancellor of England. Collected and Edited by James Spedding, +M.A., of Trinity College, Cambridge; Robert Leslie Ellis, M.A., +late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge; and Douglas Denon Heath, +Barrister-at-Law, late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. Vol. III. +Boston. Brown & Taggard. 12mo. pp. 502. $1.50. + +The Spirit of the Hebrew Poetry. By Isaac Taylor, Author of "Saturday +Evening," etc., etc. With a Biographical Introduction by Wm. Adams, +D.D., Pastor of the Madison-Square Presbyterian Church, N.Y. New York. +G.W. Carleton. 8vo. pp. 386. + +Ethical and Physiological Inquiries, chiefly Relative to Subjects of +Popular Interest. By A.H. Dana. New York. C. Scribner. 12mo. pp. 308. +$1.00. + +The New American Cyclopaedia: A Popular Dictionary of General Knowledge. +Edited by George Ripley and Charles A. Dana. Volume XIV. Reed-Spire. New +York. D. Appleton & Co. 8vo. pp. 850, viii. $3.00. + +Tracts for Priests and People. By Various Writers. Boston. Walker, Wise, +& Co. 12mo. pp. 372. $1.00. + +Method of Teachers' Institutes, and the Theory of Education. By +Samuel P. Bates. A.M., Deputy-Superintendent of the Common Schools of +Pennsylvania, and Author of "Institute Lectures." New York. Barnes & +Burr. 8vo. pp. 75. 50 cts. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 54, +April, 1862, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY *** + +***** This file should be named 12097-8.txt or 12097-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/2/0/9/12097/ + +Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Tonya Allen and PG Distributed +Proofreaders. Produced from page scans provided by Cornell University. + + +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. + + https://www.gutenberg.org/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 + + diff --git a/old/12097-8.zip b/old/12097-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..423e459 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/12097-8.zip diff --git a/old/12097.txt b/old/12097.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2756426 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/12097.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9358 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 54, April, 1862, 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, Vol. 9, No. 54, April, 1862 + +Author: Various + +Release Date: April 21, 2004 [EBook #12097] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY *** + + + + +Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Tonya Allen and PG Distributed +Proofreaders. Produced from page scans provided by Cornell University. + + + + + + +THE + +ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + +A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS. + +VOL. IX.--APRIL, 1862.--NO. LIV. + + + + +LETTER TO A YOUNG CONTRIBUTOR. + + +My dear young gentleman or young lady,--for many are the Cecil Dreemes +of literature who superscribe their offered manuscripts with very +masculine names in very feminine handwriting,--it seems wrong not to +meet your accumulated and urgent epistles with one comprehensive reply, +thus condensing many private letters into a printed one. And so large a +proportion of "Atlantic" readers either might, would, could, or should +be "Atlantic" contributors also, that this epistle will be sure of +perusal, though Mrs. Stowe remain uncut and the Autocrat go for an hour +without readers. + +Far from me be the wild expectation that every author will not +habitually measure the merits of a periodical by its appreciation of +his or her last manuscript. I should as soon ask a young lady not to +estimate the management of a ball by her own private luck in respect +to partners. But it is worth while at least to point out that in the +treatment of every contribution the real interests of editor and writer +are absolutely the same, and any antagonism is merely traditional, like +the supposed hostility between France and England, or between England +and Slavery. No editor can ever afford the rejection of a good thing, +and no author the publication of a bad one. The only difficulty lies in +drawing the line. Were all offered manuscripts unequivocally good or +bad, there would be no great trouble; it is the vast range of mediocrity +which perplexes: the majority are too bad for blessing and too good for +banning; so that no conceivable reason can be given for either fate, +save that upon the destiny of any single one may hang that of a hundred +others just like it. But whatever be the standard fixed, it is equally +for the interest of all concerned that it be enforced without flinching. + +Nor is there the slightest foundation for the supposed editorial +prejudice against new or obscure contributors. On the contrary, every +editor is always hungering and thirsting after novelties. To take the +lead in bringing forward a new genius is as fascinating a privilege as +that of the physician who boasted to Sir Henry Halford of having been +the first man to discover the Asiatic cholera and to communicate it to +the public. It is only stern necessity which compels the magazine to +fall back so constantly on the regular old staff of contributors, whose +average product has been gauged already; just as every country-lyceum +attempts annually to arrange an entirely new list of lecturers, and ends +with no bolder experiment than to substitute Chapin and Beecher in place +of last year's Beecher and Chapin. + +Of course no editor is infallible, and the best magazine contains an +occasional poor article. Do not blame the unfortunate conductor. He +knows it as well as you do,--after the deed is done. The newspapers +kindly pass it over, still preparing their accustomed opiate of sweet +praises, so much for each contributor, so much for the magazine +collectively,--like a hostess with her tea-making, a spoonful for each +person and one for the pot. But I can tell you that there is an official +person who meditates and groans, meanwhile, in the night-watches, to +think that in some atrocious moment of good-nature or sleepiness he left +the door open and let that ungainly intruder in. Do you expect him to +acknowledge the blunder, when you tax him with it? Never,--he feels it +too keenly. He rather stands up stoutly for the surpassing merits of the +misshapen thing, as a mother for her deformed child; and as the mother +is nevertheless inwardly imploring that there may never be such another +born to her, so be sure that it is not by reminding the editor of this +calamity that you can allure him into risking a repetition of it. + +An editor thus shows himself to be but human; and it is well enough to +remember this fact, when you approach him. He is not a gloomy despot, +no Nemesis or Rhadamanthus, but a bland and virtuous man, exceedingly +anxious to secure plenty of good subscribers and contributors, and very +ready to perform any acts of kindness not inconsistent with this +grand design. Draw near him, therefore, with soft approaches and mild +persuasions. Do not treat him like an enemy, and insist on reading your +whole manuscript aloud to him, with appropriate gestures. His time has +some value, if yours has not; and he has therefore educated his eye till +it has become microscopic, like a naturalist's, and can classify nine +out of ten specimens by one glance at a scale or a feather. Fancy an +ambitious echinoderm claiming a private interview with Agassiz, to +demonstrate by verbal arguments that he is a mollusk! Besides, do +you expect to administer the thing orally to each of the two hundred +thousand, more or less, who turn the leaves of the "Atlantic"? You are +writing for the average eye, and must submit to its verdict. "Do not +trouble yourself about the light on your statue; it is the light of the +public square which must test its value." + +Do not despise any honest propitiation, however small, in dealing with +your editor. Look to the physical aspect of your manuscript, and prepare +your page so neatly that it shall allure instead of repelling. Use good +pens, black ink, nice white paper and plenty of it. Do not emulate +"paper-sparing Pope," whose chaotic manuscript of the "Iliad," written +chiefly on the backs of old letters, still remains in the British +Museum. If your document be slovenly, the presumption is that its +literary execution is the same, Pope to the contrary notwithstanding. +An editor's eye becomes carnal, and is easily attracted by a comely +outside. If you really wish to obtain his good-will for your production, +do not first tax his time for deciphering it, any more than in visiting +a millionnaire to solicit a loan you would begin by asking him to pay +for the hire of the carriage which takes you to his door. + +On the same principle, send your composition in such a shape that it +shall not need the slightest literary revision before printing. Many a +bright production dies discarded which might have been made thoroughly +presentable by a single day's labor of a competent scholar, in shaping, +smoothing, dovetailing, and retrenching. The revision seems so slight +an affair that the aspirant cannot conceive why there should be so much +fuss about it. + + "The piece, you think, is incorrect; why, take it; + I'm all submission; what you'd have it, make it." + +But to discharge that friendly office no universal genius is salaried; +and for intellect in the rough there is no market. + +Rules for style, as for manners, must be chiefly negative: a positively +good style indicates certain natural powers in the individual, but an +unexceptionable style is merely a matter of culture and good models. Dr. +Channing established in New England a standard of style which really +attained almost the perfection of the pure and the colorless, and the +disciplinary value of such a literary influence, in a raw and crude +nation, has been very great; but the defect of this standard is that it +ends in utterly renouncing all the great traditions of literature, and +ignoring the magnificent mystery of words. Human language may be polite +and powerless in itself, uplifted with difficulty into expression by the +high thoughts it utters, or it may in itself become so saturated with +warm life and delicious association that every sentence shall palpitate +and thrill with the mere fascination of the syllables. The statue is +not more surely included in the block of marble than is all conceivable +splendor of utterance in "Worcester's Unabridged." And as Ruskin says of +painting that it is in the perfection and precision of the instantaneous +line that the claim to immortality is made, so it is easy to see that a +phrase may outweigh a library. Keats heads the catalogue of things real +with "sun, moon, and passages of Shakspeare"; and Keats himself has +left behind him winged wonders of expression which are not surpassed by +Shakspeare, or by any one else who ever dared touch the English tongue. +There may be phrases which shall be palaces to dwell in, treasure-houses +to explore; a single word may be a window from which one may perceive +all the kingdoms of the earth and the glory of them. Oftentimes a word +shall speak what accumulated volumes have labored in vain to utter: +there may be years of crowded passion in a word, and half a life in a +sentence. + +Such being the majesty of the art you seek to practise, you can at least +take time and deliberation before dishonoring it. Disabuse yourself +especially of the belief that any grace or flow of style can come from +writing rapidly. Haste can make you slipshod, but it can never make +you graceful. With what dismay one reads of the wonderful fellows in +fashionable novels, who can easily dash off a brilliant essay in a +single night! When I think how slowly my poor thoughts come in, how +tardily they connect themselves, what a delicious prolonged perplexity +it is to cut and contrive a decent clothing of words for them, as a +little girl does for her doll,--nay, how many new outfits a single +sentence sometimes costs before it is presentable, till it seems at +last, like our army on the Potomac, as if it never could be thoroughly +clothed,--I certainly should never dare to venture into print, but for +the confirmed suspicion that the greatest writers have done even so. I +can hardly believe that there is any autograph in the world so precious +or instructive as that scrap of paper, still preserved at Ferrara, on +which Ariosto wrote in sixteen different revisions one of his most +famous stanzas. Do you know, my dear neophyte, how Balzac used to +compose? As a specimen of the labor that sometimes goes to make an +effective style, the process is worth recording. When Balzac had a new +work in view, he first spent weeks in studying from real life for it, +haunting the streets of Paris by day and night, note-book in hand. His +materials gained, he shut himself up till the book was written, perhaps +two months, absolutely excluding everybody but his publisher. He emerged +pale and thin, with the complete manuscript in his hand,--not only +written, but almost rewritten, so thoroughly was the original copy +altered, interlined, and rearranged. This strange production, almost +illegible, was sent to the unfortunate printers; with infinite +difficulty a proof-sheet was obtained, which, being sent to the author, +was presently returned in almost as hopeless a chaos of corrections as +the manuscript first submitted. Whole sentences were erased, others +transposed, everything modified. A second and a third followed, alike +torn to pieces by the ravenous pen of Balzac. The despairing printers +labored by turns, only the picked men of the office being equal to the +task, and they relieving each other at hourly intervals, as beyond +that time no one could endure the fatigue. At last, by the fourth +proof-sheet, the author too was wearied out, though not contented. "I +work ten hours out of the twenty-four," said he, "over the elaboration +of my unhappy style, and I am never satisfied, myself, when all is +done." + +Do not complain that this scrupulousness is probably wasted, after all, +and that nobody knows. The public knows. People criticize higher than +they attain. When the Athenian audience hissed a public speaker for a +mispronunciation, it did not follow that any one of the malcontents +could pronounce as well as the orator. In our own lyceum-audiences there +may not be a man who does not yield to his own private eccentricities of +dialect, but see if they do not appreciate elegant English from Phillips +or Everett! Men talk of writing down to the public taste who have never +yet written up to that standard. "There never yet was a good tongue," +said old Fuller, "that wanted ears to hear it." If one were expecting to +be judged by a few scholars only, one might hope somehow to cajole them; +but it is this vast, unimpassioned, unconscious tribunal, this average +judgment of intelligent minds, which is truly formidable,--something +more undying than senates and more omnipotent than courts, something +which rapidly cancels all transitory reputations, and at last becomes +the organ of eternal justice and infallibly awards posthumous fame. + +The first demand made by the public upon every composition is, of +course, that it should be attractive. In addressing a miscellaneous +audience, whether through eye or ear, it is certain that no man living +has a right to be tedious. Every editor is therefore compelled to insist +that his contributors should make themselves agreeable, whatever else +they may do. To be agreeable, it is not necessary to be amusing; an +essay may be thoroughly delightful without a single witticism, while a +monotone of jokes soon grows tedious. Charge your style with life, +and the public will not ask for conundrums. But the profounder your +discourse, the greater must necessarily be the effort to refresh and +diversify. I have observed, in addressing audiences of children in +schools and elsewhere, that there is no fact so grave, no thought so +abstract, but you can make it very interesting to the small people, if +you will only put in plenty of detail and illustration; and I have not +observed that in this respect grown men are so very different. If, +therefore, in writing, you find it your mission to be abstruse, fight to +render your statement clear and attractive, as if your life depended on +it: your literary life does depend on it, and, if you fail, relapses +into a dead language, and becomes, like that of Coleridge, only a +_Biographia Literaria_. Labor, therefore, not in thought alone, but in +utterance; clothe and reclothe your grand conception twenty times, until +you find some phrase that with its grandeur shall be lucid also. It is +this unwearied literary patience that has enabled Emerson not merely to +introduce, but even to popularize, thoughts of such a quality as never +reached the popular mind before. And when such a writer, thus laborious +to do his utmost for his disciples, becomes after all incomprehensible, +we can try to believe that it is only that inevitable obscurity of vast +thought which Coleridge said was a compliment to the reader. + +In learning to write availably, a newspaper-office is a capital +preparatory school. Nothing is so good to teach the use of materials, +and to compel to pungency of style. Being always at close quarters with +his readers, a journalist must shorten and sharpen his sentences, or he +is doomed. Yet this mental alertness is bought at a severe price; such +living from hand to mouth cheapens the whole mode of intellectual +existence, and it would seem that no successful journalist could ever +get the newspaper out of his blood, or achieve any high literary +success. + +For purposes of illustration and elucidation, and even for amplitude of +vocabulary, wealth of accumulated materials is essential; and whether +this wealth be won by reading or by experience makes no great +difference. Coleridge attended Davy's chemical lectures to acquire new +metaphors, and it is of no consequence whether one comes to literature +from a library, a machine-shop, or a forecastle, provided he has learned +to work with thoroughness the soil he knows. After all is said and done, +however, books remain the chief quarries. Johnson declared, putting the +thing perhaps too mechanically, "The greater part of an author's time is +spent in reading in order to write; a man will turn over half a library +to make one book." Addison collected three folios of materials before +publishing the first number of the "Spectator." Remember, however, that +copious preparation has its perils also, in the crude display to which +it tempts. The object of high culture is not to exhibit culture, but +its results. You do not put guano on your garden that your garden may +blossom guano. Indeed, even for the proper subordination of one's own +thoughts the same self-control is needed; and there is no severer test +of literary training than in the power to prune out one's most cherished +sentence, when it grows obvious that the sacrifice will help the +symmetry or vigor of the whole. + +Be noble both in the affluence and the economy of your diction; spare +no wealth that you can put in, and tolerate no superfluity that can be +struck out. Remember the Lacedemonian who was fined for saying that in +three words which might as well have been expressed in two. Do not throw +a dozen vague epithets at a thing, in the hope that some one of them +will fit; but study each phrase so carefully that the most ingenious +critic cannot alter it without spoiling the whole passage for everybody +but himself. For the same reason do not take refuge, as was the +practice a few years since, in German combinations, heart-utterances, +soul-sentiments, and hyphenized phrases generally; but roll your thought +into one good English word. There is no fault which seems so hopeless as +commonplaceness, but it is really easier to elevate the commonplace +than to reduce the turgid. How few men in all the pride of culture can +emulate the easy grace of a bright woman's letter! + +Have faith enough in your own individuality to keep it resolutely down +for a year or two. A man has not much intellectual capital who cannot +treat himself to a brief interval of modesty. Premature individualism +commonly ends either in a reaction against the original whims, or in a +mannerism which perpetuates them. For mannerism no one is great enough, +because, though in the hands of a strong man it imprisons us in novel +fascination, yet we soon grow weary, and then hate our prison forever. +How sparkling was Reade's crisp brilliancy in "Peg Woffington"!--but +into what disagreeable affectations it has since degenerated! Carlyle +was a boon to the human race, amid the lameness into which English style +was declining; but who is not tired of him and his catchwords now? He +was the Jenner of our modern style, inoculating and saving us all by his +quaint frank Germanism, then dying of his own disease. Now the age has +outgrown him, and is approaching a mode of writing which unites the +smoothness of the eighteenth century with the vital vigor of the +seventeenth, so that Sir Thomas Browne and Andrew Marvell seem quite as +near to us as Pope or Addison,--a style penetrated with the best spirit +of Carlyle, without a trace of Carlylism. + +Be neither too lax nor too precise in your use of language: the one +fault ends in stiffness, the other in slang. Some one told the Emperor +Tiberius that he might give citizenship to men, but not to words. To be +sure, Louis XIV. in childhood, wishing for a carriage, called for _mon +carrosse_, and made the former feminine a masculine to all future +Frenchmen. But do not undertake to exercise these prerogatives of +royalty until you are quite sure of being crowned. The only thing I +remember of our college text-book of Rhetoric is one admirable verse of +caution which it quoted:-- + + "In words, as fashions, the same rule will hold, + Alike fantastic, if too new or old; + Be not the first by whom the new are tried, + Nor yet the last to lay the old aside." + +Especially do not indulge any fantastic preference for either Latin or +Anglo-Saxon, the two great wings on which our magnificent English soars +and sings; we can spare neither. The combination gives an affluence of +synonymes and a delicacy of discrimination such as no unmixed idiom can +show. + +While you utterly shun slang, whether native-or foreign-born,--(at +present, by the way, our popular writers use far less slang than the +English,)--yet do not shrink from Americanisms, so they be good ones. +American literature is now thoroughly out of leading-strings; and the +nation which supplied the first appreciative audience for Carlyle, +Tennyson, and the Brownings, can certainly trust its own literary +instincts to create the new words it needs. To be sure, the inelegancies +with which we are chiefly reproached are not distinctively American: +Burke uses "pretty considerable"; Miss Burney says, "I trembled a +few"; the English Bible says "reckon," Locke has "guess," and Southey +"realize," in the exact senses in which one sometimes hears them used +colloquially here. Nevertheless such improprieties are of course to be +avoided; but whatever good Americanisms exist, let us hold to them by +all means. The diction of Emerson alone is a sufficient proof, by its +unequalled range and precision, that no people in the world ever had +access to a vocabulary so rich and copious as we are acquiring. To +the previous traditions and associations of the English tongue we add +resources of contemporary life such as England cannot rival. Political +freedom makes every man an individual; a vast industrial activity makes +every man an inventor, not merely of labor-saving machines, but of +labor-saving words; universal schooling popularizes all thought and +sharpens the edge of all language. We unconsciously demand of our +writers the same dash and the same accuracy which we demand in +railroading or dry-goods-jobbing. The mixture of nationalities is +constantly coining and exchanging new felicities of dialect: Ireland, +Scotland, Germany, Africa are present everywhere with their various +contributions of wit and shrewdness, thought and geniality; in New York +and elsewhere one finds whole thoroughfares of France, Italy, Spain, +Portugal; on our Western railways there are placards printed in Swedish; +even China is creeping in. The colonies of England are too far and too +provincial to have had much reflex influence on her literature, but +how our phraseology is already amplified by our relations with +Spanish-America! The life-blood of Mexico flowed into our newspapers +while the war was in progress; and the gold of California glitters in +our primer: Many foreign cities may show a greater variety of mere +national costumes, but the representative value of our immigrant tribes +is far greater from the very fact that they merge their mental costume +in ours. Thus the American writer finds himself among his phrases like +an American sea-captain amid his crew: a medley of all nations, waiting +for the strong organizing New-England mind to mould them into a unit of +force. + +There are certain minor matters, subsidiary to elegance, if not +elegancies, and therefore worth attention. Do not habitually prop your +sentences on crutches, such as Italics and exclamation-points, but make +them stand without aid; if they cannot emphasize themselves, these +devices are commonly but a confession of helplessness. Do not leave +loose ends as you go on, straggling things, to be caught up and dragged +along uneasily in foot-notes, but work them all in neatly, as Biddy at +her bread-pan gradually kneads in all the outlying bits of dough, till +she has one round and comely mass. + +Reduce yourself to short allowance of parentheses and dashes; if you +employ them merely from clumsiness, they will lose all their proper +power in your hands. Economize quotation-marks also, clear that dust +from your pages, assume your readers to be acquainted with the current +jokes and the stock epithets: all persons like the compliment of having +it presumed that they know something, and prefer to discover the wit or +beauty of your allusion without a guide-board. + +The same principle applies to learned citations and the results of +study. Knead these thoroughly in, supplying the maximum of desired +information with a minimum of visible schoolmaster. It requires no +pedantic mention of Euclid to indicate a mathematical mind, but only the +habitual use of clear terms and close connections. To employ in argument +the forms of Whately's Logic would render it probable that you are +juvenile and certain that you are tedious; wreathe the chain with roses. +The more you have studied foreign languages, the more you will be +disposed to keep Ollendorff in the background: the proper result of such +acquirements is visible in a finer ear for words; so that Goethe said, +the man who had studied but one language could not know that one. But +spare the raw material; deal as cautiously in Latin as did General +Jackson when Jack Downing was out of the way; and avoid French as some +fashionable novelists avoid English. + +Thus far, these are elementary and rather technical suggestions, fitted +for the very opening of your literary career. Supposing you fairly in +print, there are needed some further counsels. + +Do not waste a minute, not a second, in trying to demonstrate to others +the merit of your own performance. If your work does not vindicate +itself, you cannot vindicate it, but you can labor steadily on to +something which needs no advocate but itself. It was said of Haydon, +the English artist, that, if he had taken half the pains to paint great +pictures that he took to persuade the public he had painted them, his +fame would have been secure. Similar was the career of poor Horne, who +wrote the farthing epic of "Orion" with one grand line in it, and a +prose work without any, on "The False Medium excluding Men of Genius +from the Public." He spent years in ineffectually trying to repeal the +exclusion in his own case, and has since manfully gone to the grazing +regions in Australia, hoping there at least to find the sheep and the +goats better discriminated. Do not emulate these tragedies. Remember how +many great writers have created the taste by which they were enjoyed, +and do not be in a hurry. Toughen yourself a little, and perform +something better. Inscribe above your desk the words of Rivarol, "Genius +is only great patience." It takes less time to build an avenue of +shingle palaces than to hide away unseen, block by block, the vast +foundation-stones of an observatory. Most by-gone literary fames have +been very short-lived in America, because they have lasted no longer +than they deserved. Happening the other day to recur to a list of +Cambridge lyceum-lecturers in my boyish days, I find with dismay that +the only name now popularly remembered is that of Emerson: death, +oblivion, or a professorship has closed over all the rest, while the +whole standard of American literature has been vastly raised meanwhile, +and no doubt partly through their labors. To this day, some of our most +gifted writers are being dwarfed by the unkind friendliness of too early +praise. It was Keats, the most precocious of all great poets, the stock +victim of critical assassination,--though the charge does him utter +injustice,--who declared that "nothing is finer for purposes of +production than a very gradual ripening of the intellectual powers." + +Yet do not be made conceited by obscurity, any more than by notoriety. +Many fine geniuses have been long neglected; but what would become +of us, if all the neglected were to turn out geniuses? It is unsafe +reasoning from either extreme. You are not necessarily writing like +Holmes because your reputation for talent began in college, nor like +Hawthorne because you have been before the public ten years without an +admirer. Above all, do not seek to encourage yourself by dwelling on +the defects of your rivals: strength comes only from what is above you. +Northcote, the painter, said, that, in observing an inferior picture, +he always felt his spirits droop, with the suspicion that perhaps he +deceived himself and his own paintings were no better; but the works of +the mighty masters always gave him renewed strength, in the hope that +perhaps his own had in their smaller way something of the same divine +quality. + +Do not complacently imagine, because your first literary attempt proved +good and successful, that your second will doubtless improve upon it. +The very contrary sometimes happens. A man dreams for years over +one projected composition, all his reading converges to it, all his +experience stands related to it, it is the net result of his existence +up to a certain time, it is the cistern into which he pours his +accumulated life. Emboldened by success, he mistakes the cistern for a +fountain, and instantly taps his brain again. The second production, +as compared with the first, costs but half the pains and attains but +a quarter part of the merit; a little more of fluency and facility +perhaps,--but the vigor, the wealth, the originality, the head of water, +in short, are wanting. One would think that almost any intelligent man +might write one good thing in a lifetime, by reserving himself long +enough: it is the effort after quantity which proves destructive. The +greatest man has passed his zenith, when he once begins to cheapen +his style of work and sink into a book-maker: after that, though the +newspapers may never hint at it, nor his admirers own it, the decline of +his career is begun. + +Yet the author is not alone to blame for this, but also the world which +first tempts and then reproves him. Goethe says, that, if a person once +does a good thing, society forms a league to prevent his doing another. +His seclusion is gone, and therefore his unconsciousness and his +leisure; luxuries tempt him from his frugality, and soon he must toil +for luxuries; then, because he has done one thing well, he is urged +to squander himself and do a thousand things badly. In this country +especially, if one can learn languages, he must go to Congress; if he +can argue a case, he must become agent of a factory: out of this comes +a variety of training which is very valuable, but a wise man must +have strength to call in his resources before middle-life, prune off +divergent activities, and concentrate himself on the main work, be it +what it may. It is shameful to see the indeterminate lives of many of +our gifted men, unable to resist the temptations of a busy land, and so +losing themselves in an aimless and miscellaneous career. + +Yet it is unjust and unworthy in Marsh to disfigure his fine work on the +English language by traducing all who now write that tongue. "None seek +the audience, fit, though few, which contented the ambition of Milton, +and all writers for the press now measure their glory by their gains," +and so indefinitely onward,--which is simply cant. Does Sylvanus Cobb, +Jr., who honestly earns his annual five thousand dollars from the "New +York Ledger," take rank as head of American literature by virtue of his +salary? Because the profits of true literature are rising,--trivial as +they still are beside those of commerce or the professions,--its merits +do not necessarily decrease, but the contrary is more likely to happen; +for in this pursuit, as in all others, cheap work is usually poor work. +None but gentlemen of fortune can enjoy the bliss of writing for nothing +and paying their own printer. Nor does the practice of compensation by +the page work the injury that has often been ignorantly predicted. No +contributor need hope to cover two pages of a periodical with what might +be adequately said in one, unless he assumes his editor to be as foolish +as himself. The Spartans exiled Ctesiphon for bragging that he could +speak the whole day on any subject selected; and a modern magazine is of +little value, unless it has a Spartan at its head. + +Strive always to remember--though it does not seem intended that we +should quite bring it home to ourselves--that "To-Day is a king in +disguise," and that this American literature of ours will be just as +classic a thing, if we do our part, as any which the past has treasured. +There is a mirage over all literary associations. Keats and Lamb seem to +our young people to be existences as remote and legendary as Homer, yet +it is not an old man's life since Keats was an awkward boy at the +door of Hazlitt's lecture-room, and Lamb was introducing Talfourd to +Wordsworth as his own only admirer. In reading Spence's "Anecdotes," +Pope and Addison appear no farther off; and wherever I open Bacon's +"Essays," I am sure to end at last with that one magical sentence, +annihilating centuries, "When I was a child, and Queen Elizabeth was in +the flower of her years." + +And this imperceptible transformation of the commonplace present into +the storied past applies equally to the pursuits of war and to the +serenest works of peace. Be not misled by the excitements of the moment +into overrating the charms of military life. In this chaos of uniforms, +we seem to be approaching times such as existed in England after +Waterloo, when the splenetic Byron declared that the only distinction +was to be a little undistinguished. No doubt, war brings out grand +and unexpected qualities, and there is a perennial fascination in the +Elizabethan Raleighs and Sidneys, alike heroes of pen and sword. But the +fact is patent, that there is scarcely any art whose rudiments are +so easy to acquire as the military; the manuals of tactics have +no difficulties comparable to those of the ordinary professional +text-books; and any one who can drill a boat's crew or a ball-club can +learn in a very few weeks to drill a company or even a regiment. Given +in addition the power to command, to organize, and to execute,--high +qualities, though not rare in this community,--and you have a man +needing but time and experience to make a general. More than this can be +acquired only by an exclusive absorption in this one art; as Napoleon +said, that, to have good soldiers, a nation must be always at war. + +If, therefore, duty and opportunity call, count it a privilege to obtain +your share in the new career; throw yourself into it as resolutely and +joyously as if it were a summer-campaign in the Adirondack, but never +fancy for a moment that you have discovered any grander or manlier life +than you might be leading every day at home. It is not needful here to +decide which is intrinsically the better thing, a column of a newspaper +or a column of attack, Wordsworth's "Lines on Immortality" or +Wellington's Lines of Torres Vedras; each is noble, if nobly done, +though posterity seems to remember literature the longest. The writer +is not celebrated for having been the favorite of the conqueror, but +sometimes the conqueror only for having favored or even for having +spurned the writer. "When the great Sultan died, his power and glory +departed from him, and nothing remained but this one fact, that he knew +not the worth of Ferdousi." There is a slight delusion in this dazzling +glory. What a fantastic whim the young lieutenants thought it, when +General Wolfe, on the eve of battle, said of Gray's "Elegy," "Gentlemen, +I would rather have written that poem than have taken Quebec." Yet, +no doubt, it is by the memory of that remark that Wolfe will live the +longest,--aided by the stray line of another poet, still reminding us, +not needlessly, that "Wolfe's great name's cotemporal with our own." + +Once the poets and the sages were held to be pleasing triflers, fit for +hours of relaxation in the lulls of war. Now the pursuits of peace are +recognized as the real, and war as the accidental. It interrupts +all higher avocations, as does the cry of fire: when the fire is +extinguished, the important affairs of life are resumed. Six years ago +the London "Times" was bewailing that all thought and culture in England +were suspended by the Crimean War. "We want no more books. Give us good +recruits, at least five feet seven, a good model for a floating-battery, +and a gun to take effect at five thousand yards,--and Whigs and Tories, +High and Low Church, the poets, astronomers, and critics, may settle it +among themselves." How remote seems that epoch now! and how remote will +the present soon appear! while art and science will resume their sway +serene, beneath skies eternal. Yesterday I turned from treatises on +gunnery and fortification to open Milton's Latin Poems, which I had +never read, and there, in the "Sylvarum Liber," I came upon a passage +as grand as anything in "Paradise Lost,"--his description of Plato's +archetypal man, the vast ideal of the human race, eternal, incorrupt, +coeval with the stars, dwelling either in the sidereal spaces, or among +the Lethean mansions of souls unborn, or pacing the unexplored confines +of the habitable globe. There stood the majestic image, veiled in a dead +language, yet still visible; and it was as if one of the poet's own +sylvan groves had been suddenly cut down, and opened a view of Olympus. +Then all these present fascinating trivialities of war and diplomacy +ebbed away, like Greece and Rome before them, and there seemed nothing +real in the universe but Plato's archetypal man. + +Indeed, it is the same with all contemporary notorieties. In all free +governments, especially, it is the habit to overrate the _dramatis +personae_ of the hour. How empty to us are now the names of the great +politicians of the last generation, as Crawford and Lowndes!--yet it +is but a few years since these men filled in the public ear as large a +space as Clay or Calhoun afterwards, and when they died, the race of the +giants was thought ended. The path to oblivion of these later idols +is just as sure; even Webster will be to the next age but a mighty +tradition, and all that he has left will seem no more commensurate with +his fame than will his statue by Powers. If anything preserves the +statesmen of to-day, it will be only because we are coming to a contest +of more vital principles, which may better embalm the men. Of all gifts, +eloquence is the most short-lived. The most accomplished orator fades +forgotten, and his laurels pass to some hoarse, inaudible Burke, +accounted rather a bore during his lifetime, and possessed of a faculty +of scattering, not convincing, the members of the House. "After all," +said the brilliant Choate, with melancholy foreboding, "a book is the +only immortality." + +So few men in any age are born with a marked gift for literary +expression, so few of this number have access to high culture, so few +even of these have the personal nobleness to use their powers well, +and this small band is finally so decimated by disease and manifold +disaster, that it makes one shudder to observe how little of the +embodied intellect of any age is left behind. Literature is attar of +roses, one distilled drop from a million blossoms. Think how Spain and +Portugal once divided the globe between them in a treaty, when England +was a petty kingdom of illiterate tribes!--and now all Spain is +condensed for us into Cervantes, and all Portugal into the fading fame +of the unread Camoens. The long magnificence of Italian culture has +left us only _I Quattro Poeti_, the Four Poets. The difference between +Shakspeare and his contemporaries is not that he is read twice, ten +times, a hundred times as much as they: it is an absolute difference; he +is read, and they are only printed. + +Yet, if our life be immortal, this temporary distinction is of little +moment, and we may learn humility, without learning despair, from +earth's evanescent glories. Who cannot bear a few disappointments, if +the vista be so wide that the mute inglorious Miltons of this sphere +may in some other sing their Paradise as Found? War or peace, fame or +forgetfulness, can bring no real injury to one who has formed the fixed +purpose to live nobly day by day. I fancy that in some other realm of +existence we may look back with some kind interest on this scene of our +earlier life, and say to one another,--"Do you remember yonder planet, +where once we went to school?" And whether our elective study here lay +chiefly in the fields of action or of thought will matter little to us +then, when other schools shall have led us through other disciplines. + + * * * * * + + +JOHN LAMAR. + + +The guard-house was, in fact, nothing but a shed in the middle of a +stubble-field. It had been built for a cider-press last summer; but +since Captain Dorr had gone into the army, his regiment had camped over +half his plantation, and the shed was boarded up, with heavy wickets at +either end, to hold whatever prisoners might fall into their hands +from Floyd's forces. It was a strong point for the Federal troops, his +farm,--a sort of wedge in the Rebel Cheat counties of Western Virginia. +Only one prisoner was in the guard-house now. The sentry, a raw +boat-hand from Illinois, gaped incessantly at him through the bars, not +sure if the "Secesh" were limbed and headed like other men; but the +November fog was so thick that he could discern nothing but a short, +squat man, in brown clothes and white hat, heavily striding to and fro. +A negro was crouching outside, his knees cuddled in his arms to keep +warm: a field-hand, you could be sure from the face, a grisly patch of +flabby black, with a dull eluding word of something, you could not tell +what, in the points of eyes,--treachery or gloom. The prisoner stopped, +cursing him about something: the only answer was a lazy rub of the +heels. + +"Got any 'baccy, Mars' John?" he whined, in the middle of the hottest +oath. + +The man stopped abruptly, turning his pockets inside out. + +"That's all, Ben," he said, kindly enough. "Now begone, you black +devil!" + +"Dem's um, Mars'! Goin' 'mediate,"--catching the tobacco, and lolling +down full length as his master turned off again. + +Dave Hall, the sentry, stared reflectively, and sat down. + +"Ben? Who air you next?"--nursing his musket across his knees, +baby-fashion. + +Ben measured him with one eye, polished the quid in his greasy hand, and +looked at it. + +"Pris'ner o' war," he mumbled, finally,--contemptuously; for Dave's +trousers were in rags like his own, and his chilblained toes stuck +through the shoe-tops. Cheap white trash, clearly. + +"Yer master's some at swearin'. Heow many, neow, hes he like you, down +to Georgy?" + +The boatman's bony face was gathering a woful pity. He had enlisted to +free the Uncle Toms, and carry God's vengeance to the Legrees. Here they +were, a pair of them. + +Ben squinted another critical survey of the "miss'able Linkinite." + +"How many wells hev _yer_ poisoned since yer set out?" he muttered. + +The sentry stopped. + +"How many 'longin' to de Lamars? 'Bout as many as der's dam' Yankees in +Richmond 'baccy-houses!" + +Something in Dave's shrewd, whitish eye warned him off. + +"Ki yi! yer white nigger, yer!" he chuckled, shuffling down the stubble. + +Dave clicked his musket,--then, choking down an oath into a grim +Methodist psalm, resumed his walk, looking askance at the coarse-moulded +face of the prisoner peering through the bars, and the diamond studs in +his shirt,--bought with human blood, doubtless. The man was the black +curse of slavery itself in the flesh, in his thought somehow, and he +hated him accordingly. Our men of the Northwest have enough brawny +Covenanter muscle in their religion to make them good haters for +opinion's sake. + +Lamar, the prisoner, watched him with a lazy drollery in his sluggish +black eyes. It died out into sternness, as he looked beyond the sentry. +He had seen this Cheat country before; this very plantation was his +grandfather's a year ago, when he had come up from Georgia here, and +loitered out the summer months with his Virginia cousins, hunting. That +was a pleasant summer! Something in the remembrance of it flashed into +his eyes, dewy, genial; the man's leather-covered face reddened like a +child's. Only a year ago,--and now----The plantation was Charley Dorr's +now, who had married Ruth. This very shed he and Dorr had planned last +spring, and now Charley held him a prisoner in it. The very thought of +Charley Dorr warmed his heart. Why, he could thank God there were such +men. True grit, every inch of his little body! There, last summer, how +he had avoided Ruth until the day when he (Lamar) was going away!--then +he told him he meant to try and win her. "She cared most for you +always," Lamar had said, bitterly; "why have you waited so long?" "You +loved her first, John, you know." That was like a man! He remembered +that even that day, when his pain was breathless and sharp, the words +made him know that Dorr was fit to be her husband. + +Dorr was his friend. The word meant much to John Lamar. He thought less +meanly of himself, when he remembered it. Charley's prisoner! An odd +chance! Better that than to have met in battle. He thrust back the +thought, the sweat oozing out on his face,--something within him +muttering, "For Liberty! I would have killed him, so help me God!" + +He had brought despatches to General Lee, that he might see Charley, and +the old place, and--Ruth again; there was a gnawing hunger in his heart +to see them. Fool! what was he to them? The man's face grew slowly +pale, as that of a savage or an animal does, when the wound is deep and +inward. + +The November day was dead, sunless: since morning the sky had had only +enough life in it to sweat out a few muddy drops, that froze as they +fell: the cold numbed his mouth as he breathed it. This stubbly slope +was where he and his grandfather had headed the deer: it was covered +with hundreds of dirty, yellow tents now. Around there were hills like +uncouth monsters, swathed in ice, holding up the soggy sky; shivering +pine-forests; unmeaning, dreary flats; and the Cheat, coiled about the +frozen sinews of the hills, limp and cold, like a cord tying a dead +man's jaws. Whatever outlook of joy or worship this region had borne on +its face in time gone, it turned to him to-day nothing but stagnation, +a great death. He wondered idly, looking at it, (for the old Huguenot +brain of the man was full of morbid fancies,) if it were winter alone +that had deadened color and pulse out of these full-blooded hills, or if +they could know the colder horror crossing their threshold, and forgot +to praise God as it came. + +Over that farthest ridge the house had stood. The guard (he had been +taken by a band of Snake-hunters, back in the hills) had brought him +past it. It was a heap of charred rafters. "Burned in the night," they +said, "when the old Colonel was alone." They were very willing to +show him this, as it was done by his own party, the Secession +"Bush-whackers"; took him to the wood-pile to show him where his +grandfather had been murdered, (there was a red mark,) and buried, his +old hands above the ground. "Colonel said 't was a job fur us to pay up; +so we went to the village an' hed a scrimmage,"--pointing to gaps in +the hedges where the dead Bush-whackers yet lay unburied. He looked at +them, and at the besotted faces about him, coolly. + +Snake-hunters and Bush-whackers, he knew, both armies used in Virginia +as tools for rapine and murder: the sooner the Devil called home his +own, the better. And yet, it was not God's fault, surely, that there +were such tools in the North, any more than that in the South Ben +was--Ben. Something was rotten in freer States than Denmark, he thought. + +One of the men went into the hedge, and brought out a child's golden +ringlet as a trophy. Lamar glanced in, and saw the small face in its +woollen hood, dimpled yet, though dead for days. He remembered it. Jessy +Birt, the ferryman's little girl. She used to come up to the house every +day for milk. He wondered for which flag _she_ died. Ruth was teaching +her to write. _Ruth!_ Some old pain hurt him just then, nearer than even +the blood of the old man or the girl crying to God from the ground. The +sergeant mistook the look. "They'll be buried," he said, gruffly. "Ye +brought it on yerselves." And so led him to the Federal camp. + +The afternoon grew colder, as he stood looking out of the guard-house. +Snow began to whiten through the gray. He thrust out his arm through the +wicket, his face kindling with childish pleasure, as he looked closer at +the fairy stars and crowns on his shaggy sleeve. If Floy were here! She +never had seen snow. When the flakes had melted off, he took a case out +of his pocket to look at Floy. His sister,--a little girl who had no +mother, nor father, nor lover, but Lamar. The man among his brother +officers in Richmond was coarse, arrogant, of dogged courage, keen +palate at the table, as keen eye on the turf. Sickly little Floy, down +at home, knew the way to something below all this: just as they of the +Rommany blood see below the muddy boulders of the streets the enchanted +land of Boabdil bare beneath. Lamar polished the ivory painting with his +breath, remembering that he had drunk nothing for days. A child's face, +of about twelve, delicate,--a breath of fever or cold would shatter such +weak beauty; big, dark eyes, (her mother was pure Castilian,) out of +which her little life looked irresolute into the world, uncertain what +to do there. The painter, with an unapt fancy, had clustered about the +Southern face the Southern emblem, buds of the magnolia, unstained, as +yet, as pearl. It angered Lamar, remembering how the creamy whiteness of +the full-blown flower exhaled passion of which the crimsonest rose knew +nothing,--a content, ecstasy, in animal life. Would Floy----Well, God +help them both! they needed help. Three hundred souls was a heavy weight +for those thin little hands to hold sway over,--to lead to hell or +heaven. Up North they could have worked for her, and gained only her +money. So Lamar reasoned, like a Georgian: scribbling a letter to +"My Baby" on the wrapper of a newspaper,--drawing the shapes of the +snowflakes,--telling her he had reached their grandfather's plantation, +but "have not seen our Cousin Ruth yet, of whom you may remember I have +told you, Floy. When you grow up, I should like you to be just such a +woman; so remember, my darling, if I"----He scratched the last words +out: why should he hint to her that he could die? Holding his life loose +in his hand, though, had brought things closer to him lately,--God and +death, this war, the meaning of it all. But he would keep his brawny +body between these terrible realities and Floy, yet awhile. "I want +you," he wrote, "to leave the plantation, and go with your old maumer to +the village. It will be safer there." He was sure the letter would reach +her. He had a plan to escape to-night, and he could put it into a post +inside the lines. Ben was to get a small hand-saw that would open the +wicket; the guards were not hard to elude. Glancing up, he saw the negro +stretched by a camp-fire, listening to the gaunt boatman, who was off +duty. Preaching Abolitionism, doubtless: he could hear Ben's derisive +shouts of laughter. "And so, good bye, Baby Florence!" he scrawled. "I +wish I could send you some of this snow, to show you what the floor of +heaven is like." + +While the snow fell faster--without, he stopped writing, and began idly +drawing a map of Georgia on the tan-bark with a stick. Here the Federal +troops could effect a landing: he knew the defences at that point. If +they did? He thought of these Snake-hunters who had found in the war a +peculiar road for themselves downward with no gallows to stumble over, +fancied he saw them skulking through the fields at Cedar Creek, closing +around the house, and behind them a mass of black faces and bloody +bayonets. Floy alone, and he here,--like a rat in a trap! "God keep my +little girl!" he wrote, unsteadily. "God bless you, Floy!" He gasped for +breath, as if he had been writing with his heart's blood. Folding up the +paper, he hid it inside his shirt and began his dogged walk, calculating +the chances of escape. Once out of this shed, he could baffle a +blood-hound, he knew the hills so well. + +His head bent down, he did not see a man who stood looking at him over +the wicket. Captain Dorr. A puny little man, with thin yellow hair, and +womanish face: but not the less the hero of his men,--they having found +out, somehow, that muscle was not the solidest thing to travel on in +war-times. Our regiments of "roughs" were not altogether crowned with +laurel at Manassas! So the men built more on the old Greatheart soul +in the man's blue eyes: one of those souls born and bred pure, sent to +teach, that can find breath only in the free North. His hearty "Hillo!" +startled Lamar. + +"How are you, old fellow?" he said, unlocking the gate and coming in. + +Lamar threw off his wretched thoughts, glad to do it. What need to +borrow trouble? He liked a laugh,--had a lazy, jolly humor of his own. +Dorr had finished drill, and come up, as he did every day, to freshen +himself with an hour's talk to this warm, blundering fellow. In this +dismal war-work, (though his whole soul was in that, too,) it was +like putting your hands to a big blaze. Dorr had no near relations; +Lamar--they had played marbles together--stood to him where a younger +brother might have stood. Yet, as they talked, he could not help his +keen eye seeing him just as he was. + +Poor John! he thought: the same uncouth-looking effort of humanity that +he had been at Yale. No wonder the Northern boys jeered him, with his +sloth-ways, his mouthed English, torpid eyes, and brain shut up in that +worst of mud-moulds,--belief in caste. Even now, going up and down the +tan-bark, his step was dead, sodden, like that of a man in whose life +God had not yet wakened the full live soul. It was wakening, though, +Dorr thought. Some pain or passion was bringing the man in him out of +the flesh, vigilant, alert, aspirant. A different man from Dorr. + +In fact, Lamar was just beginning to think for himself, and of course +his thoughts were defiant, intolerant. He did not comprehend how his +companion could give his heresies such quiet welcome, and pronounce +sentence of death on them so coolly. Because Dorr had gone farther up +the mountain, had he the right to make him follow in the same steps? +The right,--that was it. By brute force, too? Human freedom, eh? +Consequently, their talks were stormy enough. To-day, however, they were +on trivial matters. + +"I've brought the General's order for your release at last, John. It +confines you to this district, however." + +Lamar shook his head. + +"No parole for me! My stake outside is too heavy for me to remain a +prisoner on anything but compulsion. I mean to escape, if I can. Floy +has nobody but me, you know, Charley." + +There was a moment's silence. + +"I wish," said Dorr, half to himself, "the child was with her cousin +Ruth. If she could make her a woman like herself!" + +"You are kind," Lamar forced out, thinking of what might have been a +year ago. + +Dorr had forgotten. He had just kissed little Ruth at the door-step, +coming away: thinking, as he walked up to camp, how her clear thought, +narrow as it was, was making his own higher, more just; wondering if +the tears on her face last night, when she got up from her knees after +prayer, might not help as much in the great cause of truth as the life +he was ready to give. He was so used to his little wife now, that he +could look to no hour of his past life, nor of the future coming ages +of event and work, where she was not present,--very flesh of his flesh, +heart of his heart. A gulf lay between them and the rest of the world. +It was hardly probable he could see her as a woman towards whom another +man looked across the gulf, dumb, hopeless, defrauded of his right. + +"She sent you some flowers, by the way, John,--the last in the +yard,--and bade me be sure and bring you down with me. Your own colors, +you see?--to put you in mind of home,"--pointing to the crimson asters +flaked with snow. + +The man smiled faintly: the smell of the flowers choked him: he laid +them aside. God knows he was trying to wring out this bitter old +thought: he could not look in Dorr's frank eyes while it was there. +He must escape to-night: he never would come near them again, in this +world, or beyond death,--never! He thought of that like a man going to +drag through eternity with half his soul gone. Very well: there was man +enough left in him to work honestly and bravely, and to thank God for +that good pure love he yet had. He turned to Dorr with a flushed face, +and began talking of Floy in hearty earnest,--glancing at Ben coming up +the hill, thinking that escape depended on him. + +"I ordered your man up," said Captain Dorr. "Some canting Abolitionist +had him open-mouthed down there." + +The negro came in, and stood in the corner, listening while they talked. +A gigantic fellow, with a gladiator's muscles. Stronger than that Yankee +captain, he thought,--than either of them: better breathed,--drawing the +air into his brawny chest. "A man and a brother." Did the fool think he +didn't know that before? He had a contempt for Dave and his like. Lamar +would have told you Dave's words were true, but despised the man as a +crude, unlicked bigot. Ben did the same, with no words for the idea. The +negro instinct in him recognized gentle blood by any of its signs,--the +transparent animal life, the reticent eye, the mastered voice: he +had better men than Lamar at home to learn it from. It is a trait of +serfdom, the keen eye to measure the inherent rights of a man to be +master. A negro or a Catholic Irishman does not need "Sartor Resartus" +to help him to see through any clothes. Ben leaned, half-asleep, against +the wall, some old thoughts creeping out of their hiding-places through +the torpor, like rats to the sunshine: the boatman's slang had been hot +and true enough to rouse them in his brain. + +"So, Ben," said his master, as he passed once, "your friend has been +persuading you to exchange the cotton-fields at Cedar Creek for New-York +alleys, eh?" + +"Ki!" laughed Ben, "white darkey. Mind ole dad, Mars' John, as took off +in der swamp? Um asked dat Linkinite ef him saw dad up Norf. Guess him's +free now. Ki! ole dad!" + +"The swamp was the place for him," said Lamar. "I remember." + +"Dunno," said the negro, surlily: "him's dad, af'er all: tink him's free +now,"--and mumbled down into a monotonous drone about + + "Oh yo, bredern, is yer gwine ober Jordern?" + +Half-asleep, they thought,--but with dull questionings at work in his +brain, some queer notions about freedom, of that unknown North, mostly +mixed with his remembrance of his father, a vicious old negro, that in +Pennsylvania would have worked out his salvation in the under cell of +the penitentiary, but in Georgia, whipped into heroism, had betaken +himself into the swamp, and never returned. Tradition among the Lamar +slaves said he had got off to Ohio, of which they had as clear an idea +as most of us have of heaven. At any rate, old Kite became a mystery, to +be mentioned with awe at fish-bakes and barbecues. He was this uncouth +wretch's father,--do you understand? The flabby-faced boy, flogged in +the cotton-field for whining after his dad, or hiding away part of his +flitch and molasses for months in hopes the old man would come back, was +rather a comical object, you would have thought. Very different his, +from the feeling with which you left your mother's grave,--though as yet +we have not invented names for the emotions of those people. We'll grant +that it hurt Ben a little, however. Even the young polypus, when it is +torn from the old one, bleeds a drop or two, they say. As he grew up, +the great North glimmered through his thought, a sort of big field,--a +paradise of no work, no flogging, and white bread every day, where the +old man sat and ate his fill. + +The second point in Ben's history was that he fell in love. Just as +you did,--with the difference, of course: though the hot sun, or the +perpetual foot upon his breast, does not make our black Prometheus less +fierce in his agony of hope or jealousy than you, I am afraid. It was +Nan, a pale mulatto house-servant, that the field-hand took into his +dull, lonesome heart to make life of, with true-love defiance of caste. +I think Nan liked him very truly. She was lame and sickly, and if Ben +was black and a picker, and stayed in the quarters, he was strong, like +a master to her in some ways: the only thing she could call hers in the +world was the love the clumsy boy gave her. White women feel in that +way sometimes, and it makes them very tender to men not their equals. +However, old Mrs. Lamar, before she died, gave her house-servants their +free papers, and Nan was among them. So she set off, with all the finery +little Floy could give her: went up into that great, dim North. She +never came again. + +The North swallowed up all Ben knew or felt outside of his hot, hated +work, his dread of a lashing on Saturday night. All the pleasure left +him was 'possum and hominy for Sunday's dinner. It did not content him. +The spasmodic religion of the field-negro does not teach endurance. So +it came, that the slow tide of discontent ebbing in everybody's heart +towards some unreached sea set in his ignorant brooding towards that +vague country which the only two who cared for him had found. If he +forgot it through the dogged, sultry days, he remembered it when the +overseer scourged the dull tiger-look into his eyes, or when, husking +corn with the others at night, the smothered negro-soul, into which +their masters dared not look, broke out in their wild, melancholy songs. +Aimless, unappealing, yet no prayer goes up to God more keen in its +pathos. You find, perhaps, in Beethoven's seventh symphony the secrets +of your heart made manifest, and suddenly think of a Somewhere to come, +where your hope waits for you with late fulfilment. Do not laugh at Ben, +then, if he dully told in his song the story of all he had lost, or gave +to his heaven a local habitation and a name. + +From the place where he stood now, as his master and Dorr walked up and +down, he could see the purplish haze beyond which the sentry had told +him lay the North. The North! Just beyond the ridge. There was a pain +in his head, looking at it; his nerves grew cold and rigid, as yours do +when something wrings your heart sharply: for there are nerves in these +black carcasses, thicker, more quickly stung to madness than yours. Yet +if any savage longing, smouldering for years, was heating to madness now +in his brain, there was no sign of it in his face. Vapid, with sordid +content, the huge jaws munching tobacco slowly, only now and then the +beady eye shot a sharp glance after Dorr. The sentry had told him the +Northern army had come to set the slaves free; he watched the Federal +officer keenly. + +"What ails you, Ben?" said his master. "Thinking over your friend's +sermon?" + +Ben's stolid laugh was ready. + +"Done forgot dat, Mars'. Wouldn't go, nohow. Since Mars' sold dat cussed +Joe, gorry good times 't home. Dam' Abolitioner say we ums all goin' +Norf,"--with a stealthy glance at Dorr. + +"That's more than your philanthropy bargains for, Charley," laughed +Lamar. + +The men stopped; the negro skulked nearer, his whole senses sharpened +into hearing. Dorr's clear face was clouded. + +"This slave question must be kept out of the war. It puts a false face +on it." + +"I thought one face was what it needed," said Lamar. "You have too many +slogans. Strong government, tariff, Sumter, a bit of bunting, eleven +dollars a month. It ought to be a vital truth that would give soul and +_vim_ to a body with the differing members of your army. You, with your +ideal theory, and Billy Wilson with his 'Blood and Baltimore!' Try human +freedom. That's high and sharp and broad." + +Ben drew a step closer. + +"You are shrewd, Lamar. I am to go below all constitutions or expediency +or existing rights, and tell Ben here that he is free? When once the +Government accepts that doctrine, you, as a Rebel, must be let alone." + +The slave was hid back in the shade. + +"Dorr," said Lamar, "you know I'm a groping, ignorant fellow, but it +seems to me that prating of constitutions and existing rights is surface +talk; there is a broad common-sense underneath, by whose laws the world +is governed, which your statesmen don't touch often. You in the North, +in your dream of what shall be, shut your eyes to what is. You want a +republic where every man's voice shall be heard in the council, and the +majority shall rule. Granting that the free population are educated to a +fitness for this,--(God forbid I should grant it with the Snake-hunters +before my eyes!)--look here!" + +He turned round, and drew the slave out into the light: he crouched +down, gaping vacantly at them. + +"There is Ben. What, in God's name, will you do with him? Keep him a +slave, and chatter about self-government? Pah! The country is paying in +blood for the lie, to-day. Educate him for freedom, by putting a musket +in his hands? We have this mass of heathendom drifted on our shores by +your will as well as mine. Try to bring them to a level with the whites +by a wrench, and you'll waken out of your dream to a sharp reality. Your +Northern philosophy ought to be old enough to teach you that spasms in +the body-politic shake off no atom of disease,--that reform, to be +enduring, must be patient, gradual, inflexible as the Great Reformer. +'The mills of God,' the old proverb says, 'grind surely.' But, Dorr, +they grind exceeding slow!" + +Dorr watched Lamar with an amused smile. It pleased him to see his brain +waking up, eager, vehement. As for Ben, crouching there, if they talked +of him like a clod, heedless that his face deepened in stupor, that his +eyes had caught a strange, gloomy treachery,--we all do the same, you +know. + +"What is your remedy, Lamar? You have no belief in the right of +Secession, I know," said Dorr. + +"It's a bad instrument for a good end. Let the white Georgian come out +of his sloth, and the black will rise with him. Jefferson Davis may not +intend it, but God does. When we have our Lowell, our New York, when we +are a self-sustaining people instead of lazy land-princes, Ben here will +have climbed the second of the great steps of Humanity. Do you laugh at +us?" said Lamar, with a quiet self-reliance. "Charley, it needs only +work and ambition to cut the brute away from my face, and it will leave +traits very like your own. Ben's father was a Guinea fetich-worshipper; +when we stand where New England does, Ben's son will be ready for his +freedom." + +"And while you theorize," laughed Dorr, "I hold you a prisoner, John, +and Ben knows it is his right to be free. He will not wait for the +grinding of the mill, I fancy." + +Lamar did not smile. It was womanish in the man, when the life of great +nations hung in doubt before them, to go back so constantly to little +Floy sitting in the lap of her old black maumer. But he did it,--with +the quick thought that to-night he must escape, that death lay in delay. + +While Dorr talked, Lamar glanced significantly at Ben. The negro was not +slow to understand,--with a broad grin, touching his pocket, from which +projected the dull end of a hand-saw. I wonder what sudden pain made the +negro rise just then, and come close to his master, touching him with a +strange affection and remorse in his tired face, as though he had done +him some deadly wrong. + +"What is it, old fellow?" said Lamar, in his boyish way. "Homesick, eh? +There's a little girl in Georgia that will be glad to see you and your +master, and take precious good care of us when she gets us safe again. +That's true, Ben!" laying his hand kindly on the man's shoulder, while +his eyes went wandering off to the hills lying South. + +"Yes, Mars'," said Ben, in a low voice, suddenly bringing a +blacking-brush, and beginning to polish his master's shoes,--thinking, +while he did it, of how often Mars' John had interfered with the +overseers to save him from a flogging,--(Lamar, in his lazy way, +was kind to his slaves,)--thinking of little Mist' Floy with an odd +tenderness and awe, as a gorilla might of a white dove: trying to think +thus,--the simple, kindly nature of the negro struggling madly with +something beneath, new and horrible. He understood enough of the talk of +the white men to know that there was no help for him,--none. Always a +slave. Neither you nor I can ever know what those words meant to him. +The pale purple mist where the North lay was never to be passed. His +dull eyes turned to it constantly,--with a strange look, such as the +lost women might have turned to the door, when Jesus shut it: they +forever outside. There was a way to help himself? The stubby black +fingers holding the brush grew cold and clammy,--noting withal, the poor +wretch in his slavish way, that his master's clothes were finer than the +Northern captain's, his hands whiter, and proud that it was so,--holding +Lamar's foot daintily, trying to see himself in the shoe, smoothing down +the trousers with a boorish, affectionate touch,--with the same fierce +whisper in his ear, Would the shoes ever be cleaned again? would the +foot move to-morrow? + +It grew late. Lamar's supper was brought up from Captain Dorr's, and +placed on the bench. He poured out a goblet of water. + +"Come, Charley, let's drink. To Liberty! It is a war-cry for Satan or +Michael." + +They drank, laughing, while Ben stood watching. Dorr turned to go, but +Lamar called him back,--stood resting his hand on his shoulder: he never +thought to see him again, you know. + +"Look at Ruth, yonder," said Dorr, his face lighting. "She is coming to +meet us. She thought you would be with me." + +Lamar looked gravely down at the low field-house and the figure at the +gate. He thought he could see the small face and earnest eyes, though it +was far off, and night was closing. + +"She is waiting for you, Charley. Go down. Good night, old chum!" + +If it cost any effort to say it, Dorr saw nothing of it. + +"Good night, Lamar! I'll see you in the morning." + +He lingered. His old comrade looked strangely alone and desolate. + +"John!" + +"What is it, Dorr?" + +"If I could tell the Colonel you would take the oath? For Floy's sake." + +The man's rough face reddened. + +"You should know me better. Good bye." + +"Well, well, you are mad. Have you no message for Ruth?" + +There was a moment's silence. + +"Tell her I say, God bless her!" + +Dorr stopped and looked keenly in his face,--then, coming back, shook +hands again, in a different way from before, speaking in a lower +voice,-- + +"God help us all, John! Good night!"--and went slowly down the hill. + +It was nearly night, and bitter cold. Lamar stood where the snow drifted +in on him, looking out through the horizon-less gray. + +"Come out o' dem cold, Mars' John," whined Ben, pulling at his coat. + +As the night gathered, the negro was haunted with a terrified wish to be +kind to his master. Something told him that the time was short. Here and +there through the far night some tent-fire glowed in a cone of ruddy +haze, through which the thick-falling snow shivered like flakes of +light. Lamar watched only the square block of shadow where Dorr's house +stood. The door opened at last, and a broad, cheerful gleam shot out +red darts across the white waste without; then he saw two figures go +in together. They paused a moment; he put his head against the bars, +straining his eyes, and saw that the woman turned, shading her eyes +with her hand, and looked up to the side of the mountain where the +guard-house lay,--with a kindly look, perhaps, for the prisoner out in +the cold. A kind look: that was all. The door shut on them. Forever: so, +good night, Ruth! + +He stool there for an hour or two, leaning his head against the muddy +planks, smoking. Perhaps, in his coarse fashion, he took the trouble of +his manhood back to the same God he used to pray to long ago. When he +turned at last, and spoke, it was with a quiet, strong voice, like one +who would fight through life in a manly way. There was a grating sound +at the back of the shed: it was Ben, sawing through the wicket, the +guard having lounged off to supper. Lamar watched him, noticing that the +negro was unusually silent. The plank splintered, and hung loose. + +"Done gone, Mars' John, now,"--leaving it, and beginning to replenish +the fire. + +"That's right, Ben. We'll start in the morning. That sentry at two +o'clock sleeps regularly." + +Ben chuckled, heaping up the sticks. + +"Go on down to the camp, as usual. At two, Ben, remember! We will be +free to-night, old boy!" + +The black face looked up from the clogging smoke with a curious stare. + +"Ki! we'll be free to-night, Mars'!"--gulping his breath. + +Soon after, the sentry unlocked the gate, and he shambled off out into +the night. Lamar, left alone, went closer to the fire, and worked busily +at some papers he drew from his pocket: maps and schedules. He intended +to write until two o'clock; but the blaze dying down, he wrapped his +blanket about him, and lay down on the heaped straw, going on sleepily, +in his brain, with his calculations. + +The negro, in the shadow of the shed, watched him. A vague fear beset +him,--of the vast, white cold,--the glowering mountains,--of himself; +he clung to the familiar face, like a man drifting out into an unknown +sea, clutching some relic of the shore. When Lamar fell asleep, he +wandered uncertainly towards the tents. The world had grown new, +strange; was he Ben, picking cotton in the swamp-edge?--plunging his +fingers with a shudder in the icy drifts. Down in the glowing torpor of +the Santilla flats, where the Lamar plantations lay, Ben had slept off +as maddening hunger for life and freedom as this of to-day; but here, +with the winter air stinging every nerve to life, with the perpetual +mystery of the mountains terrifying his bestial nature down, the +strength of the man stood up: groping, blind, malignant, it may be; but +whose fault was that? He was half-frozen: the physical pain sharpened +the keen doubt conquering his thought. He sat down in the crusted snow, +looking vacantly about him, a man, at last,--but wakening, like a +new-born soul, into a world of unutterable solitude. Wakened dully, +slowly; sitting there far into the night, pondering stupidly on his old +life; crushing down and out the old parasite affection for his master, +the old fears, the old weight threatening to press out his thin life; +the muddy blood heating, firing with the same heroic dream that bade +Tell and Garibaldi lift up their hands to God, and cry aloud that they +were men and free: the same,--God-given, burning in the imbruted veins +of a Guinea slave. To what end? May God be merciful to America while +she answers the question! He sat, rubbing his cracked, bleeding feet, +glancing stealthily at the southern hills. Beyond them lay all that was +past; in an hour he would follow Lamar back to--what? He lifted his +hands up to the sky, in his silly way sobbing hot tears. "Gor-a'mighty, +Mars' Lord, I'se tired," was all the prayer he made. The pale purple +mist was gone from the North; the ridge behind which love, freedom +waited, struck black across the sky, a wall of iron. He looked at it +drearily. Utterly alone: he had always been alone. He got up at last, +with a sigh. + +"It's a big world,"--with a bitter chuckle,--"but der's no room in it +fur poor Ben." + +He dragged himself through the snow to a light in a tent where a +voice in a wild drone, like that he had heard at negro camp-meetings, +attracted him. He did not go in: stood at the tent-door, listening. Two +or three of the guard stood around, leaning on their muskets; in the +vivid fire-light rose the gaunt figure of the Illinois boatman, swaying +to and fro as he preached. For the men were honest, God-fearing souls, +members of the same church, and Dave, in all integrity of purpose, read +aloud to them,--the cry of Jeremiah against the foul splendors of the +doomed city,--waving, as he spoke, his bony arm to the South. The shrill +voice was that of a man wrestling with his Maker. The negro's fired +brain caught the terrible meaning of the words,--found speech in it: +the wide, dark night, the solemn silence of the men, were only fitting +audience. + +The man caught sight of the slave, and, laying down his book, began one +of those strange exhortations in the manner of his sect. Slow at first, +full of unutterable pity. There was room for pity. Pointing to the human +brute crouching there, made once in the image of God,--the saddest +wreck on His green foot-stool: to the great stealthy body, the +revengeful jaws, the foreboding eyes. Soul, brains,--a man, wifeless, +homeless, nationless, hawked, flung from trader to trader for a handful +of dirty shinplasters. "Lord God of hosts," cried the man, lifting up +his trembling hands, "lay not this sin to our charge!" There was a scar +on Ben's back where the lash had buried itself: it stung now in the +cold. He pulled his clothes tighter, that they should not see it; the +scar and the words burned into his heart: the childish nature of the man +was gone; the vague darkness in it took a shape and name. The boatman +had been praying for him; the low words seemed to shake the night:-- + +"Hear the prayer of Thy servant, and his supplications! Is not this what +Thou hast chosen: to loose the bands, to undo the heavy burdens, and let +the oppressed go free? O Lord, hear! O Lord, hearken and do! Defer not +for Thine own sake, O my God!" + +"What shall I do?" said the slave, standing up. + +The boatman paced slowly to and fro, his voice chording in its dull +monotone with the smothered savage muttering in the negro's brain. + +"The day of the Lord cometh; it is nigh at hand. Who can abide it? What +saith the prophet Jeremiah? 'Take up a burden against the South. Cry +aloud, spare not. Woe unto Babylon, for the day of her vengeance is +come, the day of her visitation! Call together the archers against +Babylon; camp against it round about; let none thereof escape. +Recompense her: as she hath done unto my people, be it done unto her. +A sword is upon Babylon: it shall break in pieces the shepherd and his +flock, the man and the woman, the young man and the maid. I will render +unto her the evil she hath done in my sight, saith the Lord.'" + +It was the voice of God: the scar burned fiercer; the slave came forward +boldly,-- + +"Mars'er, what shall I do?" + +"Give the poor devil a musket," said one of the men. "Let him come with +us, and strike a blow for freedom." + +He took a knife from his belt, and threw it to him, then sauntered off +to his tent. + +"A blow for freedom?" mumbled Ben, taking it up. + +"Let us sing to the praise of God," said the boatman, "the sixty-eighth +psalm," lining it out while they sang,--the scattered men joining, +partly to keep themselves awake. In old times David's harp charmed away +the demon from a human heart. It roused one now, never to be laid again. +A dull, droning chant, telling how the God of Vengeance rode upon the +wind, swift to loose the fetters of the chained, to make desert the +rebellious land; with a chorus, or refrain, in which Ben's wild, +melancholy cry sounded like the wail of an avenging spirit:-- + + "That in the blood of enemies + Thy foot imbrued may be: + And of thy dogs dipped in the same + The tongues thou mayest see." + +The meaning of that was plain; he sang it lower and more steadily each +time, his body swaying in cadence, the glitter in his eye more steely. + +Lamar, asleep in his prison, was wakened by the far-off plaintive song: +he roused himself, leaning on one elbow, listening with a half-smile. It +was Naomi they sang, he thought,--an old-fashioned Methodist air that +Floy had caught from the negroes, and used to sing to him sometimes. +Every night, down at home, she would come to his parlor-door to say +good-night: he thought he could see the little figure now in its white +nightgown, and hear the bare feet pattering on the matting. When he was +alone, she would come in, and sit on his lap awhile, and kneel down +before she went away, her head on his knee, to say her prayers, as she +called it. Only God knew how many times he had remained alone after +hearing those prayers, saved from nights of drunken debauch. He thought +he felt Floy's pure little hand on his forehead now, as if she were +saying her usual "Good night, Bud." He lay down to sleep again, with a +genial smile on his face, listening to the hymn. + +"It's the same God," he said,--"Floy's and theirs." + +Outside, as he slept, a dark figure watched him. The song of the men +ceased. Midnight, white and silent, covered the earth. He could hear +only the slow breathing of the sleeper. Ben's black face grew ashy pale, +but he did not tremble, as he crept, cat-like, up to the wicket, his +blubber lips apart, the white teeth clenched. + +"It's for Freedom, Mars' Lord!" he gasped, looking up to the sky, as if +he expected an answer. "Gor-a'mighty, it's for Freedom!" And went in. + +A belated bird swooped through the cold moonlight into the valley, and +vanished in the far mountain-cliffs with a low, fearing cry, as though +it had passed through Hades. + +They had broken down the wicket: he saw them lay the heavy body on the +lumber outside, the black figures hurrying over the snow. He laughed +low, savagely, watching them. Free now! The best of them despised him; +the years past of cruelty and oppression turned back, fused in a slow, +deadly current of revenge and hate, against the race that had trodden +him down. He felt the iron muscles of his fingers, looked close at the +glittering knife he held, chuckling at the strange smell it bore. Would +the Illinois boatman blame him, if it maddened him? And if Ben took the +fancy to put it to his throat, what right has he to complain? Has not he +also been a dweller in Babylon? He hesitated a moment in the cleft of +the hill, choosing his way, exultantly. He did not watch the North now; +the quiet old dream of content was gone; his thick blood throbbed and +surged with passions of which you and I know nothing: he had a lost life +to avenge. His native air, torrid, heavy with latent impurity, drew him +back: a fitter breath than this cold snow for the animal in his body, +the demon in his soul, to triumph and wallow in. He panted, thinking of +the saffron hues of the Santilla flats, of the white, stately dwellings, +the men that went in and out from them, quiet, dominant,--feeling the +edge of his knife. It was his turn to be master now! He ploughed his way +doggedly through the snow,--panting, as he went,--a hotter glow in his +gloomy eyes. It was his turn for pleasure now: he would have his fill! +Their wine and their gardens and----He did not need to choose a wife +from his own color now. He stopped, thinking of little Floy, with her +curls and great listening eyes, watching at the door for her brother. +He had watched her climb up into his arms and kiss his cheek. She never +would do that again! He laughed aloud, shrilly. By God! she should keep +the kiss for other lips! Why should he not say it? + +Up on the hill the night-air throbbed colder and holier. The guards +stood about in the snow, silent, troubled. This was not like a death in +battle: it put them in mind of home, somehow. All that the dying man +said was, "Water," now and then. He had been sleeping, when struck, +and never had thoroughly wakened from his dream. Captain Poole, of the +Snake-hunters, had wrapped him in his own blanket, finding nothing more +could be done. He went off to have the Colonel summoned now, muttering +that it was "a damned shame." They put snow to Lamar's lips constantly, +being hot and parched; a woman, Dorr's wife, was crouching on the ground +beside him, chafing his hands, keeping down her sobs for fear they would +disturb him. He opened his eyes at last, and knew Dorr, who held his +head. + +"Unfasten my coat, Charley. What makes it so close here?" + +Dorr could not speak. + +"Shall I lift you up, Captain Lamar?" asked Dave Hall, who stood leaning +on his rifle. + +He spoke in a subdued tone, Babylon being far off for the moment. Lamar +dozed again before he could answer. + +"Don't try to move him,--it is too late," said Dorr, sharply. + +The moonlight steeped mountain and sky in a fresh whiteness. Lamar's +face, paling every moment, hardening, looked in it like some solemn work +of an untaught sculptor. There was a breathless silence. Ruth, kneeling +beside him, felt his hand grow slowly colder than the snow. He moaned, +his voice going fast,-- + +"At two, Ben, old fellow! We'll be free to-night!" + +Dave, stooping to wrap the blanket, felt his hand wet: he wiped it with +a shudder. + +"As he hath done unto My people, be it done unto him!" he muttered, but +the words did not comfort him. + +Lamar moved, half-smiling. + +"That's right, Floy. What is it she says? 'Now I lay me down'----I +forget. Good night. Kiss me, Floy." + +He waited,--looked up uneasily. Dorr looked at his wife: she stooped, +and kissed his lips. Charley smoothed back the hair from the damp face +with as tender a touch as a woman's. Was he dead? The white moonlight +was not more still than the calm face. + +Suddenly the night-air was shattered by a wild, revengeful laugh from +the hill. The departing soul rushed back, at the sound, to life, full +consciousness. Lamar started from their hold,--sat up. + +"It was Ben," he said, slowly. + +In that dying flash of comprehension, it may be, the wrongs of the white +man and the black stood clearer to his eyes than ours: the two lives +trampled down. The stern face of the boatman bent over him: he was +trying to stanch the flowing blood. Lamar looked at him: Hall saw no +bitterness in the look,--a quiet, sad question rather, before which his +soul lay bare. He felt the cold hand touch his shoulder, saw the pale +lips move. + +"Was this well done?" they said. + +Before Lamar's eyes the rounded arch of gray receded, faded into dark; +the negro's fierce laugh filled his ear: some woful thought at the sound +wrung his soul, as it halted at the gate. It caught at the simple faith +his mother taught him. + +"Yea," he said aloud, "though I walk through the valley of the shadow of +death, I will fear no evil; for Thou art with me." + +Dorr gently drew down the uplifted hand. He was dead. + +"It was a manly soul," said the Northern captain, his voice choking, as +he straightened the limp hair. + +"He trusted in God? A strange delusion!" muttered the boatman. + +Yet he did not like that they should leave him alone with Lamar, as +they did, going down for help. He paced to and fro, his rifle on his +shoulder, arming his heart with strength to accomplish the vengeance +of the Lord against Babylon. Yet he could not forget the murdered man +sitting there in the calm moonlight, the dead face turned towards the +North,--the dead face, whereon little Floy's tears should never fall. +The grave, unmoving eyes seemed to the boatman to turn to him with the +same awful question. "Was this well done?" they said. He thought in +eternity they would rise before him, sad, unanswered. The earth, he +fancied, lay whiter, colder,--the heaven farther off; the war, which had +become a daily business, stood suddenly before him in all its terrible +meaning. God, he thought, had met in judgment with His people. Yet he +uttered no cry of vengeance against the doomed city. With the dead face +before him, he bent his eyes to the ground, humble, uncertain,--speaking +out of the ignorance of his own weak, human soul. + +"The day of the Lord is nigh," he said; "it is at hand; and who can +abide it?" + + + + +MOUNTAIN PICTURES. + + +II. + +MONADNOCK FROM WACHUSET. + + + I would I were a painter, for the sake + Of a sweet picture, and of her who led, + A fitting guide, with light, but reverent tread, + Into that mountain mystery! First a lake + Tinted with sunset; next the wavy lines + Of far receding hills; and yet more far, + Monadnock lifting from his night of pines + His rosy forehead to the evening star. + Beside us, purple-zoned, Wachuset laid + His head against the West, whose warm light made + His aureole; and o'er him, sharp and clear, + Like a shaft of lightning in mid launching stayed, + A single level cloud-line, shone upon + By the fierce glances of the sunken sun, + Menaced the darkness with its golden spear! + + So twilight deepened round us. Still and black + The great woods climbed the mountain at our back; + And on their skirts, where yet the lingering day + On the shorn greenness of the clearing lay, + The brown old farm-house like a bird's nest hung. + With home-life sounds the desert air was stirred: + The bleat of sheep along the hill we heard, + The bucket plashing in the cool, sweet well, + The pasture-bars that clattered as they fell; + Dogs barked, fowls fluttered, cattle lowed; the gate + Of the barn-yard creaked beneath the merry weight + Of sun-brown children, listening, while they swung, + The welcome sound of supper-call to hear; + And down the shadowy lane, in tinklings clear, + The pastoral curfew of the cow-bell rung. + Thus soothed and pleased, our backward path we took, + Praising the farmer's home. He only spake, + Looking into the sunset o'er the lake, + Like one to whom the far-off is most near: + "Yes, most folks think it has a pleasant look; + I love it for my good old mother's sake, + Who lived and died here in the peace of God!" + The lesson of his words we pondered o'er, + As silently we turned the eastern flank + Of the mountain, where its shadow deepest sank, + Doubling the night along our rugged road: + We felt that man was more than his abode,-- + The inward life than Nature's raiment more; + And the warm sky, the sundown-tinted hill, + The forest and the lake, seemed dwarfed and dim + Before the saintly soul, whose human will + Meekly in the Eternal footsteps trod, + Making her homely toil and household ways + An earthly echo of the song of praise + Swelling from angel lips and harps of seraphim! + + + + +INDIVIDUALITY. + + +At a certain depth, as has already been intimated in our literature, +all bosoms communicate, all hearts are one. Hector and Ajax, in Homer's +great picture, stand face to face, each with advanced foot, with +levelled spear, and turgid sinew, eager to kill, while on either side +ten thousand slaughterous wishes poise themselves in hot breasts, +waiting to fly with the flying weapons; yet, though the combatants +seem to surrender themselves wholly to this action, there is in each a +profound element that is no party to these hostilities. It is the pure +nature of man. Ajax is not all Greek, nor is Hector wholly Trojan: both +are also men; and to the extent of their mutual participation in this +pure and perpetual element of Manhood, they are more than friends, +more than relatives,--they are of identical spirit. For there is an +imperishable nature of Man, ever and everywhere the same, of which each +particular man is a testimony and representation. As the solid earth +underruns the "dissociating sea"--_Oceano dissociabili_--and joins in +one all sundered lands, so does this nature dip beneath the dividing +parts of our being, and make of all men one simple and inseparable +humanity. In love, in friendship, in true conversation, in all happiness +of communion between men, it is this unchangeable substratum or +substance of man's being that is efficient and supreme: out of +divers bosoms, Same calls, and replies to Same with a great joy +of self-recognition. It is only in virtue of this nature that men +understand, appreciate, admire, trust each other,--that books of the +earliest times remain true in the latest,--that society is possible; and +he in whom the virtue of it dwells divinely is admitted to the secret +confidence of all bosoms, lives in all times, and converses with each +soul and age in its own vernacular. Socrates looked beyond the gates of +death for happy communion with Homer and all the great; but already we +interchange words with these, whenever we are so sweetly prospered as to +become, in some good degree, identical with the absolute nature of man. + +Not only, moreover, is this immortal substance of man's being common and +social, but it is so great and venerable that no one can match it +with an equal report. All the epithets by which we would extol it +are disgraced by it, as the most brilliant artificial lights become +blackness when placed between the eye and the noonday sun. It is older, +it is earlier in existence than the earliest star that shone in heaven; +and it will outlive the fixed stars that now in heaven seem fixed +forever. There is nothing in the created universe of which it was not +the prophecy in its primal conception; there is nothing of which it is +not the interpretation and ultimatum in its final form. The laws which +rule the world as forces are, in it, thoughts and liberties. All the +grand imaginations of men, all the glorified shapes, the Olympian gods, +cherubic and seraphic forms, are but symbols and adumbrations of what it +contains. As the sun, having set, still leaves its golden impress on the +clouds, so does the absolute nature of man throw up and paint, as it +were, on the sky testimonies of its power, remaining itself unseen. +Only, therefore, is one a poet, as he can cause particular traits and +events, without violation of their special character, or concealment +of their peculiar interest, to bear the deep, sweet, and infinite +suggestion of this. All princeliness and imperial worth, all that is +regal, beautiful, pure in men, comes from this nature; and the words +by which we express reverence, admiration, love, borrow from it their +entire force: since reverence, admiration, love, and all other grand +sentiments, are but modes or forms of _noble unification_ between men, +and are therefore shown to spring from that spiritual unity of which +persons are exponents; while, on the other hand, all evil epithets +suggest division and separation. Of this nature all titles of honor, all +symbols that command homage and obedience on earth, are pensioners. How +could the claims of kings survive successions of Stuarts and Georges, +but for a royalty in each peasant's bosom that pleads for its poor image +on the throne? + +In the high sense, no man is great save he that is a large continent of +this absolute humanity. The common nature of man it is; yet those are +ever, and in the happiest sense, uncommon men, in whom it is liberally +present. + +But every man, besides the nature which constitutes him man, has, so to +speak, another nature, which constitutes him a particular individual. He +is not only like all others of his kind, but, at the same time, unlike +all others. By physical and mental feature he is distinguished, +insulated; he is endowed with a quality so purely in contrast with the +common nature of man, that in virtue of it he can be singled out from +hundreds of millions, from all the myriads of his race. So far, now, as +one is representative of absolute humanity, he is a Person; so far +as, by an element peculiar to himself, he is contrasted with absolute +humanity, he is an Individual. And having duly chanted our _Credo_ +concerning man's pure and public nature, let us now inquire respecting +this dividing element of Individuality,--which, with all the force it +has, strives to cut off communication, to destroy unity, and to make of +humanity a chaos or dust of biped atoms. + +Not for a moment must we make this surface nature of equal estimation +with the other. It is secondary, _very_ secondary, to the pure substance +of man. The Person first in order of importance; the Individual next,-- + + "Proximus huic, longo sed proximus intervallo,"-- + + "next with an exceeding wide remove." + +Take from Epaminondas or Luther all that makes him man, and the +rest will not be worth selling to the Jews. Individuality is an +accompaniment, an accessory, a red line on the map, a fence about the +field, a copyright on the book. It is like the particular flavors of +fruits,--of no account but in relation to their saccharine, acid, and +other staple elements. It must therefore keep its place, or become +an impertinence. If it grow forward, officious, and begin to push in +between the pure nature and its divine ends, at once it is a meddling +Peter, for whom there is no due greeting but "Get thee behind me, +Satan." If the fruit have a special flavor of such ambitious pungency +that the sweets and acids cannot appear through it, be sure that to come +at this fruit no young Wilhelm Meister will purloin keys. If one be so +much an Individual that he wellnigh ceases to be a Man, we shall not +admire him. It is the same in mental as in physical feature. Let there, +by all means, be slight divergence from the common type; but by all +means let it be no more than a slight divergence. Too much is monstrous: +even a very slight excess is what we call _ugliness_. Gladly I perceive +in my neighbor's face, voice, gait, manner, a certain charm of +peculiarity; but if in any the peculiarity be so great as to suggest +a doubt whether he be not some other creature than man, may he not be +neighbor of mine! + +A little of this surface nature suffices; yet that little cannot be +spared. Its first office is to guard frontiers. We must not lie quite +open to the inspection or invasion of others: yet, were there no medium +of unlikeness interposed between one and another, privacy would be +impossible, and one's own bosom would not be sacred to himself. But +Nature has secured us against these profanations; and as we have locks +to our doors, curtains to our windows, and, upon occasion, a passport +system on our borders, so has she cast around each spirit this veil to +guard it from intruding eyes, this barrier to keep away the feet of +strangers. Homer represents the divinities as coming invisibly to +admonish their favored heroes; but Nature was beforehand with the poet, +and every one of us is, in like manner, a celestial nature walking +concealed. Who sees _you_, when you walk the street? Who would walk the +street, did be not feel himself fortressed in a privacy that no foreign +eyes can enter? But for this, no cities would be built. Society, +therefore, would be impossible, save for this element, which seems to +hinder society. Each of us, wrapt in his opaque individuality, like +Apollo or Athene in a blue mist, remains hidden, if he will; and +therefore do men dare to come together. + +But this superficial element, while securing privacy to the pure nature, +also aids it to expression. It emphasizes the outlines of Personality by +gentle contrast. It is like the shadow in the landscape, without which +all the sunbeams of heaven could not reveal with precision a single +object. Assured lovers resort to happy banter and light oppositions, to +give themselves a sweeter sense of unity of heart. The child, with a +cunning which only Nature has taught, will sometimes put a little honey +of refusal into its kisses before giving them; the maiden adds to her +virgin blooms the further attraction of virgin coyness and reserve; the +civilizing dinner-table would lose all its dignity in losing its delays; +and so everywhere, delicate denial, withholding reserve have an inverse +force, and add a charm of emphasis to gift, assent, attraction, and +sympathy. How is the word Immortality emphasized to our hearts by the +perpetual spectacle of death! The joy and suggestion of it could, +indeed, never visit us, had not this momentary loud denial been uttered +in our ears. Such, therefore, as have learned to interpret these +oppositions in Nature, hear in the jarring note of Death only a jubilant +proclamation of life eternal; while all are thus taught the longing for +immortality, though only by their fear of the contrary. And so is the +pure universal nature of man affirmed by these provocations of contrast +and insulation on the surface. We feel the personality far more, and far +more sweetly, for its being thus divided from our own. From behind this +veil the pure nature comes to us with a kind of surprise, as out of +another heaven. The joy of truth and delight of beauty are born anew for +us from each pair of chanting lips and beholding eyes; and each new soul +that comes promises another gift of the universe. Whoever, in any time +or under any sky, sees the worth and wonder of existence, sees it for +me; whatever language he speak, whatever star he inhabit, we shall +one day meet, and through the confession of his heart all my ancient +possessions will become a new gain; he shall make for me a natal day of +creation, showing the producing breath, as it goes forth from the lips +of God, and spreads into the blue purity of sky, or rounds into the +luminance of suns; the hills and their pines, the vales and their +blooms, and heroic men and beauteous women, all that I have loved or +reverenced, shall come again, appearing and trooping out of skies never +visible before. Because of these dividing lines between souls, each new +soul is to all the others a possible factor of heaven. + +Such uses does individuality subserve. Yet it is capable of these +ministries only as it does indeed _minister_. All its uses are lost with +the loss of its humility and subordinance. It is the porter at the +gate, furthering the access of lawful, and forbidding the intrusion of +unlawful visitors to the mansion; who becomes worse than useless, if in +surly excess of zeal he bar the gate against all, or if in the excess of +self-importance he receive for himself what is meant for his master, +and turn visitors aside into the porter's lodge. Beautiful is virgin +reserve, and true it is that delicate half-denial reinforces attraction; +yet the maiden who carries only _No_ upon her tongue, and only refusal +in her ways, shall never wake before dawn on the day of espousal, nor +blush beneath her bridal veil, like Morning behind her clouds. This +surface element, we must remember, is not income and resource, but +an item of needful, and, so far as needful, graceful and economical +expenditure. Excess of it is wasteful, by causing Life to pay for +that which he does not need, by increase of social fiction, and by +obstruction of social flow with the fructifications which this brings, +not to be spared by any mortal. Nay, by extreme excess, it may so cut +off and sequester a man, that no word or aspect of another soul can +reach him; he shall see in mankind only himself, he shall hear in the +voices of others only his own echoes. Many and many a man is there, so +housed in his individuality, that it goes, like an impenetrable wall, +over eye and ear; and even in the tramp of the centuries he can find +hint of nothing save the sound of his own feet. It is a frequent +tragedy,--but profound as frequent. + +One great task, indeed _the_ great task of good-breeding is, +accordingly, to induce in this element a delicacy, a translucency, +which, without robbing any action or sentiment of the hue it imparts, +shall still allow the pure human quality perfectly and perpetually to +shine through. The world has always been charmed with fine manners; and +why should it not? For what are fine manners but this: to carry your +soul on your lip, in your eye, in the palm of your hand, and yet to +stand not naked, but clothed upon by your individual quality,--visible, +yet inscrutable,--given to the hearts of others, yet contained in your +own bosom,--nobly and humanly open, yet duly reticent and secured from +invasion? _Polished_ manners often disappoint us; _good_ manners never. + +The former may be taken on by indigent souls: the latter imply a noble +and opulent nature. And wait you not for death, according to the counsel +of Solon, to be named happy, if you are permitted fellowship with a man +of rich mind, whose individual savor you always finely perceive, +and never more than finely,--who yields you the perpetual sense of +community, and never of confusion, with your own spirit. The happiness +is all the greater, if the fellowship be accorded by a mind eminently +superior to one's own; for he, while yet more removed, comes yet nearer, +seeming to be that which our own soul may become in some future life, +and so yielding us the sense of our own being more deeply and powerfully +than it is given by the consciousness in our own bosom. And going +forward to the supreme point of this felicity, we may note that the +worshipper, in the ecstasy of his adoration, feels the Highest to be +also Nearest,--more remote than the borders of space and fringes of +heaven,--more intimate with his own being than the air he breathes or +the thought be thinks; and of this double sense is the rapture of his +adoration, and the joy indeed of every angel, born. + +Divineness appertains to the absolute nature of man; piquancy and charm +to that which serves and modifies this. Infinitude and immortality are +of the one; the strictest finiteness belongs to the other. In the first +you can never be too deep and rich; in the second never too delicate and +measured. Yet you will easily find a man in whom the latter so abounds +as not only to shut him out from others, but to absorb all the vital +resource generated in his own bosom, leaving to the pure personality +nothing. The finite nature fares sumptuously every day; the other is a +heavenly Lazarus sitting at the gate. + +Of such individuals there are many classes; and the majority of +eccentric men constitute one class. If a man have very peculiar ways, we +readily attribute to him a certain depth and force, and think that the +polished citizen wants character in comparison. Probably it is not so. +Singularity may be as shallow as the shallowest conformity. There are +numbers of such from whom if you deduct the eccentricity, it is like +subtracting red from vermilion or six from half a dozen. They are +grimaces of humanity,--no more. In particular, I make occasion to say, +that those oddities, whose chief characteristic it is to slink away from +the habitations of men, and claim companionship with musk-rats, are, +despite Mr. Thoreau's pleasant patronage of them, no whit more manly or +profound than the average citizen, who loves streets and parlors, and +does not endure estrangement from the Post-Office. Mice lurk in holes +and corners; could the cat speak, she would say that they have a genius +_only_ for lurking in holes. Bees and ants are, to say the least, quite +as witty as beetles, proverbially blind; yet they build insect cities, +and are as invincibly social and city-loving as Socrates himself. + +Aside, however, from special eccentricity, there are men, like the Earl +of Essex, Bacon's _soi-disant_ friend, who possess a certain emphatic +and imposing individuality, which, while commonly assumed to indicate +character and force, is really but the _succedaneum_ for these. They +are like oysters, with extreme stress of shell, and only a blind, soft, +acephalous body within. These are commonly great men so long as little +men will serve; and are something less than little ever after. As an +instance of this, I should select the late chief magistrate of this +nation. His whole ability lay in putting a most imposing countenance +upon commonplaces. He made a mere _air_ seem solid as rock. Owing to +this possibility of presenting all force on the outside, and so creating +a false impression of resource, all great social emergencies are +followed by a speedy breaking down of men to whom was generally +attributed an able spirit; while others of less outward mark, and for +this reason hitherto unnoticed, come forward, and prove to be indeed the +large vessels of manhood accorded to that generation. + +Our tendency to assume individual mark as the measure of personality +is flattered by many of the books we read. It is, of course, easier to +depict character, when it is accompanied by some striking individual +hue; and therefore in romances and novels this is conferred upon all the +forcible characters, merely to favor the author's hand: as microscopists +feed minute creatures with colored food to make their circulations +visible. It is only the great master who can represent a powerful +personality in the purest state, that is, with the maximum of character +and the minimum of individual distinction; while small artists, with a +feeble hold upon character, habitually resort to extreme quaintnesses +and singularities of circumstance, in order to confer upon their weak +portraitures some vigor of outline. It takes a Giotto to draw readily +a nearly perfect O; but a nearly perfect triangle any one can draw. +Shakspeare is able to delineate a Gentleman,--one, that is, who, while +nobly and profoundly a man, is so delicately individualized, that the +impression of him, however vigorous and commanding, cannot be harsh: +Shakspeare is equal to this task, but even so very able a painter as +Fielding is not. His Squire Western and Parson Adams are exquisite, his +Allworthy is vapid: deny him strong pigments of individualism, and he is +unable to portray strong character. Scott, among British novelists, is, +perhaps, in this respect most Shakspearian, though the Colonel Esmond of +Thackeray is not to be forgotten; but even Scott's Dandie Dinmonts, or +gentlemen in the rough, sparkle better than his polished diamonds. +Yet in this respect the Waverley Novels are singularly and admirably +healthful, comparing to infinite advantage with the rank and file of +novels, wherein the "characters" are but bundles of quaintnesses, and +the action is impossible. + +Written history has somewhat of the same infirmity with fictitious +literature, though not always by the fault of the historian. Far too +little can it tell us respecting those of whom we desire to know much; +while, on the other hand, it is often extremely liberal of information +concerning those of whom we desire to know nothing. The greatest of men +approach a pure personality, a pure representation of man's imperishable +nature; individual peculiarity they far less abound in; and what they do +possess is held in transparent solution by their manhood, as a certain +amount of vapor is always held by the air. The higher its temperature, +the more moisture can the atmosphere thus absorb, exhibiting it not as +cloud, but only as immortal azure of sky: and so the greater intensity +there is of the pure quality of man, the more of individual peculiarity +can it master and transform into a simple heavenliness of beauty, of +which the world finds few words to say. Men, in general, have, perhaps, +no more genius than novelists in general,--though it seems a hard speech +to make,--and while profoundly _impressed_ by any manifestation of the +pure genius of man, can _observe_ and _relate_ only peculiarities and +exceptional traits. Incongruities are noted; congruities are only felt. +If a two-headed calf be born, the newspapers hasten to tell of it; but +brave boys and beautiful girls by thousands grow to fulness of stature +without mention. We know so little of Homer and Shakspeare partly +because they were Homer and Shakspeare. Smaller men might afford more +plentiful materials for biography, because their action and character +would be more clouded with individualism. The biography of a supreme +poet is the history of his kind. He transmits himself by pure vital +impression. His remembrance is committed, not to any separable faculty, +but to a memory identical with the total being of men. If you would +learn his story, listen to the sprites that ride on crimson steeds along +the arterial highways, singing of man's destiny as they go. + + + + +THE GERMAN BURNS. + + +The extreme southwestern corner of Germany is an irregular right-angle, +formed by the course of the Rhine. Within this angle and an +hypothenuse drawn from the Lake of Constance to Carlsruhe lies a wild +mountain-region--a lateral offshoot from the central chain which +extends through Europe from west to east--known to all readers of +robber-romances as the Black Forest. It is a cold, undulating upland, +intersected with deep valleys which descend to the plains of the Rhine +and the Danube, and covered with great tracts of fir-forest. Here and +there a peak rises high above the general level, the Feldberg attaining +a height of five thousand feet. The aspect of this region is stern and +gloomy: the fir-woods appear darker than elsewhere; the frequent little +lakes are as inky in hue as the pools of the High Alps; and the meadows +of living emerald give but a partial brightness to the scenery. Here, +however, the solitary traveller may adventure without fear. Robbers and +robber-castles have long since passed away, and the people, rough and +uncouth as they may at first seem, are as kindly-hearted as they are +honest. Among them was born--and in their incomprehensible dialect +wrote--Hebel, the German Burns. + +We dislike the practice of using the name of one author as the +characteristic designation of another. It is, at best, the sign of an +imperfect fame, implying rather the imitation of a scholar than the +independent position of a master. We can, nevertheless, in no other way +indicate in advance the place which the subject of our sketch occupies +in the literature of Germany. A contemporary of Burns, and ignorant of +the English language, there is no evidence that he had ever even heard +of the former; but Burns, being the first truly great poet who succeeded +in making classic a local dialect, thereby constituted himself an +illustrious standard, by which his successors in the same path must be +measured. Thus, Bellman and Beranger have been inappropriately invested +with his mantle, from the one fact of their being song-writers of a +democratic stamp. The Gascon, Jasmin, better deserves the title; and +Longfellow, in translating his "Blind Girl of Castel-Cuille," says,-- + + "Only the lowland tongue of Scotland might + Rehearse this little tragedy aright":-- + +a conviction which we have frequently shared, in translating our German +author. + +It is a matter of surprise to us, that, while Jasmin's poems have gone +far beyond the bounds of France, the name of John Peter Hebel--who +possesses more legitimate claims to the peculiar distinction which +Burns achieved--is not only unknown outside of Germany, but not +even familiarly known to the Germans themselves. The most probable +explanation is, that the Alemannic dialect, in which he wrote, is spoken +only by the inhabitants of the Black Forest and a portion of Suabia, +and cannot be understood, without a glossary, by the great body of the +North-Germans. The same cause would operate, with greater force, in +preventing a translation into foreign languages. It is, in fact, only +within the last twenty years that the Germans have become acquainted +with Burns,--chiefly through the admirable translations of the poet +Freiligrath. + +To Hebel belongs the merit of having bent one of the harshest of German +dialects to the uses of poetry. We doubt whether the lyre of Apollo was +ever fashioned from a wood of rougher grain. Broad, crabbed, guttural, +and unpleasant to the ear which is not thoroughly accustomed to its +sound, the Alemannic _patois_ was, in truth, a most unpromising +material. The stranger, even though he were a good German scholar, would +never suspect the racy humor, the _naive_, childlike fancy, and the pure +human tenderness of expression which a little culture has brought to +bloom on such a soil. The contractions, elisions, and corruptions which +German words undergo, with the multitude of terms in common use derived +from the Gothic, Greek, Latin, and Italian, give it almost the character +of a different language. It was Hebel's mother-tongue, and his poetic +faculty always returned to its use with a fresh delight which insured +success. His _German_ poems are inferior in all respects. + +Let us first glance at the poet's life,--a life uneventful, perhaps, yet +interesting from the course of its development. He was born in Basle, +in May, 1760, in the house of Major Iselin, where both his father and +mother were at service. The former, a weaver by trade, afterwards became +a soldier, and accompanied the Major to Flanders, France, and Corsica. +He had picked up a good deal of stray knowledge on his campaigns, and +had a strong natural taste for poetry. The qualities of the son were +inherited from him rather than from the mother, of whom we know nothing +more than that she was a steady, industrious person. The parents lived +during the winter in the little village of Hausen, in the Black Forest, +but with the approach of spring returned to Basle for their summer +service in Major Iselin's house. + +The boy was but a year old when his father died, and the discipline of +such a restless spirit as he exhibited in early childhood seems to have +been a task almost beyond the poor widow's powers. An incorrigible +spirit of mischief possessed him. He was an arrant scape-grace, +plundering cupboards, gardens, and orchards, lifting the gates of +mill-races by night, and playing a thousand other practical and not +always innocent jokes. Neither counsel nor punishment availed, and +the entire weight of his good qualities, as a counterbalance, barely +sufficed to prevent him from losing the patrons whom his bright, +eager, inquisitive mind attracted. Something of this was undoubtedly +congenital, and there are indications that the strong natural impulse, +held in check only by a powerful will and a watchful conscience, was the +torment of his life. In his later years, when he filled the posts of +Ecclesiastical Counsellor and Professor in the Gymnasium at Carlsruhe, +the phrenologist Gall, in a scientific _seance_, made an examination of +his head. "A most remarkable development of"----, said Gall, abruptly +breaking off, nor could he be induced to complete the sentence. +Hebel, however, frankly exclaimed,--"You certainly mean the thievish +propensity. I know I have it by nature, for I continually feel its +suggestions." What a picture is presented by this confession! A pure, +honest, and honorable life, won by a battle with evil desires, which, +commencing with birth, ceased their assaults only at the brink of the +grave! A daily struggle, and a daily victory! + +Hebel lost his mother in his thirteenth year, but was fortunate in +possessing generous patrons, who contributed enough to the slender means +he inherited to enable him to enter the Gymnasium at Carlsruhe. Leaving +this institution with the reputation of a good classical scholar, he +entered the University of Erlangen as a student of theology. Here his +jovial, reckless temperament, finding a congenial atmosphere, so got the +upperhand that he barely succeeded in passing the necessary examination, +in 1780. At the end of two years, during which time he supported himself +as a private tutor, he was ordained, and received a meagre situation +as teacher in the Academy at Loerrach, with a salary of one hundred and +forty dollars a year! Laboring patiently in this humble position for +eight years, he was at last rewarded by being transferred to the +Gymnasium at Carlsruhe, with the rank of Sub-Deacon. Hither, the +Markgraf Frederick of Baden, attracted by the warmth, simplicity, and +genial humor of the man, came habitually to listen to his sermons. He +found himself, without seeking it, in the path of promotion, and his +life thenceforth was a series of sure and moderate successes. His +expectations, indeed, were so humble that they were always exceeded by +his rewards. When Baden became a Grand Duchy, with a constitutional form +of government, it required much persuasion to induce him to accept +the rank of Prelate, with a seat in the Upper House. His friends were +disappointed, that, with his readiness and fluent power of speech, +he took so little part in the legislative proceedings. To one who +reproached him for this timidity he naively wrote,--"Oh, you have a +right to talk: you are the son of Pastor N. in X. Before you were twelve +years old, you heard yourself called _Mr._ Gottlieb; and when you went +with your father down the street, and the judge or a notary met you, +they took off their hats, you waiting for your father to return the +greeting, before you even lifted your cap. But I, as you well know, +grew up as the son of a poor widow in Hausen; and when I accompanied my +mother to Schopfheim or Basle, and we happened to meet a notary, she +commanded, 'Peter, jerk your cap off, there's a gentleman!'--but when +the judge or the counsellor appeared, she called out to me, when they +were twenty paces off, 'Peter, stand still where you are, and off with +your cap quick, the Lord Judge is comin'!' Now you can easily +imagine how I feel, when I recall those times,--and I recall them +often,--sitting in the Chamber among Barons, Counsellors of State, +Ministers, and Generals, with Counts and Princes of the reigning House +before me." Hebel may have felt that rank is but the guinea-stamp, but +he never would have dared to speak it out with the defiant independence +of Burns. Socially, however, he was thoroughly democratic in his tastes; +and his chief objection to accepting the dignity of Prelate was the fear +that it might restrict his intercourse with humbler friends. + +His ambition appears to have been mainly confined to his theological +labors, and he never could have dreamed that his after-fame was to rest +upon a few poems in a rough mountain-dialect, written to beguile his +intense longing for the wild scenery of his early home. After his +transfer to Carlsruhe, he remained several years absent from the Black +Forest; and the pictures of its dark hills, its secluded valleys, and +their rude, warm-hearted, and unsophisticated inhabitants, became more +and more fresh and lively in his memory. Distance and absence turned the +quaint dialect to music, and out of this mild home-sickness grew the +Alemannic poems. A healthy oyster never produces a pearl. + +These poems, written in the years 1801 and 1802, were at first +circulated in manuscript among the author's friends. He resisted the +proposal to collect and publish them, until the prospect of pecuniary +advantage decided him to issue an anonymous edition. The success of +the experiment was so positive that in the course of five years four +editions appeared,--a great deal for those days. Not only among his +native Alemanni, and in Baden and Wuertemberg, where the dialect was +more easily understood, but from all parts of Germany, from poets and +scholars, came messages of praise and appreciation. Jean Paul (Richter) +was one of Hebel's first and warmest admirers. "Our Alemannic poet," he +wrote, "has life and feeling for everything,--the open heart, the open +arms of love; and every star and every flower are human in his sight.... +In other, better words,--the evening-glow of a lovely, peaceful soul +slumbers upon all the hills he bids arise; for the flowers of poetry he +substitutes the flower-goddess Poetry herself; he sets to his lips the +Swiss Alp-horn of youthful longing and joy, while pointing with the +other hand to the sunset-gleam of the lofty glaciers, and dissolved +in prayer, as the sound of the chapel-bells is flung down from the +mountains." + +Contrast this somewhat confused rhapsody with the clear, precise, yet +genial words wherewith Goethe welcomed the new poet. He instantly +seized, weighed in the fine balance of his ordered mind, and valued with +nice discrimination, those qualities of Hebel's genius which had but +stirred the splendid chaos of Richter with an emotion of vague delight. +"The author of these poems," says he, in the Jena "Literaturzeitung," +(1804,) "is about to achieve a place of his own on the German Parnassus. +His talent manifests itself in two opposite directions. On the one hand, +he observes with a fresh, cheerful glance those objects of Nature which +express their life in positive existence, in growth and in motion, +(objects which we are accustomed to call _lifeless_,) and thereby +approaches the field of descriptive poetry; yet he succeeds, by his +happy personifications, in lifting his pictures to a loftier plane of +Art. On the other hand, he inclines to the didactic and the allegorical; +but here, also, the same power of personification comes to his aid, and +as, in the one case, he finds a soul for his bodies, so, in the other, +he finds a body for his souls. As the ancient poets, and others who have +been developed through a plastic sentiment for Art, introduce +loftier spirits, related to the gods,--such as nymphs, dryads, and +hamadryads,--in the place of rocks, fountains, and trees: so the author +transforms these objects into peasants, and countrifies [_verbauert_] +the universe in the most _naive_, quaint, and genial manner, until the +landscape, in which we nevertheless always recognize the human figure, +seems to become one with man in the cheerful enchantment exercised upon +our fancy." + +This is entirely correct, as a poetic characterization. Hebel, however, +possesses the additional merit--no slight one, either--of giving +faithful expression to the thoughts, emotions, and passions of the +simple people among whom his childhood was passed. The hearty native +kindness, the tenderness, hidden under a rough exterior, the lively, +droll, unformed fancy, the timidity and the boldness of love, the +tendency to yield to temptation, and the unfeigned piety of the +inhabitants of the Black Forest, are all reproduced in his poems. To say +that they teach, more or less directly, a wholesome morality, is but +indifferent praise; for morality is the cheap veneering wherewith +would-be poets attempt to conceal the lack of the true faculty. We +prefer to let our readers judge for themselves concerning this feature +of Hebel's poetry. + +The Alemannic dialect, we have said, is at first harsh to the ear. +It requires, indeed, not a little practice, to perceive its especial +beauties; since these consist in certain quaint, playful inflections and +elisions, which, like the speech of children, have a fresh, natural, +simple charm of their own. The changes of pronunciation, in German +words, are curious. _K_ becomes a light guttural _ch_, and a great +number of monosyllabic words--especially those ending in _ut_ and +_ueh_--receive a peculiar twist from the introduction of _e_ or _ei_: +as _gut, frueh_, which become _guet, frueeih_. This seems to be a +characteristic feature of the South-German dialects, though in none is +it so pronounced as in the Alemannic. The change of _ist_ into _isch, +hast_ into _hesch, ich_ into _i, dich_ into _de_, etc., is much more +widely spread, among the peasantry, and is readily learned, even by the +foreign reader. But a good German scholar would be somewhat puzzled by +the consolidation of several abbreviated words into a single one, which +occurs in almost every Alemannic sentence: for instance, in _woni_ he +would have some difficulty in recognizing _wo ich; sagene_ does not +suggest _sage ihnen_, nor _uffeme, auf einem_. + +These singularities of the dialect render the translation of Hebel's +poems into a foreign language a work of great difficulty. In the absence +of any English dialect which possesses corresponding features, the +peculiar quaintness and raciness which they confer must inevitably be +lost. Fresh, wild, and lovely as the Schwarzwald heather, they are +equally apt to die in transplanting. How much they lose by being +converted into classical German was so evident to us (fancy, "Scots who +have with Wallace bled"!) that we at first shrank from the experiment of +reproducing them in a language still farther removed from the original. +Certainly, classical English would not answer; the individual soul of +the poems could never be recognized in such a garb. The tongue of Burns +can be spoken only by a born Scot; and our Yankee, which is rather a +grotesque English than a dialect, is unfortunately so associated +with the coarse and the farcical--Lowell's little poem of "'Zekel's +Courtship" being the single exception--that it seems hardly adapted to +the simple and tender fancies of Hebel. Like the comedian whose one +serious attempt at tragic acting was greeted with roars of laughter, as +an admirable burlesque, the reader might, in such a case, persist in +seeing fun where sentiment was intended. + +In this dilemma, it occurred to us that the common, rude form of the +English language, as it is spoken by the uneducated everywhere, without +reference to provincial idioms, might possibly be the best medium. +It offers, at least, the advantage of simplicity, of a directness +of expression which overlooks grammatical rules, of natural pathos, +even,--and therefore, so far as these traits go, may reproduce them +without detracting seriously from the original. Those other qualities of +the poems which spring from the character of the people of whom and +for whom they were written must depend, for their recognition, on the +sympathetic insight of the reader. We can only promise him the utmost +fidelity in the translation, having taken no other liberty than the +substitution of common idiomatic phrases, peculiar to our language, +for corresponding phrases in the other. The original metre, in every +instance, has been strictly adhered to. + +The poems, only fifty-nine in number, consist principally of short songs +or pastorals, and narratives. The latter are written in hexameter, but +by no means classic in form. It is a rough, irregular metre, in which +the trochees preponderate over the dactyls: many of the lines, in fact, +would not bear a critical scansion. We have not scrupled to imitate this +irregularity, as not inconsistent with the plain, ungrammatical speech +of the characters introduced, and the homely air of even the most +imaginative passages. The opening poem is a charmingly wayward idyl, +called "The Meadow," (_Die Wiese_,) the name of a mountain-stream, +which, rising in the Feldberg, the highest peak of the Black Forest, +flows past Hausen, Hebel's early home, on its way to the Rhine. An +extract from it will illustrate what Jean Paul calls the "hazardous +boldness" of Hebel's personifications:-- + + Beautiful "Meadow," daughter o' Feldberg, I + welcome and greet you. + Listen: I'm goin' to sing a song, and all in + y'r honor, + Makin' a music beside ye, follerin' wherever + you wander. + Born unbeknown in the rocky, hidden heart + o' the mountain, + Suckled o' clouds and fogs, and weaned by + the waters o' heaven, + There you slep' like a babblin' baby, a-kep' + in the bed-room, + Secret, and tenderly cared-for: and eye o' + man never saw you,-- + Never peeked through a key-hole and saw + my little girl sleepin' + Sound in her chamber o' crystal, rocked in + her cradle o' silver. + Neither an ear o' man ever listened to hear + her a-breathin', + No, nor her voice all alone to herself + a-laughin' or cryin'. + Only the close little spirits that know every + passage and entrance, + In and out dodgin', they brought ye up and + teached ye to toddle, + Gev' you a cheerful natur', and larnt you + how to be useful: + Yes, and their words didn't go into one ear + and out at the t'other. + Stand on your slippery feet as soon as may + be, and use 'em, + That you do, as you slyly creep from your + chamber o' crystal + Out o' doors, barefoot, and squint up to + heaven, mischievously smilin'. + Oh, but you're pretty, my darlin', y'r eyes + have a beautiful sparkle! + Isn't it nice, out o' doors? you didn't guess + 't was so pleasant? + Listen, the leaves is rustlin', and listen, the + birdies a-singin'! + "Yes," says you, "but I'm goin' furder, and + can't stay to hear 'm: + Pleasant, truly, 's my way, and more so the + furder I travel." + + Only see how spry my little one is at her + jumpin'! + "Ketch me!" she shouts, in her fun,--"if + you want me, foller and ketch me!" + Every minute she turns and jumps in another + direction. + + There, you'll fall from the bank! You see, + she's done it: I said so. + Didn't I say it? And now she wobbles + furder and furder, + Creepin' along on all-fours, then off on her + legs she's a-toddlin',-- + Slips in the bushes,--"Hunt me!"--and + there, on a sudden, she peeks out. + Wait, I'm a-comin'! Back o' the trees I + hear her a-callin': + "Guess where I am!"--she's whims of her + own, a plenty, and keeps 'em. + But, as you go, you're growin' han'somer, + bigger, and stronger. + Where the breath o' y'r breathin' falls, the + meadows is greener, + Fresher o' color, right and left, and the + weeds and the grasses + Sprout up as juicy as _can_ be, and posies o' + loveliest colors + Blossom as brightly as wink, and bees come + and suck 'em. + Water-wagtails come tiltin',--and, look! + there's the geese o' the village! + All are a-comin' to see you, and all want to + give you a welcome; + Yes, and you're kind o' heart, and you + prattle to all of 'em kindly; + "Come, you well-behaved creeturs, eat and + drink what I bring you,-- + I must be off and away: God bless you, + well-behaved creeturs!"[A] + +[Footnote A: As the reader of German may be curious to see a specimen +of the original, we give this last passage, which contains, in a brief +compass, many distinctive features of the Alemannic dialect:-- + + "Nei so lucg me doch, wie cha mi Meiddeli springe! + 'Chunnsch mi ueber,' seits und lacht, 'und witt + mi, se hol mi!' + All' wil en andere Weg, und alliwil anderi + Spruengli! + Fall mer nit sel Reiuli ab!--Do hemmer's, i sags io-- + Hani's denn nit gseit? Doch gauckelet's witers + und witers, + Groblet uf alle Vieren, und stellt si wieder uf + d' Beinli, + Schlieft in d' Huerst--iez such mer's eisl--doert + gueggelet's use, + Wart, i chumm! Druf rueefts mer wieder hinter + de Baeume: + 'Roth wo bin i iez!'--und het si urige Phatest. + Aber wie de gosch, wirsch sichtli groesser und + schoener. + Wo di liebligen Othern weiht, so faerbt si der Rase + Grueener rechts und links, es stoehn in saftige + Triebe + Gras und Chrueter uf, es stoehn in frischere Gstalte + Farbigi Blueemli do, und d' Immli choemmen und + suge. + 'S Wasserstelzli chunnt, und lueg doch,'s Wuli + vo Todtnau! + Alles will di bschauen, und Alles will di bigruesse, + Und di fruendlig Herz git alle fruendligi Rede: + 'Choemmet ihr ordlige Thierli, do hender, esset + und trinket! + Witers goht mi Weg, Gsegott, ihr ordlige Thierli!'" +] + +The poet follows the stream through her whole course, never dropping the +figure, which is adapted, with infinite adroitness, and with the play +of a fancy as wayward and unrestrained as her own waters, to all her +changing aspects. Beside the Catholic chapel of Fair-Beeches she pauses +to listen to the mass; but farther down the valley becomes an apostate, +and attends the Lutheran service in the Husemer church. Stronger and +statelier grown, she trips along with the step of a maiden conscious of +her own beauty, and the poet clothes her in the costume of an Alemannic +bride, with a green kirtle of a hundred folds, and a stomacher of Milan +gauze, "like a loose cloud on a morning sky in spring-time." Thus +equipped, she wanders at will over the broader meadows, around the feet +of vineyard-hills, visits villages and churches, or stops to gossip with +the lusty young millers. But the woman's destiny is before her; she +cannot escape it; and the time is drawing near when her wild, singing, +pastoral being shall be absorbed in that of the strong male stream, the +bright-eyed son of the Alps, who has come so far to woo and win her. + + Daughter o' Feldberg, half-and-half I've got + a suspicion + How as you've virtues and faults enough now + to choose ye a husband. + Castin' y'r eyes down, are you? Pickin' and + plattin' y'r ribbons? + Don't be so foolish, wench!--She thinks I + know nothin' about it, + How she's already engaged, and each is + a-waitin' for t'other. + Don't I know him, my darlin', the lusty + young fellow, y'r sweetheart? + + Over powerful rocks, and through the hedges + and thickets, + Right away from the snowy Swiss mountains + he plunges at Rheineck + Down to the lake, and straight ahead swims + through it to Constance, + Sayin': "'T's no use o' talkin', I'll have + the gal I'm engaged to!" + + + But, as he reaches Stein, he goes a little more slowly, + Leavin' the lake where he's decently washed his feet and his body. + Diessenhofen don't please him,--no, nor the convent beside it. + For'ard he goes to Schaffhausen, onto the rocks at the corner; + There he says: "It's no use o' talkin', I'll git to my sweetheart: + Body and life I'll stake, cravat and embroidered suspenders." + Woop! but he jumps! And now he talks to hisself, goin' furder, + Giddy, belike, in his head, but pushes for'ard to Rheinau, + Eglisau, and Kaiserstuhl, and Zurzach, and Waldshut,-- + All are behind him, passin' one village after another + Down to Grenzach, and out on the broad and beautiful bottoms + Nigh unto Basle; and there he must stop and look after his license. + + * * * * * + + Look! isn't that y'r bridegroom a-comin' down yonder to meet you?-- + Yes, it's him, it's him, I hear't, for his voice is so jolly! + Yes, it's him, it's him,--with his eyes as blue as the heavens, + With his Swiss knee-breeches o' green, and suspenders o' velvet, + With his shirt o' the color o' pearl, and buttons o' crystal, + With his powerful loins, and his sturdy back and his shoulders, + Grand in his gait, commandin', beautiful, free in his motions, + Proud as a Basle Councilman,--yes, it's the big boy o' Gothard![B] + +[Footnote B: The Rhine.] + +The daring with which Hebel _countrifies_ (or, rather, _farmerizes_, to +translate Goethe's--word more literally) the spirit of natural objects, +carrying his personifications to that point where the imaginative +borders on the grotesque, is perhaps his strongest characteristic. His +poetic faculty, putting on its Alemannic costume, seems to abdicate all +ambition of moving in a higher sphere of society, but within the bounds +it has chosen allows itself the utmost range of capricious enjoyment. +In another pastoral, called "The Oatmeal Porridge," he takes the grain +which the peasant has sown, makes it a sentient creature, and carries it +through the processes of germination, growth, and bloom, without once +dropping the figure or introducing an incongruous epithet. It is not +only a child, but a child of the Black Forest, uttering its hopes, its +anxieties, and its joys in the familiar dialect. The beetle, in +his eyes, becomes a gross, hard-headed boor, carrying his sacks of +blossom-meal, and drinking his mug of XX morning-dew; the stork parades +about to show his red stockings; the spider is at once machinist and +civil engineer; and even the sun, moon, and morning-star are not secure +from the poet's familiarities. In his pastoral of "The Field-Watchmen," +he ventures to say,-- + + Mister Schoolmaster Moon, with y'r forehead wrinkled with teachin', + With y'r face full o' larnin', a plaster stuck on y'r cheek-bone, + Say, do y'r children mind ye, and larn their psalm and their texes? + +We much fear that this over-quaintness of fancy, to which the Alemannic +dialect gives such a racy flavor, and which belongs, in a lesser +degree, to the minds of the people who speak that dialect, cannot be +successfully clothed in an English dress. Let us try, therefore, a +little poem, the sentiment whereof is of universal application:-- + + THE CONTENTED FARMER. + + I guess I'll take my pouch, and fill + My pipe just once,--yes, that I will! + Turn out my plough and home'ards go: + _Buck_ thinks, enough's been done, I know. + + Why, when the Emperor's council's done, + And he can hunt, and have his fun, + He stops, I guess, at any tree, + And fills his pipe as well as me. + + But smokin' does him little good: + He can't have all things as he would. + His crown's a precious weight, at that: + It isn't like my old straw hat. + + He gits a deal o' tin, no doubt, + But all the more he pays it out; + And everywheres they beg and cry + Heaps more than he can satisfy. + + And when, to see that nothin' 's wrong, + He plagues hisself the whole day long, + And thinks, "I guess I've fixed it now," + Nobody thanks him, anyhow. + + And so, when in his bloody clo'es + The Gineral out o' battle goes, + He takes his pouch, too, I'll agree, + And fills his pipe as well as me. + + But in the wild and dreadfle fight, + His pipe don't taste ezackly right: + He's galloped here and galloped there, + And things a'n't pleasant, anywhere. + + And sich a cursin': "Thunder!" "Hell!" + And "Devil!" (worse nor I can tell:) + His grannydiers in blood lay down, + And yonder smokes a burnin' town. + + And when, a-travellin' to the Fairs, + The merchant goes with all his wares, + He takes a pouch o' th' best, I guess, + And fills and smokes his pipe, no less. + + Poor devil, 't isn't good for you! + With all y'r gold, you've trouble, too. + Twice two is four, if stocks'll rise: + I see the figgers in your eyes. + + It's hurry, worry, tare and tret; + Ye ha'n't enough, the more ye get,-- + And couldn't use it, if ye had: + No wonder that y'r pipe tastes bad! + + But good, thank God! and wholesome's mine: + The bottom-wheat is growin' fine, + And God, o' mornin's, sends the dew, + And sends his breath o' blessin', too. + + And, home, there's Nancy bustlin' round: + The supper's ready, I'll be bound, + And youngsters waitin'. Lord! I vow + I dunno which is smartest, now. + + My pipe tastes good; the reason's plain: + (I guess I'll fill it once again:) + With cheerful heart, and jolly mood, + And goin' home, all things is good. + +Hebel's narrative poems abound with the wayward pranks of a fancy which +seems a little too restive to be entirely controlled by his artistic +sense; but they possess much dramatic truth and power. He delights in +the supernatural element, but approaches it from the gentler human side. +In "The Carbuncle," only, we find something of that weird, uncanny +atmosphere which casts its glamour around the "Tam O'Shanter" of Burns. +A more satisfactory illustration of his peculiar qualities is "The +Ghost's Visit on the Feldberg,"--a story told by a loafer of Basle to a +group of beer-drinkers in the tavern at Todtnau, a little village at +the foot of the mountain. This is, perhaps, the most popular of Hebel's +poems, and we therefore translate it entire. The superstition that a +child born on Sunday has the power of seeing spirits is universal among +the German peasantry. + + THE GHOST'S VISIT ON THE FELDBERG. + + Hark ye, fellows o' Todtnau, if ever I told + you the Scythe-Ghost[C] + Was a spirit of Evil, I've now got a different + story. + Out of the town am I,--yes, that I'll honestly + own to,-- + Related to merchants, at seven tables free to + take pot-luck. + But I'm a Sunday's child; and wherever the ghosts + at the cross-roads + Stand in the air, in vaults, and cellars, and + out-o'-way places,-- + Guardin' hidden money with eyes like fiery + sauce-pans, + Washin' with bitter tears the spot where + somebody's murdered, + Shovellin' the dirt, and scratchin' it over + with nails all so bloody,-- + Clear as day I can see, when it lightens. + Ugh! how they whimper! + Also, whenever with beautiful blue eyes the + heavenly angels, + Deep in the night, in silent, sleepin' + villages wander, + Peekin' in at the windows, and talkin' + together so pleasant, + Smilin' one at the t'other, and settin' + outside o' the house-doors, + So that the pious folks shall take no harm + while they're sleepin': + Then ag'in, when in couples or threes they + walk in the grave-yard, + Talkin' in this like: "There a faithful + mother is layin'; + And here's a man that was poor, but took no + advantage o' no one: + Take your rest, for you're tired,--we'll waken + ye up when the time comes!" + Clearly I see by the light o' the stars, and I + hear them a-talkin'. + Many I know by their names, and speak to, + whenever I meet 'em, + Give 'em the time o' day, and ask 'em, and + answer their questions. + "How do ye do?" "How's y'r watch?" + "Praise God, it's tolerable, thank you!" + Believe it, or not! Well, once on a time my + cousin, he sent me + Over to Todtnau, on business with all sorts o' + troublesome people, + Where you've coffee to drink, and biscuit + they give you to soak in 't. + "Don't you stop on the road, nor gabble + whatever comes foremost," + Hooted my cousin at startin', "nor don't you + let go o' your snuff-box, + Leavin' it round in the tavern, as gentlemen + do, for the next time." + Up and away I went, and all that my cousin + he'd ordered + Fairly and squarely I fixed. At the sign o' + the Eagle in Todtnau + Set for a while; then, sure o' my way, tramped + off ag'in, home'ards, + Nigh by the village, I reckoned,--but found + myself climbin' the Feldberg, + Lured by the birdies, and down by the brooks + the beautiful posies: + That's a weakness o' mine,--I ran like a fool + after such things. + Now it was dusk, and the birdies hushed up, + settin' still on the branches. + Hither and yonder a starlie stuck its head + through the darkness, + Peekin' out, as oncertain whether the sun was + in bed yet,-- + Whether it mightn't come, and called to the + other ones: "Come now!" + Then I knowed I was lost, and laid myself + down,--I was weary: + There, you know, there's a hut, and I found + an armful o' straw in 't. + "Here's a go!" I thinks to myself, "and I + wish I was safely + Cuddled in bed to home,--or 't was midnight, + and some little spirit + Somewhere popped out, as o' nights when it's + twelve they're accustomed, + Passin' the time with me, friendly, till winds + that blow early o' mornin's + Blow out the heavenly lights, and I see the + way back to the village." + Now, as thinkin' in this like, I felt all over my + watch-face,-- + Dark as pitch all around,--and felt with my + finger the hour-hand, + Found it was nigh onto 'leven, and hauled my + pipe from my pocket, + Thinkin': "Maybe a bit of a smoke'll keep + me from snoozin'": + Thunder! all of a sudden beside me was two + of 'em talkin', + Like as they'd business together! You'd + better believe that I listened. + "Say, a'n't I late a-comin'? Because there + was, over in Mambach, + Dyin', a girl with pains in the bones and terrible + fever: + Now, but she's easy! I held to her mouth the + drink o' departure, + So that the sufferin' ceased, and softly lowered + the eyelids, + Sayin': 'Sleep, and in peace,--I'll waken + thee up when the time comes!' + Do me the favor, brother: fetch in the basin o' + silver + Water, ever so little: my scythe, as you see, + must be whetted." + "Whetted?" says I to myself, "and a spirit?" + and peeked from the window. + Lo and behold, there sat a youngster with + wings that was golden; + White was his mantle, white, and his girdle + the color o' roses, + Fair and lovely to see, and beside him two + lights all a-burnin'. + "All the good spirits," says I, "Mr. Angel, + God have you in keepin'!" + "Praise their Master, the Lord," said the angel; + "God thank you, as I do!" + "Take no offence, Mr. Ghost, and by y'r good + leave and permission, + Tell me, what have you got for to mow?" + "Why, the scythe!" was his answer. + "Yes," says I, "for I see it; and that is my + question exackly, + What you're goin' to do with the scythe." + "Why, to mow!" was his answer. + Then I ventur'd to say: "And that is my question + exackly, + What you're goin' to mow, supposin' you're + willin' to tell me." + "Grass! And what is your business so late up + here in the night-time?" + "Nothin' special," I answered; "I'm burnin' + a little tobacco. + Lost my way, or most likely I'd be at the + Eagle, in Todtnau. + But to come to the subject, supposin' it isn't + a secret, + Tell me, what do you make o' the grass?" + And he answered me: "Fodder!" + "Don't understand it," says I; "for the Lord + has no cows up in heaven." + "Not precisely a cow," he remarked, "but + heifers and asses. + Seest, up yonder, the star?" and he pointed + one out with his finger. + "There's the ass o' the Christmas-Child, and + Fridolin's heifers,[D] + Breathin' the starry air, and waitin' for grass + that I bring 'em: + Grass doesn't grow there,--nothin' grows but + the heavenly raisins, + Milk and honey a-runnin' in rivers, plenty as + water: + But they're particular cattle,--grass they + must have every mornin', + Mouthfuls o' hay, and drink from earthly + fountains they're used to. + So for them I'm a-whettin' my scythe, and + soon must be mowin': + Wouldn't it be worth while, if politely you'd + offer to help me?" + So the angel he talked, and this way I answered + the angel: + "Hark ye, this it is, just: and I'll go wi' the + greatest o' pleasure. + Folks from the town know nothin' about it: + we write and we cipher, + Reckon up money,--that we can do!--and + measure and weigh out, + Unload, and on-load, and eat and drink without + any trouble. + All that we want for the belly, in kitchen, + pantry, and cellar, + Comes in lots through every gate, in baskets + and boxes, + Runs in every street, and cries at every + corner: + 'Buy my cherries!' and 'Buy my butter!' + and 'Look at my salad!' + 'Buy my onions!' and 'Here's your carrots!' + and 'Spinage and parsley!' + 'Lucifer matches! Lucifer matches!' 'Cabbage + and turnips!' + 'Here's your umbrellas!' 'Caraway-seed and + juniper-berries! + Cheap for cash, and all to be traded for sugar + and coffee!' + Say, Mr. Angel, didst ever drink coffee? + how do you like it?" + "Stop with y'r nonsense!" then he said, but + he couldn't help laughin'; + "No, we drink but the heavenly air, and eat + nothin' but raisins, + Four on a day o' the week, and afterwards five + on a Sunday. + Come, if you want to go with me, now, for + I'm off to my mowin', + Back o' Todtnau, there on the grassy holt by + the highway." + "Yes, Mr. Angel, that will I truly, seein' + you're willin': + Seems to me that it's cooler: give me y'r + scythe for to carry: + Here's a pipe and a pouch,--you're welcome + to smoke, if you want to." + While I was talkin', "Poohoo!" cried the + angel. A fiery man stood, + Quicker than lightnin', beside me. "Light us + the way to the village!" + Said he. And truly before us marched, a-burnin', + the Poohoo, + Over stock and rock, through the bushes, a + travellin' torch-light. + "Handy, isn't it?" laughin', the angel said. + --"What are ye doin'? + Why do you nick at y'r flint? You can light + y'r pipe at the Poohoo. + Use him whenever you like: but it seems to + me you're a-frightened,-- + You, and a Sunday's-child, as you are: do you + think he will bite you?" + "No, he ha'n't bit me; but this you'll allow + me to say, Mr. Angel,-- + Half-and-half I mistrust him: besides, my tobacco's + a-burnin'. + That's a weakness o' mine,--I'm afeard o' + them fiery creeturs: + Give me seventy angels, instead o' this big + burnin' devil!" + "Really, it's dreadfle," the angel says he, + "that men is so silly, + Fearful o' ghosts and spectres, and skeery + without any reason. + Two of 'em only is dangerous, two of 'em hurtful + to mankind: + One of 'em's known by the name o' Delusion, + and Worry the t'other. + Him, Delusion, 's a dweller in wine: from + cans and decanters + Up to the head he rises, and turns your sense + to confusion. + This is the ghost that leads you astray in forest + and highway: + Undermost, uppermost, hither and yon the + ground is a-rollin', + Bridges bendin', and mountains movin', and + everything double. + Hark ye, keep out of his way!" "Aha!" + I says to the angel, + "There you prick me, but not to the blood: I + see what you're after. + Sober am I, as a judge. To be sure, I emptied + my tankard + Once, at the Eagle,--_once_,--and the landlord + 'll tell you the same thing, + S'posin' you doubt me. And now, pray, tell + me who is the t'other?" + "Who is the t'other? Don't know without + askin'?" answered the angel. + "He's a terrible ghost: the Lord forbid you + should meet him! + When you waken early, at four or five in the + mornin', + There he stands a-waitin' with burnin eyes + at y'r bed-side, + Gives you the time o' day with blazin switches + and pinchers: + Even prayin' don't help, nor helps all your + _Ave Marias!_ + When you begin 'em, he takes your jaws and + claps 'em together; + Look to heaven, he comes and blinds y'r eyes + with his ashes; + Be you hungry, and eat, he pizons y'r soup + with his wormwood; + Take you a drink o' nights, he squeezes gall + in the tankard; + Run like a stag, he follows as close on y'r trail + as a blood-hound; + Creep like a shadow, be whispers: 'Good! we + had best take it easy'; + Kneels at y'r side in the church, and sets at + y'r side in the tavern. + Go wherever you will, there's ghosts a-hoverin' + round you. + Shut your eyes in y'r bed, they mutter: + 'There 's no need o' hurry; + By-and-by you can sleep, but listen! we've + somethin' to tell you: + Have you forgot how you stoled? and how + you cheated the orphans? + Secretly sinned?'--and this, and t'other; + and when they have finished, + Say it over ag'in, and you get little good o' + your slumber." + So the angel he talked, and, like iron under + the hammer, + Sparked and spirited the Poohoo. "Surely," + I says to the angel, + "Born on a Sunday was I, and friendly with + many a preacher, + Yet the Father protect me from these!" Says + he to me, smilin': + "Keep y'r conscience pure; it is better than + crossin' and blessin'. + Here we must part, for y'r way turns off and + down to the village. + Take the Poohoo along, but mind! put him + out, in the meadow, + Lest he should run in the village, settin' fire + to the stables. + God be with you and keep you!" And then + says I: "Mr. Angel, + God, the Father, protect you! Be sure, when + you come to the city, + Christmas evenin', call, and I'll hold it an + honor to see you: + Raisins I'll have at your service, and hippocras, + if you like it. + Chilly 's the air, o' evenin's, especially down + by the river." + Day was breakin' by this, and right there was + Todtnau before me! + Past, and onward to Basle I wandered, i' the + shade and the coolness. + When into Mambach I came, they bore a dead + girl to the grave-yard, + After the Holy Cross, and the faded banner o' + Heaven, + With the funeral garlands upon her, with sobbin' + and weepin'. + Ah, but she 'd heard what he said! he'll + waken her up when the time comes. + Afterwards, Tuesday it was, I got safely back + to my cousin; + But it turned out as he said,--I'd somewhere + forgotten my snuff-box! + +[Footnote C: _Dengle-Geist_, literally, "Whetting-Spirit." The exact +meaning of _dengeln_ is to sharpen a scythe by hammering the edge of the +blade, which was practised before whetstones came in use.] + +[Footnote D: According to an old legend, Fridolin (a favorite saint with +the Catholic population of the Black Forest) harnessed two young heifers +to a mighty fir-tree, and hauled it into the Rhine near Saeckingen, +thereby damming the river and forcing it to take a new course, on the +other side of the town.] + +In this poem the hero of the story unconsciously describes himself by +his manner of telling it,--a reflective action of the dramatic faculty, +which Browning, among living poets, possesses in a marked degree. The +"moral" is so skilfully inwoven into the substance of the narrative as +to conceal the appearance of design, and the reader has swallowed the +pill before its sugar-coating of fancy has dissolved in his mouth. There +are few of Hebel's poems which were not written for the purpose of +inculcating some wholesome lesson, but in none does this object +prominently appear. Even where it is not merely implied, but directly +expressed, he contrives to give it the air of having been accidentally +suggested by the theme. In the following, which is the most pointedly +didactic of all his productions, the characteristic fancy still betrays +itself:-- + + THE GUIDE-POST. + + D' ye know the road to th' bar'l o' flour? + At break o' day let down the bars, + And plough y'r wheat-field, hour by hour, + Till sundown,--yes, till shine o' stars. + + You peg away, the livelong day, + Nor loaf about, nor gape around; + And that's the road to the thrashin'-floor, + And into the kitchen, I'll be bound! + + D' ye know the road where dollars lays? + Follow the red cents, here and there: + For if a man leaves them, I guess, + He won't find dollars anywhere. + + D' ye know the road to Sunday's rest? + Jist don't o' week-days be afeard; + In field and workshop do y'r best, + And Sunday comes itself, I've heerd. + On Saturdays it's not fur off, + And brings a basketful o' cheer,-- + A roast, and lots o' garden-stuff, + And, like as not, a jug o' beer! + + D' ye know the road to poverty? + Turn in at any tavern-sign: + Turn in,--it's temptin' as can be: + There's bran'-new cards and liquor fine. + + In the last tavern there's a sack, + And, when the cash y'r pocket quits, + Jist hang the wallet on y'r back,-- + You vagabond! see how it fits! + + D' ye know what road to honor leads, + And good old age?--a lovely sight! + By way o' temperance, honest deeds, + And tryin' to do y'r dooty right. + + And when the road forks, ary side, + And you're in doubt which one it is, + Stand still, and let y'r conscience guide: + Thank God, it can't lead much amiss! + + And now, the road to church-yard gate + You needn't ask! Go anywhere! + For, whether roundabout or straight, + All roads, at last, 'll bring you there. + + Go, fearin' God, but lovin' more!-- + I've tried to be an honest guide,-- + You'll find the grave has got a door, + And somethin' for you t'other side. + +We could linger much longer over our simple, brave old poet, were we +sure of the ability of the reader approximately to distinguish his +features through the veil of translation. In turning the leaves of the +smoky book, with its coarse paper and rude type,--which suggests to us, +by-the-by, the fact that Hebel was accustomed to hang a book, which he +wished especially to enjoy, in the chimney, for a few days,--we are +tempted by "The Market-Women in Town," by "The Mother on Christmas-Eve," +"The Morning-Star," and the charming fairy-story of "Riedliger's +Daughter," but must be content to close our specimens, for the present, +with a song of love,--"_Hans und Verene_,"--under the equivalent title +of + + JACK AND MAGGIE. + + There's only one I'm after, + And she's the one, I vow! + If she was here, and standin' by, + She is a gal so neat and spry, + So neat and spry, + I'd be in glory now! + + It's so,--I'm hankerin' for her, + And want to have her, too. + Her temper's always gay, and bright, + Her face like posies red and white, + Both red and white, + And eyes like posies blue. + + And when I see her comin', + My face gits red at once; + My heart feels chokin'-like, and weak, + And drops o' sweat run down my cheek, + Yes, down my cheek,-- + Confound me for a dunce! + + She spoke so kind, last Tuesday, + When at the well we met: + "Jack, give a lift! What ails you? Say! + I see that somethin' 's wrong to-day: + What's wrong to-day?" + No, that I can't forget! + + I know I'd ought to tell her, + And wish I'd told her then; + And if I wasn't poor and low, + And sayin' it didn't choke me so, + (It chokes me so,) + I'd find a chance again. + + Well, up and off I'm goin': + She's in the field below: + I'll try and let her know my mind; + And if her answer isn't kind, + If 't isn't kind, + I'll jine the ranks, and go! + + I'm but a poor young fellow, + Yes, poor enough, no doubt: + But ha'n't, thank God, done nothin' wrong, + And be a man as stout and strong, + As stout and strong, + As any roundabout. + + What's rustlin' in the bushes? + I see a movin' stalk: + The leaves is openin': there's a dress! + O Lord, forbid it! but I guess-- + I guess--I guess + Somebody's heard me talk! + + "Ha! here I am! you've got me! + So keep me, if you can! + I've guessed it ever since last Fall, + And Tuesday morn I saw it all, + _I_ saw it all! + Speak out, then, like a man! + + "Though rich you a'n't in money, + Nor rich in goods to sell, + An honest heart is more than gold, + And hands you've got for field and fold, + For house and fold, + And--Jack--I love you well!" + + "O Maggie, say it over! + O Maggie, is it so? + I couldn't longer bear the doubt: + 'Twas hell,--but now you've drawed me out, + You've drawed me out! + And will I? _Won't_ I, though!" + +The later years of Hebel's life quietly passed away in the circle of his +friends at Carlsruhe. After the peculiar mood which called forth the +Alemannic poems had passed away, he seems to have felt no further +temptation to pursue his literary success. His labors, thenceforth, were +chiefly confined to the preparation of a Biblical History, for schools, +and the editing of the "Rhenish House-Friend," an illustrated calendar +for the people, to which he gave a character somewhat similar to that of +Franklin's "Poor Richard." His short, pithy narratives, each with its +inevitable, though unobtrusive moral, are models of style. The calendar +became so popular, under his management, that forty thousand copies were +annually printed. He finally discontinued his connection with it, in +1819, in consequence of an interference with his articles on the part of +the censor. + +In society Hebel was a universal favorite. Possessing, in his personal +appearance, no less than in his intellect, a marked individuality, he +carried a fresh, vital, inspiring element into every company which he +visited. His cheerfulness was inexhaustible, his wit keen and lambent +without being acrid, his speech clear, fluent, and genial, and his fund +of anecdote commensurate with his remarkable narrative power. He was +exceedingly frank, joyous, and unconstrained in his demeanor; fond of +the pipe and the beer-glass; and as one of his maxims was, "Not to close +any door through which Fortune might enter," he not only occasionally +bought a lottery-ticket, but was sometimes to be seen, during the +season, at the roulette-tables of Baden-Baden. One of his friends +declares, however, that he never obtruded "the clergyman" at +inappropriate times! + +In person he was of medium height, with a body of massive Teutonic +build, a large, broad head, inclined a little towards one shoulder, the +eyes small, brown, and mischievously sparkling, the hair short, crisp, +and brown, the nose aquiline, and the mouth compressed, with the +commencement of a smile stamped in the corners. He was careless in +his gait, and negligent in his dress. Warm-hearted and tender, and +especially attracted towards women and children, the cause of his +celibacy always remained a mystery to his friends. + +The manner of his death, finally, illustrated the genuine humanity of +his nature. In September, 1826, although an invalid at the time, he made +a journey to Mannheim for the sake of procuring a mitigation of the +sentence of a condemned poacher, whose case appealed strongly to his +sympathy. His exertions on behalf of the poor man so aggravated his +disease that he was soon beyond medical aid. Only his corpse, crowned +with laurel, returned to Carlsruhe. Nine years afterwards a monument was +erected to his memory in the park attached to the Ducal palace. Nor have +the inhabitants of the Black Forest failed in worthy commemoration of +their poet's name. A prominent peak among the mountains which inclose +the valley of his favorite "Meadow" has been solemnly christened +"Hebel's Mount"; and a flower of the Forest--the _Anthericum_ of +Linnaeus--now figures in German botanies as the _Hebelia Alemannica_. + + + +THE FORESTER. + + Then bless thy secret growth, nor catch + At noise, but thrive unseen and dumb, + Keep clean, bear fruit, earn life, and watch + Till the white-winged reapers come.--Henry Vaughan + + +I had never thought of knowing a man so thoroughly of the country as +this friend of mine, and so purely a son of Nature. Perhaps he has +the profoundest passion for it of any one living; and had the human +sentiment been as tender from the first, and as pervading, we might have +had pastorals of which Virgil and Theocritus would have envied him the +authorship, had they chanced to be his contemporaries. As it is, he has +come nearer the antique spirit than any of our native poets, and touched +the fields and groves and streams of his native town with a classic +interest that shall not fade. Some of his verses are suffused with an +elegiac tenderness, as if the woods and fields bewailed the absence +of their forester, and murmured their griefs meanwhile to one +another,--responsive like idyls. Living in close companionship with +Nature, his Muse breathes the spirit and voice of poetry; his excellence +lying herein: for when the heart is once divorced from the senses and +all sympathy with common things, then poetry has fled, and the love that +sings. + +The most welcome of companions, this plain countryman. One shall not +meet with thoughts invigorating like his often; coming so scented of +mountain and field breezes and rippling springs, so like a luxuriant +clod from under forest-leaves, moist and mossy with earth-spirits. His +presence is tonic, like ice-water in dog-days to the parched citizen +pent in chambers and under brazen ceilings. Welcome as the gurgle of +brooks, the dripping of pitchers,--then drink and be cool! He seems one +with things, of Nature's essence and core, knit of strong timbers, most +like a wood and its inhabitants. There are in him sod and shade, woods +and waters manifold, the mould and mist of earth and sky. Self-poised +and sagacious as any denizen of the elements, he has the key to every +animal's brain, every plant, every shrub; and were an Indian to flower +forth, and reveal the secrets hidden in his cranium, it would not be +more surprising than the speech of our Sylvanus. He must belong to the +Homeric age,--is older than pastures and gardens, as if he were of the +race of heroes, and one with the elements. He, of all men, seems to be +the native New-Englander, as much so as the oak, the granite ledge, our +best sample of an indigenous American, untouched by the Old Country, +unless he came down from Thor, the Northman; as yet unfathered by any, +and a nondescript in the books of natural history. + +A peripatetic philosopher, and out of doors for the best parts of his +days and nights, he has manifold weather and seasons in him, and the +manners of an animal of probity and virtues unstained. Of our moralists +he seems the wholesomest; and the best republican citizen in the +world,--always at home, and minding his own affairs. Perhaps a little +over-confident sometimes, and stiffly individual, dropping society clean +out of his theories, while standing friendly in his strict sense of +friendship, there is in him an integrity and sense of justice that make +possible and actual the virtues of Sparta and the Stoics, and all the +more welcome to us in these times of shuffling and of pusillanimity. +Plutarch would have made him immortal in his pages, had he lived before +his day. Nor have we any so modern as be,--his own and ours; too purely +so to be appreciated at once. A scholar by birthright, and an author, +his fame has not yet travelled far from the banks of the rivers he has +described in his books; but I hazard only the truth in affirming of his +prose, that in substance and sense it surpasses that of any naturalist +of his time, and that he is sure of a reading in the future. There are +fairer fishes in his pages than any now swimming in our streams, and +some sleep of his on the banks of the Merrimack by moonlight that Egypt +never rivalled; a morning of which Memnon might have envied the music, +and a greyhound that was meant for Adonis; some frogs, too, better than +any of Aristophanes. Perhaps we have had no eyes like his since Pliny's +time. His senses seem double, giving him access to secrets not easily +read by other men: his sagacity resembling that of the beaver and the +bee, the dog and the deer; an instinct for seeing and judging, as by +some other or seventh sense, dealing with objects as if they were +shooting forth from his own mind mythologically, thus completing Nature +all round to his senses, and a creation of his at the moment. I am sure +he knows the animals, one by one, and everything else knowable in our +town, and has named them rightly as Adam did in Paradise, if he be +not that ancestor himself. His works are pieces of exquisite sense, +celebrations of Nature's virginity, exemplified by rare learning and +original observations. Persistently independent and manly, he criticizes +men and times largely, urging and defending his opinions with the spirit +and pertinacity befitting a descendant of him of the Hammer. A head +of mixed genealogy like his, Franco-Norman crossed by Scottish and +New-England descent, may be forgiven a few characteristic peculiarities +and trenchant traits of thinking, amidst his great common sense and +fidelity to the core of natural things. Seldom has a head circumscribed +so much of the sense of Cosmos as this footed intelligence,--nothing +less than all out-of-doors sufficing his genius and scopes, and, day by +day, through all weeks and seasons, the year round. + +If one would find the wealth of wit there is in this plain man, the +information, the sagacity, the poetry, the piety, let him take a walk +with him, say of a winter's afternoon, to the Blue Water, or anywhere +about the outskirts of his village-residence. Pagan as he shall +outwardly appear, yet he soon shall be seen to be the hearty worshipper +of whatsoever is sound and wholesome in Nature,--a piece of russet +probity and sound sense that she delights to own and honor. His talk +shall be suggestive, subtile, and sincere, under as many masks and +mimicries as the shows he passes, and as significant,--Nature choosing +to speak through her chosen mouth-piece,--cynically, perhaps, sometimes, +and searching into the marrows of men and times he chances to speak of, +to his discomfort mostly, and avoidance. Nature, poetry, life,--not +politics, not strict science, not society as it is,--are his preferred +themes: the new Pantheon, probably, before he gets far, to the naming of +the gods some coming Angelo, some Pliny, is to paint and describe. The +world is holy, the things seen symbolizing the Unseen, and worthy of +worship so, the Zoroastrian rites most becoming a nature so fine as ours +in this thin newness, this worship being so sensible, so promotive of +possible pieties,--calling us out of doors and under the firmament, +where health and wholesomeness are finely insinuated into our +souls,--not as idolaters, but as idealists, the seekers of the Unseen +through images of the Invisible. + +I think his religion of the most primitive type, and inclusive of all +natural creatures and things, even to "the sparrow that falls to the +ground,"--though never by shot of his,--and, for whatsoever is manly +in man, his worship may compare with that of the priests and heroes +of pagan times. Nor is he false to these traits under any +guise,--worshipping at unbloody altars, a favorite of the Unseen, +Wisest, and Best. Certainly he is better poised and more nearly +self-reliant than other men. + +Perhaps he deals best with matter, properly, though very adroitly with +mind, with persons, as he knows them best, and sees them from Nature's +circle, wherein he dwells habitually. I should say he inspired the +sentiment of love, if, indeed, the sentiment he awakens did not seem to +partake of a yet purer sentiment, were that possible,--but nameless from +its excellency. Friendly he is, and holds his friends by bearings as +strict in their tenderness and consideration as are the laws of his +thinking,--as prompt and kindly equitable,--neighborly always, and as +apt for occasions as he is strenuous against meddling with others in +things not his. + +I know of nothing more creditable to his greatness than the thoughtful +regard, approaching to reverence, by which he has held for many years +some of the best persons of his time, living at a distance, and wont +to make their annual pilgrimage, usually on foot, to the master,--a +devotion very rare in these times of personal indifference, if not of +confessed unbelief in persons and ideas. + +He has been less of a housekeeper than most, has harvested more wind and +storm, sun and sky; abroad night and day with his leash of keen scents, +bounding any game stirring, and running it down, for certain, to be +spread on the dresser of his page, and served as a feast to the sound +intelligences, before he has done with it. We have been accustomed to +consider him the salt of things so long that they must lose their savor +without his to season them. And when he goes hence, then Pan is dead, +and Nature ailing throughout. + +His friend sings him thus, with the advantages of his Walden to show him +in Nature:-- + + "It is not far beyond the Village church, + After we pass the wood that skirts the road, + A Lake,--the blue-eyed Walden, that doth smile + Most tenderly upon its neighbor Pines; + And they, as if to recompense this love, + In double beauty spread their branches forth. + This Lake has tranquil loveliness and breadth, + And, of late years, has added to its charms; + For one attracted to its pleasant edge + Has built himself a little Hermitage, + Where with much piety he passes life. + + "More fitting place I cannot fancy now, + For such a man to let the line run off + The mortal reel,--such patience hath the Lake, + Such gratitude and cheer is in the Pines. + But more than either lake or forest's depths + This man has in himself: a tranquil man, + With sunny sides where well the fruit is ripe, + Good front and resolute bearing to this life, + And some serener virtues, which control + This rich exterior prudence,--virtues high, + That in the principles of Things are set, + Great by their nature, and consigned to him, + Who, like a faithful Merchant, does account + To God for what he spends, and in what way. + Thrice happy art thou, Walden, in thyself! + Such purity is in thy limpid springs,-- + In those green shores which do reflect in thee, + And in this man who dwells upon thy edge, + A holy man within a Hermitage. + May all good showers fall gently into thee, + May thy surrounding forests long be spared, + And may the Dweller on thy tranquil marge + There lead a life of deep tranquillity, + Pure as thy Waters, handsome as thy Shores, + And with those virtues which are like the Stars!" + + + + +METHODS OF STUDY IN NATURAL HISTORY. + + +VII. + + +I come now to an obscure part of my subject, very difficult to present +in a popular form, and yet so important in the scientific investigations +of our day that I cannot omit it entirely. I allude to what are called +by naturalists Collateral Series or Parallel Types. These are by +no means difficult to trace, because they are connected by seeming +resemblances, which, though very likely to mislead and perplex the +observer, yet naturally suggest the association of such groups. Let me +introduce the subject with the statement of some facts. + +There are in Australia numerous Mammalia, occupying the same relation +and answering the same purposes as the Mammalia of other countries. Some +of them are domesticated by the natives, and serve them with meat, milk, +wool, as our domesticated animals serve us. Representatives of almost +all types, Wolves, Foxes, Sloths, Bears, Weasels, Martens, Squirrels, +Rats, etc., are found there; and yet, though all these animals resemble +ours so closely that the English settlers have called many of them by +the same names, there are no genuine Wolves, Foxes, Sloths, Bears, +Weasels, Martens, Squirrels, or Rats in Australia. The Australian +Mammalia are peculiar to the region where they are found, and are all +linked together by two remarkable structural features which distinguish +them from all other Mammalia and unite them under one head as the +so-called Marsupials. They bring forth their young in an imperfect +condition, and transfer them to a pouch, where they remain attached to +the teats of the mother till their development is as far advanced as +that of other Mammalia at the time of their birth; and they are further +characterized by an absence of that combination of transverse fibres +forming the large bridge which unites the two hemispheres of the brain +in all the other members of their class. Here, then, is a series of +animals parallel with ours, separated from them by anatomical features, +but so united with them by form and external features that many among +them have been at first associated together. + +This is what Cuvier has called subordination of characters, +distinguishing between characters that control the organization and +those that are not essentially connected with it. The skill of the +naturalist consists in detecting the difference between the two, so +that he may not take the more superficial features as the basis of his +classification, instead of those important ones which, though often less +easily recognized, are more deeply rooted in the organization. It is a +difference of the same nature as that between affinity and analogy, to +which I have alluded before, when speaking of the ingrafting of certain +features of one type upon animals of another type, thus producing a +superficial resemblance, not truly characteristic. In the Reptiles, for +instance, there are two groups,--those devoid of scales, with naked +skin, laying numerous eggs, but hatching their young in an imperfect +state, and the Scaly Reptiles, which lay comparatively few eggs, but +whose young, when hatched, are completely developed, and undergo no +subsequent metamorphosis. Yet, notwithstanding this difference in +essential features of structure, and in the mode of reproduction and +development, there is such an external resemblance between certain +animals belonging to the two groups that they were associated together +even by so eminent a naturalist as Linnaeus. Compare, for instance, the +Serpents among the Scaly Reptiles with the Caecilians among the Naked +Reptiles. They have the same elongated form, and are both destitute +of limbs; the head in both is on a level with the body, without any +contraction behind it, such as marks the neck in the higher Reptiles, +and moves only by the action of the back-bone; they are singularly alike +in their external features, but the young of the Serpent are hatched in +a mature condition, while the young of the type to which the Caecilians +belong undergo a succession of metamorphoses before attaining to a +resemblance to the parent. Or compare the Lizard and the Salamander, in +which the likeness is perhaps even more striking; for any inexperienced +observer would mistake one for the other. Both are superior to the +Serpents and Caecilians, for in them the head moves freely on the neck +and they creep on short imperfect legs. But the Lizard is clothed with +scales, while the body of the Salamander is naked, and the young of +the former is complete when hatched, while the Tadpole born from the +Salamander has a life of its own to live, with certain changes to pass +through before it assumes its mature condition; during the early part of +its life it is even destitute of legs, and has gills like the Fishes. +Above the Lizards and Salamanders, highest in the class of Reptiles, +stand two other collateral types,--the Turtles at the head of the Scaly +Reptiles, the Toads and Frogs at the Lead of the Naked Reptiles. The +external likeness between these two groups is perhaps less striking than +between those mentioned above, on account of the large shield of the +Turtle. But there are Turtles with a soft covering, and there are some +Toads with a hard shield over the head and neck at least, and both +groups are alike distinguished by the shortness and breadth of the body +and by the greater development of the limbs as compared with the lower +Reptiles. But here again there is the same essential difference in the +mode of development of their young as distinguishes all the rest. The +two series may thus be contrasted:-- + +_Naked Reptiles_. Toads and Frogs, Salamanders, Caecilians. + +_Scaly Reptiles._ Turtles, Lizards, Serpents. + +Such corresponding groups or parallel types, united only by external +resemblance, and distinguished from each other by essential elements of +structure, exist among all animals, though they are less striking among +Birds on account of the uniformity of that class. Yet even there we may +trace such analogies,--as between the Palmate or Aquatic Birds, for +instance, and the Birds of Prey, or between the Frigate Bird and the +Kites. Among Fishes such analogies are very common, often suggesting a +comparison even with land animals, though on account of the scales and +spines of the former the likeness may not be easily traced. But the +common names used by the fishermen often indicate these resemblances, +--as, for instance, Sea-Vulture, Sea-Eagle, Cat-Fish, Flying-Fish, +Sea-Porcupine, Sea-Cow, Sea-Horse, and the like. In the branch of +Mollusks, also, the same superficial analogies are found. In the lowest +class of this division of the Animal Kingdom there is a group so similar +to the Polyps, that, until recently, they have been associated with +them,--the Bryozoa. They are very small animals, allied to the Clams by +the plan of their structure, but they have a resemblance to the Polyps +on account of a radiating wreath of feelers around the upper part of +their body: yet, when examined closely, this wreath is found to be +incomplete; it does not, form a circle, but leaves an open space between +the two ends, where they approach each other, so that it has a horseshoe +outline, and partakes of the bilateral symmetry characteristic of its +type and on which its own structure is based. These series have not yet +been very carefully traced, and young naturalists should turn their +attention to them, and be prepared to draw the nicest distinction +between analogies and true affinities among animals. + + +VIII. + + +After this digression, let us proceed to a careful examination of the +natural groups of animals called Families by naturalists,--a subject +already briefly alluded to in a previous chapter. Families are natural +assemblages of animals of less extent than Orders, but, like Orders, +Classes, and Branches, founded upon certain categories of structure, +which are as distinct for this kind of group as for all the other +divisions in the classification of the Animal Kingdom. + +That we may understand the true meaning of these divisions, we must not +be misled by the name given by naturalists to this kind of group. Here, +as in so many other instances, a word already familiar, and that had +become, as it were, identified with the special sense in which it +had been used, has been adopted by science and has received a new +signification. When naturalists speak of Families among animals, they do +not allude to the progeny of a known stock, as we designate, in common +parlance, the children or the descendants of known parents by the word +family; they understand by Families natural groups of different kinds +of animals, having no genetic relations so far as we know, but agreeing +with one another closely enough to leave the impression of a more +or less remote common parentage. The difficulty here consists in +determining the natural limits of such groups, and in tracing the +characteristic features by which they may be defined; for individual +investigators differ greatly as to the degree of resemblance existing +between the members of many Families, and there is no kind of +group which presents greater diversity of circumscription in the +classifications of animals proposed by different naturalists than these +so-called Families. + +It should be remembered, however, that, unless a sound criterion be +applied to the limitation of Families, they, like all other groups +introduced into zooelogical systems, must forever remain arbitrary +divisions, as they have been hitherto. A retrospective glance at the +progress of our science during the past century, in this connection, +may perhaps help us to solve the difficulty. Linnaeus, in his System +of Nature, does not admit Families; he has only four kinds of +groups,--Classes, Orders, Genera, and Species. It was among plants that +naturalists first perceived those general traits of resemblance which +exist everywhere among the members of natural families, and added this +kind of group to the framework of their system. In France, particularly, +this method was pursued with success; and the improvements thus +introduced by the French botanists were so great, and rendered their +classification so superior to that of Linnaeus, that the botanical +systems in which Families were introduced were called natural systems, +in contradistinction especially to the botanical classification of +Linnaeus, which was founded upon the organs of reproduction, and which +received thenceforth the name of the sexual system of plants. The same +method so successfully used by botanists was soon introduced +into Zooelogy by the French naturalists of the beginning of this +century,--Lamarck, Latreille, and Cuvier. But, to this day, the +limitation of Families among animals has not yet reached the precision +which it has among plants, and I see no other reason for the difference +than the absence of a leading principle to guide us in Zooelogy. + +Families, as they exist in Nature, are based upon peculiarities of form +as related to structure; but though a very large number of them have +been named and recorded, very few are characterized with anything like +scientific accuracy. It has been a very simple matter to establish such +groups according to the superficial method that has been pursued, for +the fact that they are determined by external outline renders the +recognition of them easy and in many instances almost instinctive; but +it is very difficult to characterize them, or, in other words, to trace +the connection between form and structure. Indeed, many naturalists do +not admit that Families are based upon form; and it was in trying to +account for the facility with which they detect these groups, while they +find it so difficult to characterize them, that I perceived that they +are always associated with peculiarities of form. Naturalists have +established Families simply by bringing together a number of animals +resembling each other more or less closely, and, taking usually the name +of the Genus to which the best known among them belongs, they have given +it a patronymic termination to designate the Family, and allowed the +matter to rest there, sometimes without even attempting any description +corresponding to those by which Genus and Species are commonly defined. + +For instance, from _Canis_, the Dog, _Canidae_ has been formed, to +designate the whole Family of Dogs, Wolves, Foxes, etc. Nothing can be +more superficial than such a mode of classification; and if these +groups actually exist in Nature, they must be based, like all the other +divisions, upon some combination of structural characters peculiar to +them. We have seen that Branches are founded upon the general plan of +structure, Classes on the mode of executing the plan, Orders upon the +greater or less complication of a given mode of execution, and we shall +find that form, as _determined by structure_, characterizes Families. I +would call attention to this qualification of my definition; since, of +course, when speaking of form in this connection, I do not mean those +superficial resemblances in external features already alluded to in +my remarks upon Parallel or Collateral Types. I speak now of form as +controlled by structural elements; and unless we analyze Families in +this way, the mere distinguishing and naming them does not advance our +science at all. Compare, for instance, the Dogs, the Seals, and the +Bears. These are all members of one Order,--that of the Carnivorous +Mammalia. Their dentition is peculiar and alike in all, (cutting teeth, +canine teeth, and grinders,) adapted for tearing and chewing their +food; and their internal structure bears a definite relation to their +dentition. But look at these animals with reference to form. The Dog is +comparatively slender, with legs adapted for running and hunting his +prey; the Bear is heavier, with shorter limbs; while the Seal has a +continuous uniform outline adapted for swimming. They form separate +Families, and are easily recognized as such by the difference in their +external outline; but what is the anatomical difference which produces +the peculiarity of form in each, by which they have been thus +distinguished? It lies in the structure of the limbs, and especially in +that of the wrist and fingers. In the Seal the limbs are short, and the +wrists are on one continuous line with them, so that it has no power of +bending the wrist or the fingers, and the limbs, therefore, act like +flappers or oars. The Bear has a well-developed paw with a flexible +wrist, but it steps on the whole sole of the foot, from the wrist to the +tip of the toe, giving it the heavy tread so characteristic of all the +Bears. The Dogs, on the contrary, walk on tip-toe, and their step, +though firm, is light, while the greater slenderness and flexibility of +their legs add to their nimbleness and swiftness. By a more extensive +investigation of the anatomical structure of the limbs in their +connection with the whole body, it could easily be shown that the +peculiarity of form in these animals is essentially determined by, or at +least stands in the closest relation to, the peculiar structure of the +wrist and fingers. + +Take the Family of Owls as distinguished from the Falcons, Kites, etc. +Here the difference of form is in the position of the eyes. In the +Owl, the sides of the head are prominent and the eye-socket is brought +forward. In the Falcons and Kites, on the contrary, the sides of the +head are flattened and the eyes are set back. The difference in the +appearance of the birds is evident to the most superficial observer; but +to call the one Strigidae and the other Falconidae tells us nothing of +the anatomical peculiarities on which this difference is founded. + +These few examples, selected purposely among closely allied and +universally known animals, may be sufficient to show, that, beyond the +general complication of the structure which characterizes the Orders, +there is a more limited element in the organization of animals, bearing +chiefly upon their form, which, if it have any general application as +a principle of classification, may well be considered as essentially +characteristic of the Families. There are certainly closely allied +natural groups of animals, belonging to the same Order, but including +many Genera, which differ from each other chiefly in their form, while +that form is determined by peculiarities of structure which do not +influence the general structural complication upon which Orders are +based, or relate to the minor details of structure on which Genera are +founded. I am therefore convinced that form is the criterion by which +Families may be determined. The great facility with which animals may +be combined together in natural groups of this kind without any special +investigation of their structure, a superficial method of classification +in which zooelogists have lately indulged to a most unjustifiable degree, +convinces me that it is the similarity of form which has unconsciously +led such shallow investigators to correct results, since upon close +examination it is found that a large number of the Families so +determined, and to which no characters at all are assigned, nevertheless +bear the severest criticism founded upon anatomical investigation. + +The questions proposed to themselves by all students who would +characterize Families should be these: What are, throughout the +Animal Kingdom, the peculiar patterns of form by which Families are +distinguished? and on what structural features are these patterns based? +Only the most patient investigations can give us the answer, and it will +be very long before we can write out the formulae of these patterns with +mathematical precision, as I believe we shall be able to do in a more +advanced stage of our science. But while the work is in progress, it +ought to be remembered that a mere general similarity of outline is not +yet in itself evidence of identity of form or pattern, and that, while +seemingly very different forms may be derived from the same formula, the +most similar forms may belong to entirely different systems, when their +derivation is properly traced. Our great mathematician, in a lecture +delivered at the Lowell Institute last winter, showed that in his +science, also, similarity of outline does not always indicate identity +of character. Compare the different circles,--the perfect circle, in +which every point of the periphery is at the same distance from the +centre, with an ellipse in which the variation from the true circle is +so slight as to be almost imperceptible to the eye; yet the latter, like +all ellipses, has its two _foci_ by which it differs from a circle, +and to refer it to the family of circles instead of the family of +ellipses would be overlooking its true character on account of its +external appearance; and yet ellipses may be so elongated, that, far +from resembling a circle, they make the impression of parallel lines +linked at their extremities. Or we may have an elastic curve in which +the appearance of a circle is produced by the meeting of the two ends; +nevertheless it belongs to the family of elastic curves, in which may +even be included a line actually straight, and is formed by a process +entirely different from that which produces the circle or the ellipse. + +But it is sometimes exceedingly difficult to find the relation between +structure and form in Families, and I remember a case which I had taken +as a test of the accuracy of the views I entertained upon this subject, +and which perplexed and baffled me for years. It was that of our +fresh-water Mussels, the Family of Unios. There is a great variety of +outline among them,--some being oblong and very slender, others broad +with seemingly square outlines, others having a nearly triangular form, +while others again are almost circular; and I could not detect among +them all any feature of form that was connected with any essential +element of their structure. At last, however, I found this +test-character, and since that time I have had no doubt left in my mind +that form, determined by structure, is the true criterion of Families. +In the Unios it consists of the rounded outline of the anterior end of +the body reflected in a more or less open curve of the shell, bending +more abruptly along the lower side with an inflection followed by a +bulging, corresponding to the most prominent part of the gills, to which +alone, in a large number of American Species of this Family, the eggs +are transferred, giving to this part of the shell a prominence which it +has not in any of the European Species. At the posterior end of the body +this curve then bends upwards and backwards again, the outline meeting +the side occupied by the hinge and ligament, which, when very short, may +determine a triangular form of the whole shell, or, when equal to the +lower side and connected with a great height of the body, gives it a +quadrangular form, or, if the height is reduced, produces an elongated +form, or, finally, a rounded form, if the passage from one side to the +other is gradual. A comparison of the position of the internal organs of +different Species of Unios with the outlines of their shells will leave +no doubt that their form is determined by the structure of the animal. + +A few other and more familiar examples may complete this discussion. +Among Climbing Birds, for instance, which are held together as a +more comprehensive group by the structure of their feet and by other +anatomical features, there are two Families so widely different in +their form that they may well serve as examples of this principle. The +Woodpeckers (_Picidae_) and the Parrots (_Psittacidae_), once considered +as two Genera only, have both been subdivided, in consequence of a more +intimate knowledge of their generic characters, into a large number of +Genera; but all the Genera of Woodpeckers and all the Genera of the +Parrots are still held together by their form as Families, corresponding +as such to the two old Genera of _Picus_ and _Psittacus_. They are now +known as the Families of Woodpeckers and Parrots; and though each group +includes a number of Genera combined upon a variety of details in the +finish of special parts of the structure, such as the number of toes, +the peculiarities of the bill, etc., it is impossible to overlook the +peculiar form which is characteristic of each. No one who is familiar +with the outline of the Parrot will fail to recognize any member of +that Family by a general form which is equally common to the diminutive +Nonpareil, the gorgeous Ara, and the high-crested Cockatoo. Neither will +any one, who has ever observed the small head, the straight bill, the +flat back, and stiff tail of the Woodpecker, hesitate to identify the +family form in any of the numerous Genera into which this group is now +divided. The family characters are even more invariable than the generic +ones; for there are Woodpeckers which, instead of the four toes, two +turning forward and two backward, which form an essential generic +character, have three toes only, while the family form is always +maintained, whatever variations there may be in the characters of the +more limited groups it includes. + +The Turtles and Terrapins form another good illustration of family +characters. They constitute together a natural Order, but are +distinguished from each other as two Families very distinct in general +form and outline. Among Fishes I may mention the Family of Pickerels, +with their flat, long snout, and slender, almost cylindrical body, as +contrasted with the plump, compressed body and tapering tail of the +Trout Family. Or compare, among Insects, the Hawk-Moths with the Diurnal +Butterfly, or with the so-called Miller,--or, among Crustacea, the +common Crab with the Sea-Spider, or the Lobsters with the Shrimps,--or, +among Worms, the Leeches with the Earth-Worms,--or, among Mollusks, +the Squids with the Cuttle-Fishes, or the Snails with the Slugs, or the +Periwinkles with the Limpets and Conchs, or the Clam with the so-called +Venus, or the Oyster with the Mother-of-Pearl shell,--everywhere, +throughout the Animal Kingdom, difference of form points at difference +of Families. + +There is a chapter in the Natural History of Animals that has hardly +been touched upon as yet, and that will be especially interesting with +reference to Families. The voices of animals have a family character not +to be mistaken. All the Canidae bark and howl: the Fox, the Wolf, the +Dog have the same kind of utterance, though on a somewhat different +pitch. All the Bears growl, from the White Bear of the Arctic snows to +the small Black Bear of the Andes. All the Cats _miau_, from our quiet +fireside companion to the Lions and Tigers and Panthers of the forest +and jungle. This last may seem a strange assertion; but to any one who +has listened critically to their sounds and analyzed their voices, +the roar of the Lion is but a gigantic _miau_, bearing about the same +proportion to that of a Cat as its stately and majestic form does to the +smaller, softer, more peaceful aspect of the Cat. Yet, notwithstanding +the difference in their size, who can look at the Lion, whether in his +more sleepy mood as he lies curled up in the corner of his cage, or in +his fiercer moments of hunger or of rage, without being reminded of a +Cat? And this is not merely the resemblance of one carnivorous animal to +another; for no one was ever reminded of a Dog or Wolf by a Lion. Again, +all the Horses and Donkeys neigh; for the bray of the Donkey is only a +harsher neigh, pitched on a different key, it is true, but a sound of +the same character,--as the Donkey himself is but a clumsy and dwarfish +Horse. All the Cows low, from the Buffalo roaming the prairie, the +Musk-Ox of the Arctic ice-fields, or the Jack of Asia, to the Cattle +feeding in our pastures. Among the Birds, this similarity of voice in +Families is still more marked. We need only recall the harsh and noisy +Parrots, so similar in their peculiar utterance. Or take as an example +the web-footed Family,--do not all the Geese and the innumerable host +of Ducks quack? Does not every member of the Crow Family caw, whether it +be the Jackdaw, the Jay, the Magpie, the Rook in some green rookery of +the Old World, or the Crow of our woods, with its long, melancholy caw +that seems to make the silence and solitude deeper? Compare all the +sweet warblers of the Songster Family,--the Nightingales, the Thrushes, +the Mocking-Birds, the Robins; they differ in the greater or less +perfection of their note, but the same kind of voice runs through the +whole group. These affinities of the vocal systems among animals form a +subject well worthy of the deepest study, not only as another character +by which to classify the Animal Kingdom correctly, but as bearing +indirectly also on the question of the origin of animals. Can we suppose +that characteristics like these have been communicated from one animal +to another? When we find that all the members of one zoological Family, +however widely scattered over the surface of the earth, inhabiting +different continents and even different hemispheres, speak with one +voice, must we not believe that they have originated in the places where +they now occur with all their distinctive peculiarities? Who taught the +American Thrush to sing like his European relative? He surely did not +learn it from his cousin over the waters. Those who would have us +believe that all animals have originated from common centres and single +pairs, and have been distributed from such common centres over the +world, will find it difficult to explain the tenacity of such characters +and their recurrence and repetition under circumstances that seem to +preclude the possibility of any communication, on any other supposition +than that of their creation in the different regions where they are now +found. We have much yet to learn in this kind of investigation, with +reference not only to Families among animals, but to nationalities among +men also. I trust that the nature of languages will teach us as much +about the origin of the races as the vocal systems of the animals may +one day teach us about the origin of the different groups of animals. +At all events, similarity of vocal utterance among animals is not +indicative of identity of Species; I doubt, therefore, whether +similarity of speech proves community of origin among men. + +The similarity of motion in Families is another subject well worth the +consideration of the naturalist: the soaring of the Birds of Prey,--the +heavy flapping of the wings in the Gallinaceous Birds,--the floating of +the Swallows, with their short cuts and angular turns,--the hopping +of the Sparrows,--the deliberate walk of the Hens and the strut of the +Cocks,--the waddle of the Ducks and Geese,--the slow, heavy creeping +of the Land-Turtle,--the graceful flight of the Sea-Turtle under the +water,--the leaping and swimming of the Frog,--the swift run of the +Lizard, like a flash of green or red light in the sunshine,--the +lateral undulation of the Serpent,--the dart of the Pickerel,--the +leap of the Trout,--the rush of the Hawk-Moth through the air,--the +fluttering flight of the Butterfly,--the quivering poise of the +Humming-Bird,--the arrow-like shooting of the Squid through the water, +--the slow crawling of the Snail on the land,--the sideway movement +of the Sand-Crab,--the backward walk of the Crawfish,--the almost +imperceptible gliding of the Sea-Anemone over the rock,--the graceful, +rapid motion of the Pleurobrachia, with its endless change of curve and +spiral. In short, every Family of animals has its characteristic action +and its peculiar voice; and yet so little is this endless variety +of rhythm and cadence both of motion and sound in the organic world +understood, that we lack words to express one-half its richness and +beauty. + + +IX. + + +The well-known meaning of the words _generic_ and _specific_ may serve, +in the absence of a more precise definition, to express the relative +importance of those groups of animals called Genera and Species in our +scientific systems. The Genus is the more comprehensive of the two kinds +of groups, while the Species is the most precisely defined, or at least +the most easily recognized, of all the divisions of the Animal Kingdom. +But neither the term Genus nor Species has always been taken in the same +sense. Genus especially has varied in its acceptation, from the time +when Aristotle applied it indiscriminately to any kind of comprehensive +group, from the Classes down to what we commonly call Genera, till the +present day. But we have already seen, that, instead of calling all the +various kinds of more comprehensive divisions by the name of Genera, +modern science has applied special names to each of them, and we have +now Families, Orders, Classes, and Branches above Genera proper. If +the foregoing discussion upon the nature of these groups is based upon +trustworthy principles, we must admit that they are all founded upon +distinct categories of characters,--the primary divisions, or the +Branches, on plan of structure, the Classes upon the manner of its +execution, the Orders upon the greater or less complication of a given +mode of execution, the Families upon form; and it now remains to be +ascertained whether Genera also exist in Nature, and by what kind of +characteristics they may be distinguished. Taking the practice of the +ablest naturalists in discriminating Genera as a guide in our estimation +of their true nature, we must, nevertheless, remember that even now, +while their classifications of the more comprehensive groups usually +agree, they differ greatly in their limitation of Genera, so that the +Genera of some authors correspond to the Families of others, and vice +versa. This undoubtedly arises from the absence of a definite standard +for the estimation of these divisions. But the different categories of +structure which form the distinctive criteria of the more comprehensive +divisions once established, the question is narrowed down to an inquiry +into the special category upon which Genera may be determined; and if +this can be accurately defined, no difference of opinion need interfere +hereafter with their uniform limitation. Considering all these divisions +of the Animal Kingdom from this point of view, it is evident that the +more comprehensive ones must be those which are based on the broadest +characters,--Branches, as united upon plan of structure, standing of +course at the head; next to these the Classes, since the general mode +of executing the plan presents a wider category of characters than +the complication of structure on which Orders rest; after Orders come +Families, or the patterns of form in which these greater or less +complications of structure are clothed; and proceeding in the same way +from more general to more special considerations, we can have no other +category of structure as characteristic of Genera than the details of +structure by which members of the same Family may differ from each +other, and this I consider as the only true basis on which to limit +Genera, while it is at the same time in perfect accordance with the +practice of the most eminent modern zoologists. It is in this way that +Cuvier has distinguished the large number of Genera he has characterized +in his great Natural History of the Fishes, in connection with +Valenciennes. Latreille has done the same for the Crustacea and Insects; +and Milne Edwards, with the cooeperation of Haime, has recently proceeded +upon the same principle in characterizing a great number of Genera among +the Corals. Many others have followed this example, but few have kept +in view the necessity of a uniform mode of proceeding, or, if they have +done their researches have covered too limited a ground, to be taken +into consideration in a discussion of principles. It is, in fact, only +when extending over a whole Class that the study of Genera acquires a +truly scientific importance, as it then shows in a connected manner, in +what way, by what features, and to what extent a large number of animals +are closely linked together in Nature. Considering the Animal Kingdom as +a single complete work of one Creative Intellect, consistent throughout, +such keen analysis and close criticism of all its parts have the same +kind of interest, in a higher degree, as that which attaches to other +studies undertaken in the spirit of careful comparative research. +These different categories of characters are, as it were, different +peculiarities of style in the author, different modes of treating the +same material, new combinations of evidence bearing on the same general +principles. The study of Genera is a department of Natural History which +thus far has received too little attention even at the hands of our best +zoologists, and has been treated in the most arbitrary manner; it +should henceforth be made a philosophical investigation into the closer +affinities which naturally bind in minor groups all the representatives +of a natural Family. + +Genera, then, are groups of a more restricted character than any of +those we have examined thus far. Some of them include only one Species, +while others comprise hundreds; since certain definite combinations of +characters may be limited to a single Species, while other combinations +may be repeated in many. We have striking examples of this among Birds: +the Ostrich stands alone in its Genus, while the number of Species among +the Warblers is very great. Among Mammalia the Giraffe also stands +alone, while Mice and Squirrels include many Species. Genera are +founded, not, as we have seen, on general structural characters, but on +the finish of special parts, as, for instance, on the dentition. The +Cats have only four grinders in the upper jaw and three in the lower, +while the Hyenas have one more above and below, and the Dogs and Wolves +have two more above and two more below. In the last, some of the teeth +have also flat surfaces for crushing the food, adapted especially to +their habits, since they live on vegetable as well as animal substances. +The formation of the claws is another generic feature. There is a +curious example with reference to this in the Cheetah, which is again +a Genus containing only one Species. It belongs to the Cat Family, +but differs from ordinary Lions and Tigers in having its claws so +constructed that it cannot draw them back under the paws, though in +every other respect they are like the claws of all the Cats. But while +it has the Cat-like claw, its paws are like those of the Dog, and this +singular combination of features is in direct relation to its habits, +for it does not lie in wait and spring upon its prey like the Cat, but +hunts it like the Dog. + +While Genera themselves are, like Families, easily distinguished, the +characters on which they are founded, like those of Families, are +difficult to trace. There are often features belonging to these groups +which attract the attention and suggest their association, though they +are not those which may be truly considered generic characters. It is +easy to distinguish the Genus Fox, for instance, by its bushy tail, and +yet that is no true generic character; the collar of feathers round the +neck of the Vultures leads us at once to separate them from the Eagles, +but it is not the collar that truly marks the Genus, but rather the +peculiar structure of the feathers which form it. No Bird has a more +striking plumage than the Peacock, but it is not the appearance merely +of its crest and spreading fan that constitutes a Genus, but the +peculiar structure of the feathers. Thousands of examples might be +quoted to show how easily Genera may be singled out, named, and entered +in our systems, without being duly characterized, and it is much to be +lamented that there is no possibility of checking the loose work of this +kind with which the annals of our science are daily flooded. + +It would, of course, be quite inappropriate to present here any +general revision of these groups; but I may present a few instances to +illustrate the principle of their classification, and to show on what +characters they are properly based. Among Reptiles, we find, for +instance, that the Genera of our fresh-water Turtles differ from each +other in the cut of their bill, in the arrangement of their scales, +in the form of their claws, etc. Among Fishes, the different Genera +included under the Family of Perches are distinguished by the +arrangement of their teeth, by the serratures of their gill-covers, and +of the arch to which the pectoral fins are attached, by the nature and +combination of the rays of their fins, by the structure of their scales, +etc. Among Insects, the various Genera of the Butterflies differ in the +combination of the little rods which sustain their wings, in the form +and structure of their antennae, of their feet, of the minute scales +which cover their wings, etc. Among Crustacea, the Genera of Shrimps +vary in the form of the claws, in the structure of the parts of the +mouth, in the articulations of their feelers, etc. Among Worms, the +different Genera of the Leech Family are combined upon the form of the +disks by which they attach themselves, upon the number and arrangement +of their eyes, upon the structure of the hard parts with which the mouth +is armed, etc. Among Cephalopods, the Family of Squids contains several +Genera distinguished by the structure of the solid shield within the +skin of the back, by the form and connection of their fins, by the +structure of the suckers with which their arms are provided, by the +form of their beak, etc. In every Class, we find throughout the Animal +Kingdom that there is no sound basis for the discrimination of Genera +except the details of their structure; but in order to define them +accurately an extensive comparison of them is indispensable, and in +characterizing them only such features should be enumerated as are truly +generic; whereas in the present superficial method of describing them, +features are frequently introduced which belong not only to the whole +Family, but even to the whole Class which includes them. + + +X. + + +There remains but one more division of the Animal Kingdom for our +consideration, the most limited of all in its circumscription,--that +of Species. It is with the study of this kind of group that naturalists +generally begin their investigations. I believe, however, that the study +of Species as the basis of a scientific education is a great mistake. +It leads us to overrate the value of Species, and to believe that they +exist in Nature in some different sense from other groups; as if there +were something more real and tangible in Species than in Genera, +Families, Orders, Classes, or Branches. The truth is, that to study a +vast number of Species without tracing the principles that combine +them under more comprehensive groups is only to burden the mind with +disconnected facts, and more may be learned by a faithful and careful +comparison of a few Species than by a more cursory examination of a +greater number. When one considers the immense number of Species already +known, naturalists might well despair of becoming acquainted with them +all, were they not constructed on a few fundamental patterns, so that +the study of one Species teaches us a great deal for all the rest. De +Candolle, who was at the same time a great botanist and a great teacher, +told me once that he could undertake to illustrate the fundamental +principles of his science with the aid of a dozen plants judiciously +selected, and that it was his unvarying practice to induce students to +make a thorough study of a few minor groups of plants, in all their +relations to one another, rather than to attempt to gain a superficial +acquaintance with a large number of species. The powerful influence he +has had upon the progress of Botany vouches for the correctness of his +views. Indeed, every profound scholar knows that sound learning can be +attained only by this method, and the study of Nature makes no exception +to the rule. I would therefore advise every student to select a few +representatives from all the Classes, and to study these not only with +reference to their specific characters, but as members also of a Genus, +of a Family, of an Order, of a Class, and of a Branch. He will soon +convince himself that Species have no more definite and real existence +in Nature than all the other divisions of the Animal Kingdom, and that +every animal is the representative of its Branch, Class, Order, Family, +and Genus as much as of its Species, Specific characters are only +those determining size, proportion, color, habits, and relations to +surrounding circumstances and external objects. How superficial, then, +must be any one's knowledge of an animal who studies it only with +relation to its specific characters! He will know nothing of the finish +of special parts of the body,--nothing of the relations between its +form and its structure,--nothing of the relative complication of its +organization as compared with other allied animals,--nothing of the +general mode of execution,--nothing of the plan expressed in that mode +of execution. Yet, with the exception of the ordinal characters, which, +since they imply relative superiority and inferiority, require, of +course, a number of specimens for comparison, his one animal would tell +him all this as well as the specific characters. + +All the more comprehensive groups, equally with Species, have a +positive, permanent, specific principle, maintained generation after +generation with all its essential characteristics. Individuals are +the transient representatives of all these organic principles, which +certainly have an independent, immaterial existence, since they outlive +the individuals that embody them, and are no less real after the +generation that has represented them for a time has passed away than +they were before. + +From a comparison of a number of well-known Species belonging to a +natural Genus, it is not difficult to ascertain what are essentially +specific characters. There is hardly among Mammalia a more natural Genus +than that which includes the Rabbits and Hares, or that to which the +Rats and Mice are referred. Let us see how the different Species differ +from one another. Though we give two names in the vernacular to +the Genus Hare, both Hares and Rabbits agree in all the structural +peculiarities which constitute a Genus; but the different Species are +distinguished by their absolute size when full-grown,--by the nature and +color of their fur,--by the size and form of the ear,--by the relative +length of their legs and tail,--by the more or less slender build of +their whole body,--by their habits, some living in open grounds, +others among the bushes, others in swamps, others burrowing under the +earth,--by the number of young they bring forth,--by their different +seasons of breeding,--and by still minor differences, such as the +permanent color of the hair throughout the year in some, while in others +it turns white in winter. The Rats and Mice differ in a similar way: +there being large and small Species,--some gray, some brown, others +rust-colored,--some with soft, others with coarse hair; they differ also +in the length of the tail, and in having it more or less covered with +hair,--in the cut of the ears, and their size,--in the length of +their limbs, which are slender and long in some, short and thick in +others,--in their various ways of living,--in the different substances +on which they feed,--and also in their distribution over the surface +of the earth, whether circumscribed within certain limited areas +or scattered over a wider range. What is now the nature of these +differences by which we distinguish Species? They are totally distinct +from any of the categories on which Genera, Families, Orders, Classes, +or Branches are founded, and may readily be reduced to a few heads. They +are differences in the proportion of the parts and in the absolute size +of the whole animal, in the color and general ornamentation of the +surface of the body, and in the relations of the individuals to one +another and to the world around. A farther analysis of other Genera +would show us that among Birds, Reptiles, Fishes, and, in fact, +throughout the Animal Kingdom, Species of well-defined natural Genera +differ in the same way. We are therefore justified in saying that the +category of characters on which Species are based implies no structural +differences, but presents the same structure combined under certain +minor differences of size, proportion, and habits. All the specific +characters stand in direct reference to the generic structure, the +family form, the ordinal complication of structure, the mode of +execution of the Class, and the plan of structure of the Branch, all of +which are embodied in the frame of each individual in each Species, even +though all these individuals are constantly dying away and reproducing +others; so that the specific characters have no more permanency in the +individuals than those which characterize the Genus, the Family, the +Order, the Class, and the Branch. I believe, therefore, that naturalists +have been entirely wrong in considering the more comprehensive groups +to be theoretical and in a measure arbitrary, an attempt, that is, of +certain men to classify the Animal Kingdom according to their individual +views, while they have ascribed to Species, as contrasted with the other +divisions, a more positive existence in Nature. No further argument +is needed to show that it is not only the Species that lives in the +individual, but that every individual, though belonging to a distinct +Species, is built upon a precise and definite plan which characterizes +its Branch,--that that plan is executed in each individual in a +particular way which characterizes its Class,--that every individual +with its kindred occupies a definite position in a series of structural +complications which characterizes its Order,--that in every individual +all these structural features are combined under a definite pattern of +form which characterizes its Family,--that every individual exhibits +structural details in the finish of its parts which characterize its +Genus,--and finally that every individual presents certain peculiarities +in the proportion of its parts, in its color, in its size, in its +relations to its fellow-beings and surrounding things, which constitute +its specific characters; and all this is repeated in the same kind of +combination, generation after generation, while the individuals die. +If we accept these propositions, which seem to me self-evident, it is +impossible to avoid the conclusion that Species do not exist in Nature +in any other sense than the more comprehensive groups of the zoological +systems. + +There is one question respecting Species that gives rise to very earnest +discussions in our day, not only among naturalists, but among all +thinking people. How far are they permanent, and how far mutable? With +reference to the permanence of Species, there is much to be learned from +the geological phenomena that belong to our own period, and that bear +witness to the invariability of types during hundreds of thousands of +years at least. I hope to present a part of this evidence in a future +article upon Coral Reefs, but in the mean time I cannot leave this +subject without touching upon a point of which great use has been made +in recent discussions. I refer to the variability of Species as shown in +domestication. + +The domesticated animals with their numerous breeds are constantly +adduced as evidence of the changes which animals may undergo, and as +furnishing hints respecting the way in which the diversity now observed +among animals has already been produced. It is my conviction that such +inferences are in no way sustained by the facts of the case, and that, +however striking the differences may be between the breeds of our +domesticated animals, as compared with the wild Species of the same +Genus, they are of a peculiar character entirely distinct from those +that prevail among the latter, and are altogether incident to the +circumstances under which they occur. By this I do not mean the natural +action of physical conditions, but the more or less intelligent +direction of the circumstances under which they live. The inference +drawn from the varieties introduced among animals in a state of +domestication, with reference to the origin of Species, is usually this: +that what the farmer does on a small scale Nature may do on a large one. +It is true that man has been able to produce certain changes in the +animals under his care, and that these changes have resulted in a +variety of breeds. But in doing this, he has, in my estimation, in no +way altered the character of the Species, but has only developed its +pliability to the will of man, that is, to a power similar in its +nature and mode of action to that power to which animals owe their very +existence. The influence of man upon Animals is, in other words, the +action of mind upon them; and yet the ordinary mode of arguing upon +this subject is, that, because the intelligence of man has been able to +produce certain varieties in domesticated animals, therefore physical +causes have produced all the diversities among wild ones. Surely, the +sounder logic would be to infer, that, because our finite intelligence +can cause the original pattern to vary by some slight shades of +difference, therefore an infinite intelligence must have established +all the boundless diversity of which our boasted varieties are but the +faintest echo. It is the most intelligent farmer that has the greatest +success in improving his breeds; and if the animals he has so fostered +are left to themselves without that intelligent care, they return +to their normal condition. So with plants: the shrewd, observing, +thoughtful gardener will obtain many varieties from his flowers; but +those varieties will fade out, if left to themselves. There is, as it +were, a certain degree of pliability and docility in the organization +both of animals and plants, which may be developed by the fostering care +of man, and within which he can exercise a certain influence; but the +variations which he thus produces are of a peculiar kind, and do not +correspond to the differences of the wild Species. Let us take some +examples to illustrate this assertion. + +Every Species of wild Bull differs from the others in its size; but +all the individuals correspond to the average standard of size +characteristic of their respective Species, and show none of those +extreme differences of size so remarkable among our domesticated +Cattle. Every Species of wild Bull has its peculiar color, and all the +individuals of one Species share in it: not so with our domesticated +Cattle, among which every individual may differ in color from every +other. All the individuals of the same Species of wild Bull agree in the +proportion of their parts, in the mode of growth of the hair, in its +quality, whether fine or soft: not so with our domesticated Cattle, +among which we find in the same Species overgrown and dwarfish +individuals, those with long and short legs, with slender and stout +build of the body, with horns or without, as well as the greatest +variety in the mode of twisting the horns,--in short, the widest +extremes of development which the degree of pliability in that Species +will allow. + +A curious instance of the power of man, not only in developing the +pliability of an animal's organization, but in adapting it to suit his +own caprices, is that of the Golden Carp, so frequently seen in bowls +and tanks as the ornament of drawing-rooms and gardens. Not only an +infinite variety of spotted, striped, variegated colors has been +produced in these Fishes, but, especially among the Chinese, so famous +for their morbid love of whatever is distorted and warped from its +natural shape and appearance, all sorts of changes have been brought +about in this single Species. A book of Chinese paintings showing the +Golden Carp in its varieties represents some as short and stout, +others long and slender,--some with the ventral side swollen, others +hunch-backed,--some with the mouth greatly enlarged, while in others +the caudal fin, which in the normal condition of the Species is placed +vertically at the end of the tail and is forked like those of other +Fishes, has become crested and arched, or is double, or crooked, or has +swerved in some other way from its original pattern. But in all these +variations there is nothing which recalls the characteristic specific +differences among the representatives of the Carp Family, which in their +wild state are very monotonous in their appearance all the world over. + +Were it appropriate to accumulate evidence here upon this subject, I +could bring forward many more examples quite as striking as those above +mentioned. The various breeds of our domesticated Horses present the +same kind of irregularities, and do not differ from each other in the +same way as the wild Species differ from one another. Or take the Genus +Dog: the differences between its wild Species do not correspond in the +least with the differences observed among the domesticated ones. Compare +the differences between the various kinds of Jackals and Wolves with +those that exist between the Bull-Dog and Greyhound, for instance, or +between the St. Charles and the Terrier, or between the Esquimaux and +the Newfoundland Dog. I need hardly add that what is true of the Horses, +the Cattle, the Dogs, is true also of the Donkey, the Goat, the Sheep, +the Pig, the Cat, the Rabbit, the different kinds of barn-yard fowl,--in +short, of all those animals that are in domesticity the chosen +companions of man. + +In fact, all the variability among domesticated Species is due to the +fostering care, or, in its more extravagant freaks, to the fancies of +man, and it has never been observed in the wild Species, where, on +the contrary, everything shows the closest adherence to the distinct, +well-defined, and invariable limits of the Species. It surely does +not follow, that, because the Chinese can, under abnormal conditions, +produce a variety of fantastic shapes in the Golden Carp, therefore +water, or the physical conditions established in the water, can create a +Fish, any more than it follows, that, because they can dwarf a tree, or +alter its aspect by stunting its growth in one direction and forcing it +in another, therefore the earth, or the physical conditions connected +with their growth, can create a Pine, an Oak, a Birch, or a Maple. +I confess that in all the arguments derived from the phenomena of +domestication, to prove that all animals owe their origin and diversity +to the natural action of the conditions under which they live, the +conclusion does not seem to me to follow logically from the premises. +And the fact that the domesticated animals of all races of men, equally +with the white race, vary among themselves in the same way and differ +in the same way from the wild Species, makes it still more evident that +domesticated varieties do not explain the origin of Species, except, as +I have said, by showing that the intelligent will of man can produce +effects which physical causes have never been known to produce, and that +we must therefore look to some cause outside of Nature, corresponding in +kind, though so different in degree, to the intelligence of man, for +all the phenomena connected with the existence of animals in their wild +state. So far from attributing these original differences among animals +to natural influences, it would seem, that, while a certain freedom of +development is left, within the limits of which man can exercise his +intelligence and his ingenuity, not even this superficial influence is +allowed to physical conditions unaided by some guiding power, since in +their normal state the wild Species remain, so far as we have been able +to discover, entirely unchanged,--maintained, it is true, in their +integrity by the circumstances that were established for their support +by the power that created both, but never altered by them. Nature holds +inviolable the stamp that God has set upon his creatures; and if man +is able to influence their organization in some slight degree, it is +because the Creator has given to his relations with the animals he has +intended for his companions the same plasticity which he has allowed to +every other side of his life, in virtue of which he may in some sort +mould and shape it to his own ends, and be held responsible also for its +results. + +The common sense of a civilized community has already pointed out the +true distinction in applying another word to the discrimination of the +different kinds of domesticated animals. They are called Breeds, and +Breeds among animals are the work of man;--Species were created by God. + + * * * * * + + +THE STRASBURG CLOCK. + + + Many and many a year ago,-- + To say how many I scarcely dare,-- + Three of us stood in Strasburg streets, + In the wide and open square, + Where, quaint and old and touched with the gold + Of a summer morn, at stroke of noon + The tongue of the great Cathedral tolled, + And into the church with the crowd we strolled + To see their wonder, the famous Clock. + Well, my love, there are clocks a many, + As big as a house, as small as a penny; + And clocks there be with voices as queer + As any that torture human ear,-- + Clocks that grunt, and clocks that growl, + That wheeze like a pump, and hoot like an owl, + From the coffin shape with its brooding face + That stands on the stair, (you know the place,) + Saying, "Click, cluck," like an ancient hen, + A-gathering the minutes home again, + To the kitchen knave with its wooden stutter, + Doing equal work with double splutter, + Yelping, "Click, clack," with a vulgar jerk, + As much as to say, "Just see me work!" + + But of all the clocks that tell Time's bead-roll, + There are none like this in the old Cathedral; + Never a one so bids you stand + While it deals the minutes with even hand: + For clocks, like men, are better and worse, + And some you dote on, and some you curse; + And clock and man may have such a way + Of telling the truth that you can't say nay. + + So in we went and stood in the crowd + To hear the old clock as it crooned aloud, + With sound and symbol, the only tongue + The maker taught it while yet 't was young. + And we saw Saint Peter clasp his hands, + And the cock crow hoarsely to all the lands, + And the Twelve Apostles come and go, + And the solemn Christ pass sadly and slow; + And strange that iron-legged procession, + And odd to us the whole impression, + As the crowd beneath, in silence pressing, + Bent to that cold mechanic blessing. + + But I alone thought far in my soul + What a touch of genius was in the whole, + And felt how graceful had been the thought + Which for the signs of the months had sought, + Sweetest of symbols, Christ's chosen train; + And much I pondered, if he whose brain + Had builded this clock with labor and pain + Did only think, twelve months there are, + And the Bible twelve will fit to a hair; + Or did he say, with a heart in tune, + Well-loved John is the sign of June, + And changeful Peter hath April hours, + And Paul the stately, October bowers, + And sweet, or faithful, or bold, or strong, + Unto each one shall a month belong. + + But beside the thought that under it lurks, + Pray, do you think clocks are saved by their works? + + + + +ARTHUR HUGH CLOUGH. + + +To win such love as Arthur Hugh Clough won in life, to leave so dear a +memory as he has left, is a happiness that falls to few men. In America, +as in England, his death is mourned by friends whose affection is better +than fame, and who in losing him have met with an irreparable loss. +Outside the circle of his friends his reputation had no large extent; +but though his writings are but little known by the great public of +readers, they are prized by all those of thoughtful and poetic temper +to whose hands they have come, as among the most precious and original +productions of the time. To those who knew him personally his poems had +a special worth and charm, as the sincere expression of a character of +the purest stamp, of rare truthfulness and simplicity, not less tender +than strong, and of a genius thoroughly individual in its form, and full +of the promise of a large career. He was by Nature endowed with subtile +and profound powers of thought, with feeling at once delicate and +intense, with lively and generous sympathies, and with conscientiousness +so acute as to pervade and control his whole intellectual disposition. +Loving, seeking, and holding fast to the truth, he despised all +falseness and affectation. With his serious and earnest thinking was +joined the play of a genial humor and the brightness of poetic fancy. +Liberal in sentiment, absolutely free from dogmatism and pride of +intellect, of a questioning temper, but of reverent spirit, faithful in +the performance not only of the larger duties, but also of the lesser +charities and the familiar courtesies of life, he has left a memory of +singular consistency, purity, and dignity. He lived to conscience, not +for show, and few men carry through life so white a soul. + +A notice of Mr. Clough understood to be written by one who knew him well +gives the outline of his life. + +"Arthur Hugh Clough was educated at Rugby, to which school he went +very young, soon after Dr. Arnold had been elected head-master. He +distinguished himself at once by gaining the only scholarship which +existed at that time, and which was open to the whole school under the +age of fourteen. Before he was sixteen he was at the head of the fifth +form, and, as that was the earliest age at which boys were then admitted +into the sixth, had to wait for a year before coming under the personal +tuition of the headmaster. He came in the next (school) generation to +Stanley and Vaughan, and gained a reputation, if possible, even greater +than theirs. At the yearly speeches, in the last year of his residence, +when the prizes are given away in the presence of the school and the +friends who gather on such occasions, Arnold took the almost unexampled +course of addressing him, (when he and two fags went up to carry off his +load of splendidly bound books,) and congratulating him on having +gained every honor which Rugby could bestow, and having also already +distinguished himself and done the highest credit to his school at the +University. He had just gained a scholarship at Balliol, then, as now, +the blue ribbon of undergraduates. + +"At school, although before all things a student, he had thoroughly +entered into the life of the place, and before he left had gained +supreme influence with the boys. He was the leading contributor to the +'Rugby Magazine'; and though a weakness in his ankles prevented him from +taking a prominent part in the games of the place, was known as the +best goal-keeper on record, a reputation which no boy could have gained +without promptness and courage. He was also one of the best swimmers in +the school, his weakness of ankle being no drawback here, and in his +last half passed the crucial test of that day, by swimming from Swift's +(the bathing-place of the sixth) to the mill on the Leicester road, and +back again, between callings over. + +"He went to reside at Oxford when the whole University was in a ferment. +The struggle of Alma Mater to humble or cast out the most remarkable +of her sons was at its height. Ward had not yet been arraigned for his +opinions, and was a fellow and tutor of Balliol, and Newman was in +residence at Oriel, and incumbent of St. Mary's. + +"Clough's was a mind which, under any circumstances, would have thrown +itself into the deepest speculative thought of its time. He seems soon +to have passed through the mere ecclesiastical debatings to the deep +questions which lay below them. There was one lesson--probably one +only--which he had never been able to learn from his great master, +namely, to acknowledge that there are problems which intellectually are +not to be solved by man, and before these to sit down quietly. Whether +it were from the harass of thought on such matters which interfered with +his regular work, or from one of those strange miscarriages in the most +perfect of examining machines, which every now and then deprive the best +men of the highest honors, to the surprise of every one Clough missed +his first class. But he completely retrieved this academical mishap +shortly afterwards by gaining an Oriel fellowship. In his new college, +the college of Pusey, Newman, Keble, Marriott, Wilberforce, presided +over by Dr. Hawkins, and in which the influence of Whately, Davidson, +and Arnold had scarcely yet died out, he found himself in the very +centre and eye of the battle. His own convictions were by this time +leading him far away from both sides in the Oxford contest; he, however, +accepted a tutorship at the college, and all who had the privilege of +attending them will long remember his lectures on logic and ethics. +His fault (besides a shy and reserved manner) was that he was much too +long-suffering to youthful philosophic coxcombry, and would rather +encourage it by his gentle 'Ah! you think so?' or, 'Yes, but might not +such and such be the case?'" + +Clough was at Oxford in 1847,--the year of the terrible Irish famine, +and with others of the most earnest men at the University he took part +in an association which had for its object "Retrenchment for the sake +of the Irish." Such a society was little likely to be popular with the +comfortable dignitaries or the luxurious youth of the University. Many +objections, frivolous or serious as the case might be, were raised +against so subversive a notion as that of the self-sacrifice of the rich +for the sake of the poor. Disregarding all personal considerations, +Clough printed a pamphlet entitled, "A Consideration of Objections +against the Retrenchment Association," in which he met the careless or +selfish arguments of those who set themselves against the efforts of +the society. It was a characteristic performance. His heart was deeply +stirred by the harsh contrast between the miseries of the Irish poor and +the wasteful extravagance of living prevalent at Oxford. He wrote with +vehement indignation against the selfish pleas of the indifferent and +the thoughtless possessors of wealth, wasters of the goods given them as +a trust for others. His words were chiefly addressed to the young men +at the University,--and they were not without effect. Such views of the +rights and duties of property as he put forward, of the claims of labor, +and of the responsibilities of the aristocracy, had not been often heard +at Oxford. He was called a Socialist and a Radical, but it mattered +little to him by what name he was known to those whose consciences were +not touched by his appeal. "Will you say," he writes toward the end of +this pamphlet, "this is all rhetoric and declamation? There is, I dare +say, something too much in that kind. What with criticizing style and +correcting exercises, we college tutors perhaps may be likely, in the +heat of composition, to lose sight of realities, and pass into the limbo +of the factitious,--especially when the thing must be done at odd times, +in any case, and, if at all, quickly. But if I have been obliged to +write hurriedly, believe me, I have obliged myself to think not hastily. +And believe me, too, though I have desired to succeed in putting vividly +and forcibly that which vividly and forcibly I felt and saw, still the +graces and splendors of composition were thoughts far less present to my +mind than Irish poor men's miseries, English poor men's hardships, and +your unthinking indifference. Shocking enough the first and the second, +almost more shocking the third." + +It was about this time that the most widely known of his works, "The +Bothie of Toper-na-Fuosich, a Long-Vacation Pastoral," was written. It +was published in 1848, and though it at once secured a circle of warm +admirers, and the edition was very soon exhausted, it "is assuredly +deserving of a far higher popularity than it has ever attained." The +poem was reprinted in America, at Cambridge, in 1849, and it may be +safely asserted that its merit was more deeply felt and more generously +acknowledged by American than by English readers. The fact that its +essential form and local coloring were purely and genuinely English, and +thus gratified the curiosity felt in this country concerning the social +habits and ways of life in the mother-land, while on the other hand its +spirit was in sympathy with the most liberal and progressive thought +of the age, may sufficiently account for its popularity here. But +the lovers of poetry found delight in it, apart from these +characteristics,--in its fresh descriptions of Nature, its healthy +manliness of tone, its scholarly construction, its lively humor, its +large thought quickened and deepened by the penetrating imagination of +the poet. + +"Any one who has read it will acknowledge that a tutorship at Oriel was +not the place for the author. The intense love of freedom, the deep and +hearty sympathy with the foremost thought of the time, the humorous +dealing with old formulas and conventionalisms grown meaningless, which +breathe in every line of the 'Bothie,' show this clearly enough. He +would tell in after-life, with much enjoyment, how the dons of the +University, who, hearing that he had something in the press, and knowing +that his theological views were not wholly sound, were looking for a +publication on the Articles, were astounded by the appearance of that +fresh and frolicsome poem. Oxford (at least the Oriel common room) +and he were becoming more estranged daily. How keenly he felt the +estrangement, not from Oxford, but from old friends, about this time, +can be read only in his own words." It is in such poems as the "Qua +Cursum Ventus," or the sonnet beginning, "Well, well,--Heaven bless you +all from day to day!" that it is to be read. These, with a few other +fugitive pieces, were printed, in company with verses by a friend, as +one part of a small volume entitled, "Ambarvalia," which never attained +any general circulation, although containing some poems which will take +their place among the best of English poetry of this generation. + + "_Qua Cursum Ventus_. + + "As ships, becalmed at eve, that lay + With canvas drooping, side by side, + Two towers of sail at dawn of day, + Are scarce long leagues apart descried: + + "When fell the night, upsprung the breeze, + And all the darkling hours they plied, + Nor dreamt but each the self-same seas + By each was cleaving side by side: + + "E'en so----But why the tale reveal + Of those whom, year by year unchanged, + Brief absence joined anew to feel, + Astounded, soul from soul estranged? + + "At dead of night their sails were filled, + And onward each rejoicing steered: + Ah, neither blame, for neither willed, + Or wist, what first with dawn appeared! + + "To veer, how vain! On, onward strain, + Brave barks! In light, in darkness too, + Through winds and tides one compass guides: + To that, and your own selves, be true! + + "But, O blithe breeze! and O great seas! + Though ne'er, that earliest parting past, + On your wide plain they join again, + Together lead them home at last! + + "One port, methought, alike they sought, + One purpose hold where'er they fare: + O bounding breeze! O rushing seas! + At last, at last, unite them there!" + +"In 1848-49 the revolutionary crisis came on Europe, and Clough's +sympathies drew him with great earnestness into the struggles which were +going on. He was in Paris directly after the barricades, and in Rome +during the siege, where he gained the friendship of Saffi and other +leading Italian patriots." A part of his experiences and his thoughts +while at Rome are interwoven with the story in his "Amours de Voyage," a +poem which exhibits in extraordinary measure the subtilty and delicacy +of his powers, and the fulness of his sympathy with the intellectual +conditions of the time. It was first published in the "Atlantic Monthly" +for 1858, and was at once established in the admiration of readers +capable of appreciating its rare and refined excellence. The spirit +of the poem is thoroughly characteristic of its author, and the +speculative, analytic turn of his mind is represented in many passages +of the letters of the imaginary hero. Had he been writing in his own +name, he could not have uttered his inmost conviction more distinctly, +or have given the clue to his intellectual life more openly than in the +following verses:-- + + "I will look straight out, see things, not try to + evade them: + Fact shall be Fact for me; and the Truth the + Truth as ever, + Flexible, changeable, vague, and multiform + and doubtful." + +Or, again,-- + + "Ah, the key of our life, that passes all wards, + opens all locks, + Is not _I will_, but _I must_. I must,--I must, + --and I do it." + +And still again,-- + + "But for the steady fore-sense of a freer and + larger existence, + Think you that man could consent to be + circumscribed here into action? + But for assurance within of a limitless ocean + divine, o'er + Whose great tranquil depths unconscious + the wind-tost surface + Breaks into ripples of trouble that come and + change and endure not,-- + But that in this, of a truth, we have our + being, and know it, + Think you we men could submit to live and + move as we do here?" + +"To keep on doing right,--not to speculate only, but to act, not to +think only, but to live,"--was, it has been said, characteristic of the +leading men at Oxford during this period. "It was not so much a part of +their teaching as a doctrine woven into their being." And while they +thus exercised a moral not less than an intellectual influence over +their contemporaries and their pupils, they themselves, according to +their various tempers and circumstances, were led on into new paths of +inquiry or of life. Some of them fell into the common temptations of +an English University career, and lost the freshness of energy and the +honesty of conviction which first inspired them; others, holding their +places in the established order of things, were able by happy faculties +of character to retain also the vigor and simplicity of their early +purposes; while others again, among whom was Clough, finding the +restraints of the University incompatible with independence, gave up +their positions at Oxford to seek other places in which they could more +freely search for the truth and express their own convictions. + +It was not long after his return from Italy that he became Professor of +English Language and Literature at University College, London. He filled +this place, which was not in all respects suited to him, until 1852. +After resigning it, he took various projects into consideration, and +at length determined to come to America with the intention of settling +here, if circumstances should prove favorable. In November, 1852, +he arrived in Boston. He at once established himself at Cambridge, +proposing to give instruction to young men preparing for college, or to +take on in more advanced studies those who had completed the collegiate +course. He speedily won the friendship of those whose friendship +was best worth having in Boston and its neighborhood. His thorough +scholarship, the result of the best English training, and his intrinsic +qualities caused his society to be sought and prized by the most +cultivated and thoughtful men. He had nothing of insular narrowness, and +none of the hereditary prejudices which too often interfere with the +capacity of English travellers or residents among us to sympathize with +and justly understand habits of life and of thought so different from +those to which they have been accustomed. His liberal sentiments and his +independence of thought harmonized with the new social conditions in +which he found himself, and with the essential spirit of American life. +The intellectual freedom and animation of this country were congenial +to his disposition. From the beginning he took a large share in the +interests of his new friends. He contributed several remarkable articles +to the pages of the "North American Review" and of "Putnam's Magazine," +and he undertook a work which was to occupy his scanty leisure for +several years, the revision of the so-called Dryden's Translation of +Plutarch's Lives. Although the work was undertaken simply as a revision, +it turned out to involve little less labor than a complete new +translation, and it was so accomplished that henceforth it must remain +the standard version of this most popular of the ancient authors. + +But all that made the presence of such a man a great gain to his new +friends made his absence felt by his old ones as a great loss. In July, +1853, he received the announcement that a place had been obtained for +him by their efforts in the Education Department of the Privy Council, +and he was so strenuously urged to return to England, that, although +unwilling to give up the prospect of a final settlement in America, +he felt that it was best to go home for a time. Some months after his +return he was married to the granddaughter of the late Mr. William +Smith, M.P. for Norwich. He established himself in a house in London, +and settled down to the hard routine-work of his office. In a private +letter written not long after his return, he said,--"As for myself, whom +you ask about, there is nothing to tell about me. I live on contentedly +enough, but feel rather unwilling to be re-Englished, after once +attaining that higher transatlantic development. However, _il faut s'y +soumettre_, I presume,--though I fear I am embarked in the foundering +ship. I hope to Heaven you'll get rid of slavery, and then I shouldn't +fear but you would really 'go ahead' in the long run. As for us and our +inveterate feudalism, it is not hopeful." + +In another letter about this time, he wrote,--"I like America all the +better for the comparison with England on my return. Certainly I think +you are more right than I was willing to admit, about the position of +the poorer classes here. Such is my first reimpression. However, it +will wear off soon enough, I dare say; so you must make the most of my +admissions." + +Again, a little later, he wrote,--"I do truly hope that you will get the +North erelong thoroughly united against any further encroachments. I +don't by any means feel that the slave-system is an intolerable crime, +nor do I think that our system here is so much better; but it is clear +to me that the only safe ground to go upon is that of your Northern +States. I suppose the rich-and-poor difficulties must be creeping in at +New York, but one would fain hope that European analogies will not be +quite accepted even there." + +His letters were reflections of himself,--full of thought, fancy, and +pleasant humor, as well as of affectionateness and true feeling. Their +character is hardly to be given in extracts, but a few passages may +serve to illustrate some of these qualities. + +"Ambrose Philips, the Roman Catholic, who set up the new St. Bernard +Monastery at Charnwood Forest, has taken to spirit-rappings. He avers, +_inter alia_, that a Buddhist spirit in misery held communication with +him through the table, and entreated his confessor, Father Lorraine, to +say three masses for him. Pray, convey this to T---- for his warning. +For, moreover, it remains uncertain whether Father Lorraine did say the +masses; so that perhaps T----'s deceased co-religionist is still in the +wrong place." + +Some time after his return, he wrote,--"Really, I may say I am only +just beginning to recover my spirits after returning from the young and +hopeful and humane republic, to this cruel, unbelieving, inveterate old +monarchy. There are deeper waters of ancient knowledge and experience +about one here, and one is saved from the temptation of flying off into +space; but I think you have, beyond all question, the happiest country +going. Still, the political talk of America, as one hears it here, is +not always true to the best intentions of the country, is it?" + +Writing on a July day from his office in Whitehall, he says, after +speaking of the heat of the weather,--"Time has often been compared to +a river: if the Thames at London represent the stream of traditional +wisdom, the comparison will indeed be of an ill odor; the accumulated +wisdom of the past will be proved upon analogy to be as it were the +collected sewage of the centuries; and the great problem, how to get rid +of it." + +In March, 1854, he wrote,--"People talk a good deal about that book of +Whewell's on the Plurality of Worlds. I recommend Fields to pirate it. +Have you seen it? It is to show that Jupiter, Venus, Saturn, etc., are +all pretty certainly uninhabitable,--being (Jupiter, Saturn, etc., to +wit) strange washy limbos of places, where at the best only mollusks +(or, in the case of Venus, salamanders) could exist. Hence we conclude +we are the only rational creatures, which is highly satisfactory, and, +what is more, quite Scriptural. Owen, on the other hand, I believe, +and other scientific people, declare it a most presumptuous essay,-- +conclusions audacious, and reasoning fallacious, though the facts are +allowed; and in that opinion I, on the ground that there are more things +in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in the inductive philosophy, +incline to concur." + +Of his work he wrote,--"Well, I go on in the office, _operose nihil +agenda_, very _operose_, and very _nihil_ too. For lack of news, I send +you a specimen of my labors."--"We are here going on much as usual, +--occupied with nothing else but commerce and the money-market. I do not +think any one is thinking audibly of anything else."--"I have read with +more pleasure than anything else that I have read lately Kane's Arctic +Explorations, i.e., his second voyage, which is certainly a wonderful +story. The whole narrative is, I think, very characteristic of the +differences between the English and the American-English habits of +command and obedience." + +In the autumn of 1857, after speaking of some of the features of the +Sepoy revolt, he said,--"I don't believe Christianity can spread far in +Asia, unless it will allow men more than one wife,--which isn't likely +yet out of Utah. But I believe the old Brahmin 'Touch not and taste not, +and I am holier than thou, because I don't touch and taste,' may be got +rid of. As for Mahometanism, it is a crystallized monotheism, out of +which no vegetation can come. I doubt its being good even for the +Central negro." + +March, 1859. "Excuse this letter all about my own concerns. I am pretty +busy, and have time for little else: such is our fate after forty. My +figure 40 stands nearly three months behind me on the roadway, unwept, +unhonored, and unsung, an _octavum lustrum_ bound up and laid on the +shelf. 'So-and-so is dead,' said a friend to Lord Melbourne of some +author. 'Dear me, how glad I am! Now I can bind him up.'" + +It was not until 1859 that the translation of Plutarch, begun six years +before, was completed and published. It had involved much wearisome +study, and gave proof of patient, exact, and elegant scholarship. +Clough's life in the Council-Office was exceedingly laborious, and +for several years his work was increased by services rendered to Miss +Nightingale, a near relative of his wife. He employed "many hours, both +before and after his professional duties were over, to aid her in those +reforms of the military administration to which she has devoted the +remaining energies of her overtasked life." For this work he was the +better fitted from having acted, during a period of relief from his +regular employment, as Secretary to a Military Commission appointed by +Government shortly after the Crimean War to examine and report upon the +military systems of some of the chief Continental nations. But at length +his health gave way under the strain of continuous overwork. He had for +a long time been delicate, and early in 1861 he was obliged to give +up work, and was ordered to travel abroad. He went to Greece and +Constantinople, and enjoyed greatly the charms of scenery and of +association which he was so well fitted to appreciate. But the release +from work had come too late. He returned to England in July, his health +but little improved. In a letter written at that time he spoke of Lord +Campbell's death, which had just occurred. "Lord Campbell's death is +rather the characteristic death of the English political man. In the +Cabinet, on the Bench, and at a dinner-party, busy, animated, and full +of effort to-day, and in the early morning a vessel has burst. It is a +wonder they last so long." But of himself he says, in words of striking +contrast,--"My nervous energy is pretty nearly spent for to-day, so I +must come to a stop. I have leave till November, and by that time I hope +I shall be strong again for another good spell of work." After a happy +three weeks in England, he went abroad again, and spent some time +with his friends the Tennysons in Auvergne and among the Pyrenees. In +September he was joined by his wife in Paris, and thence went with her +through Switzerland to Italy. He had scarcely reached Florence before +he became alarmingly ill with symptoms of a low malaria fever. His +exhausted constitution never rallied against its attack. He sank +gradually away, and died on the 13th of November. "I have leave till +November, and by that time I hope I shall be strong again for another +good spell of work." That hope is accomplished;-- + + "For sure in the wide heaven there is room + For love, and pity, and for helpful deeds." + +He was buried in the little Protestant cemetery at Florence, a fit +resting-place for a poet, the Protestant Santa Croce, where the tall +cypresses rise over the graves, and the beautiful hills keep guard +around. + +"Every one who knew Clough even slightly," says one of his oldest +friends, "received the strongest impression of the unusual breadth +and massiveness of his mind. Singularly simple and genial, he was +unfortunately cast upon a self-questioning age, which led him to worry +himself with constantly testing the veracity of his own emotions. He has +delineated in four lines the impression which his habitual reluctance to +converse on the deeper themes of life made upon those of his friends who +were attracted by his frank simplicity. In one of his shorter poems he +writes,-- + + 'I said, My heart is all too soft; + He who would climb and soar aloft + Must needs keep ever at his side + The tonic of a wholesome pride.' + +That expresses the man in a very remarkable manner. He had a kind of +proud simplicity about him singularly attractive, and often singularly +disappointing to those who longed to know him well. He had a fear, which +many would think morbid, of leaning much on the approbation of the +world. And there is one remarkable passage in his poems in which he +intimates that men who live on the good opinion of others might even be +benefited by a crime which would rob them of that evil stimulant:-- + + 'Why, so is good no longer good, but crime + Our truest, best advantage, since it lifts us + Out of the stifling gas of men's opinion + Into the vital atmosphere of Truth, + Where He again is visible, though in anger.' + +"So eager was his craving for reality and perfect sincerity, so morbid +his dislike even for the unreal conventional forms of life, that a mind +quite unique in simplicity and truthfulness represents _itself_ in his +poems as + + 'Seeking in vain, in all my store, + One feeling based on truth.' + +"Indeed, he wanted to reach some guaranty for simplicity deeper than +simplicity itself. We remember his principal criticism on America, +after returning from his residence in Massachusetts, was, that the +New-Englanders were much simpler than the English, and that this was +the great charm of New-England society. His own habits were of the same +kind, sometimes almost austere in their simplicity. Luxury he disliked, +and sometimes his friends thought him even ascetic. + +"This almost morbid craving for a firm base on the absolute realities +of life was very wearing in a mind so self-conscious as Clough's, and +tended to paralyze the expression of a certainly great genius. He heads +some of his poems with a line from Wordsworth's great ode, which depicts +perfectly the expression often written in the deep furrows which +sometimes crossed and crowded his massive forehead:-- + + 'Blank misgivings of a creature moving about + in worlds not realized.' + +"Nor did Clough's great powers ever realize themselves to his +contemporaries by any outward sign at all commensurate with the profound +impression which they produced in actual life. But if his powers did +not, there was much in his character that did produce its full effect +upon all who knew him. He never looked, even in time of severe trial, to +his own interest or advancement. He never flinched from the worldly loss +which his deepest convictions brought on him. Even when clouds were +thick over his own head, and the ground beneath his feet seemed +crumbling away, he could still bear witness to an eternal light behind +the cloud, and tell others that there is solid ground to be reached in +the end by the weary feet of all who will wait to be strong. Let him +speak his own farewell:-- + + 'Say not the struggle nought availeth, + The labor and the wounds are vain, + The enemy faints not nor faileth, + And as things have been things remain. + + 'Though hopes were dupes, fears may be liars; + It may be, in yon smoke concealed, + Your comrades chase e'en now the fliers, + And but for you possess the field. + + 'For though the tired wave, idly breaking, + Seems here no tedious inch to gain, + Far back, through creek and inlet making, + Came, silent flooding in, the main. + + 'And not through eastern windows only, + When daylight comes, comes in the light; + In front the sun climbs slow,--how slowly! + But westward--look! the land is bright.'" + + + + +WHAT SHALL WE DO WITH THEM? + + +We have many precedents upon the part of the "Guardian of Civilization," +which may or may not guide us. Not to return to that age "whereunto the +memory of man runneth not to the contrary," "the day of King Richard our +grandfather," and to the Wars of the Roses, we will begin with the happy +occasion of the Restoration of King Charles of merry and disreputable +fame. Since he came back to his kingdoms on sufferance and as a +convenient compromise between anarchy and despotism, he could hardly +afford the luxury of wholesale proscription. What the returning +Royalists could, they did. It was obviously unsafe, as well as +ungrateful, to hang General Monk in presence of his army, many of whom +had followed the "Son of the Man" from Worcester Fight in hot pursuit, +and had hunted him from thicket to thicket of Boscobel Wood. But to dig +up the dead Cromwell and Ireton, to suspend them upon the gallows, to +mark out John Milton, old and blind, for poverty and contempt, was both +safe and pleasant. And civilization was guarded accordingly. One little +bit of comfort, however, was permitted. Scotland had been the Virginia +of his day, and Charles had the satisfaction of hearing that the Whigs, +who had betrayed and sold his father, and who had (a far worse offence) +made himself listen to three-hours' sermons, were chased like wild +beasts among the hills, after the defeat of Bothwell Brigg. But what +Charles could not do was permitted to his brother. After the rebellion +of Monmouth was put down, the West of England was turned to mourning. +From the princely bastard who sued in agony and vain humiliation, to the +clown of Devon forced into the rebel ranks,--from the peer who plotted, +to the venerable and Christian woman whose sole crime was sheltering the +houseless and starving fugitive, there was given to the vanquished no +mercy but the mercy of Jeffreys, no tenderness but the tenderness of +Kirk. + +But the House of Stuart was not always to represent the side of victory. +Thirty years after the Rout of Sedgemoor, the son of James, whose name +was clouded by rumor with the same stain of spuriousness as that of his +unfortunate cousin, was proclaimed by the Earl of Mar. The Jacobites +were forced to drink to the dregs the cup of bitterness they had so +gladly administered to others. Over Temple Bar and London Bridge the +heads of the defeated rebels bore witness to the guardianship of +civilization as understood in the eighteenth century. + +Another thirty years brings us to the landing of Moidart, the rising +of the clans, the fall of Edinburgh and Carlisle, the "Bull's Run" at +Prestonpans, and the panic of London. If we are anxious to guard our +civilization according to Hanoverian precedents, there is one name +commonly given to the Commander-in-chief at Culloden which Congress +should add to the titles it is preparing against McClellan's successful +advance. The "Butcher Cumberland" not only hounded on his troops with +the tempting price of thirty thousand pounds for the Pretender _dead or +alive_, but every adherent of the luckless Jefferson Davis of that day +was in peril of life and wholesale confiscation. The House of Hanover +not only broke the backbone of the Rebellion, but mangled without mercy +its remains. + +We come now, in another thirty years, to the next struggle of England +with a portion of her people. It is impossible, as well as unfair, +to say what might have been done with "Mr. Washington, the Virginia +colonel," and Mr. Franklin, the Philadelphia printer, had they not been +able to determine their own destiny. We can only surmise, by referring +to two well-known localities in New York, the "Old Sugar-House" and the +"Jersey Prison-Ship," how paternally George III was disposed then to +resume his rights. And without disposition to press historic parallels, +we cannot but compare Arnold and Tryon's raid along the south shore of +Connecticut with a certain sail recently made up the Tennessee River to +the foot of the Muscle Shoals by the command of a modern Connecticut +officer. + +But as we were spared the necessity of testing the royal clemency to the +submitted Provinces of North America, we had better pass on twenty years +to the era of the Act of Union between Great Britain and Ireland. In +this country the Irishman need not "fear to speak of '98," and in this +country he still treasures the memory of the whippings and pitch-caps of +Major Beresford's riding-house, and other pleasant souvenirs of the way +in which, sixty years ago, loyalty dealt with rebellion. There is no +inherent proneness to treason in the Hibernian nature, as Corcoran and +the Sixty-Ninth can bear witness; nor is Pat so fond of a riot that he +cannot with fair play be a--well, a good citizen. Yet at home he has +been so "civilized" by his British guardian as to be in a chronic state +of discontent and fretfulness. + +We must, however, hasten to our latest precedent,--England in India. +The Sepoy Rebellion had some features in common with our own. It was +inaugurated by premeditated military treachery. It seized upon a large +quantity of Government munitions of war. It only asked "to be let +alone." It found the Government wholly unprepared. But it was the +uprising of a conquered people. The rebels were in circumstances, as in +complexion, much nearer akin to that portion of our Southern citizens +which has _not_ rebelled, and which has lost no opportunity of seeking +our lines "to take the oath of allegiance" or any other little favor +which could be found there. We do not defend their atrocities, although +a plea in mitigation might be put in, that these "were wisely planned to +break the spell which British domination had woven over the native mind +of India," and that they were part of that decided and desperate policy +which was designed to forever bar the way of reconstruction. But toward +the recaptured rebels there was used a course for which the only +precedent, so far as we know, was furnished by that highly civilized +guardian, the Dey of Algiers. These prisoners of war were in cold blood +tied to the muzzles of cannon and blown into fragments. The illustrated +papers of that most Christian land which is overcome with the barbarity +of sinking old hulks in a channel through which privateers were wont to +escape our blockade furnished effective engravings "by our own artist" +of the scene. Wholesale plunder and devastation of the chief city of the +revolt followed. The rebellion was put down, and put down, we may say, +without any unnecessary tenderness, any womanish weakness for the +rebels. + +We have thus established what we believe is called by theologians a +_catena_ of precedents, coming down from the days of the Commonwealth to +our own time. It covers about the whole period of New England history. +And we next propose to ask the question, how far it may be desirable to +be bound by such indisputable authority. + +Is it too late to reopen the question, and to retry the issue between +sovereign and rebel, less with respect to ancient and immemorial usage, +and more according to eternal principle? We answer, No. The same power +that enables us to master this rebellion will give us original and final +jurisdiction over it. + +But one principle asserts itself out of the uniform coarse of history. +The restoration of the lawful authority over rebels does not restore +them to their old _status_. They are at the pleasure of the conquering +power. Rights of citizenship, having been abjured, do not return +with the same coercion which demands duties of citizenship. Thus, to +illustrate on an individual scale, every wrong-doer is _ipso facto_ a +rebel. He forfeits, according to due course of law, a measure of his +privileges, while constrained to the same responsibility of obedience. +His property is not exempt from taxes because he is in prison, but his +right of voting is gone; he cannot bear arms, but he must keep the +peace, he must labor compulsorily, and attend such worship as the State +provides. In short, he becomes a ward of the State, while not ceasing to +be a member. His inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of +happiness were inalienable only so long as he remained obedient and true +to the sovereign. Now this is equally true on the large scale as on the +small. The only difficulty is to apply it to broad masses of men and to +States. + +It may not be expedient to try South Carolina collectively, but we +contend that the application of the principle gives us the right. +Corporate bodies have again and again been punished by suspension of +franchise, while held to allegiance and duties. + +The simple question for us is, What will it be best to do? The South +may save us the trouble of deciding for the present a part of the many +questions that occur. We may put down the Confederate Government, and +take military occupation. We cannot compel the Southerners to hold +elections and resume their share in the Government. It can go on without +them. The same force which reopens the Mississippi can collect taxes or +exact forfeitures along its banks. If Charleston is sullen, the National +Government, having restored its flag to Moultrie and Sumter, can take +its own time in the matter of clearing out the channel and rebuilding +the light-houses. If a secluded neighborhood does not receive a +Government postmaster, but is disposed to welcome him with tarry hands +to a feathery bed, it can be left without the mails. The rebel we can +compel to return to his duties; if necessary, we can leave him to get +back his rights as he best may. + +But we are the representatives of a great political discovery. The +American Union is founded on a fact unknown to the Old World. That fact +is the direct ratio of the prosperity of the parts to the prosperity of +the whole. It is the principle upon which in every community our life +is built. We cannot, therefore, afford to have any part of the land +languishing and suffering. We are fighting, not for conquest, for we +mean to abjure our power the moment we safely can,--not for vengeance, +for those with whom we fight are our brethren. We are compelled by a +necessity, partly geographical and partly social, into restoring a Union +politically which never for a day has actually ceased. + +Let us advert to one fact very patent and significant. We have heard +of nearly all our successes through Rebel sources. Even where it made +against them, they could not help telling us (we do not say the _truth_, +for that is rather strong, but) the _news_. Never did two nations at war +know one-tenth part as much of each other's affairs. Like husband and +wife, the two parts of the country cannot keep secrets from one another, +let them try ever so hard. And the end of all will be that we shall know +and respect one another a great deal better for our sharp encounter. + +But this necessity of union demands of the Government, imperatively +demands, that it take whatever step is necessary to its own +preservation. It is as with a ship at sea,--all must pull together, or +somebody must go overboard. There can be no such order of things as an +_agreed state of mutiny_,--forecastle seceding from cabin, and steerage +independent of both. + +Not only is rebellion to be put down, therefore, but to be kept from +coming up again. It is obvious to every one, not thoroughly blinded by +party, how it did come up. The Gulf States were coaxed out, the Border +States were bullied or conjured out. A few leading men, who had made +the science of political management their own, got the control of the +popular mind. One great secret of their success was their constant +assumption that what was to be done had been done already. It is the +very art of the veteran seducer, who ever persuades his victim that +return is impossible, in order that he may actually make it so. North +Carolina, as one expressively said, "found herself out of the Union she +hardly knew how." Virginia was dragged out. Tennessee was forced out. +Missouri was declared out. Kentucky was all but out. Maryland hung in +the crisis of life and death under the guns of Fort McHenry. In South +Carolina alone can it be said that any fair expression of the popular +will was on the Secession side. The Rebellion was the work of a +governing class, all whose ideas and hopes were the aggrandizement of +their own order. Terrorism opened the way, reckless lying made the game +sure. If any one is inclined to doubt this, let him look at the sway +which Robespierre and his few associates exercised in Paris. Some +seventy executions delivered that great city from its nightmare agony of +months. A dozen resolute, united men, with arms and without scruples, +could seize almost any New England village for a time, provided they +knew just what they wanted to do. Decision and energy are master-keys to +almost most all doors not fortified by Hobbs's patent locks. A party of +tipsy Americans one night stormed a Parisian guard-house, disarmed the +sentry, and sent the guard flying in desperate fear, thinking that a +general _emente_ was in progress. Now one issue of the Rebellion must +be to put down, not only this governing class, but also the system from +which it springs. We have no such class at the North. We can have no +such class. The very collision of interests, the rivalries of trade, the +thousand-and-one social relations, all neutralize each other, are checks +and counterchecks, which, like the particles in a vessel of water, +always tend toward the level of an equilibrium. Two men meet in their +lodge as Odd-Fellows, but they are opponents on "town-meeting day." Two +partners in business are, one the most bitter of Calvinists, and the +other the most progressive of Universalists. Dr. A. and the Rev. Mr. B. +pull asunder the men whom 'Change unites. But with the Southerner of the +governing class it is not so. One sympathy, more potent than any other +can be, leagues them all. All are masters of the Helot race upon which +their success and station are built. It is a living relation, the most +powerful and vital which can bind men together, that sense of authority +borne by the few over the many. + +The Norman barons after the Conquest, the Spanish conquerors in Mexico +and Peru, the Englishmen of the days of Clive and Hastings in India, are +all examples of that thorough concentration of strength which must arise +in the conflicts of races. Republics have fallen through their standing +armies. The proprietary class at the South was the most dangerous of +standing armies, for it was disciplined to the use of power night and +day. The overthrow of the Rebellion will to a great degree ruin this +class. But since it is one not founded on birth or culture, but simply +on white blood and circumstance, (for no Secessionist is so fierce as +your converted Northerner,) it cannot fall like the Norman nobility in +the Wars of the Roses, or waste by operation of climate like the +masters of Mexico and Hindostan. It renews itself whenever it touches +slave-soil. That gives it life. We contend that Government must for its +own preservation go to the root of the matter. And we cannot see that +there is any Constitutional difficulty. There are probably not ten +slave-proprietors in the South whom it has not the right to arrest, try, +and hang, for high-treason. Of course, every one can see the practical +difficulty, as well as the manifest folly, of doing this. But if it has +that right toward these individuals, it certainly may say, by Act of +Congress, if we choose, that it will not waive it except upon conditions +which shall secure it from any further trouble. It seems to us fully +within our power. And we will use an illustration that may help to show +what we mean. President Lincoln has no right to require of any citizen +of the United States that he take the temperance-pledge. But suppose a +murderer who has taken life in a fit of drunkenness applies for pardon +to the Executive. The Executive, Governor or President, as the case may +be, may surely then impose that condition before commuting the sentence +or releasing the prisoner. Now the Nation stands toward the Rebels in a +like attitude. It may be good policy to take them back as fast as they +submit, it may be Christian magnanimity to make the way as easy as +possible for their return, but they have no right to come back to +anything but a prison and hard labor for life. Many of them have trebly +forfeited their lives,--as traitors, as deserters from the naval and +military service, and as paroled prisoners who have broken their parole. +And therefore we say, since we cannot deal with all the individuals, +we must deal with the masses, and that in their corporate capacity. If +South Carolina is a sovereign State, is in the Union as a feudal chief +in his king's court, with power to carry from York to Lancaster and from +Lancaster to York his subject vassals, then South Carolina has dared the +hazard of rebellion, and her political head is forfeit. + +It is next to be asked, what these conditions are to be. And that is +not to be answered in a breath. That they can have but one result, +emancipation, is a foregone conclusion; but the mode of reaching it is +not so easily determined. A cotton-loaded ship took fire at sea. It +would have been easy to pump in water enough to drown the fire. But the +captain said, "No," for that would swell the bales to such an extent +as to open every seam and start every timber. So with, the ship now +carrying King Cotton: you may indeed quench the fire, but you may +possibly turn the ship inside out into the bargain. + +But something we have a right to insist on. We have it, over and above +the Constitutional right shown just now, upon the broad principle of +necessity. Slavery has proved itself a nuisance. Just as we say to the +owner of a bone-boiling establishment, "You poison the air; we cannot +live here; you must go farther off,"--and if a fever break out which can +be clearly traced to that source, we say it emphatically: so now Slavery +having proved itself pestilential, we say, "March!" + +We are not disposed, _a la_ Staten Island, to burn down our +yellow-feverish neighbor's house. We will give everybody time to pack +up. We will make up a little purse for any specially hard case which the +removal may show. But stay and be plague-stricken we will no longer; nor +are we disposed to spend our whole income in burning sulphur, saltpetre, +and charcoal to keep out infection. And certainly, when by neglect to +pay ground-rent, or other illegality, the owner of our nuisance has +_forfeited_ his right to stay, no mortal can blame us for taking the +strictest and most decisive steps known to the law to remove him. + + + + +AGNES OF SORRENTO. + + +CHAPTER XXVII. + +THE SAINT'S REST. + + +Agnes entered the city of Rome in a trance of enthusiastic emotion, +almost such as one might imagine in a soul entering the heavenly +Jerusalem above. To her exalted ideas she was approaching not only the +ground hallowed by the blood of apostles and martyrs, not merely the +tombs of the faithful, but the visible "general assembly and church of +the first-born which are written in heaven." Here reigned the appointed +representative of Jesus,--and she imagined a benignant image of a prince +clothed with honor and splendor, who was yet the righter of all wrongs, +the redresser of all injuries, the friend and succorer of the poor and +needy; and she was firm in a secret purpose to go to this great and +benignant father, and on her knees entreat him to forgive the sins of +her lover, and remove the excommunication that threatened at every +moment his eternal salvation. For she trembled to think of it,--a sudden +accident, a thrust of a dagger, a fall from his horse might put him +forever beyond the pale of repentance,--he might die unforgiven, and +sink to eternal pain. + +If any should wonder that a Christian soul could preserve within itself +an image so ignorantly fair, in such an age, when the worldliness and +corruption in the Papal chair were obtruded by a thousand incidental +manifestations, and were alluded to in all the calculations of simple +common people, who looked at facts with a mere view to the guidance of +their daily conduct, it is necessary to remember the nature of Agnes's +religious training, and the absolute renunciation of all individual +reasoning which from infancy had been laid down before her as the first +and indispensable prerequisite of spiritual progress. To believe,--to +believe utterly and blindly,--not only without evidence, but against +evidence,--to reject the testimony even of her senses, when set against +the simple affirmation of her superiors,--had been the beginning, +middle, and end of her religious instruction. When a doubt assailed her +mind on any point, she had been taught to retire within herself and +repeat a prayer; and in this way her mental eye had formed the habit +of closing to anything that might shake her faith as quickly as the +physical eye closes at a threatened blow. Then, as she was of a poetic +and ideal nature, entirely differing from the mass of those with whom +she associated, she had formed that habit of abstraction and mental +reverie which prevented her hearing or perceiving the true sense of a +great deal that went on around her. The conversations that commonly +were carried on in her presence had for her so little interest that +she scarcely heard them. The world in which she moved was a glorified +world,--wherein, to be sure, the forms of every-day life appeared, +but appeared as different from what they were in reality as the old +mouldering daylight view of Rome is from the warm translucent glory of +its evening transfiguration. + +So in her quiet, silent heart she nursed this beautiful hope of finding +in Rome the earthly image of her Saviour's home above, of finding in the +head of the Church the real image of her Redeemer,--the friend to whom +the poorest and lowliest may pour out their souls with as much freedom +as the highest and noblest. The spiritual directors who had formed the +mind of Agnes in her early days had been persons in the same manner +taught to move in an ideal world of faith. The Mother Theresa had never +seen the realities of life, and supposed the Church on earth to be all +that the fondest visions of human longing could paint it. The hard, +energetic, prose experience of old Jocunda, and the downright way with +which she sometimes spoke of things as a trooper's wife must have seen +them, were repressed and hushed, down, as the imperfect faith of a +half-reclaimed worldling,--they could not be allowed to awaken her +from the sweetness of so blissful a dream. In like manner, when Lorenzo +Sforza became Father Francesco, he strove with earnest prayer to bury +his gift of individual reason in the same grave with his family name +and worldly experience. As to all that transpired in the real world, he +wrapped himself in a mantle of imperturbable silence; the intrigues of +popes and cardinals, once well known to him, sank away as a forbidden +dream; and by some metaphysical process of imaginative devotion he +enthroned God in the place of the dominant powers, and taught himself to +receive all that came from them in uninquiring submission, as proceeding +from unerring wisdom. Though he had begun his spiritual life under the +impulse of Savonarola, yet so perfect had been his isolation from all +tidings of what transpired in the external world that the conflict which +was going on between that distinguished man and the Papal hierarchy +never reached his ear. He sought and aimed as much as possible to make +his soul like the soul of one dead, which adores and worships in ideal +space, and forgets forever the scenes and relations of earth; and he +had so long contemplated Rome under the celestial aspects of his faith, +that, though the shock of his first confession there had been painful, +still it was insufficient to shake his faith. It had been God's will, he +thought, that where he looked for aid he should meet only confusion, +and he bowed to the inscrutable will, and blindly adored the mysterious +revelation. If such could be the submission and the faith of a strong +and experienced man, who can wonder at the enthusiastic illusions of an +innocent, trustful child? + +Agnes and her grandmother entered the city of Rome just as the twilight +had faded into night; and though Agnes, full of faith and enthusiasm, +was longing to begin immediately the ecstatic vision of shrines and holy +places, old Elsie commanded her not to think of anything further that +night. They proceeded, therefore, with several other pilgrims who had +entered the city, to a church specially set apart for their reception, +connected with which were large dormitories and a religious order whose +business was to receive and wait upon them, and to see that all their +wants were supplied. This religious foundation is one of the oldest in +Rome; and it is esteemed a work of especial merit and sanctity among the +citizens to associate themselves temporarily in these labors in Holy +Week. Even princes and princesses come, humble and lowly, mingling with +those of common degree, and all, calling each other brother and sister, +vie in kind attentions to these guests of the Church. + +When Agnes and Elsie arrived, several of these volunteer assistants were +in waiting. Agnes was remarked among all the rest of the company for her +peculiar beauty and the rapt enthusiastic expression of her face. + +Almost immediately on their entrance into the reception-hall connected +with the church, they seemed to attract the attention of a tall lady +dressed in deep mourning, and accompanied by a female servant, with whom +she was conversing on those terms of intimacy which showed confidential +relations between the two. + +"See!" she said, "my Mona, what a heavenly face is there!--that sweet +child has certainly the light of grace shining through her. My heart +warms to her." + +"Indeed," said the old servant, looking across, "and well it +may,--dear lamb come so far! But, Holy Virgin, how my head swims! How +strange!--that child reminds me of some one. My Lady, perhaps, may think +of some one whom she looks like." + +"Mona, you say true. I have the same strange impression that I have seen +a face like hers, but who or where I cannot say." + +"What would my Lady say, if I said it was our dear Prince?--God rest his +soul!" + +"Mona, it _is_ so,--yes," added the lady, looking more intently,--"how +singular!--the very traits of our house in a peasant-girl! She is of +Sorrento, I judge, by her costume,--what a pretty one it is! That old +woman is her mother, perhaps. I must choose her for my care,--and, Mona, +you shall wait on her mother." + +So saying, the Princess Paulina crossed the hall, and, bending affably +over Agnes, took her hand and kissed her, saying,-- + +"Welcome, my dear little sister, to the house of our Father!" + +Agnes looked up with strange, wondering eyes into the face that was bent +to hers. It was sallow and sunken, with deep lines of ill-health and +sorrow, but the features were noble, and must once have been, beautiful; +the whole action, voice, and manner were dignified and impressive. +Instinctively she felt that the lady was of superior birth and breeding +to any with whom she had been in the habit of associating. + +"Come with me," said the lady; "and this--your mother"--she added. + +"She is my grandmother," said Agnes. + +"Well, then, your grandmother, sweet child, shall be attended by my good +sister Mona here." + +The Princess Paulina drew the hand of Agnes through her arm, and, laying +her hand affectionately on it, looked down and smiled tenderly on her. + +"Are you very tired, my dear?" + +"Oh, no! no!" said Agnes,--"I am so happy, so blessed to be here!" + +"You have travelled a long way?" + +"Yes, from Sorrento; but I am used to walking,--I did not feel it to be +long,--my heart kept me up,--I wanted to come home so much." + +"Home?" said the Princess. + +"Yes, to my soul's home,--the house of our dear Father the Pope." + +The Princess started, and looked incredulously down for a moment; then +noticing the confiding, whole-hearted air of the child, she sighed and +was silent. + +"Come with me above," she said, "and let me attend a little to your +comfort." + +"How good you are, dear lady!" said Agnes. + +"I am not good, my child,--I am only your unworthy sister in Christ"; +and as the lady spoke, she opened the door into a room where were a +number of other female pilgrims seated around the wall, each attended by +a person whose peculiar care she seemed to be. + +At the feet of each was a vessel of water, and when the seats were all +full, a cardinal in robes of office entered, and began reading prayers. +Each lady present, kneeling at the feet of her chosen pilgrim, divested +them carefully of their worn and travel-soiled shoes and stockings, and +proceeded to wash them. It was not a mere rose-water ceremony, but a +good hearty washing of feet that for the most part had great need of the +ablution. While this service was going on, the cardinal read from the +Gospel how a Greater than they all had washed the feet of His disciples, +and said, "If I, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet, ye also +ought to wash one another's feet." Then all repeated in concert the +Lord's Prayer, while each humbly kissed the feet she had washed, and +proceeded to replace the worn and travel-soiled shoes and stockings with +new and strong ones, the gift of Christian love. Each lady then led her +charge into a room where tables were spread with a plain and wholesome +repast of all such articles of food as the season of Lent allowed. Each +placed her _protegee_ at table, and carefully attended to all her wants +at the supper, and afterwards dormitories were opened for their repose. + +The Princess Paulina performed all these offices for Agnes with a tender +earnestness which won upon her heart. The young girl thought herself +indeed in that blessed society of which she had dreamed, where the +high-born and the rich become through Christ's love the servants of the +poor and lowly,--and through all the services she sat in a sort of dream +of rapture. How lovely this reception into the Holy City! how sweet thus +to be taken to the arms of the great Christian family, bound together in +the charity which is the bond of perfectness! + +"Please tell me, dear lady," said Agnes, after supper, "who is that holy +man that prayed with us?" + +"Oh, he--he is the Cardinal Capello," said the Princess. + +"I should like to have spoken with him," said Agnes. + +"Why, my child?" + +"I wanted to ask him when and how I could get speech with our dear +Father the Pope,--for there is somewhat on my mind that I would lay +before him." + +"My poor little sister," said the Princess, much perplexed, "you do not +understand things. What you speak of is impossible. The Pope is a great +king." + +"I know he is," said Agnes,--"and so is our Lord Jesus,--but every soul +may come to him." + +"I cannot explain to you now," said the Princess,--"there is not time +to-night. But I shall see you again. I will send for you to come to my +house, and there talk with you about many things which you need to know. +Meanwhile, promise me, dear child, not to try to do anything of the kind +you spoke of until I have talked with you." + +"Well, I will not," said Agnes, with a glance of docile affection, +kissing the hand of the Princess. + +The action was so pretty,--the great, soft, dark eyes looked so +fawn-like and confiding in their innocent tenderness, that the lady +seemed much moved. + +"Our dear Mother bless thee, child!" she said, laying her hand on her +head, and stooping to kiss her forehead. + +She left her at the door of the dormitory. + +The Princess and her attendant went out of the church-door, where her +litter stood in waiting. The two took their seats in silence, and +silently pursued their way through the streets of the old dimly-lighted +city and out of one of its principal gates to the wide Campagna beyond. +The villa of the Princess was situated on an eminence at some distance +from the city, and the night-ride to it was solemn and solitary. They +passed along the old Appian Way over pavements that had rumbled under +the chariot-wheels of the emperors and nobles of a by-gone age, while +along their way, glooming up against the clear of the sky, were vast +shadowy piles,--the tombs of the dead of other days. All mouldering and +lonely, shaggy and fringed with bushes and streaming wild vines through +which the night-wind sighed and rustled, they might seem to be pervaded +by the restless spirits of the dead; and as the lady passed them, she +shivered, and, crossing herself, repeated an inward prayer against +wandering demons that walk in desolate places. + +Timid and solitary, the high-born lady shrank and cowered within herself +with a distressing feeling of loneliness. A childless widow in delicate +health, whose paternal family had been for the most part cruelly robbed, +exiled, or destroyed by the reigning Pope and his family, she felt her +own situation a most unprotected and precarious one, since the least +jealousy or misunderstanding might bring upon her, too, the ill-will +of the Borgias, which had proved so fatal to the rest of her race. No +comfort in life remained to her but her religion, to whose practice she +clung as to her all; but even in this her life was embittered by facts +to which, with the best disposition in the world, she could not shut her +eyes. Her own family had been too near the seat of power not to see all +the base intrigues by which that sacred and solemn position of Head of +the Christian Church had been traded for as a marketable commodity. The +pride, the indecency, the cruelty of those who now reigned in the name +of Christ came over her mind in contrast with the picture painted by +the artless, trusting faith of the peasant-girl with whom she had just +parted. Her mind had been too thoroughly drilled in the non-reflective +practice of her faith to dare to put forth any act of reasoning upon +facts so visible and so tremendous,--she rather trembled at herself for +seeing what she saw and for knowing what she knew, and feared somehow +that this very knowledge might endanger her salvation; and so she rode +homeward cowering and praying like a frightened child. + +"Does my Lady feel ill?" said the old servant, anxiously. + +"No, Mona, no,--not in body." + +"And what is on my Lady's mind now?" + +"Oh, Mona, it is only what is always there. To-morrow is Palm Sunday, +and how can I go to see the murderers and robbers of our house in holy +places? Oh, Mona, what can Christians do, when such men handle holy +things? It was a comfort to wash the feet of those poor simple pilgrims, +who tread in the steps of the saints of old; but how I felt when that +poor child spoke of wanting to see the Pope!" + +"Yes," said Mona, "it's like sending the lamb to get spiritual counsel +of the wolf." + +"See what sweet belief the poor infant has! Should not the head of the +Christian Church be such as she thinks? Ah, in the old days, when the +Church here in Rome was poor and persecuted, there were popes who were +loving fathers and not haughty princes." + +"My dear Lady," said the servant, "pray, consider, the very stones have +ears. We don't know what day we may be turned out, neck and heels, to +make room for some of their creatures." + +"Well, Mona," said the lady, with some spirit, "I'm sure I haven't said +any more than you have." + +"Holy Mother! and so you haven't, but somehow things look more dangerous +when other people say them.--A pretty child that was, as you say; but +that old thing, her grandmother, is a sharp piece. She is a Roman, +and lived here in her early days. She says the little one was born +hereabouts; but she shuts up her mouth like a vice, when one would get +more out of her." + +"Mona, I shall not go out to-morrow; but you go to the services, and +find the girl and her grandmother, and bring them out to me. I want to +counsel the child." + +"You may be sure," said Mona, "that her grandmother knows the ins and +outs of Rome as well as any of us, for all she has learned to screw up +her lips so tight" + +"At any rate, bring her to me, because she interests me." + +"Well, well, it shall be so," said Mona. + + +CHAPTER XXVIII. + +PALM SUNDAY. + + +The morning after her arrival in Rome, Agnes was awakened from sleep +by a solemn dropping of bell-tones which seemed to fill the whole air, +intermingled dimly at intervals with long-drawn plaintive sounds of +chanting. She had slept profoundly, overwearied with her pilgrimage, and +soothed by that deep lulling sense of quiet which comes over one, when, +after long and weary toils, some auspicious goal is at length reached. +She had come to Rome, and been received with open arms into the +household of the saints, and seen even those of highest degree imitating +the simplicity of the Lord in serving the poor. Surely, this was indeed +the house of God and the gate of heaven; and so the bell-tones and +chants, mingling with her dreams, seemed naturally enough angel-harpings +and distant echoes of the perpetual adoration of the blessed. She rose +and dressed herself with a tremulous joy. She felt full of hope that +somehow--in what way she could not say--this auspicious beginning +would end in a full fruition of all her wishes, an answer to all her +prayers. + +"Well, child," said old Elsie, "you must have slept well; you look fresh +as a lark." + +"The air of this holy place revives me," said Agnes, with enthusiasm. + +"I wish I could say as much," said Elsie. "My bones ache yet with the +tramp, and I suppose nothing will do but we must go out now to all the +holy places, up and down and hither and yon, to everything that goes on. +I saw enough of it all years ago when I lived here." + +"Dear grandmother, if you are tired, why should you not rest? I can go +forth alone in this holy city. No harm can possibly befall me here. I +can join any of the pilgrims who are going to the holy places where I +long to worship." + +"A likely story!" said Elsie. "I know more about old Rome than you do, +and I tell you, child, that you do not stir out a step without me; so if +you must go, I must go too,--and like enough it's for my soul's health. +I suppose it is," she added, after a reflective pause. + +"How beautiful it was that we were welcomed so last night!" said +Agnes,--"that dear lady was so kind to me!" + +"Ay, ay, and well she might be!" said Elsie, nodding her head. "But +there's no truth in the kindness of the nobles to us, child. They don't +do it because they love us, but because they expect to buy heaven by +washing our feet and giving us what little they can clip and snip off +from their abundance." + +"Oh, grandmother," said Agnes, "how can you say so? Certainly, if any +one ever spoke and looked lovingly, it was that dear lady." + +"Yes, and she rolls away in her carriage, well content, and leaves you +with a pair of new shoes and stockings,--you, as worthy of a carriage +and a palace as she." + +"No, grandmamma; she said she should send for me to talk more with her." + +"_She_ said she should send for you?" said Elsie. "Well, well, that is +strange, to be sure!--that is wonderful!" she added, reflectively. "But +come, child, we must hasten through our breakfast and prayers, and go to +see the Pope, and all the great birds with fine feathers that fly after +him." + +"Yes, indeed!" said Agnes, joyfully. "Oh, grandmamma, what a blessed +sight it will be!" + +"Yes, child, and a fine sight enough he makes with his great canopy and +his plumes and his servants and his trumpeters;--there isn't a king in +Christendom that goes so proudly as he." + +"No other king is worthy of it," said Agnes. "The Lord reigns in him." + +"Much you know about it!" said Elsie, between her teeth, as they started +out. + +The streets of Rome through which they walked were damp and cellar-like, +filthy and ill-paved; but Agnes neither saw nor felt anything of +inconvenience in this: had they been floored, like those of the New +Jerusalem, with translucent gold, her faith could not have been more +fervent. + +Rome is at all times a forest of quaint costumes, a pantomime of +shifting scenic effects of religious ceremonies. Nothing there, however +singular, strikes the eye as out-of-the-way or unexpected, since no +one knows precisely to what religious order it may belong, or what +individual vow or purpose it may represent. Neither Agnes nor Elsie, +therefore, was surprised, when they passed through the door-way to the +street, at the apparition of a man covered from head to foot in a long +robe of white serge, with a high-peaked cap of the same material drawn +completely down over his head and face. Two round holes cut in this +ghostly head-gear revealed simply two black glittering eyes, which shone +with that singular elfish effect which belongs to the human eye when +removed from its appropriate and natural accessories. As they passed +out, the figure rattled a box on which was painted an image of +despairing souls raising imploring hands from very red tongues of flame, +by which it was understood at once that he sought aid for souls in +Purgatory. Agnes and her grandmother each dropped therein a small coin +and went on their way; but the figure followed them at a little distance +behind, keeping carefully within sight of them. + +By means of energetic pushing and striving, Elsie contrived to secure +for herself and her grandchild stations in the piazza in front of the +church, in the very front rank, where the procession was to pass. A +motley assemblage it was, this crowd, comprising every variety of +costume of rank and station and ecclesiastical profession,--cowls +and hoods of Franciscan and Dominican,--picturesque headdresses of +peasant-women of different districts,--plumes and ruffs of more +aspiring gentility,--mixed with every quaint phase of foreign costume +belonging to the strangers from different parts of the earth;--for, +like the old Jewish Passover, this celebration of Holy Week had its +assemblage of Parthians, Medes, Elamites, dwellers in Mesopotamia, +Cretes, and Arabians, all blending in one common memorial. + +Amid the strange variety of persons among whom they were crowded, Elsie +remarked the stranger in the white sack, who had followed them, and who +had stationed himself behind them,--but it did not occur to her that his +presence there was other than merely accidental. + +And now came sweeping up the grand procession, brilliant with scarlet +and gold, waving with plumes, sparkling with gems,--it seemed as if +earth had been ransacked and human invention taxed to express the +ultimatum of all that could dazzle and bewilder,--and, with a rustle +like that of ripe grain before a swaying wind, all the multitude went +down on their knees as the cortege passed. Agnes knelt, too, with +clasped hands, adoring the sacred vision enshrined in her soul; and as +she knelt with upraised eyes, her cheeks flushed with enthusiasm, her +beauty attracted the attention of more than one in the procession. + +"There is the model which our master has been looking for," said a young +and handsome man in a rich dress of black velvet, who, by his costume, +appeared to hold the rank of first chamberlain in the Papal suite. + +The young man to whom he spoke gave a bold glance at Agnes and +answered,-- + +"Pretty little rogue, how well she does the saint!" + +"One can see, that, with judicious arrangement, she might make a nymph +as well as a saint," said the first speaker. + +"A Daphne, for example," said the other, laughing. + +"And she wouldn't turn into a laurel, either," said the first. "Well, +we must keep our eye on her." And as they were passing into the +church-door, he beckoned to a servant in waiting and whispered +something, indicating Agnes with a backward movement of his hand. + +The servant, after this, kept cautiously within observing distance of +her, as she with the crowd pressed into the church to assist at the +devotions. + +Long and dazzling were those ceremonies, when, raised on high like an +enthroned God, Pope Alexander VI. received the homage of bended knee +from the ambassadors of every Christian nation, from heads of all +ecclesiastical orders, and from generals and chiefs and princes and +nobles, who, robed and plumed and gemmed in all the brightest and +proudest that earth could give, bowed the knee humbly and kissed his +foot in return for the palm-branch which he presented. Meanwhile, voices +of invisible singers chanted the simple event which all this splendor +was commemorating,--how of old Jesus came into Jerusalem meek and lowly, +riding on an ass,--how His disciples cast their garments in the way, +and the multitude took branches of palm-trees to come forth and meet +Him,--how He was seized, tried, condemned to a cruel death,--and +the crowd, with dazzled and wondering eyes following the gorgeous +ceremonial, reflected little how great was the satire of the contrast, +how different the coming of that meek and lowly One to suffer and to +die from this triumphant display of worldly-pomp and splendor in His +professed representative. + +But to the pure all things are pure, and Agnes thought only of the +enthronement of all virtues, of all celestial charities and unworldly +purities in that splendid ceremonial, and longed within herself to +approach so near as to touch the hem of those wondrous and sacred +garments. It was to her enthusiastic imagination like the unclosing of +celestial doors, where the kings and priests of an eternal and heavenly +temple move to and fro in music, with the many-colored glories of +rainbows and sunset clouds. Her whole nature was wrought upon by the +sights and sounds of that gorgeous worship,--she seemed to burn and +brighten like an altar-coal, her figure appeared to dilate, her eyes +grew deeper and shone with a starry light, and the color of her cheeks +flushed up with a vivid glow,--nor was she aware how often eyes were +turned upon her, nor how murmurs of admiration followed all her +absorbed, unconscious movements. "_Ecco! Eccola_!" was often repeated +from mouth to mouth around her, but she heard it not. + +When at last the ceremony was finished, the crowd rushed again out of +the church to see the departure of various dignitaries. There was +a perfect whirl of dazzling equipages, and glittering lackeys, and +prancing horses, crusted with gold, flaming in scarlet and purple, +retinues of cardinals and princes and nobles and ambassadors all in one +splendid confused jostle of noise and brightness. + +Suddenly a servant in a gorgeous scarlet livery touched Agnes on the +shoulder, and said, in a tone of authority,-- + +"Young maiden, your presence is commanded." + +"Who commands it?" said Elsie, laying her hand on her grandchild's +shoulder fiercely. + +"Are you mad?" whispered two or three women of the lower orders to Elsie +at once; "don't you know who that is? Hush, for your life!" + +"I shall go with you, Agnes," said Elsie, resolutely. + +"No, you will not," said the attendant, insolently. "This maiden is +commanded, and none else." + +"He belongs to the Pope's nephew," whispered a voice in Elsie's ear. +"You had better have your tongue torn out than say another word." +Whereupon, Elsie found herself actually borne backward by three or four +stout women. + +Agnes looked round and smiled on her,--a smile full of innocent +trust,--and then, turning, followed the servant into the finest of the +equipages, where she was lost to view. + +Elsie was almost wild with fear and impotent rage; but a low, impressive +voice now spoke in her ear. It came from the white figure which had +followed them in the morning. + +"Listen," it said, "and be quiet; don't turn your head, but hear what +I tell you. Your child is followed by those who will save her. Go your +ways whence you came. Wait till the hour after the Ave Maria, then come +to the Porta San Sebastiano, and all will be well." + +When Elsie turned to look she saw no one, but caught a distant glimpse +of a white figure vanishing in the crowd. + +She returned to her asylum, wondering and disconsolate, and the first +person whom she saw was old Mona. + +"Well, good morrow, sister!" she said. "Know that I am here on a strange +errand. The Princess has taken such a liking to you that nothing will +do but we must fetch you and your little one out to her villa. I +looked everywhere for you in church this morning. Where have you hid +yourselves?" + +"We were there," said Elsie, confused, and hesitating whether to speak +of what had happened. + +"Well, where is the little one? Get her ready; we have horses in +waiting. It is a good bit out of the city." + +"Alack!" said Elsie, "I know not where she is." + +"Holy Virgin!" said Mona, "how is this?" + +Elsie, moved by the necessity which makes it a relief to open the heart +to some one, sat down on the steps of the church and poured forth the +whole story into the listening ear of Mona. + +"Well, well, well!" said the old servant, "in our days, one does +not wonder at anything,--one never knows one day what may come the +next,--but this is bad enough!" + +"Do you think," said Elsie, "there is any hope in that strange promise?" + +"One can but try it," said Mona. + +"If you could but be there then," said Elsie, "and take us to your +mistress." + +"Well, I will wait, for my mistress has taken an especial fancy to your +little one, more particularly since this morning, when a holy Capuchin +came to our house and held a long conference with her, and after he was +gone I found my lady almost in a faint, and she would have it that we +should start directly to bring her out here, and I had much ado to let +her see that the child would do quite as well after services were over. +I tired myself looking about for you in the crowd." + +The two women then digressed upon various gossiping particulars, as they +sat on the old mossy, grass-grown steps, looking up over house-tops +yellow with lichen, into the blue spring air, where flocks of white +pigeons were soaring and careering in the soft, warm sunshine. +Brightness and warmth and flowers seemed to be the only idea natural to +that charming weather, and Elsie, sad-hearted and foreboding as she was, +felt the benign influence. Rome, which had been so fatal a place to her +peace, yet had for her, as it has for every one, potent spells of a +lulling and soothing power. Where is the grief or anxiety that can +resist the enchantment of one of Rome's bright, soft, spring days? + + +CHAPTER XXIX. + +THE NIGHT-RIDE. + + +The villa of the Princess Paulina was one of those soft, idyllic +paradises which lie like so many fairy-lands around the dreamy solitudes +of Rome. They are so fair, so wild, so still, these villas! Nature in +them seems to run in such gentle sympathy with Art that one feels as if +they had not been so much the product of human skill as some indigenous +growth of Arcadian ages. There are quaint terraces shadowed by clipped +ilex-trees whose branches make twilight even in the sultriest noon; +there are long-drawn paths, through wildernesses where cyclamens blossom +in crimson clouds among crushed fragments of sculptured marble green +with the moss of ages, and glossy-leaved myrtles put forth their pale +blue stars in constellations under the leafy shadows. Everywhere is the +voice of water, ever lulling, ever babbling, and taught by Art to run in +many a quaint caprice,--here to rush down marble steps slippery with +sedgy green, there to spout up in silvery spray, and anon to spread into +a cool, waveless lake, whose mirror reflects trees and flowers far down +in some visionary underworld. Then there are wide lawns, where the +grass in spring is a perfect rainbow of anemones, white, rose, crimson, +purple, mottled, streaked, and dappled with ever varying shade of sunset +clouds. There are soft, moist banks where purple and white violets grow +large and fair, and trees all interlaced with ivy, which runs and twines +everywhere, intermingling its dark, graceful leaves and vivid young +shoots with the bloom and leafage of all shadowy places. + +In our day, these lovely places have their dark shadow ever haunting +their loveliness: the malaria, like an unseen demon, lies hid in their +sweetness. And in the time we are speaking of, a curse not less deadly +poisoned the beauties of the Princess's villa,--the malaria of fear. + +The gravelled terrace in front of the villa commanded, through the +clipped arches of the ilex-trees, the Campagna with its soft, undulating +bands of many-colored green, and the distant city of Rome, whose bells +were always filling the air between with a tremulous vibration. Here, +during the long sunny afternoon while Elsie and Monica were crooning +together on the steps of the church, the Princess Paulina walked +restlessly up and down, looking forth on the way towards the city for +the travellers whom she expected. + +Father Francesco had been there that morning and communicated to her +the dying message of the aged Capuchin, from which it appeared that the +child who had so much interested her was her near kinswoman. Perhaps, +had her house remained at the height of its power and splendor, she +might have rejected with scorn the idea of a kinswoman whose existence +had been owing to a _mesalliance_; but a member of an exiled and +disinherited family, deriving her only comfort from unworldly sources, +she regarded this event as an opportunity afforded her to make expiation +for one of the sins of her house. The beauty and winning graces of her +young kinswoman were not without their influence in attracting a lonely +heart deprived of the support of natural ties. The Princess longed for +something to love, and the discovery of a legitimate object of family +affection was an event in the weary monotony of her life; and therefore +it was that the hours of the afternoon seemed long while she looked +forth towards Rome, listening to the ceaseless chiming of its bells, and +wondering why no one appeared along the road. + +The sun went down, and all the wide plain seemed like the sea at +twilight, lying in rosy and lilac and purple shadowy bands, out of +which rose the old city, solemn and lonely as some enchanted island of +dream-land, with a flush of radiance behind it and a tolling of weird +music filling all the air around. Now they are chanting the Ave Maria in +hundreds of churches, and the Princess worships in distant accord, and +tries to still the anxieties of her heart with many a prayer. Twilight +fades and fades, the Campagna becomes a black sea, and the distant city +looms up like a dark rock against the glimmering sky, and the Princess +goes within and walks restlessly through the wide halls, stopping first +at one open window and then at another to listen. Beneath her feet she +treads a cool mosaic pavement where laughing Cupids are dancing. Above, +from the ceiling, Aurora and the Hours look down in many-colored clouds +of brightness. The sound of the fountains without is so clear in the +intense stillness that the peculiar voice of each one can be told. That +is the swaying noise of the great jet that rises from marble shells and +falls into a wide basin, where silvery swans swim round and round in +enchanted circles; and the other slenderer sound is the smaller jet that +rains down its spray into the violet-borders deep in the shrubbery; and +that other, the shallow babble of the waters that go down the marble +steps to the lake. How dreamlike and plaintive they all sound in the +night stillness! The nightingale sings from the dark shadows of the +wilderness; and the musky odors of the cyclamen come floating ever +and anon through the casement, in that strange, cloudy way in which +flower-scents seem to come and go in the air in the night season. + +At last the Princess fancies she hears the distant tramp of horses' +feet, and her heart beats so that she can scarcely listen: now she hears +it,--and now a rising wind, sweeping across the Campagna, seems to bear +it moaning away. She goes to a door and looks out into the darkness. +Yes, she hears it now, quick and regular,--the beat of many horses' feet +coming in hot haste along the road. Surely the few servants whom she has +sent cannot make all this noise! and she trembles with vague affright. +Perhaps it is a tyrannical message, bringing imprisonment and death. She +calls a maid, and bids her bring lights into the reception-hall. A +few moments more, and there is a confused stamping of horses' feet +approaching the house, and she hears the voices of her servants. She +runs into the piazza, and sees dismounting a knight who carries Agnes in +his arms pale and fainting. Old Elsie and Monica, too, dismount, with +the Princess's men-servants; but, wonderful to tell, there seems besides +them to be a train of some hundred armed horsemen. + +The timid Princess was so fluttered and bewildered that she lost all +presence of mind, and stood in uncomprehending wonder, while Monica +pushed authoritatively into the house, and beckoned the knight to bring +Agnes and lay her on a sofa, when she and old Elsie busied themselves +vigorously with restoratives. + +The Lady Paulina, as soon as she could collect her scattered senses, +recognized in Agostino the banished lord of the Sarelli family, a race +who had shared with her own the hatred and cruelty of the Borgia tribe; +and he in turn had recognized a daughter of the Colonnas. + +He drew her aside into a small boudoir adjoining the apartment. + +"Noble lady," he said, "we are companions in misfortune, and so, I +trust, you will pardon what seems a tumultuous intrusion on your +privacy. I and my men came to Rome in disguise, that we might watch over +and protect this poor innocent, who now finds asylum with you." + +"My Lord," said the Princess, "I see in this event the wonderful working +of the good God. I have but just learned that this young person is my +near kinswoman; it was only this morning that the fact was certified to +me on the dying confession of a holy Capuchin, who privately united my +brother to her mother. The marriage was an indiscretion of his youth; +but afterwards he fell into more grievous sin in denying the holy +sacrament, and leaving his wife to die in misery and dishonor, and +perhaps for this fault such great judgments fell upon him. I wish to +make atonement in such sort as is yet possible by acting as a mother to +this child." + +"The times are so troublous and uncertain," said Agostino, "that she +must have stronger protection than that of any woman. She is of a most +holy and religious nature, but as ignorant of sin as an angel who never +has seen anything out of heaven; and so the Borgias enticed her into +their impure den, from which, God helping, I have saved her. I tried +all I could to prevent her coming to Rome, and to convince her of the +vileness that ruled here; but the poor little one could not believe me, +and thought me a heretic only for saying what she now knows from her own +senses." + +The Lady Paulina shuddered with fear. + +"Is it possible that you have come into collision with the dreadful +Borgias? What will become of us?" + +"I brought a hundred men into Rome in different disguises," said +Agostino, "and we gained over a servant in their household, through whom +I entered and carried her off. Their men pursued us, and we had a fight +in the streets, but for the moment we mustered more than they. Some of +them chased us a good distance. But it will not do for us to remain +here. As soon as she is revived enough, we must retreat towards one +of our fastnesses in the mountains, whence, when rested, we shall go +northward to Florence, where I have powerful friends, and she has also +an uncle, a holy man, by whose counsels she is much guided." + +"You must take me with you," said the Princess, in a tremor of anxiety. + +"Not for the world would I stay, if it be known you have taken refuge +here. For a long time their spies have been watching about me; they +only wait for some occasion to seize upon my villa, as they have on the +possessions of all my father's house. Let me flee with you. I have a +brother-in-law in Florence who hath often urged me to escape to him till +times mend,--for, surely, God will not allow the wicked to bear rule +forever." + +"Willingly, noble lady, will we give you our escort,--the more so that +this poor child will then have a friend with her beseeming her father's +rank. Believe me, lady, she will do no discredit to her lineage. She was +trained in a convent, and her soul is a flower of marvellous beauty. I +must declare to you here that I have wooed her honorably to be my wife, +and she would willingly be so, had not some scruples of a religious +vocation taken hold on her, to dispel which I look for the aid of the +holy father, her uncle." + +"It would be a most fit and proper thing," said the Princess, "thus to +ally our houses, in hope of some good time to come which shall restore +their former standing and possessions. Of course some holy man must +judge of the obstacle interposed by her vocation; but I doubt not the +Church will be an indulgent mother in a case where the issue seems so +desirable." + +"If I be married to her," said Agostino, "I can take her out of all +these strifes and confusions which now agitate our Italy to the court of +France, where I have an uncle high in favor with the King, and who will +use all his influence to compose these troubles in Italy, and bring +about a better day." + +While this conversation was going on, bountiful refreshments had been +provided for the whole party, and the attendants of the Princess +received orders to pack all her jewels and valuable effects for a sudden +journey. + +As soon as preparations could be made, the whole party left the villa of +the Princess for a retreat in the Alban Mountains, where Agostino +and his band had one of their rendezvous. Only the immediate female +attendants of the Princess, and one or two men-servants, left with her. +The silver plate, and all objects of particular value, were buried in +the garden. This being done, the keys of the house were intrusted to a +gray-headed servant, who with his wife had grown old in the family. + +It was midnight before everything was ready for starting. The moon cast +silver gleams through the ilex-avenues, and caused the jet of the great +fountain to look like a wavering pillar of cloudy brightness, when the +Princess led forth Agnes upon the wide veranda. Two gentle, yet spirited +little animals from the Princess's stables were there awaiting them, and +they were lifted into their saddles by Agostino. + +"Fear nothing, Madam," he said, observing how the hands of the Princess +trembled; "a few hours will put us in perfect safety, and I shall be at +your side constantly." + +Then lifting Agnes to her seat, he placed the reins in her hand. + +"Are you rested?" he asked. + +It was the first time since her rescue that he had spoken to Agnes. The +words were brief, but no expressions of endearment could convey more +than the manner in which they were spoken. + +"Yes, my Lord," said Agnes, firmly, "I am rested." + +"You think you can bear the ride?" + +"I can bear anything, so I escape," she said. + +The company were now all mounted, and were marshalled in regular order. +A body of armed men rode in front; then came Agnes and the Princess, +with Agostino between them, while two or three troopers rode on either +side; Elsie, Monica, and the servants of the Princess followed close +behind, and the rear was brought up in like manner by armed men. + +The path wound first through the grounds of the villa, with its plats +of light and shade, its solemn groves of stone-pines rising like +palm-trees high in air above the tops of all other trees, its terraces +and statues and fountains,--all seeming so lovely in the midnight +stillness. + +"Perhaps I am leaving all this forever," said the Princess. + +"Let us hope for the best," said Agostino. "It cannot be that God will +suffer the seat of the Apostles to be subjected to such ignominy +and disgrace much longer. I am amazed that no Christian kings have +interfered before for the honor of Christendom. I have it from the best +authority that the King of Naples burst into tears when he heard of the +election of this wretch to be Pope. He said that it was a scandal which +threatened the very existence of Christianity. He has sent me secret +messages divers times expressive of sympathy, but he is not of himself +strong enough. Our hope must lie either in the King of France or the +Emperor of Germany: perhaps both will engage. There is now a most holy +monk in Florence who has been stirring all hearts in a wonderful way. It +is said that the very gifts of miracles and prophecy are revived in him, +as among the holy Apostles, and he has been bestirring himself to have +a General Council of the Church to look into these matters. When I left +Florence, a short time ago, the faction opposed to him broke into the +convent and took him away. I myself was there." + +"What!" said Agnes, "did they break into the convent of the San Marco? +My uncle is there." + +"Yes, and he and I fought side by side with the mob who were rushing +in." + +"Uncle Antonio fight!" said Agnes, in astonishment. + +"Even women will fight, when what they love most is attacked," said the +knight. + +He turned to her, as he spoke, and saw in the moonlight a flash from her +eye, and an heroic expression on her face, such as he had never remarked +before; but she said nothing. The veil had been rudely torn from her +eyes; she had seen with horror the defilement and impurity of what she +had ignorantly adored in holy places, and the revelation seemed to have +wrought a change in her whole nature. + +"Even you could fight, Agnes," said the knight, "to save your religion +from disgrace." + +"No," said she; "but," she added, with gathering firmness, "I could die. +I should be glad to die with and for the holy men who would save the +honor of the true faith. I should like to go to Florence to my uncle. If +he dies for his religion, I should like to die with him." + +"Ah, live to teach it to me!" said the knight, bending towards her, as +if to adjust her bridle-rein, and speaking in a voice scarcely audible. +In a moment he was turned again towards the Princess, listening to her. + +"So it seems," she said, "that we shall be running into the thick of the +conflict in Florence." + +"Yes, but my uncle hath promised that the King of France shall +interfere. I have hope something may even now have been done. I hope to +effect something myself." + +Agostino spoke with the cheerful courage of youth. Agnes glanced timidly +up at him. How great the change in her ideas! No longer looking on him +as a wanderer from the fold, an enemy of the Church, he seemed now in +the attitude of a champion of the faith, a defender of holy men and +things against a base usurpation. What injustice had she done him, and +how patiently had he borne that injustice! Had he not sought to warn +her against the danger of venturing into that corrupt city? Those words +which so much shocked her, against which she had shut her ears, were all +true; she had found them so; she could doubt no longer. And yet he had +followed her, and saved her at the risk of his life. Could she help +loving one who had loved her so much, one so noble and heroic? Would +it be a sin to love him? She pondered the dark warnings of Father +Francesco, and then thought of the cheerful, fervent piety of her old +uncle. How warm, how tender, how life-giving had been his presence +always! how full of faith and prayer, how fruitful of heavenly words and +thoughts had been all his ministrations!--and yet it was for him and +with him and his master that Agostino Sarelli was fighting, and against +him the usurping head of the Christian Church. Then there was another +subject for pondering during this night-ride. The secret of her birth +had been told her by the Princess, who claimed her as kinswoman. It had +seemed to her at first like the revelations of a dream; but as she rode +and reflected, gradually the idea shaped itself in her mind. She was, in +birth and blood, the equal of her lover, and henceforth her life would +no more be in that lowly plane where it had always moved. She thought of +the little orange-garden at Sorrento, of the gorge with its old bridge, +the Convent, the sisters, with a sort of tender, wondering pain. Perhaps +she should see them no more. In this new situation she longed once more +to see and talk with her old uncle, and to have him tell her what were +her duties. + +Their path soon began to be a wild clamber among the mountains, now lost +in the shadow of groves of gray, rustling olives, whose knotted, serpent +roots coiled round the rocks, and whose leaves silvered in the moonlight +whenever the wind swayed them. Whatever might be the roughness and +difficulties of the way, Agnes found her knight ever at her bridle-rein, +guiding and upholding, steadying her in her saddle when the horse +plunged down short and sudden descents, and wrapping her in his mantle +to protect her from the chill mountain-air. When the day was just +reddening in the sky, the whole troop made a sudden halt before a square +stone tower which seemed to be a portion of a ruined building, and here +some of the men dismounting knocked at an arched door. It was soon swung +open by a woman with a lamp in her hand, the light of which revealed +very black hair and eyes, and heavy gold earrings. + +"Have my directions been attended to?" said Agostino, in a tone of +command. "Are there places made ready for these ladies to sleep?" + +"There are, my Lord," said the woman, obsequiously,--"the best we could +get ready on so short a notice." + +Agostino came up to the Princess. "Noble Madam," he said, "you will +value safety before all things; doubtless the best that can be done here +is but poor, but it will give you a few hours for repose where you may +be sure of being in perfect safety." + +So saying, he assisted her and Agnes to dismount, and Elsie and Monica +also alighting, they followed the woman into a dark stone passage and up +some rude stone steps. She opened at last the door of a brick-floored +room, where beds appeared to have been hastily prepared. There was no +furniture of any sort except the beds. The walls were dusty and hung +with cobwebs. A smaller apartment opening into this had beds for Elsie +and Monica. + +The travellers, however, were too much exhausted with their night-ride +to be critical, the services of disrobing and preparing for rest were +quickly concluded, and in less than an hour all were asleep, while +Agostino was busy concerting the means for an immediate journey to +Florence. + + +CHAPTER XXX. + +"LET US ALSO GO, THAT WE MAY DIE WITH HIM." + + +Father Antonio sat alone in his cell in the San Marco in an attitude of +deep dejection. The open window looked into the garden of the convent, +from which steamed up the fragrance of violet, jasmine, and rose, and +the sunshine lay fair on all that was without. On a table beside him +were many loose and scattered sketches, and an unfinished page of +the Breviary he was executing, rich in quaint tracery of gold and +arabesques, seemed to have recently occupied his attention, for his +palette was wet and many loose brushes lay strewed around. Upon the +table stood a Venetian glass with a narrow neck and a bulb clear +and thin as a soap-bubble, containing vines and blossoms of the +passion-flower, which he had evidently been using as models in his work. + +The page he was illuminating was the prophetic Psalm which describes the +ignominy and sufferings of the Redeemer. It was surrounded by a wreathed +border of thorn-branches interwoven with the blossoms and tendrils of +the passion-flower, and the initial letters of the first two words were +formed by a curious combination of the hammer, the nails, the spear, the +crown of thorns, the cross, and other instruments of the Passion; and +clear, in red letter, gleamed out those wonderful, mysterious words, +consecrated by the remembrance of a more than mortal anguish,--"My God, +my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" + +The artist-monk had perhaps fled to his palette to assuage the +throbbings of his heart, as a mourning mother flies to the cradle of her +child; but even there his grief appeared to have overtaken him, for the +work lay as if pushed from him in an access of anguish such as comes +from the sudden recurrence of some overwhelming recollection. He was +leaning forward with his face buried in his hands, sobbing convulsively. + +The door opened, and a man advancing stealthily behind laid a hand +kindly on his shoulder, saying softly, "So, so, brother!" + +Father Antonio looked up, and, dashing his hand hastily across his +eyes, grasped that of the new-comer convulsively, and saying only, "Oh, +Baccio! Baccio!" hid his face again. + +The eyes of the other filled with tears, as he answered gently,-- + +"Nay, but, my brother, you are killing yourself. They tell me that you +have eaten nothing for three days, and slept not for weeks; you will die +of this grief." + +"Would that I might! Why could not I die with him as well as Fra +Domenico? Oh, my master! my dear master!" + +"It is indeed a most heavy day to us all," said Baccio della Porta, +the amiable and pure-minded artist better known to our times by his +conventual name of Fra Bartolommeo. "Never have we had among us such a +man; and if there be any light of grace in my soul, his preaching first +awakened it, brother. I only wait to see him enter Paradise, and then +I take farewell of the world forever. I am going to Prato to take the +Dominican habit, and follow him as near as I may." + +"It is well, Baccio, it is well," said Father Antonio; "but you must not +put out the light of your genius in those shadows,--you must still paint +for the glory of God." + +"I have no heart for painting now," said Baccio, dejectedly. "He was my +inspiration, he taught me the holier way, and he is gone." + +At this moment the conference of the two was interrupted by a knocking +at the door, and Agostino Sarelli entered, pale and disordered. + +"How is this?" he said, hastily. "What devils' carnival is this which +hath broken loose in Florence? Every good thing is gone into dens and +holes, and every vile thing that can hiss and spit and sting is crawling +abroad. What do the princes of Europe mean to let such things be?" + +"Only the old story," said Father Antonio,--"_Principes convenerunt in +unum adversus Dominum, adversus Christum ejus_." + +So much were all three absorbed in the subject of their thoughts, that +no kind of greeting or mark of recognition passed among them, such as is +common when people meet after temporary separation. Each spoke out from +the fulness of his soul, as from an overflowing bitter fountain. + +"Was there no one to speak for him,--no one to stand up for the pride of +Italy,--the man of his age?" said Agostino. + +"There was one voice raised for him in the council," said Father +Antonio. "There was Agnolo Niccolini: a grave man is this Agnolo, and of +great experience in public affairs, and he spoke out his mind boldly. He +told them flatly, that, if they looked through the present time or the +past ages, they would not meet a man of such a high and noble order as +this, and that to lay at our door the blood of a man the like of whom +might not be born for centuries was too impious and execrable a thing to +be thought of. I'll warrant me, he made a rustling among them when he +said that, and the Pope's commissary--old Romalino--then whispered +and frowned; but Agnolo is a stiff old fellow when he once begins a +thing,--he never minded it, and went through with his say. It seems to +me he said that it was not for us to quench a light like this, capable +of giving lustre to the faith even when it had grown dim in other parts +of the world,--and not to the faith alone, but to all the arts and +sciences connected with it. If it were needed to put restraint on him, +he said, why not put him into some fortress, and give him commodious +apartments, with abundance of books, and pen, ink, and paper, where he +would write books to the honor of God and the exaltation of the holy +faith? He told them that this might be a good to the world, whereas +consigning him to death without use of any kind would bring on our +republic perpetual dishonor." + +"Well said for him!" said Baccio, with warmth; "but I'll warrant me, he +might as well have preached to the north wind in March, his enemies are +in such a fury." + +"Yes, yes," said Antonio, "it is just as it was of old: the chief +priests and Scribes and Pharisees were instant with loud voices, +requiring he should be put to death; and the easy Pilates, for fear of +the tumult, washed their hands of it." + +"And now," said Agostino, "they are putting up a great gibbet in the +shape of a cross in the public square, where they will hang the three +holiest and best men of Florence!" + +"I came through there this morning," said Baccio, "and there were young +men and boys shouting, and howling, and singing indecent songs, and +putting up indecent pictures, such as those he used to preach against. +It is just as you say. All things vile have crept out of their lair, and +triumph that the man who made them afraid is put down; and every house +is full of the most horrible lies about him,--things that they said he +confessed." + +"Confessed!" said Father Antonio,--"was it not enough that they tore +and tortured him seven times, but they must garble and twist the very +words that he said in his agony? The process they have published is +foully falsified,--stuffed full of improbable lies; for I myself have +read the first draught of all he did say, just as Signor Ceccone took it +down as they were torturing him. I had it from Jacopo Manelli, canon of +our Duomo here, and he got it from Ceccone's wife herself. They not only +can torture and slay him, but they torture and slay his memory with +lies." + +"Would I were in God's place for one day!" said Agostino, speaking +through his clenched teeth. "May I be forgiven for saying so." + +"We are hot and hasty," said Father Antonio, "ever ready to call down +fire from heaven,--but, after all, 'the Lord reigneth, let the earth +rejoice.' 'Unto the upright there ariseth light in the darkness.' Our +dear father is sustained in spirit and full of love. Even when they +let him go from the torture, he fell on his knees, praying for his +tormentors." + +"Good God! this passes me!" said Agostino, striking his hands together. +"Oh, wherefore hath a strong man arms and hands, and a sword, if he +must stand still and see such things done? If I had only my hundred +mountaineers here, I would make one charge for him to-morrow. If I could +only _do_ something!" he added, striding impetuously up and down the +cell and clenching his fists. "What! hath nobody petitioned to stay this +thing?" + +"Nobody for him," said Father Antonio. "There was talk in the city +yesterday that Fra Domenico was to be pardoned; in fact, Romalino was +quite inclined to do it, but Battista Albert talked violently against +it, and so Romalino said, 'Well, a monk more or less isn't much matter,' +and then he put his name down for death with the rest. The order was +signed by both commissaries of the Pope, and one was Fra Turiano, the +general of our order, a mild man, full of charity, but unable to stand +against the Pope." + +"Mild men are nuisances in such places", said Agostino, hastily; "our +times want something of another sort." + +"There be many who have fallen away from him even in our house here," +said Father Antonio,--"as it was with our blessed Lord, whose disciples +forsook him and fled. It seems to be the only thought with some how they +shall make their peace with the Pope." + +"And so the thing will be hurried through to-morrow," said Agostino, +"and when it's done and over, I'll warrant me there will be found kings +and emperors to say they meant to have saved him. It's a vile, evil +world, this of ours; an honorable man longs to see the end of it. But," +he added, coming up and speaking to Father Antonio, "I have a private +message for you." + +"I am gone this moment," said Baccio, rising with ready courtesy; "but +keep up heart, brother." + +So saying, the good-hearted artist left the cell, and Agostino said,-- + +"I bring tidings to you of your kindred. Your niece and sister are here +in Florence, and would see you. You will find them at the house of one +Gherardo Rosselli, a rich citizen of noble blood." + +"Why are they there?" said the monk, lost in amazement. + +You must know, then, that a most singular discovery hath been made +by your niece at Rome. The sister of her father, being a lady of the +princely blood of Colonna, hath been assured of her birth by the +confession of the priest that married him; and being driven from Rome by +fear of the Borgias, they came hither under my escort, and wait to see +you. So, if you will come with me now, I will guide you to them." + +"Even so," said Father Antonio. + + +CHAPTER XXXI. + +MARTYRDOM. + + +In a shadowy chamber of a room overlooking the grand square of Florence +might be seen, on the next morning, some of the principal personages of +our story. Father Antonio, Baccio della Porta, Agostino Sarelli, the +Princess Paulina, Agnes, with her grandmother, and mixed crowd of +citizens and ecclesiastics who all spoke in hushed and tremulous voices, +as men do in the chamber of mourners at a funeral. The great, mysterious +bell of the Campanile was swinging with dismal, heart-shaking toll, like +a mighty voice from the spirit-world; and it was answered by the +tolling of all the bells in the city, making such wavering clangors and +vibrating circles in the air over Florence that it might seem as if it +were full of warring spirits wrestling for mastery. + +Toll! toll! toll! O great bell of the fair Campanile! for this day the +noblest of the wonderful men of Florence is to offered up. Toll! for an +era is going out,--the era of her artists, her statesmen, her poets, and +her scholars. Toll! for an era is coming in,--the era of her disgrace +and subjugation and misfortune! + +The stepping of the vast crowd in the square was like the patter of a +great storm, and the hum of voices rose up like the murmur of the ocean; +but in the chamber all was so still that one could have heard the +dropping of a pin. + +Under the balcony of this room were seated in pomp and state the Papal +commissioners, radiant in gold and scarlet respectability; and Pilate +and Herod, on terms of the most excellent friendship, were ready to act +over again the part they had acted fourteen hundred years by before. Now +has arrived the moment when the three followers of the Man of Calvary +are to be degraded from the fellowship of His visible Church. + +Father Antonio, Agostino, and Baccio stood forth in the balcony, and, +drawing in their breath, looked down, as the three men of the hour, pale +and haggard with imprisonment and torture, were brought up amid the +hoots and obscene jests of the populace. Savonarola first was led before +the tribunal, and there, with circumstantial minuteness, endued with +all his priestly vestments, which again, with separate ceremonies of +reprobation and ignominy, were taken from him. He stood through it all +serene as stood his Master when stripped of His garments on Calvary. +There is a momentary hush of voices and drawing in of breaths in the +great crowd. The Papal legate takes him by the hand and pronounces the +words, "Jerome Savonarola, I separate thee from the Church Militant and +the Church Triumphant." + +He is going to speak. + +"What says he?" said Agostino, leaning over the balcony. + +Solemnly and clear that impressive voice which so often had thrilled the +crowds in that very square made answer,-- + +"From the Church Militant you _may_ divide me; but from the Church +Triumphant, _no,--that_ is above your power!"--and a light flashed out +in his face as if a smile from Christ had shone down upon him. + +"Amen!" said Father Antonio; "he hath witnessed a good confession,"--and +turning, he went in, and, burying his face in his hands, remained in +prayer. + +"When like ceremonies had been passed through with the others, the three +martyrs were delivered to the secular executioner, and, amid the scoffs +and jeers of the brutal crowd, turned their faces to the gibbet. + +"Brothers, let us sing the Te Deum," said Savonarola. + +"Do not so infuriate the mob," said the executioner,--"for harm might be +done." + +"At least let us repeat it together," said he, "lest we forget it." + +And so they went forward, speaking to each other of the glorious company +of the apostles, the goodly fellowship of the prophets, the noble army +of martyrs, and giving thanks aloud in that great triumphal hymn of the +Church of all Ages. + +When the lurid fires were lighted which blazed red and fearful through +that crowded square, all in that silent chamber fell on their knees, and +Father Antonio repeated prayers for departing souls. + +To the last, that benignant right hand which had so often pointed the +way of life to that faithless city was stretched out over the crowd +in the attitude of blessing; and so loving, not hating, praying with +exaltation, and rendering blessing for cursing, the souls of the martyrs +ascended to the great cloud of witnesses above. + + +CHAPTER XXXII. + +CONCLUSION. + + +A few days after the death of Savonarola, Father Antonio was found one +morning engaged in deep converse with Agnes. + +The Princess Paulina, acting for her family, desired to give her hand to +the Prince Agostino Sarelli, and the interview related to the religious +scruples which still conflicted with the natural desires of the child. + +"Tell me, my little one," said Father Antonio, "frankly and truly, dost +thou not love this man with all thy heart?" + +"Yes, my father, I do," said Agnes; "but ought I not to resign this love +for the love of my Saviour?" + +"I see not why," said the monk. "Marriage is a sacrament as well as holy +orders, and it is a most holy and venerable one, representing the divine +mystery by which the souls of the blessed are united to the Lord. I do +not hold with Saint Bernard, who, in his zeal for a conventual life, +seemed to see no other way of serving God but for all men and women to +become monks and nuns. The holy order is indeed blessed to those souls +whose call to it is clear and evident, like mine; but if there be a +strong and virtuous love for a worthy object, it is a vocation unto +marriage, which should not be denied." + +"So, Agnes," said the knight, who had stolen into the room unperceived, +and who now boldly possessed himself of one of her hands--"Father +Antonio hath decided this matter," he added, turning to the Princess +and Elsie, who entered, "and everything having been made ready for +my journey into France, the wedding ceremony shall take place on the +morrow, and, for that we are in deep affliction, it shall be as private +as may be." + +And so on the next morning the wedding ceremony took place, and the +bride and groom went on their way to France, where preparations +befitting their rank awaited them. + +Old Elsie was heard to observe to Monica, that there was some sense in +making pilgrimages, since this to Rome, which she had undertaken so +unwillingly, had turned out so satisfactory. + +In the reign of Julius II., the banished families who had been plundered +by the Borgias were restored to their rights and honors at Rome; and +there was a princess of the house of Sarelli then at Rome, whose +sanctity of life and manners was held to go back to the traditions of +primitive Christianity, so that she was renowned not less for goodness +than for rank and beauty. + +In those days, too, Raphael, the friend of Fra Bartolommeo, placed in +one of the grandest halls of the Vatican, among the Apostles and Saints, +the image of the traduced and despised martyr whose ashes had been cast +to the winds and waters in Florence. His memory lingered long in Italy, +so that it was even claimed that miracles were wrought in his name and +by his intercession. Certain it is, that the living words he spoke were +seeds of immortal flowers which blossomed in secret dells and obscure +shadows of his beautiful Italy. + + * * * * * + + +EXODUS. + + + Hear ye not how, from all high points of Time,-- + From peak to peak adown the mighty chain + That links the ages,--echoing sublime + A Voice Almighty,--leaps one grand refrain, + Wakening the generations with a shout, + And trumpet-call of thunder,--Come ye out! + + Out from old forms and dead idolatries; + From fading myths and superstitious dreams; + From Pharisaic rituals and lies, + And all the bondage of the life that seems! + Out,--on the pilgrim path, of heroes trod, + Over earth's wastes, to reach forth after God! + + The Lord hath bowed His heaven, and come down! + Now, in this latter century of time, + Once more His tent is pitched on Sinai's crown! + Once more in clouds must Faith to meet Him climb! + Once more His thunder crashes on our doubt + And fear and sin,--"My people! come ye out! + + "From false ambitions and base luxuries; + From puny aims and indolent self-ends; + From cant of faith, and shams of liberties, + And mist of ill that Truth's pure daybeam bends: + Out, from all darkness of the Egypt-land, + Into My sun-blaze on the desert sand! + + "Leave ye your flesh-pots; turn from filthy greed + Of gain that doth the thirsting spirit mock; + And heaven shall drop sweet manna for your need, + And rain clear rivers from the unhewn rock! + Thus saith the Lord!" And Moses--meek, unshod-- + Within the cloud stands hearkening to his God! + + Show us our Aaron, with his rod in flower! + Our Miriam, with her timbrel-soul in tune! + And call some Joshua, in the Spirit's power, + To poise our sun of strength at point of noon! + God of our fathers! over sand and sea, + Still keep our struggling footsteps close to Thee! + + * * * * * + + +THEN AND NOW IN THE OLD DOMINION. + + +The history of Virginia opens with a romance. No one will be surprised +at this, for it is a habit histories have. There is Plymouth Rock, for +example; it would be hard to find anything more purely romantic than +that. Well do we remember the sad day when a friend took us to the +perfectly flat wharf at Plymouth, and recited Mrs. Hemans's humorous +verse,-- + + "The breaking waves dashed high, + On a stern and rock-bound coast." + +"Such, then," we reflected, "is History! If Plymouth Rock turns out to +be a myth, why may not Columbus or Santa Claus or Napoleon, or anything +or anybody?" Since then we have been skeptical about history even where +it seems most probable; at times doubt whether Rip Van Winkle really +slept twenty years without turning over; are annoyed with misgivings as +to whether our Western pioneers Boone, Crockett, and others, _did_ keep +bears in their stables for saddle-horses, and harness alligators as we +do oxen. So we doubted the story of John Smith and Pocahontas with which +Virginia opens. In one thing we had already caught that State making a +mythical statement: it was named by Queen Elizabeth Virginia in honor of +her own virgin state,--which, if Cobbett is to be believed, was also a +romance. Well, America was named after a pirate, and Sir Walter Raleigh, +who suggested the name of the Virgin Queen, was fond of a joke. + +But notwithstanding the suspicion with which we entered upon the +investigation, we are convinced that the romance of Pocahontas is true. +As only a portion of the story of this Indian maiden, "the colonial +angel," as she was termed by the settlers, is known, and that not +generally with exactness, we will reproduce it here. + +It will be remembered that Pocahontas, when about thirteen years of age, +saved the young English captain, John Smith, from the death which her +father, Powhatan, had resolved he should suffer. As the tomahawk was +about to descend on his head, the girl rushed forward and clasped that +head in her arms. The stern heart of Powhatan relented, and he consented +that the captive should live to make tomahawks for him and beads and +bells for Pocahontas. Afterward Powhatan agreed that Smith should return +to Jamestown, on condition of his sending him two guns and a grindstone. +Soon, after this Jamestown with all its stores was destroyed by fire, +and the colonists came near perishing from cold and hunger. Half of them +died; and the rest were saved only by Pocahontas, who appeared in the +midst of their distress, bringing bread, raccoons, and venison. + +John Smith and his companions after this explored a large portion of the +State, and a second time came to rest at the home of Powhatan and his +beautiful daughter. The name of the place was Werowocomoco. His visit +this time fell on the eve of the coronation of Powhatan. The king, +being absent when Smith came, was sent for; meanwhile Pocahontas called +together a number of Indian maidens to get up a dramatic entertainment +and ballet for the handsome young Englishman and his companions. They +made a fire in a level field, and Smith sat on a mat before it. A +hideous noise and shrieking were suddenly heard in the adjoining woods. +The English snatched up their arms, apprehending foul play. Pocahontas +rushed forward, and asked Smith to slay her rather than suspect her of +perfidy; so their apprehensions were quieted. Then thirty young Indian +maidens issued suddenly from the wood, all naked except a cincture of +green leaves, their bodies painted. Pocahontas was a complete picture of +an Indian Diana: a quiver hung on her shoulder, and she held a bow and +arrow in her hand; she wore, also, on her head a beautiful pair of +buck's horns, an otter's skin at her girdle, and another on her arm. The +other nymphs had antlers on their heads and various savage decorations. +Bursting from the forest, they circled around the fire and John Smith, +singing and dancing for an hour. They then disappeared into the wood as +suddenly as they had come forth. When they reappeared, it was to invite +Smith to their habitations, where they danced around him again, singing, +"Love you not me? Love you not me?" They then feasted him richly, and, +lastly, with pine-knot torches lighted him to his finely decorated +apartments. + +Captain John Smith was, without doubt, an imperial kind of man. His +personal appearance was fine, his sense and tact excellent, his manners +both cordial and elegant. There is no doubt, as there is no wonder, that +the Indian maiden felt some tender palpitations on his account. Once +again, when, owing to some misunderstanding, Powhatan had decreed the +death of all the whites, Pocahontas spent the whole pitch-dark night +climbing hills and toiling through pathless thickets, to save Smith and +his friends by warning them of the imminent danger. Smith offered her +many beautiful presents on this occasion, evidently not appreciating the +sentiment that was animating her. To this offer of presents she replied +with tears; and when their acceptance was urged, Smith himself relates, +that, "with the teares running downe her cheeks, she said she durst not +be seen to have any, for, if Powhatan should know it, she were but dead; +and so she ran away by herself, as she came." + +There is no doubt what the Muse of History ought to do here: were she a +dame of proper sensibilities, she would have Mr. John Smith married to +Miss P. Powhatan as soon as a parson could be got from Jamestown. Were +it a romance, this would be the result. As it is, we find Smith going +off to England in two years, and living unmarried until his death; and +Pocahontas married to the Englishman John Rolfe, for reasons of state, +we fear,--a link of friendship between the Reds and the Whites being +thought desirable. She was of course Christianized and baptized, as any +one may see by Chapman's picture in the Rotunda at Washington, unless +Zouave criticism has demolished it. Immediately she went with her +husband to England. At Brentford, where she was staying,. Captain John +Smith went to visit her. Their meeting was significant and affecting. +"After a modest salutation, without uttering a word, she turned away and +hid her face as if displeased.". She remained thus motionless for two or +three hours. Who can know what struggles passed through the heart of +the Indian bride at this moment,--emotions doubly unutterable to this +untaught stranger? It seems that she had been deceived by Rolfe and his +friends into thinking that Smith was dead, under the conviction that she +could not be induced to marry him, if she thought Smith alive. After +her long, sad silence, before mentioned, she came forward to Smith and +touchingly reminded him, there in the presence of her husband and a +large company, of the kindness she had shown him in her own country, +saying, "You did promise Powhatan what was yours should be his, and he +the like to you; you called him 'Father,' being in his land a stranger, +and for the same reason so I must call you." After a pause, during which +she seemed to be under the influence of strong emotion, she said, "I +will call you Father, and you shall call me Child, and so I will be +forever and ever your countrywoman." Then she added, slowly and with +emphasis, "_They did tell us always you were dead, and I knew no other +till I came to Plimoth; yet Powhatan did command Uttamattomakin to seeke +you and know the truth, because your countrymen will lie much_." It was +not long after this interview that Pocahontas died: she never returned +to Virginia. Her death occurred in 1617. The issue of her marriage was +one child, Thomas Rolfe; so it is through him that the First Families of +Virginia are so invariably descended from the Indian Princess. Captain +Smith lived until 1631, and, as we have said, never married. He was a +noble and true man, and Pocahontas was every way worthy to be his wife; +and one feels very ill-natured at Rolfe and Company for the cruel +deception which, we must believe, was all that kept them asunder, and +gave to the story of the lovely maiden its almost tragic close. + +One can scarcely imagine a finer device for Virginia to have adopted +than that of the Indian maiden protecting the white man from the +tomahawk. But, alas! with the departure of Smith the soul seems to have +left the Colony. The beautiful lands became a prey to the worn-out +English gentry, who spent their time cheating the simple-hearted red +men. These called themselves gentlemen, because they could do nothing. +In a classification of seventy-eight persons at Jamestown we are +informed that there were "four carpenters, twelve laborers, one +blacksmith, one bricklayer, one sailor, one barber, one mason, one +tailor, one drummer, one chirurgeon, and fifty-four gentlemen." To this +day there seems to be a large number in that vicinity who have no other +occupation than that of being gentlemen, and it is evidently in many +cases just as much as they can do. + +When Pocahontas died, the last link was broken between the Indian and +the settler. Unprovoked wars of extermination were begun to dispossess +these children of Nature of the very breasts of their mother, which had +sustained them so long and so peacefully. For a century the Indian's +name for Virginian was "Longknife." The very missionaries robbed him +with one hand whilst baptizing him with the other. One story concerning +the missionaries strikes us as sufficiently characteristic of the wit +of the Indian and the temper of the period to be preserved. There was a +branch of the Catawbas on the Potomac, in which river are to be found +the best shad in the world. The missionaries who settled among +this tribe taught them that it would be a good investment in their +soul-assurance to catch large quantities of the shad for them, the +missionaries. The Indians earnestly set themselves to the work; their +reverend teachers taking the fish and sending them off secretly to +various settlements in Virginia and Maryland, and making thereby +large sums of money. The Indians worked on for several months without +receiving any compensation, and the missionaries were getting richer and +richer,--when by some means the red men discovered the trick, and routed +the holy men from their neighborhood. Many years afterward the Catholics +made an effort to establish a mission with this same tribe. The +priest who first addressed them took as his text, "Ho, every one that +thirsteth, come ye to the waters,"--and went on in figurative style to +describe the waters of life. When the sermon was ended, the Indians held +a council to consider what they had just heard, and finally sent three +of their number to the missionaries, who said, "White men, you speak in +fine words of the waters of life; but before we decide on what we have +heard, we wish to know _whether any shad swim in those waters_." + +It is very certain that Christianity, as illustrated by the Virginians, +did not make a good impression on these savages. They were always +willing to compare their own religion with that of the whites, and +generally regarded the contrast as in their favor. One of them said to +Colonel Barnett, the commissioner to run the boundary-line of lands +ceded by the Indians, "As to religion, you go to your churches, sing +loud, pray loud, and make great noise. The red people meet once a year +at the feast of New Corn, extinguish all their fires and kindle up a +new one, the smoke of which ascends to the Great Spirit as a grateful +incense and sacrifice. Now what better is your religion than ours?" One +of the chiefs, it is said, received an Episcopal divine who wished to +indoctrinate him into the mystery of the Trinity. The Indian, who was +a "model of deportment," heard his argument; and then, when he was +through, began in turn to indoctrinate the divine in _his_ faith, +speaking of the Great Spirit, whose voice was the thunder, whose eye was +the sun. The clergyman interrupted him rather rudely, saying, "But +that is not true,--that is all heathen trash!" The chief turned to his +companions and said gravely, "This is the most impolite man I have ever +met; he has just declared that he has three gods, and now will not let +me have one!" + +The valley of Virginia, its El Dorado in every sense, had a different +settlement, and by a different people. They were, for the most part, +Germans, of the same class with those that settled in the great valleys +of Pennsylvania, and who have made so large a portion of that State into +a rich ingrain-carpet of cultivation upon a floor of limestone. One day +the history of the Germans of Pennsylvania and Virginia will be written, +and it will be full of interest and value. They were the first strong +sinews strung in the industrial arm of the Colonies to which they came; +and although mingled with nearly every European race, they remain to +this day a distinct people. A partition-wall rarely broken down has +always inclosed them, and to this, perhaps, is due that slowness of +progress which marks them. The restless ambition of _Le Grand Monarque_ +and the cruelties of Turenne converted the beautiful valley of the Rhine +into a smoking desert, and the wretched peasantry of the Palatinate fled +from their desolated firesides to seek a more hospitable home in the +forests of New York and Pennsylvania, and thence, somewhat later, +found their way into Virginia. The exodus of the Puritans has had more +celebrity, but was scarcely attended with more hardship and heroism. The +greater part of the German exiles landed in America stripped of their +all. They came to the forests of the Susquehanna and the Shenandoah +armed only with the woodman's axe. They were ignorant and superstitious, +and brought with them the legends of their fatherland. The spirits +of the Hartz Mountains and the genii of the Black Forest, which +Christianity had not been able entirely to exorcise, were transferred to +the wild mountains and dark caverns of the Old Dominion, and the same +unearthly visitants which haunted the old castles of the Rhine continued +their gambols in some deserted cabin on the banks of the Sherandah (as +the Shenandoah was then called). Since these men left their fatherland, +a great Literature and Philosophy have breathed like a tropic upon that +land, and the superstitions have been wrought into poetry and thought; +but that raw material of legend which in Germany has been woven into +finest tissues on the brain-looms of Wieland, Tieck, Schiller, and +Goethe, has remained raw material in the great valley that stretches +from New York to Upper Alabama. Whole communities are found which in +manners and customs are much the same with their ancestors who crossed +the ocean. The horseshoe is still nailed above the door as a protection +against the troublesome spook, and the black art is still practised. +Rough in their manners, and plain in their appearance, they yet conceal +under this exterior a warm hospitality, and the stranger will much +sooner be turned away from the door of the "chivalry" than from that of +the German farmer. Seated by his blazing fire, with plenty of apples and +hard cider, the Dutchman of the Kanawha enjoys his condition with gusto, +and is contented with the limitations of his fence. We have seen one +within two miles of the great Natural Bridge who could not direct us to +that celebrated curiosity; his wife remarking, that "a great many people +passed that way to the hills, but for what she could not see: for her +part, give her a level country." + +The first German settler who came to Virginia was one Jacob Stover, who +went there from Pennsylvania, and obtained a grant of five thousand +acres of land on the Shenandoah. Stover was very shrewd, and does not at +all justify the character we have ascribed to his race: there is a story +that casts a suspicion on his proper Teutonism. The story runs, that, +on his application to the colonial governor of Virginia for a grant of +land, he was refused, unless he could give satisfactory assurance that +he would have the land settled with the required number of families +within a given time. Being unable to do this, he went over to England, +and petitioned the King himself to direct the issuing of his grant; and +in order to insure success, had given human names to every horse, cow, +hog, and dog he owned, and which he represented as heads of families, +ready to settle the land. His Majesty, ignorant that the Williams, +Georges, and Susans seeking royal consideration were some squeaking +in pig-pens, others braying in the luxuriant meadows for which they +petitioned, issued the huge grant; and to-day there is serious reason +to suppose that many of the wealthiest and oldest families around +Winchester are enjoying their lands by virtue of titles given to +ancestral flocks and herds. + +The condition of Virginia for the period immediately preceding the +Revolution was one which well merits the consideration of political +philosophers. For many years the extent of the territory of the Old +Dominion was undecided, no lines being fixed between that State and Ohio +and Pennsylvania. Virginia claimed a large part of both these States +as hers; and, indeed, there seems to be in that State an hereditary +unconsciousness of the limits of her dominion. The question of +jurisdiction superseded every other for the time, and the formal +administration of the law itself ceased. There is a period lasting +through a whole generation in which society in the western part of the +State went on without courts or authorities. There was no court but of +public opinion, no administration but of the mob. Judges were ermined +and juries impanelled by the community when occasion demanded. +Kercheval, who grew from that vicinity and state of things, and whose +authority is excellent, says,--"They had no civil, military, or +ecclesiastical laws,--at least, none were enforced; yet we look in vain +for any period, before or since, when property, life, and morals were +any better protected." A statement worth pondering by those who tell +us that man is nought, government all. The tongue-lynchings and other +punishments inflicted by the community upon evil-doers were adapted to +the reformation of the culprit or his banishment from the community. The +punishment for idleness, lying, dishonesty, and ill-fame generally, was +that of "hating the offender out," as they expressed it. This was about +equivalent to the [Greek: atimia] among the Greeks. It was a public +expression, in various ways, of the general indignation against any +transgressor, and commonly resulted either in the profound repentance or +the voluntary exile of the person against whom it was directed: it was +generally the fixing of any epithet which was proclaimed by each tongue +when the sinner appeared,--_e.g.,_ Foultongue, Lawrence, Snakefang. +The name of Extra-Billy Smith is a quite recent case of this +"tongue-lynching." It was in these days of no laws, however, that the +practice of duelling was imported into Virginia. With this exception, +the State can trace no evil results to the period when society was +resolved into its simplest elements. Indeed, it was at this time +that there began to appear there signs of a sturdy and noble race of +Americanized Englishmen. The average size of the European Englishman was +surpassed. A woman was equal to an Indian. A young Virginian one day +killed a buffalo on the Alleghany Mountains, stretched its skin over +ribs of wood, and on the boat so made sailed the full length of the Ohio +and Mississippi Rivers. But this development was checked by the influx +of "English gentry," who brought laws and fashions from London. The old +books are full of the conflicts which these fastidious gentlemen and +ladies had with the rude pioneer customs and laws. The fine ladies found +that there was an old statute of the Colony which read,--"It shall be +permitted to none but the Council and Heads of Hundreds to wear gold +in their clothes, or to wear silk till they make it themselves." What, +then, could Miss Softdown do with the silks and breastpins brought from +London? "Let her wear deer-skin and arrow-head," said the natives. But +Miss Softdown soon had her way. Still more were these new families +shocked, when, on ringing for some newly purchased negro domestic, the +said negro came into the parlor nearly naked. Then began one of the most +extended controversies in the history of Virginia,--the question being, +whether out-door negroes should wear clothes, and domestics dress like +other people. The popular belief, in which it seems the negroes shared, +was, that the race would perish, if subjected to clothing the year +round. The custom of negro men going about _in puris naturalibus_ +prevailed to a much more recent period than is generally supposed. + +One by one, the barbarisms of Old Virginia were eradicated, and the +danger was then that effeminacy would succeed; but a better class of +families began to come from England, now that the Colony was somewhat +prepared for them. These aimed to make Virginia repeat England: it might +have repeated something worse, and in the end has. About one or two old +mansions in Maryland and Virginia the long silvery grass characteristic +of the English park is yet found: the seed was carefully brought from +England by those gentlemen who came under Raleigh's administration, +and who regarded their residence in these Colonies as patriotic +self-devotion. On one occasion, the writer, walking through one of +these fields, startled an English lark, which rose singing and soaring +skyward. It sang a theme of the olden time. Governor Spottswood brought +with him, when he came, a number of these larks, and made strenuous +efforts to domesticate them in the neighborhood of Fredericksburg, +Virginia. He did not succeed. Now and then we have heard of one's being +seen, companionless. It is a sad symbol of that nobler being who tried +to domesticate himself in Virginia, the fine old English gentleman. He +is now seen but little oftener than the silver grass and the lark which +he brought with him. But let no one think, whilst ridiculing those who +can now only hide their poor stature under the lion-skin of F-F-V-ism, +that the race of old Virginia gentlemen is a mythic race. Through +the fair slopes of Eastern Virginia we have wandered and counted the +epitaphs of as princely men and women as ever trod this continent. +Yonder is the island, floating on the crystal Rappahannock, which, +instead of, as now, masking the guns which aim at Freedom's heart, +once bore witness to the noble Spottswood's effort to realize for the +working-man a Utopia in the New World. Yonder is the house, on the same +river, frowning now with the cannon which defend the slave-shamble, (for +the Richmond railroad passes on its verge,) where Washington was reared +to love justice and honor; and over to the right its porch commands +a marble shaft on which is written, "Here lies Mary, the Mother of +Washington." A little lower is the spot where John Smith gave the right +hand to the ambassadors of King Powhatan. In that old court-house the +voice of Patrick Henry thundered for Liberty and Union. Time was when +the brave men on whose hearts rested the destinies of the New World made +this the centre of activity and rule upon the continent; they lived and +acted here as Anglo-Saxon blood should live and act, wherever it bears +its rightful sceptre; but now one walks here as through the splendid +ruins of some buried Nineveh, and emerges to find the very sunlight sad, +as it reveals those who garnish the sepulchres of their ancestors with +one hand, whilst with the other they stone and destroy the freedom and +institutions which their fathers lived to build and died to defend. + +And this, alas! is the first black line in the sketch of Virginia as +it now is. The true preface to the present edition of Virginia, which, +unhappily, has been for many years stereotyped, may be found in a single +entry of Captain John Smith's journal:-- + +"August, 1619. A Dutch man-of-war visited Jamestown and sold the +settlers twenty negroes, the first that have ever touched the soil of +Virginia." + +They have scarcely made it "sacred soil." A little entry it is, of what +seemed then, perhaps, an unimportant event,--but how pregnant with +evil! + +The very year in which that Dutch ship arrived with its freight of +slaves at Jamestown, the Mayflower sailed with its freight of freemen +for Plymouth. + +Let us pause a moment and consider the prospects and opportunities which +opened before the two bands of pilgrim. How hard and bleak were the +shores that received the Mayflower pilgrims! Winter seemed the only +season of the land to which they had come; when the snow disappeared, it +was only to reveal a landscape of sand and rock. To have soil they must +pulverize rock. Nature said to these exiles from a rich soil, with her +sternest voice,--"Here is no streaming breast: sand with no gold mined: +all the wealth you get must be mined from your own hearts and coined by +your own right hands!" + +How different was it in Virginia! Old John Rolfe, the husband of +Pocahontas, writing to the King in 1616, said,--"Virginia is the same as +it was, I meane for the goodness of the scate, and the fertilenesse of +the land, and will, no doubt, so continue to the worlds end,--a countrey +as worthy of good report as can be declared by the pen of the best +writer; a countrey spacious and wide, capable of many hundred thousands +of inhabitants." It must be borne in mind that Rolfe's idea of an +inhabitant's needs was that he should own a county or two to begin with, +which will account for his moderate estimate of the number that could be +accommodated upon a hundred thousand square miles. He continues,--"For +the soil, most fertile to plant in; for ayre, fresh and temperate, +somewhat hotter in summer, and not altogether so cold in winter as in +England, yet so agreable is it to our constitutions that now 't is more +rare to hear of a man's death than in England; for water, most wholesome +and verie plentifull; and for fayre navigable rivers and good harbors, +no countrey in Christendom, in so small a circuite, is so well stored." +Any one who has passed through the State, or paid any attention to its +resources, may go far beyond the old settler's statement. Virginia is a +State combining, as in some divinely planned garden, every variety of +soil known on earth, resting under a sky that Italy alone can match, +with a Valley anticipating in vigor the loam of the prairies: up to that +Valley and Piedmont stretch throughout the State navigable rivers, like +fingers of the Ocean-hand, ready to bear to all marts the produce of +the soil, the superb vein of gold, and the iron which, unlocked from +mountain-barriers, could defy competition. But in her castle Virginia is +still, a sleeping beauty awaiting the hero whose kiss shall recall her +to life. Comparing what free labor has done for the granite rock called +Massachusetts, and what slave labor has done for the enchanted garden +called Virginia, one would say, that, though the Dutch ship that brought +to our shores the Norway rat was bad, and that which brought the Hessian +fly was worse, the most fatal ship that ever cast anchor in American +waters was that which brought the first twenty negroes to the settlers +of Jamestown. Like the Indian in her own aboriginal legend, on whom a +spell was cast which kept the rain from falling on him and the sun from +shining on him, Virginia received from that Dutch ship a curse which +chained back the blessings which her magnificent resources would have +rained upon her, and the sun of knowledge shining everywhere has left +her to-day more than eighty thousand white adults who cannot read or +write. + +It was at an early period as manifest as now that a slave population +implied and rendered necessary a large poor-white population. And whilst +the pilgrims of Plymouth inaugurated the free-school system in their +first organic law, which now renders it impossible for one sane person +born in their land to be unable to read and write, Virginia was boasting +with Lord Douglas in "Marmion," + + "Thanks to Saint Bothan, son of mine + Could never pen a written line." + +Sir William Berkeley, Governor of Virginia for thirty-six years, +beginning with 1641, wrote to the King as follows:--"I thank God, there +are no free schools nor printing, and I hope we shall not have these +hundred years; for learning has brought disobedience and heresy and +sects into the world, and printing has divulged them, and libels upon +the best governments. God keep us from both!" Most fearfully has the +prayer been answered. In Berkeley's track nearly all the succeeding ones +went on. Henry A. Wise boasted in Congress that no newspaper was printed +in his district, and he soon became governor. + +It gives but a poor description of the "poor-white trash" to say that +they cannot read. The very slaves cannot endure to be classed on their +level. They are inconceivably wretched and degraded. For every rich +slave-owner there are some eight or ten families of these miserable +tenants. Both sexes are almost always drunk. + +There is no better man than the Anglo-Saxon man who labors; there is no +worse animal than the same man when bred to habits of idleness. When +Watts wrote, + + "Satan finds some mischief still + For idle hands to do," + +he wrote what is much truer of his own race than of any other. This +law has been the Nemesis of the young Virginian. His descent demands +excitement and activity; and unless he becomes emasculated into a +clay-eater, he obtains the excitement that his ancestors got in war, and +the New-Englander gets in work, in gaming, horse-racing, and all manner +of dissipation. His life verifies the proverb, that the idle brain is +the Devil's workshop. He is trained to despise labor, for it puts him on +a level with his father's slaves. At the University of Virginia one may +see the extent of demoralization to which eight generations of idleness +can bring English blood. There the spree, the riot, and we might almost +say the duel, are normal. About five years ago we spent some time +at Charlottesville. The evening of our arrival was the occasion of +witnessing some of the ways of the students. A hundred or more of them +with blackened or masked faces were rushing about the college yard; a +large fire was burning around a stake, upon which was the effigy of a +woman. A gentleman connected with the University, with whom we were +walking, informed us that the special occasion of this affair was, that +a near relative of Mrs. Stowe's, a sister, perhaps, had that day arrived +to visit her relative, Mrs. McGuffey. The effigy of Mrs. Stowe was +burned for her benefit. The lady and her friends were very much alarmed, +and left on the early train next morning, without completing their +visit. + +"They will close up by all getting dead-drunk," said our friend, the +Professor. + +"But," we asked, "why does not the faculty at once interfere in this +disgraceful procedure?" + +"They have got us lately," he replied, "where we are powerless. Whenever +they wish a spree, they tackle it on to the slavery question, and know +that their parents will pardon everything to the spirit of the South +when it is burning the effigy of Mrs. Stowe or Charles Sumner, or the +last person who furnishes a chance for a spree. To arrest them ends only +in casting suspicion of unsoundness on the professor who does it." + +Virginia has had, for these same causes, no religious development +whatever. The people spend four-and-a-half fifths of their time arguing +about politics and religion,--questions of the latter being chiefly as +to the best method of being baptized, or whether sudden conversions are +the safest,--but they never take a step forward in either. Archbishop +Purcell, of Cincinnati, stated to us, that, once being in Richmond, +he resolved to give a little religious exploration to the surrounding +country. About seven miles out from the city he saw a man lying +down,--the Virginian's natural posture,--and approaching, he made +various inquiries, and received lazy Yes and No replies. Presently he +inquired to what churches the people in that vicinity usually went. + +"Well, not much to any." + +"What are their religious views?" + +"Well, not much of any." + +"Well, my friend, may I inquire what are _your_ opinions on religious +subjects?" + +"The man, yet reclining," said the Archbishop, "looked at me sleepily a +moment, and replied,-- + +"'My opinion is that them as made me will take care of me.'" + +The Archbishop came off discouraged; but we assured him that the man +was far ahead of many specimens we had met. We never see an opossum in +Virginia--a fossil animal in most other places--but it seems the sign +of the moral stratification around. There are many varieties of +opossum in Virginia,--political and religious: Saturn, who devours his +offspring, has not come to Virginia yet. + +Old formulas have, doubtless, to a great extent, lost their power there +also, but there is not vitality enough to create a higher form. For no +new church can ever be anywhere inaugurated in this world until the +period has come when its chief corner-stone can be Humanity. Till then +the old creeds in Virginia must wander like ghosts, haunting the old +ruins which their once exquisite churches have become. Nothing can be +more picturesque, nothing more sad, than these old churches,--every +brick in them imported from Old England, every prayer from the past +world and its past need: the high and wide pews where the rich sat +lifted some feet above the seats of the poor represent still the faith +in a God who subjects the weak to the strong. These old churches, rarely +rebuilt, are ready now to become rocks imbedding fossil creeds. In these +old aisles one walks, and the snake glides away on the pavement, and the +bat flutters in the high pulpit, whilst moss and ivy tenderly enshroud +the lonely walls; and over all is written the word DESOLATION. Symbol it +is of the desolation which caused it, even the trampled fanes and altars +of the human soul,--the temple of God, whose profanation the church has +suffered to go on unrebuked, till now both must crumble into the same +grave. + + * * * * * + + +AMERICAN CIVILIZATION. + + +A certain degree of progress from the rudest state in which man is +found,--a dweller in caves, or on trees, like an ape, a cannibal, an +eater of pounded snails, worms, and offal,--a certain degree of progress +from this extreme is called Civilization. It is a vague, complex name, +of many degrees. Nobody has attempted a definition. Mr. Guizot, writing +a book on the subject, does not. It implies the evolution of a highly +organized man, brought to supreme delicacy of sentiment, as in practical +power, religion, liberty, sense of honor, and taste. In the hesitation +to define what it is, we usually suggest it by negations. A nation that +has no clothing, no alphabet, no iron, no marriage, no arts of peace, no +abstract thought, we call barbarous. And after many arts are invented or +imported, as among the Turks and Moorish nations, it is often a little +complaisant to call them civilized. + +Each nation grows after its own genius, and has a civilization of its +own. The Chinese and Japanese, though each complete in his way, is +different from the man of Madrid or the man of New York. The term +imports a mysterious progress. In the brutes is none; and in mankind, +the savage tribes do not advance. The Indians of this country have not +learned the white man's work; and in Africa, the negro of to-day is the +negro of Herodotus. But in other races the growth is not arrested; but +the like progress that is made by a boy, "when he cuts his eye-teeth," +as we say,--childish illusions pricing daily away, and he seeing things +really and comprehensively,--is made by tribes. It is the learning the +secret of cumulative power, of advancing on one's self. It implies a +facility of association, power to compare, the ceasing from fixed ideas. +The Indian is gloomy and distressed, when urged to depart from his +habits and traditions. He is overpowered by the gaze of the white, and +his eye sinks. The occasion of one of these starts of growth is always +some novelty that astounds the mind, and provokes it to dare to change. +Thus there is a Manco Capac at the beginning of each improvement, some +superior foreigner importing new and wonderful arts, and teaching them. +Of course, he must not know too much, but must have the sympathy, +language, and gods of those he would inform. But chiefly the sea-shore +has been the point of departure to knowledge, as to commerce. The most +advanced nations are always those who navigate the most. The power which +the sea requires in the sailor makes a man of him very fast, and the +change of shores and population clears his head of much nonsense of his +wigwam. + +Where shall we begin or end the list of those feats of liberty and wit, +each of which feats made an epoch of history? Thus, the effect of +a framed or stone house is immense on the tranquillity, power, and +refinement of the builder. A man in a cave, or in a camp, a nomad, will +die with no more estate than the wolf or the horse leaves. But so simple +a labor as a house being achieved, his chief enemies are kept at bay. +He is safe from the teeth of wild animals, from frost, sunstroke, and +weather; and fine faculties begin to yield their fine harvest. Invention +and art are born, manners and social beauty and delight. 'T is wonderful +how soon a piano gets into a log-hut on the frontier. You would think +they found it under a pine-stump. With it comes a Latin grammar, and one +of those towhead boys has written a hymn on Sunday. Now let colleges, +now let senates take heed! for here is one, who, opening these fine +tastes on the basis of the pioneer's iron constitution, will gather all +their laurels in his strong hands. + +When the Indian trail gets widened, graded, and bridged to a good +road,--there is a benefactor, there is a missionary, a pacificator, a +wealth-bringer, a maker of markets, a vent for industry. The building +three or four hundred miles of road in the Scotch Highlands in 1726 +to 1749 effectually tamed the ferocious clans, and established public +order. Another step in civility is the change from war, hunting, and +pasturage, to agriculture. Our Scandinavian forefathers have left us a +significant legend to convey their sense of the importance of this step. +"There was once a giantess who had a daughter, and the child saw a +husbandman ploughing in the field. Then she ran and picked him up with +her finger and thumb, and put him and his plough and his oxen into her +apron, and carried them to her mother, and said, 'Mother, what sort of a +beetle is this that I found wriggling in the sand?' But the mother said, +'Put it away, my child; we must begone out of this land, for these +people will dwell in it.'" Another success is the post-office, with +its educating energy, augmented by cheapness, and guarded by a certain +religious sentiment in mankind, so that the power of a wafer or a drop +of wax or gluten to guard a letter, as it flies over sea, over land, and +comes to its address as if a battalion of artillery brought it, I look +upon as a fine metre of civilization. + +The division of labor, the multiplication of the arts of peace, which is +nothing but a large allowance to each man to choose his work according +to his faculty, to live by his better hand, fills the State with useful +and happy laborers,--and they, creating demand by the very temptation +of their productions, are rapidly and surely rewarded by good sale: and +what a police and ten commandments their work thus becomes! So true is +Dr. Johnson's remark, that "men are seldom more innocently employed than +when they are making money." + +The skilful combinations of civil government, though they usually +follow natural leadings, as the lines of race, language, religion, and +territory, yet require wisdom and conduct in the rulers, and in their +result delight the imagination. "We see insurmountable multitudes +obeying, in opposition to their strongest passions, the restraints of +a power which they scarcely perceive, and the crimes of a single +individual marked and punished at the distance of half the earth."[A] + +[Footnote A: Dr. Thomas Brown.] + +Right position of woman in the State is another index. Poverty and +industry with a healthy mind read very easily the laws of humanity, and +love them: place the sexes in right relations of mutual respect, and a +severe morality gives that essential charm to woman which educates all +that is delicate, poetic, and self-sacrificing, breeds courtesy and +learning, conversation and wit, in her rough mate; so that I have +thought it a sufficient definition of civilization to say, it is the +influence of good women. + +Another measure of culture is the diffusion of knowledge, overrunning +all the old barriers of caste, and, by the cheap press, bringing the +university to every poor man's door in the newsboy's basket. Scraps of +science, of thought, of poetry are in the coarsest sheet, so that in +every house we hesitate to tear a newspaper until we have looked it +through. + +The ship, in its latest complete equipment, is an abridgment and compend +of a nation's arts: the ship steered by compass and chart, longitude +reckoned by lunar observation, and, when the heavens are hid, by +chronometer; driven by steam; and in wildest sea-mountains, at vast +distances from home, + + "The pulses of her iron heart + Go beating through the storm." + +No use can lessen the wonder of this control, by so weak a creature, of +forces so prodigious. I remember I watched, in crossing the sea, the +beautiful skill whereby the engine in its constant working was made to +produce two hundred gallons of fresh water out of salt water, every +hour,--thereby supplying all the ship's want. + +The skill that pervades complex details; the man that maintains himself; +the chimney taught to burn its own smoke; the farm made to produce all +that is consumed on it; the very prison compelled to maintain itself +and yield a revenue, and, better than that, made a reform school, and a +manufactory of honest men out of rogues, as the steamer made fresh +water out of salt: all these are examples of that tendency to combine +antagonisms, and utilize evil, which is the index of high civilization. + +Civilization is the result of highly complex organization. In the snake, +all the organs are sheathed: no hands, no feet, no fins, no wings. In +bird and beast, the organs are released, and begin to play. In man, they +are all unbound, and full of joyful action. With this unswaddling, he +receives the absolute illumination we call Reason, and thereby true +liberty. + +Climate has much to do with this melioration. The highest civility has +never loved the hot zones. Wherever snow falls, there is usually civil +freedom. Where the banana grows, the animal system is indolent and +pampered at the cost of higher qualities: the man is grasping, sensual, +and cruel. But this scale is by no means invariable. For high degrees of +moral sentiment control the unfavorable influences of climate; and some +of our grandest examples of men and of races come from the equatorial +regions,--as the genius of Egypt, of India, and of Arabia. + +These feats are measures or traits of civility; and temperate climate is +an important influence, though not quite indispensable, for there have +been learning, philosophy, and art in Iceland, and in the tropics. But +one condition is essential to the social education of man,--namely, +morality. There can be no high civility without a deep morality, though +it may not always call itself by that name, but sometimes the point +of honor, as in the institution of chivalry; or patriotism, as in the +Spartan and Roman republics; or the enthusiasm of some religious sect +which imputes its virtue to its dogma; or the cabalism, or _esprit du +corps_, of a masonic or other association of friends. + +The evolution of a highly destined society must be moral; it must run in +the grooves of the celestial wheels. It must be catholic in aims. What +is moral? It is the respecting in action catholic or universal ends. +Hear the definition which Kant gives of moral conduct: "Act always so +that the immediate motive of thy will may become a universal rule for +all intelligent beings." + +Civilization depends on morality. Everything good in man leans on what +is higher. This rule holds in small as in great. Thus, all our strength +and success in the work of our hands depend on our borrowing the aid of +the elements. You have seen a carpenter on a ladder with a broad-axe +chopping upward chips and slivers from a beam. How awkward! at what +disadvantage he works! But see him on the ground, dressing his timber +under him. Now, not his feeble muscles, but the force of gravity brings +down the axe; that is to say, the planet itself splits his stick. The +farmer had much ill-temper, laziness, and shirking to endure from his +hand-sawyers, until, one day, he bethought him to put his saw-mill on +the edge of a waterfall; and the river never tires of turning his wheel: +the river is good-natured, and never hints an objection. + +We had letters to send: couriers could not go fast enough, nor far +enough; broke their wagons, foundered their horses; bad roads in spring, +snow-drifts in winter, heats in summer; could not get the horses out +of a walk. But we found out that the air and earth were full of +electricity; and it was always going our way,--just the way we wanted to +send. _Would he take a message?_ Just as lief as not; had nothing +else to do; would carry it in no time. Only one doubt occurred, one +staggering objection,--he had no carpet-bag, no visible pockets, no +hands, not so much as a mouth, to carry a letter. But, after much +thought and many experiments, we managed to meet the conditions, and to +fold up the letter in such invisible compact form as he could carry in +those invisible pockets of his, never wrought by needle and thread,--and +it went like a charm. + +I admire still more than the saw-mill the skill which, on the sea-shore, +makes the tides drive the wheels and grind corn, and which thus engages +the assistance of the moon, like a hired hand, to grind, and wind, and +pump, and saw, and split stone, and roll iron. + +Now that is the wisdom of a man, in every instance of his labor, +to hitch his wagon to a star, and see his chore done by the gods +themselves. That is the way we are strong, by borrowing the might of the +elements. The forces of steam, gravity, galvanism, light, magnets, wind, +fire, serve us day by day, and cost us nothing. + +Our astronomy is full of examples of calling in the aid of these +magnificent helpers. Thus, on a planet so small as ours, the want of +an adequate base for astronomical measurements is early felt, as, for +example, in detecting the parallax of a star. But the astronomer, having +by an observation fixed the place of a star, by so simple an expedient +as waiting six months, and then repeating his observation, contrived +to put the diameter of the earth's orbit, say two hundred millions of +miles, between his first observation and his second, and this line +afforded him a respectable base for his triangle. + +All our arts aim to win this vantage. We cannot bring the heavenly +powers to us, but, if we will only choose our jobs in directions in +which they travel, they will undertake them with the greatest pleasure. +It is a peremptory rule with them, that _they never go out of their +road_. We are dapper little busybodies, and run this way and that +way superserviceably; but they swerve never from their fore-ordained +paths,--neither the sun, nor the moon, nor a bubble of air, nor a mote +of dust. + +And as our handiworks borrow the elements, so all our social and +political action leans on principles. To accomplish anything excellent, +the will must work for catholic and universal ends. A puny creature +walled in on every side, as Donne wrote,-- + + ------"unless above himself he can + Erect himself, how poor a thing is man!" + +but when his will leans on a principle, when he is the vehicle of ideas, +he borrows their omnipotence. Gibraltar may be strong, but ideas are +impregnable, and bestow on the hero their invincibility. "It was a great +instruction," said a saint in Cromwell's war, "that the best courages +are but beams of the Almighty." Hitch your wagon to a star. Let us not +fag in paltry works which serve our pot and bag alone. Let us not lie +and steal. No god will help. We shall find all their teams going the +other way,--Charles's Wain, Great Bear, Orion, Leo, Hercules:--every +god will leave us. Work rather for those interests which the divinities +honor and promote,--justice, love, freedom, knowledge, utility. + +If we can thus ride in Olympian chariots by putting our works in the +path of the celestial circuits, we can harness also evil agents, the +powers of darkness, and force them to serve against their will the ends +of wisdom and virtue. Thus, a wise Government puts fines and penalties +on pleasant vices. What a benefit would the American Government, now +in the hour of its extreme need, render to itself, and to every city, +village, and hamlet in the States, if it would tax whiskey and rum +almost to the point of prohibition! Was it Bonaparte who said that he +found vices very good patriots?--"he got five millions from the love of +brandy, and he should be glad to know which of the virtues would pay him +as much." Tobacco and opium have broad backs, and will cheerfully carry +the load of armies, if you choose to make them pay high for such joy as +they give and such harm as they do. + +These are traits, and measures, and modes; and the true test of +civilization is, not the census, nor the size of cities, nor the +crops,--no, but the kind of man the country turns out. I see the vast +advantages of this country, spanning the breadth of the temperate zone. +I see the immense material prosperity,--towns on towns, states on +states, and wealth piled in the massive architecture of cities, +California quartz-mountains dumped down in New York to be re-piled +architecturally along-shore from Canada to Cuba, and thence westward to +California again. But it is not New-York streets built by the confluence +of workmen and wealth of all nations, though stretching out towards +Philadelphia until they touch it, and northward until they touch New +Haven, Hartford, Springfield, Worcester, and Boston,--not these that +make the real estimation. But, when I look over this constellation of +cities which animate and illustrate the land, and see how little +the Government has to do with their daily life, how self-helped and +self-directed all families are,--knots of men in purely natural +societies,--societies of trade, of kindred blood, of habitual +hospitality, house and house, man acting on man by weight of opinion, of +longer or better-directed industry, the refining influence of women, +the invitation which experience and permanent causes open to youth and +labor,--when I see how much each virtuous and gifted person whom all men +consider lives affectionately with scores of excellent people who are +not known far from home, and perhaps with great reason reckons these +people his superiors in virtue, and in the symmetry and force of their +qualities, I see what cubic values America has, and in these a better +certificate of civilization than great cities or enormous wealth. + +In strictness, the vital refinements are the moral and intellectual +steps. The appearance of the Hebrew Moses, of the Indian Buddh,--in +Greece, of the Seven Wise Masters, of the acute and upright Socrates, +and of the Stoic Zeno,--in Judea, the advent of Jesus,--and in modern +Christendom, of the realists Huss, Savonarola, and Luther, are causal +facts which carry forward races to new convictions, and elevate the rule +of life. In the presence of these agencies, it is frivolous to insist +on the invention of printing or gunpowder, of steam-power or gas-light, +percussion-caps and rubber-shoes, which are toys thrown off from that +security, freedom, and exhilaration which a healthy morality creates in +society. These arts add a comfort and smoothness to house and +street life; but a purer morality, which kindles genius, civilizes +civilization, casts backward all that we held sacred into the profane, +as the flame of oil throws a shadow when shined upon by the flame of the +Bude-light. Not the less the popular measures of progress will ever be +the arts and the laws. + +But if there be a country which cannot stand any one of these tests,--a +country where knowledge cannot be diffused without perils of mob-law +and statute-law,--where speech is not free,--where the post-office is +violated, mail-bags opened, and letters tampered with,--where public +debts and private debts outside of the State are repudiated,--where +liberty is attacked in the primary institution of their social +life,--where the position of the white woman is injuriously affected by +the outlawry of the black woman,--where the arts, such as they have, +are all imported, having no indigenous life,--where the laborer is not +secured in the earnings of his own hands,--where suffrage is not free +or equal,--that country is, in all these respects, not civil, but +barbarous, and no advantages of soil, climate, or coast can resist these +suicidal mischiefs. + +Morality is essential, and all the incidents of morality,--as, justice +to the subject, and personal liberty. Montesquieu says,--"Countries are +well cultivated, not as they are fertile, but as they are free"; and the +remark holds not less, but more, true of the culture of men than of the +tillage of land. And the highest proof of civility is, that the whole +public action of the State is directed on securing the greatest good of +the greatest number. + +Our Southern States have introduced confusion into the moral sentiments +of their people, by reversing this rule in theory and practice, and +denying a man's right to his labor. The distinction and end of a soundly +constituted man is his labor. Use is inscribed on all his faculties. Use +is the end to which he exists. As the tree exists for its fruit, so a +man for his work. A fruitless plant, an idle animal, is not found in +the universe. They are all toiling, however secretly or slowly, in the +province assigned them, and to a use in the economy of the world,--the +higher and more complex organizations to higher and more catholic +service; and man seems to play a certain part that tells on the general +face of the planet,--as if dressing the globe for happier races of +his own kind, or, as we sometimes fancy, for beings of superior +organization. + +But thus use, labor of each for all, is the health and virtue of all +beings. ICH DIEN, _I serve_, is a truly royal motto. And it is the mark +of nobleness to volunteer the lowest service,--the greatest spirit only +attaining to humility. Nay, God is God because he is the servant of +all. Well, now here comes this conspiracy of slavery,--they call it an +institution, I call it a destitution,--this stealing of men and setting +them to work,--stealing their labor, and the thief sitting idle himself; +and for two or three ages it has lasted, and has yielded a certain +quantity of rice, cotton, and sugar. And standing on this doleful +experience, these people have endeavored to reverse the natural +sentiments of mankind, and to pronounce labor disgraceful, and the +well-being of a man to consist in eating the fruit of other men's labor. +Labor: a man coins himself into his labor,--turns his day, his strength, +his thought, his affection into some product which remains as the +visible sign of his power; and to protect that, to secure that to +him, to secure his past self to his future self, is the object of all +government. There is no interest in any country so imperative as that +of labor; it covers all, and constitutions and governments exist for +that,--to protect and insure it to the laborer. All honest men are daily +striving to earn their bread by their industry. And who is this who +tosses his empty head at this blessing in disguise, the constitution of +human nature, and calls labor vile, and insults the faithful workman at +his daily toil? I see for such madness no hellebore,--for such calamity +no solution but servile war, and the Africanization of the country that +permits it. + +At this moment in America the aspects of political society absorb +attention. In every house, from Canada to the Gulf, the children ask +the serious father,--"What is the news of the war to-day? and when will +there be better times?" The boys have no new clothes, no gifts, no +journeys; the girls must go without new bonnets; boys and girls find +their education, this year, less liberal and complete. All the little +hopes that heretofore made the year pleasant are deferred. The state of +the country fills us with anxiety and stern duties. We have attempted to +hold together two states of civilization: a higher state, where labor +and the tenure of land and the right of suffrage are democratical; and +a lower state, in which the old military tenure of prisoners or slaves, +and of power and land in a few hands, makes an oligarchy: we have +attempted to hold these two states of society under one law. But the +rude and early state of society does not work well with the later, +nay, works badly, and has poisoned politics, public morals, and social +intercourse in the Republic, now for many years. + +The times put this question,--Why cannot the best civilization be +extended over the whole country, since the disorder of the less +civilized portion menaces the existence of the country? Is this secular +progress we have described, this evolution of man to the highest powers, +only to give him sensibility, and not to bring duties with it? Is he +not to make his knowledge practical? to stand and to withstand? Is not +civilization heroic also? Is it not for action? has it not a will? +"There are periods," said Niebuhr, "when something much better than, +happiness and security of life is attainable." We live in a new and +exceptional age. America is another word for Opportunity. Our whole +history appears like a last effort of the Divine Providence in behalf of +the human race; and a literal slavish following of precedents, as by +a justice of the peace, is not for those who at this hour lead the +destinies of this people. The evil you contend with has taken alarming +proportions, and you still content yourself with parrying the blows it +aims, but, as if enchanted, abstain from striking at the cause. + +If the American people hesitate, it is not for want of warning or +advices. The telegraph has been swift enough to announce our disasters. +The journals have not suppressed the extent of the calamity. Neither +was there any want of argument or of experience. If the war brought +any surprise to the North, it was not the fault of sentinels on the +watch-towers, who had furnished full details of the designs, the muster, +and the means of the enemy. Neither was anything concealed of the theory +or practice of slavery. To what purpose make more big books of these +statistics? There are already mountains of facts, if any one wants them. +But people do not want them. They bring their opinions into the world. +If they have a comatose tendency in the brain, they are pro-slavery +while they live; if of a nervous sanguineous temperament, they are +abolitionists. Then interests were never persuaded. Can you convince the +shoe interest, or the iron interest, or the cotton interest, by reading +passages from Milton or Montesquieu? You wish to satisfy people that +slavery is bad economy. Why, the "Edinburgh Review" pounded on that +string, and made out its case forty years ago. A democratic statesman +said to me, long since, that, if he owned the State of Kentucky, he +would manumit all the slaves, and be a gainer by the transaction. Is +this new? No, everybody knows it. As a general economy it is admitted. +But there is no one owner of the State, but a good many small owners. +One man owns land and slaves; another owns slaves only. Here is a woman +who has no other property,--like a lady in Charleston I knew of, who +owned fifteen chimney-sweeps and rode in her carriage. It is clearly a +vast inconvenience to each of these to make any change, and they are +fretful and talkative, and all their friends are; and those less +interested are inert, and, from want of thought, averse to innovation. +It is like free trade, certainly the interest of nations, but by no +means the interest of certain towns and districts, which tariff feeds +fat; and the eager interest of the few overpowers the apathetic general +conviction of the many. Banknotes rob the public, but are such a daily +convenience that we silence our scruples, and make believe they are +gold. So imposts are the cheap and right taxation; but by the dislike of +people to pay out a direct tax, governments are forced to render life +costly by making them pay twice as much, hidden in the price of tea and +sugar. + +In this national crisis, it is not argument that we want, but that rare +courage which dares commit itself to a principle, believing that Nature +is its ally, and will create the instruments it requires, and more than +make good any petty and injurious profit which it may disturb. There +never was such a combination as this of ours, and the rules to meet it +are not set down in any history. We want men of original perception and +original action, who can open their eyes wider than to a nationality, +namely, to considerations of benefit to the human race, can act in the +interest of civilization. Government must not be a parish clerk, a +justice of the peace. It has, of necessity, in any crisis of the State, +the absolute powers of a Dictator. The existing Administration is +entitled to the utmost candor. It is to be thanked for its angelic +virtue, compared with any executive experiences with which we have been +familiar. But the times will not allow us to indulge in compliment. I +wish I saw in the people that inspiration which, if Government would not +obey the same, it would leave the Government behind, and create on the +moment the means and executors it wanted. Better the war should more +dangerously threaten us,--should threaten fracture in what is still +whole, and punish us with burned capitals and slaughtered regiments, and +so exasperate the people to energy, exasperate our nationality. There +are Scriptures written invisibly on men's hearts, whose letters do not +come out until they are enraged. They can be read by war-fires, and by +eyes in the last peril. + +We cannot but remember that there have been days in American history, +when, if the Free States had done their duty, Slavery had been blocked +by an immovable barrier, and our recent calamities forever precluded. +The Free States yielded, and every compromise was surrender, and invited +new demands. Here again is a new occasion which Heaven offers to sense +and virtue. It looks as if we held the fate of the fairest possession +of mankind in our hands, to be saved by our firmness or to be lost by +hesitation. + +The one power that has legs long enough and strong enough to cross the +Potomac offers itself at this hour; the one strong enough to bring all +the civility up to the height of that which is best prays now at the +door of Congress for leave to move. Emancipation is the demand of +civilization. That is a principle; everything else is an intrigue. This +is a progressive policy,--puts the whole people in healthy, productive, +amiable position,--puts every man in the South in just and natural +relations with every man in the North, laborer with laborer. + +We shall not attempt to unfold the details of the project of +emancipation. It has been stated with great ability by several of its +leading advocates. I will only advert to some leading points of the +argument, at the risk of repeating the reasons of others.[B] + +[Footnote B: I refer mainly to a Discourse by the Rev. M.D. Conway, +delivered before the "Emancipation League," in Boston, in January last.] + +The war is welcome to the Southerner: a chivalrous sport to him, like +hunting, and suits his semi-civilized condition. On the climbing scale +of progress, he is just up to war, and has never appeared to such +advantage as in the last twelve-month. It does not suit us. We are +advanced some ages on the war-state,--to trade, art, and general +cultivation. His laborer works for him at home, so that he loses no +labor by the war. All our soldiers are laborers; so that the South, with +its inferior numbers, is almost on a footing in effective war-population +with the North. Again, as long as we fight without any affirmative step +taken by the Government, any word intimating forfeiture in the rebel +States of their old privileges under the law, they and we fight on the +same side, for Slavery. Again, if we conquer the enemy,--what then? We +shall still have to keep him under, and it will cost as much to hold him +down as it did to get him down. Then comes the summer, and the fever +will drive our soldiers home; next winter, we must begin at the +beginning, and conquer him over again. What use, then, to take a fort, +or a privateer, or get possession of an inlet, or to capture a regiment +of rebels? + +But one weapon we hold which is sure. Congress can, by edict, as a part +of the military defence which it is the duty of Congress to provide, +abolish slavery, and pay for such slaves as we ought to pay for. Then +the slaves near our armies will come to us: those in the interior will +know in a week what their rights are, and will, where opportunity +offers, prepare to take them. Instantly, the armies that now confront +you must run home to protect their estates, and must stay there, and +your enemies will disappear. + +There can be no safety until this step is taken. We fancy that the +endless debate, emphasized by the crime and by the cannons of this war, +has brought the Free States to some conviction that it can never go well +with us whilst this mischief of Slavery remains in our politics, and +that by concert or by might we must put an end to it. But we have too +much experience of the futility of an easy reliance on the momentary +good dispositions of the public. There does exist, perhaps, a popular +will that the Union shall not be broken,--that our trade, and therefore +our laws, must have the whole breadth of the continent, and from Canada +to the Gulf. But, since this is the rooted belief and will of the +people, so much the more are they in danger, when impatient of defeats, +or impatient of taxes, to go with a rush for some peace, and what kind +of peace shall at that moment be easiest attained: they will make +concessions for it,--will give up the slaves; and the whole torment of +the past half-century will come back to be endured anew. + +Neither do I doubt, if such a composition should take place, that the +Southerners will come back quietly and politely, leaving their haughty +dictation. It will be an era of good feelings. There will be a lull +after so loud a storm; and, no doubt, there will be discreet men from +that section who will earnestly strive to inaugurate more moderate and +fair administration of the Government, and the North will for a time +have its full share and more, in place and counsel. But this will not +last,--not for want of sincere good-will in sensible Southerners, but +because Slavery will again speak through them its harsh necessity. It +cannot live but by injustice, and it will be unjust and violent to the +end of the world. + +The power of Emancipation is this, that it alters the atomic social +constitution of the Southern people. Now their interest is in keeping +out white labor; then, when they must pay wages, their interest will be +to let it in, to get the best labor, and, if they fear their blacks, to +invite Irish, German, and American laborers. Thus, whilst Slavery makes +and keeps disunion, Emancipation removes the whole objection to union. +Emancipation at one stroke elevates the poor white of the South, and +identifies his interest with that of the Northern laborer. + +Now, in the name of all that is simple and generous, why should not +this great right be done? Why should not America be capable of a second +stroke for the well-being of the human race, as eighty or ninety years +ago she was for the first? an affirmative step in the interests of human +civility, urged on her, too, not by any romance of sentiment, but by +her own extreme perils? It is very certain that the statesman who shall +break through the cobwebs of doubt, fear, and petty cavil that lie +in the way, will be greeted by the unanimous thanks of mankind. Men +reconcile themselves very fast to a bold and good measure, when once it +is taken, though they condemned it in advance. A week before the two +captive commissioners were surrendered to England, every one thought it +could not be done: it would divide the North. It was done, and in two +days all agreed it was the right action. And this action which costs so +little (the parties injured by it being such a handful that they can +very easily be indemnified) rids the world, at one stroke, of this +degrading nuisance, the cause of war and ruin to nations. This measure +at once puts all parties right. This is borrowing, as I said, the +omnipotence of a principle. What is so foolish as the terror lest the +blacks should be made furious by freedom and wages? It is denying these +that is the outrage, and makes the danger from the blacks. But justice +satisfies everybody,--white man, red man, yellow man, and black man. All +like wages, and the appetite grows by feeding. + +But this measure, to be effectual, must come speedily. The weapon is +slipping out of our hands. "Time," say the Indian Scriptures, "drinketh +up the essence of every great and noble action which ought to be +performed, and which is delayed in the execution." + +I hope it is not a fatal objection to this policy that it is simple and +beneficent thoroughly, which is the attribute of a moral action. An +unprecedented material prosperity has not tended to make us Stoics or +Christians. But the laws by which the universe is organized reappear at +every point, and will rule it. The end of all political struggle is +to establish morality as the basis of all legislation. It is not free +institutions, 't is not a republic, 't is not a democracy, that is the +end,--no, but only the means. Morality is the object of government. +We want a state of things in which crime shall not pay. This is the +consolation on which we rest in the darkness of the future and the +afflictions of to-day, that the government of the world is moral, and +does forever destroy what is not. + +It is the maxim of natural philosophers, that the natural forces wear +out in time all obstacles, and take place: and 't is the maxim of +history, that victory always falls at last where it ought to fall; or, +there is perpetual march and progress to ideas. But, in either case, +no link of the chain can drop out. Nature works through her appointed +elements; and ideas must work through the brains and the arms of good +and brave men, or they are no better than dreams. + + * * * * * + +Since the above pages were written, President Lincoln has proposed to +Congress that the Government shall cooeperate with any State that shall +enact a gradual abolishment of Slavery. In the recent series of national +successes, this Message is the best. It marks the happiest day in the +political year. The American Executive ranges itself for the first time +on the side of freedom. If Congress has been backward, the President has +advanced. This state-paper is the more interesting that it appears to be +the President's individual act, done under a strong sense of duty. He +speaks his own thought in his own style. All thanks and honor to the +Head of the State! The Message has been received throughout the country +with praise, and, we doubt not, with more pleasure than has been spoken. +If Congress accords with the President, it is not yet too late to begin +the emancipation; but we think it will always be too late to make it +gradual. All experience agrees that it should be immediate. More and +better than the President has spoken shall, perhaps, the effect of this +Message be,--but, we are sure, not more or better than he hoped in his +heart, when, thoughtful of all the complexities of his position, he +penned these cautious words. + + * * * * * + + + COMPENSATION. + + + In the strength of the endeavor, + In the temper of the giver, + In the loving of the lover, + Lies the hidden recompense. + + In the sowing of the sower, + In the fleeting of the flower, + In the fading of each hour, + Lurks eternal recompense. + + + + +A MESSAGE OF JEFF DAVIS IN SECRET SESSION. + +CONJECTURALLY REPORTED BY H. BIGLOW. + + +_To the Editors of the_ ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + +Jaalam, 10th March, 1862. + +GENTLEMEN,--My leisure has been so entirely occupied with the hitherto +fruitless endeavour to decypher the Runick inscription whose fortunate +discovery I mentioned in my last communication, that I have not found +time to discuss, as I had intended, the great problem of what we are to +do with slavery, a topick on which the publick mind in this place is at +present more than ever agitated. What my wishes and hopes are I need +not say, but for safe conclusions I do not conceive that we are yet +in possession of facts enough on which to bottom them with certainty. +Acknowledging the hand of Providence, as I do, in all events, I am +sometimes inclined to think that they are wiser than we, and am willing +to wait till we have made this continent once more a place where +freemen can live in security and honour, before assuming any further +responsibility. This is the view taken by my neighbour Habakkuk +Sloansure, Esq., the president of our bank, whose opinion in the +practical affairs of life has great weight with me, as I have generally +found it to be justified by the event, and whose counsel, had I followed +it, would have saved me from an unfortunate investment of a considerable +part of the painful economies of half a century in the Northwest-Passage +Tunnel. After a somewhat animated discussion with this gentleman, a +few days since, I expanded, on the _audi alteram partem_ principle, +something which he happened to say by way of illustration, into the +following fable. + + FESTINA LENTE. + + Once on a time there was a pool + Fringed all about with flag-leaves cool + And spotted with cow-lilies garish, + Of frogs and pouts the ancient parish. + Alders the creaking redwings sink on, + Tussocks that house blithe Bob o' Lincoln. + Hedged round the unassailed seclusion, + Where muskrats piled their cells Carthusian; + And many a moss-embroidered log, + The watering-place of summer frog, + Slept and decayed with patient skill, + As watering-places sometimes will. + + Now in this Abbey of Theleme, + Which realized the fairest dream + That ever dozing bull-frog had, + Sunned on a half-sunk lily-pad, + There rose a party with a mission + To mend the polliwogs' condition, + Who notified the selectmen + To call a meeting there and then. + "Some kind of steps." they said, "are needed; + They don't come on so fast as we did: + Let's dock their tails; if that don't make 'em + Frogs by brevet, the Old One take 'em! + That boy, that came the other day + To dig some flag-root down this way, + His jack-knife left, and 't is a sign + That Heaven approves of our design: + 'T were wicked not to urge the step on, + When Providence has sent the weapon." + + Old croakers, deacons of the mire, + That led the deep batrachiain choir, + _Uk! Uk! Caronk!_ with bass that might + Have left Lablache's out of sight, + Shook knobby heads, and said, "No go! + You'd better let 'em try to grow: + Old Doctor Time is slow, but still + He does know how to make a pill." + + But vain was all their hoarsest bass, + Their old experience out of place, + And, spite of croaking and entreating, + The vote was carried in marsh-meeting. + + "Lord knows," protest the polliwogs, + "We're anxious to be grown-up frogs; + But do not undertake the work + Of Nature till she prove a shirk; + 'T is not by jumps that she advances, + But wins her way by circumstances: + Pray, wait awhile, until you know + We're so contrived as not to grow; + Let Nature take her own direction, + And she'll absorb our imperfection; + _You_ mightn't like 'em to appear with, + But we must have the things to steer with." + + "No," piped the party of reform, + "All great results are ta'en by storm; + Fate holds her best gifts till we show + We've strength to make her let them go: + No more reject the Age's chrism, + Your cues are an anachronism; + No more the Future's promise mock, + But lay your tails upon the block, + Thankful that we the means have voted + To have you thus to frogs promoted." + + The thing was done, the tails were cropped, + And home each philotadpole hopped, + In faith rewarded to exult, + And wait the beautiful result. + Too soon it came; our pool, so long + The theme of patriot bull-frogs' song, + Next day was reeking, fit to smother, + With heads and tails that missed each other,-- + Here snoutless tails, there tailless snouts: + The only gainers were the pouts. + + MORAL. + + From lower to the higher next, + Not to the top, is Nature's text; + And embryo Good, to reach full stature, + Absorbs the Evil in its nature. + +I think that nothing will ever give permanent peace and security to +this continent but the extirpation of Slavery therefrom, and that the +occasion is nigh; but I would do nothing hastily or vindictively, nor +presume to jog the elbow of Providence. No desperate measures for me +till we are sure that all others are hopeless,--_flectere si nequeo +SUPEROS, Acheronta movebo_. To make Emancipation a reform instead of +a revolution is worth a little patience, that we may have the Border +States first, and then the non-slaveholders of the Cotton States with us +in principle,--a consummation that seems to me nearer than many imagine. +_Fiat justitia, ruat coelum,_ is not to be taken in a literal sense by +statesmen, whose problem is to get justice done with as little jar as +possible to existing order, which has at least so much of heaven in it +that it is not chaos. I rejoice in the President's late Message, which +at last proclaims the Government on the side of freedom, justice, and +sound policy. + +As I write, comes the news of our disaster at Hampton Roads. I do not +understand the supineness which, after fair warning, leaves wood to an +unequal conflict with iron. It is not enough merely to have the right +on our side, if we stick to the old flint-lock of tradition. I have +observed in my parochial experience (_haud ignarus mali_) that the Devil +is prompt to adopt the latest inventions of destructive warfare, and may +thus take even such a three-decker as Bishop Butler at an advantage. It +is curious, that, as gunpowder made armour useless on shore, so armour +is having its revenge by baffling its old enemy at sea,--and that, while +gunpowder robbed land-warfare of nearly all its picturesqueness to give +even greater stateliness and sublimity to a sea-fight, armour bids fair +to degrade the latter into a squabble between two iron-shelled turtles. + +Yours, with esteem and respect, + +HOMER WILBUR, A.M. + +P.S. I had wellnigh forgotten to say that the object of this letter is +to inclose a communication from the gifted pen of Mr. Biglow. + + I sent you a messige, my friens, t' other day, + To tell you I'd nothin' pertickler to say: + 'T wuz the day our new nation gut kin' o' stillborn, + So't wuz my pleasant dooty t' acknowledge the corn, + An' I see clearly then, ef I didn't before, + Thet the _augur_ in inauguration means _bore_. + I needn't tell _you_ thet my messige wuz written + To diffuse correc' notions in France an' Gret Britten, + An' agin to impress on the poppylar mind + The comfort an' wisdom o' goin' it blind,-- + To say thet I didn't abate not a hooter + O' my faith in a happy an' glorious futur', + Ez rich in each soshle an' p'litickle blessin' + Ez them thet we now hed the joy o' possessin', + With a people united, an' longin' to die + For wut _we_ call their country, without askin' why, + An' all the gret things we concluded to slope for + Ez much within reach now ez ever--to hope for. + We've all o' the ellermunts, this very hour, + Thet make up a fus'-class, self-governin' power: + We've a war, an' a debt, an' a flag; an' ef this + Ain't to be inderpendunt, why, wut on airth is? + An' nothin' now henders our takin' our station + Ez the freest, enlightenedest, civerlized nation, + Built up on our bran'-new politickle thesis + Thet a Guv'ment's fust right is to tumble to pieces,-- + I say nothin' henders our takin' our place + Ez the very fus'-best o' the whole human race, + A-spittin' tobacker ez proud ez you please + On Victory's bes' carpets, or loafin' at ease + In the Tool'ries front-parlor, discussin' affairs + With our heels on the backs o' Napoleon's new chairs, + An' princes a-mixin' our cocktails an' slings,-- + Excep', wal, excep' jest a very few things, + Sech ez navies an' armies an' wherewith to pay, + An' gittin' our sogers to run t' other way, + An' not be too over-pertickler in tryin' + To hunt up the very las' ditches to die in. + + Ther' are critters so base thet they want it explained + Jes' wut is the totle amount thet we've gained, + Ez ef we could maysure stupenjious events + By the low Yankee stan'ard o' dollars an' cents: + They seem to forgit, thet, sence last year revolved, + We've succeeded in gittin' seceshed an' dissolved, + An' thet no one can't hope to git thru dissolootion + 'Thout sonic kin' o' strain on the best Constitootion. + Who asks for a prospec' more flettrin' an' bright, + When from here clean to Texas it's all one free fight? + Hain't we rescued from Seward the gret leadin' featurs + Thet makes it wuth while to be reasonin' creaturs? + Hain't we saved Habus Coppers, improved it in fact, + By suspending the Unionists 'stid o' the Act? + Ain't the laws free to all? Where on airth else d' ye see + Every freeman improvin' his own rope an' tree? + + It's ne'ssary to take a good confident tone + With the public; but here, jest amongst us, I own + Things looks blacker 'n thunder. Ther' 's no use denyin' + We're clean out o' money, an' 'most out o' lyin',-- + Two things a young nation can't mennage without, + Ef she wants to look wal at her fust comin' out; + For the fust supplies physickle strength, while the second + Gives a morril edvantage thet's hard to be reckoned: + For this latter I'm willin' to du wut I can; + For the former you'll hev to consult on a plan,-- + Though our _fust_ want (an' this pint I want your best views on) + Is plausible paper to print I.O.U.s on. + Some gennlemen think it would cure all our cankers + In the way o' finance, ef we jes' hanged the bankers; + An' I own the proposle 'ud square with my views, + Ef their lives wuzn't all thet we'd left 'em to lose. + Some say thet more confidence might be inspired, + Ef we voted our cities an' towns to be fired,-- + A plan thet 'ud suttenly tax our endurance, + Coz 't would be our own bills we should git for th' insurance; + But cinders, no metter how sacred we think 'em, + Mightn't strike furrin minds ez good sources of income, + Nor the people, perhaps, wouldn't like the eclaw + O' bein' all turned into paytriots by law. + Some want we should buy all the cotton an' burn it, + On a pledge, when we've gut thru the war, to return it,-- + Then to take the proceeds an' hold _them_ ez security + For an issue o' bonds to be met at maturity + With an issue o' notes to be paid in hard cash + On the fus' Monday follerin' the 'tarnal Allsmash: + This hez a safe air, an', once hold o' the gold, + 'Ud leave our vile plunderers out in the cold, + An' _might_ temp' John Bull, ef it warn't for the dip he + Once gut from the banks o' my own Massissippi. + Some think we could make, by arrangin' the figgers, + A hendy home-currency out of our niggers; + But it wun't du to lean much on ary sech staff, + For they're gittin' tu current a'ready, by half. + One gennleman says, ef we lef' our loan out + Where Floyd could git hold on 't, _he_'d take it, no doubt; + But 't ain't jes' the takin', though 't hez a good look, + We mus' git sunthin' out on it arter it's took, + An' we need now more 'n ever, with sorrer I own, + Thet some one another should let us a loan, + Sence a soger wun't fight, on'y jes' while he draws his + Pay down on the nail, for the best of all causes, + 'Thout askin' to know wut the quarrel's about,-- + An' once come to thet, why, our game is played out. + It's ez true ez though I shouldn't never hev said it + Thet a hitch hez took place in our system o' credit; + I swear it's all right in my speeches an' messiges, + But ther' 's idees afloat, ez ther' is about sessiges: + Folks wun't take a bond ez a basis to trade on, + Without nosin' round to find out wut it's made on, + An' the thought more an' more thru the public min' crosses + Thet our Treshry hez gut 'mos' too many dead hosses. + Wut's called credit, you see, is some like a balloon, + Thet looks while it's up 'most ez harnsome 'z a moon, + But once git a leak in 't an' wut looked so grand + Caves righ' down in a jiffy ez flat ez your hand. + Now the world is a dreffle mean place, for our sins, + Where ther' ollus is critters about with long pins + A-prickin' the globes we've blowcd up with sech care, + An' provin' ther' 's nothin' inside but bad air: + They're all Stuart Millses, poor-white trash, an' sneaks, + Without no more chivverlry 'n Choctaws or Creeks, + Who think a real gennleman's promise to pay + Is meant to be took in trade's ornery way: + Them fellers an' I couldn' never agree; + They're the nateral foes o' the Southun Idee; + I'd gladly take all of our other resks on me + To be red o' this low-lived politikle 'con'my! + + Now a dastardly notion is gittin' about + Thet our bladder is bust an' the gas oozin' out, + An' onless we can mennage in some way to stop it, + Why, the thing's a gone coon, an' we might ez wal drop it. + Brag works wal at fust, but it ain't jes' the thing + For a stiddy inves'ment the shiners to bring, + An' votin' we're prosp'rous a hundred times over + Wun't change bein' starved into livin' on clover. + Manassas done sunthin' tow'rds drawin' the wool + O'er the green, anti-slavery eyes o' John Bull: + Oh, _warn't_ it a godsend, jes' when sech tight fixes + Wuz crowdin' us mourners, to throw double-sixes! + I wuz tempted to think, an' it wuzn't no wonder, + Ther' wuz reelly a Providence,--over or under,-- + When, all packed for Nashville, I fust ascertained + From the papers up North wut a victory we'd gained, + 'T wuz the time for diffusin' correc' views abroad + Of our union an' strength an' relyin' on God; + An', fact, when I'd gut thru my fust big surprise, + I much ez half b'lieved in my own tallest lies, + An' conveyed the idee thet the whole Southun popperlace + Wuz Spartans all on the keen jump for Thermopperlies, + Thet set on the Lincolnites' bombs till they bust, + An' fight for the priv'lege o' dyin' the fust; + But Roanoke, Bufort, Millspring, an' the rest + Of our recent starn-foremost successes out West, + Hain't left us a foot for our swellin' to stand on,-- + + We've showed _too_ much o' wut Buregard calls _abandon_, + For all our Thermopperlies (an' it's a marcy + We hain't hed no more) hev ben clean vicy-varsy, + An' wut Spartans wuz lef' when the battle wuz done + Wuz them thet wuz too unambitious to run. + + Oh, ef we hed on'y jes' gut Reecognition, + Things now would ha' ben in a different position! + You'd ha' hed all you wanted: the paper blockade + Smashed up into toothpicks,--unlimited trade + In the one thing thet's needfle, till niggers, I swow, + Hed ben thicker 'n provisional shinplasters now,-- + Quinine by the ton 'ginst the shakes when they seize ye,-- + Nice paper to coin into C.S.A. specie; + The voice of the driver'd be heerd in our land, + An' the univarse scringe, ef we lifted our hand: + Wouldn't _thet_ be some like a fulfillin' the prophecies, + With all the fus' fem'lies in all the best offices? + 'T wuz a beautiful dream, an' all sorrer is idle,-- + But _ef_ Lincoln _would_ ha' hanged Mason an' Slidell! + They ain't o' no good in European pellices, + But think wut a help they'd ha' ben on their gallowses! + They'd ha' felt they wuz truly fulfillin' their mission, + An', oh, how dog-cheap we'd ha' gut Reecognition! + + But somehow another, wutever we've tried, + Though the the'ry's fust-rate, the facs _wun't_ coincide: + Facs are contrary 'z mules, an' ez hard in the mouth, + An' they allus hev showed a mean spite to the South. + Sech bein' the case, we hed best look about + For some kin' o' way to slip _our_ necks out: + Le''s vote our las' dollar, ef one can be found, + (An', at any rate, votin' it hez a good sound,)-- + Le''s swear thet to arms all our people is flyin', + (The critters can't read, an' wun't know how we're lyin',)-- + Thet Toombs is advancin' to sack Cincinnater, + With a rovin' commission to pillage an' slarter,-- + Thet we've throwed to the winds all regard for wut's lawfle, + An' gone in for sunthin' promiscu'sly awfle. + Ye see, hitherto, it's our own knaves an' fools + Thet we've used,--those for whetstones, an't' others ez tools,-- + An' now our las' chance is in puttin' to test + The same kin' o' cattle up North an' out West. + I----But, Gennlemen, here's a despatch jes' come in + Which shows thet the tide's begun turnin' agin,-- + Gret Cornfedrit success! C'lumbus eevacooated! + I mus' run down an' hev the thing properly stated, + An' show wut a triumph it is, an' how lucky + To fin'lly git red o' thet cussed Kentucky,-- + An' how, sence Fort Donelson, winnin' the day + Consists in triumphantly gittin' away. + + + + +REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES. + + +_The Sisters, Inisfail, and other Poems._ By AUBREY DE VERE. London. + +Whatever Mr. De Vere writes is welcomed by a select audience. Not taking +rank among the great masters of English poetry, he yet possesses a +genuine poetic faculty which distinguishes him from "the small harpers +with their glees" who counterfeit the true gift of Nature. In refined +and delicate sensibility, in purity of feeling, in elevation of tone, +there is no English writer of verse at the present day who surpasses +him. The fine instinct of a poet is united in him with the cultivated +taste of a scholar. There is nothing forced or spasmodic in his verse; +it is the true expression of character disciplined by thought and study, +of fancy quickened by ready sympathies, of feeling deepened and calmed +by faith. As is the case with most English poets since Wordsworth, he +invests the impressions received from the various aspects of Nature with +moral associations, and with fine spiritual insight he seeks out the +inner meaning of the external life of the earth. No one describes more +truthfully than he those transient beauties of Nature which in their +briefness and their exquisite variety of change elude the coarse grasp +of the common observer, and too frequently pass half unnoticed and +unfelt even by those whose temperament is susceptive of their inspiring +influences, but whose thoughts are occupied with the cares and business +of living. But it is especially as the poet of Ireland, and of the Roman +Church, that Mr. De Vere presents himself to us in this last volume; +and while, consequently, the subject and treatment of many of the poems +contained in it give to them a special rather than a universal interest, +the patriotic spirit and the fervor of faith manifest in them appeal +powerfully to the sympathies of readers in other countries and of other +creeds. "'Inisfail' may be regarded as a sort of National Chronicle, +cast in a form partly lyrical, partly narrative.... Its aim is to record +the past alone, and that chiefly as its chances might have been sung by +those old bards, who, consciously or unconsciously, uttered the voice +which comes from a people's heart." In this attempt Mr. De Vere has had +an uncommon measure of success. The strings of the Irish harp sound with +the cadences of fitting harmonies under his hand, as he sings of the +sorrows and the joys of Ireland, of the wild storms and the rare +sunshine of her pathetic history,--as he denounces vengeance on her +oppressors, or blesses the saints and the heroes who have made the land +dear and beautiful to its children. The key-note of the series of poems +which form this poetic chronicle is struck in the fine verses with which +it begins, entitled "History," and of which our space allows us to quote +but the opening stanza:-- + + "At my casement I sat by night, while the wind far off in dark valleys + Voluminous gathered and grew, and waxing swelled to a gale; + An hour I heard it, or more, ere yet it sobbed on my lattice: + Far off, 't was a People's moan; hard by, but a widow's wail. + Atoms we are, we men: of the myriad sorrow around us + Our littleness little grasps; and the selfish in that have no part: + Yet time with the measureless chain of a world-wide mourning hath + wound us; + History but counts the drops as they fall from a Nation's heart." + +One of the most vigorous poems in the volume is that called "The Bard +Ethell," and which represents this bard of the thirteenth century +telling in his old age of himself and his country, of his memories, and +of the wrongs that he and his land had alike suffered:-- + + "I am Ethell, the son of Conn; + Here I live at the foot of the hill; + I am clansman to Brian, and servant to none; + Whom I hated, I hate; whom I loved, love still." + +Here is a passage from near the end of this poem:-- + + "Ah me, that man who is made of dust + Should have pride toward God! 'T is an angel's sin! + I have often feared lest God, the All-Just, + Should bend from heaven and sweep earth clean, + Should sweep us all into corners and holes, + Like dust of the house-floor, both bodies and + souls; + I have often feared He would send some + wind + In wrath, and the nation wake up stone-blind! + In age or youth we have all wrought ill." + +But a large part of the volume before us is made up of poems that do not +belong to this Irish series, and the readers of the "Atlantic" will find +in it several pieces which they will recognize with pleasure as having +first appeared in our own pages, and which, once read, were not to be +readily forgotten. Mr. De Vere has expressed in several passages his +warm sympathy in our national affairs, and his clear appreciation of +the great cause, so little understood abroad, which we of the North are +engaged in upholding and maintaining. And although in these days of war +there is little reading of poetry, and little chance that this volume +will find the welcome it deserves and would receive in quieter times in +America, we yet trust that it will meet with worthy readers among those +who possess their souls in quietness in the midst of the noise of arms, +and to such we heartily commend it. + + +_A Book about Doctors_. By J. CORDY JEAFFRESON, Author of "Novels and +Novelists," "Crewe Else," etc., etc. New York: Rudd & Carleton. 12mo. + +Mr. Jeaffreson is not usually either a brilliant or a sensible man with +pen in hand, albeit he dates from "Rolls Chambers, Chancery Lane." He is +apt to select slow coaches, whenever he attempts a ride. His "Novels +and Novelists" is a sad move in the "deadly lively" direction, and his +"Crewe Rise" has not risen to much distinction among the reading crew. +In those volumes of departed rubbish he sinks very low, whenever he +essays to mount; but his dulness is innoxious, for few there be who can +say, "We have read him." His "Book about Doctors" is the best literary +venture he has yet made. It is not a dull volume. The anecdotes so +industriously collected keep attention alert, and one feels inclined to +applaud Mr. Jeaffreson as the leaves of his book are turned. + +Everything about Doctors is interesting. Here are a few Bible verses +which it will do no harm to quote in connection with Mr. Jeaffreson's +volume:-- + + "Honor a physician with the honor due + unto him for the uses which you have made + of him: for the Lord hath created him." + + "For of the Most High cometh healing, and + he shall receive honor of the king." + + "The skill of the physician shall lift up his + head; and in the sight of great men he shall + be in admiration." + + "The Lord hath created medicines out of + the earth; and he that is wise will not abhor + them." + +It was no unwise thing in Mr. Jeaffreson to bring so many noble men +together, as it were into one family. What "names embalmed" one meets +with in the collection! Here are Sydenham, Goldsmith, Smollett, Sir +Thomas Browne, and a golden line of other Doctors, nearly all the +way down to our own time. (Our well-beloved M.D. [Monthly Diamond] +contributor is too young to be included.) Keats is among the worthies, +although he got no farther into the mysteries than the apothecary's +counter. Meeting with this interesting series of splendid medicine-men +leads us to muse a good deal about the Faculty, and to re-read several +good anecdotes about the great symptom-watchers of the past and the +present day. + +When Sir Richard Blackmore asked the great Sydenham, "Prince of English +physicians," what he would advise him for medical reading, he is said to +have replied, "Read Don Quixote, Sir." Sensible and witty old man! + +We are struck with the cheerful character of nearly all the M.D.s +mentioned in the volume, and are constantly reminded of the advice we +once read of an old Doctor to a young one:--"Moreover, let me tell you, +my young doctor friend, that a cheerful face, and step, and neckcloth, +and button-hole, and an occasional hearty and kindly joke, a power of +executing and setting a-going a good laugh, are stock in our trade not +to be despised." + +"I may give an instance," says the same good-natured physician, "when +a joke was more and better than itself. A comely young wife, the +'cynosure' of her circle, was in bed, apparently dying from swelling and +inflammation of the throat, an inaccessible abscess stopping the way; +she could swallow nothing; everything had been tried. Her friends were +standing round the bed in misery and helplessness. '_Try her wi' a +compliment_,' said her husband, in a not uncomic despair. She had +genuine humor, as well as he; and an physiologists know, there is a sort +of mental tickling which is beyond and above control, being under the +reflex system, and instinctive as well as sighing. She laughed with her +whole body, and burst the abscess, and was well." + +Mr. Jeaffreson's book might be better, but it might be worse. We cannot +forgive him for his "Novels and Novelists" and his "Crewe Rise," two +works which go far to prove their author a person of indefatigable +incoherency; but we thank him for the industry which brought together so +much that is very readable about Doctors. + + +_John Brent_. By THEODORE WINTHROP, Author of "Cecil Dreeme." Boston: +Ticknor & Fields. 16mo. + +It is probable that we have not yet completely appreciated the value +of the bright and noble life which a wretched Rebel sharp-shooter +extinguished in the disastrous fight of Great Bethel. "John Brent" is +a book which gives us important aid in the attempt to form an adequate +conception of Winthrop's character. Its vivid pages shine throughout +with the author's brave and tender spirit. "Cecil Dreeme" was an +embodiment of his thoughts, observations, and imaginations; "John Brent" +shows us the inbred poetry and romance of the man in the grander form of +action. The scene is placed in the wild Western plains of America, among +men entirely free from the restraints of conventional life; and the +book has a buoyancy and brisk vitality, a dashing, daring, and jubilant +vigor, such as we are not accustomed to in ordinary romances of American +life. Sir Philip Sidney is the type of the Anglo-Saxon hero; but we +think that Winthrop was fully his match in delicacy and intrepidity, in +manly courage, and in sweet, instinctive tenderness. As to style, the +American far exceeds the Englishman. A certain conventional artifice and +dainty affectation clouded the clear and beautiful nature of Sidney, +when he wrote. The elaborate embroidery of thought, the stiff and +cumbrous Elizabethan _dress_ of language, with all its ruffles and +laces, make the "Arcadia" an imperfect exponent of Sidney's nature. +His intense thoughts, delicate emotions, and burning passions are half +concealed in the form he adopts for their expression. But Winthrop is as +fresh, natural, strong, and direct in his language as in his life. +He used words, not for ornament, but for expression. Every phrase is +stamped by a die supplied by reflection or feeling, and not a paragraph +in "John Brent" differs in spirit from the practical heroism which urged +the author to expose himself to certain death at Great Bethel. The +condensed, lucid, picturesque, and sharp-cut sentences, flooded with +will, show the nature of the man,--a man who announced no sentiments and +principles he was not willing to sacrifice himself to disseminate or +defend. A living energy of soul glows over the whole book,--swift, +fiery, brave, wholesome, sincere, impatient of all physical obstacles to +the operation of thought and affection, and eager to make stubborn facts +yield to the impatient pressure of spiritual purpose. + +We cannot say much in praise of the plot of "John Brent," but it at +least enables the author to supply a good framework for his incidents, +descriptions, and characters. The plot is based rather on possibilities +than probabilities; but the men and women he depicts are thoroughly +natural. It would be difficult to point to any other American novel +which furnishes incidents that can compare in vigor and vividness +with some of the incidents in this romance. The ride to rescue Helen +Clitheroe from her kidnappers is a masterpiece, worthy to rank with the +finest passages of Cooper or Scott. The fierce, swift black stallion, +"Don Fulano," a horse superior to any which Homer has immortalized, is +almost the hero of the romance. That Winthrop, with all his sympathy +with the "advanced" ideas and sentiments of the reformers and +philanthropists of the time, was not a mere prattling and scribbling +sentimentalist, is proved by his glorious idealization of this +magnificent horse. He raises the beast into a moral and intellectual +sympathy with his human rider, and there is a poetic justice in making +him die at last in an attempt to further the escape of a fugitive slave. + +The characterization of the book is original. Gerrian, Jake Shamberlain, +Armstrong, Sizzum, the Mormon preacher, are absolutely new creations. +Hugh Clitheroe may suggest Dickens's Skimpole and Hawthorne's Clifford, +but the character is developed under entirely new circumstances. As for +Wade and Brent, they are persons whom we all recognize as the old heroes +of romance, though the conditions under which they act are changed. +Helen, the heroine of the story, is a more puzzling character to the +critic; but, on the whole, we are bound to say that she is a new +development of womanhood. The author exhausts all the resources of his +genius in giving a "local habitation and a name" to this fond creation +of his imagination, and he has succeeded. Helen Clitheroe promises to be +one of those "beings of the mind" which will he permanently remembered. + +Heroism, active or passive, is the lesson taught by this romance, and +we know that the author, in his life, illustrated both phases of the +quality. His novels, which, when he was alive, the booksellers refused +to publish, are now passing through their tenth and twelfth editions. +Everybody reads "Cecil Dreeme" and "John Brent," and everybody must +catch a more or less vivid glimpse of the noble nature of their author. +But these books give but an imperfect expression of the soul of Theodore +Winthrop. They have great merits, but they are still rather promises +than performances. They hint of a genius which was denied full +development. The character, however, from which they derive their +vitality and their power to please, shines steadily through all the +imperfections of plot and construction. The novelist, after all, only +suggests the power and beauty of the man; and the man, though dead, will +keep the novels alive. Through them we can commune with a rare and noble +spirit, called away from earth before all its capacities of invention +and action were developed, but still leaving brilliant traces in +literature of the powers it was denied the opportunity adequately to +unfold. + + * * * * * + + +FOREIGN LITERATURE. + + +To keep pace with the productions of foreign literature is a task beyond +the possibilities of any reader. The bibliographical journals of France, +Germany, Italy, and Spain weekly present such copious lists of new +works, that a mere mention of only the principal ones would far exceed +the limits we have proposed to ourselves. However, from the chaos of +contemporary productions it is our intention to sift, as far as lies in +our power, such works as may with justice be styled _representative_ of +the country in which they are produced. Ranging in this introductory +article through the year 1861, we shall limit ourselves to a few of the +contributions upon French literary history. + +No branch of letters is richer at the present time than that in which +the writer, laying aside all thought of direct creativeness, confines +himself to the criticism of the works of the past or present, analyzing +and studying the influences that have been brought to hear upon the +poet, historian, or novelist, anatomizing literature and resolving it +into its elements, pointing out the action exercised upon thought and +expression by the age, and seeking the effects of these upon society +and politics as well as upon the general tastes and moral being of a +generation. Methods of writing are now discussed rather than put in +practice. We are in a transition age more than politically. Creative +genius seems to be resting for more marked and permanent channels to be +formed; so that, though every year gives birth to numberless works in +every branch of art, original production is rarer than the activity, the +restlessness of the time might lead us to expect. + +In no country has literary criticism more life than in France. It +engages the attention of the best minds. No writer, whatever be his +speciality, thinks it derogatory to give long and elaborate notices +in the daily press of new books or new editions of old books. Thus, +Sainte-Beuve in the "Moniteur," De Sacy, Saint-Marc Girardin, Philarete +Chasles, Prevost-Paradol in the "Journal des Debats," not to mention the +numerous writers of the "Revue des Deux Mondes," the "Europeenne," and +the "Nationale," vie with each other in extracting from all that appears +what is most acceptable to the general reader. + +M. Sainte-Beuve may be taken as a type of the avowedly professional +critic. Whatever he may accomplish as the historian of Port-Royal, it is +to his weekly articles, informal and disconnected as they are, that he +owes his high rank among French authors. These "Causeries du Lundi" have +now reached the fourteenth volume.[A] In the last we find the same easy +admiration, facility of approbation, and suppleness that enable him to +praise the "Fanny" of Feydeau, calling it a poem, and on the next page +to do justice to the last volume of Thiers's "Consulate and Empire," +or to the recent publication of the Correspondence of Buffon. The most +important articles in the volume are those on Vauvenargues, on the Abbe +de Marolles, and on Bonstetten. + +[Footnote A: _Causeries du Lundi_. Par C.A. Sainte-Beuve, de l'Academie +Francaise. Tome Quatorzieme. Paris: Garnier Freres. 12mo. pp. 480.] + +Of quite a different school is M. Armand de Pontmartin, who, under the +titles of "Causeries du Samedi," "Causeries Litteraires," etc., has +now issued over a dozen volumes touching on all points of contemporary +letters, often very severe in their strictures. The last, "Les Semaines +Litteraires,"[B] contains notices of late works by Cousin, About, +Quinet, Laprade, and others, and concludes with an article on Scribe. +Pontmarlin represents the Catholic sentiment in literature. He measures +everything as it agrees or disagrees with Legitimacy and Ultramontanism. +His works are a continual defence of the Bourbons and the Pope. Modern +democracy he cannot pardon. Without seeking to deny the excesses and +shortcomings of his own party, he finds an explanation for all in the +levelling tendencies of the age. He cannot be too severe on the first +French Revolution and its results. "In letters," he tells us, "it has +led to materialism and anarchy, while the Bourbons personify for France +peace, glory," etc. + +[Footnote B: _Les Semaines Litteraires_. Troisieme Serie des Causeries +Litteraires. Par Armand de Pontmartin. Paris: Michel Levy Freres. 12mo. +pp. 364.] + +Pontmartin is an able representative of the side he has taken. He +believes in and ably defends those heroes of literature so well +characterized as "Prophets of the Past," Chateaubriand, De Bonald, +and J. de Maistre. His special objects of antipathy are writers +like Michelet and Quinet, pamphleteers like About, and critics like +Sainte-Beuve. + +The last he cannot pardon for his work on Chateaubriand,[C] published in +the early part of the year 1861. The time is past for giving a fuller +account of this remarkable production of the historian of Port-Royal. +Suffice it to say, that, though it deals in very small criticism indeed, +though its author seems to have made it his task to sum up all the +weaknesses of one the prestige of whose name fills, in France at least, +the first half of this century, yet there exists no more valuable +contribution to the history of literature under the first Empire. It has +been called "a work no one would wish to have written, yet which is read +by all with exquisite pleasure." Nothing could be truer. + +[Footnote C: _Chateaubriand et son Groupe Litteraire sous l'Empire_. +Cours professe a Liege en 1848-1849, par C.A. Sainte-Beuve, de +l'Academie Francaise. Paris: Garnier Freres. 2 vols. 8vo. pp. 410, 457.] + +"Chateaubriand and his Literary Group under the Empire" is a course +of twenty-one lectures delivered by Sainte-Beuve at Liege, whither he +repaired soon after the Revolution of 1848 broke out in Paris. Fragments +of the work appeared in the "Revue des Deux Mondes," among others the +paper on Chenedolle, which forms the most interesting portion of the +second division. In this are to be found several original letters, now +published for the first time, casting much new light on the life of that +unfortunate poet. + +Of more general interest, however, are the pages on Chateaubriand +himself. It was the fate of this writer to be flattered beyond measure +in his lifetime, and now come the first judgments of posterity, which +deals with him no less harshly than it has already begun to deal +with another idol of the French people, Beranger. Sainte-Beuve has +constituted himself judge, reversing even his own adulatory articles, +as they may be read in the earlier volumes of the "Causeries." It is at +best an ungrateful task to dissect a reputation in the way in which we +find it done in the present work. It must seem strange to many a reader +that the very man who in early life could utter such sweet flattery, who +long was the foremost to bear incense, should now consider it his duty +"to seek the foot of clay beneath the splendid drapery, and to replace +about the statue the aromas of the sanctuary by the perfumes of the +boudoir." In spite of this, "Chateaubriand and his Literary Group" must +be ranked among the most remarkable of literary biographies. Here the +critic gives full scope to his inclination for minute analysis; the +history of the author of "Rene" explains his works, and these in turn +are made to tell his life,--that life so full of love of effect, and +constant painstaking to seem rather than to be. Even in his religious +sentiments the author of the "Genius of Christianity" appears lukewarm, +not to say more. + +In comprehensive works on literary history France is far from being +as rich as Germany. Beyond the native literature little has been +accomplished; and even in this, works of importance may be counted on +the fingers. The past year saw the conclusion of Nisard's work, the most +comprehensive history of French literature. The fourth volume[D] is +devoted to the eighteenth century, and concludes with a few general +chapters on the nineteenth. + +[Footnote D: _Histoire de la Literature Francaise_. Par D. Nisard, de +l'Academie Francaise, Inspecteur-General de l'Enseignement Superieur. +Tome Quatrieme, Paris: Firmin Didot Freres, Fils, et Cie. 8vo. pp. 584.] + +The work of M. Gerusez, "History of French Literature from its Origin to +the Devolution,"[E] although it had the honor of being considered worthy +of the _prix Gobert_ by the French Academy, is far from satisfying the +requirements of general literary history. It may rather be considered +a systematic series of essays, beginning with the "Chansons de Geste," +analyzing several poems of the cycle of Charlemagne, and followed by +successive independent chapters on the Middle Ages, the revival of +letters, and modern times down to the Revolution. It will be remembered +that in 1859 M. Gerusez published a "History of Literature during the +French Revolution, 1789-1800." This also obtained a prize from the +Academy,--much more deservedly, we think, than the last production, when +we consider the interest he cast over the literary efforts of a period +much more marked by action than by artistic productiveness of any kind. +The German writer Schmidt-Weiszenfels in the same year issued a work +with the pretentious title, "History of the Revolution-Literature of +France."[F] This is little more than a declamatory production, wanting +in what is most characteristic of the German mind, original research. +The "Literary History of the National Convention," [G] by E. Maron, is +devoted more to politics than to letters. + +[Footnote E: Histoire de la Litterature Francaise, depuis ses Origines +jusqu'a la Revolution. Par Eugene Gerusez. Paris: Didier et Cie. 2 vols. +8vo. pp. 488, 507.] + +[Footnote F: _Geschichte der Franzoesischen Revolutions-Literatur_, +1789-1795. Von Schmidt-Weiszenfels. Prague: Kober und Markgraf. 8vo. pp. +395.] + +[Footnote G: _Histoire Litteraire de la Convention Nationale_. Par +Eugene Maron. Paris: Poulet-Malassis et De Boise. 12mo. pp. 359.] + +To return to the volumes of M. Gerusez. It is rather a sign of poverty +in general literary history, that detached sketches, with little +connection beyond their chronological order, should have been deemed +worthy of the prize and the praises awarded to them. However, though +lacking in comprehensive views such as we have a right to expect from an +author who attempts to portray the rise, growth, and full expansion of +a literature, the work of M. Gerusez may be perused with pleasure and +profit by the student. It is clear and satisfactory in the details. +Thus, the pages devoted to the writers of the "Encyclopedie," though +few, may vie with any that have been written to set in their true light +men whose influence was so great on the generation that succeeded them. +If impartiality consisted in always steering in the _juste-milieu_, M. +Gerusez would be the most impartial of historians. As it is, we have to +thank him for a good book, regretting only that he has gone no farther. + +Far otherwise is it with M. Saint-Marc Girardin. The eloquent Sorbonne +professor has seen his fame increase with every new volume of his +"Course of Dramatic Literature." We have now the fourth volume.[H] "A +Course of Dramatic Literature";--it is more. It is the history of the +expression of Passion among the ancients and the moderns, by no means +confined to the drama. The present volume, as well as the third, +published several years ago, is devoted to the analysis of Love as +expressed in different ages and by different nations, under the two +divisions of _L'Amour Ingenu_ and _L'Amour Conjugal_. + +[Footnote H: _Cours de Litterature Dramatique._ Par Saint-Marc Girardin, +de l'Academie Francaise, Professeur a la Faculte des Lettres de Paris, +Membre du Conseil Imperial de l'Instruction Publique. Tome IV. Paris: +Charpentier.] + +The first he had studied in the authors of antiquity in his third +volume, beginning in this with the episode of Cupid and Psyche in +Apuleius; then following up, through the moderns, the expression +of Ingenuous Love in Corneille, La Fontaine, Sedaine, Bernardin de +Saint-Pierre, Milton, Gessner, Voss, Andre Chenier, and Chateaubriand. +For the last he finds more blame than praise. Indeed, this +effect-seeking writer, with all his genius, seemed less fitted than any +one to express the natural and spontaneous. His Atala, who charms us so +at the first reading, deals in studied emotions. As to Rene, his is the +vain sentimentality parading its own impotency for higher feelings, +a virtual boasting of want of soul,--the sickly dissatisfaction of +Werther, without his passion for an excuse. M. Saint-Marc Girardin then +follows up his subject through later authors, even in Madame George +Sand and in Madame Emile de Girardin. He is particularly severe upon +Lamartine, that poet "who for more than thirty years seemed best to +express love as our century understands it," but who in Raphael +and Graziella destroyed, by disclosing too much, the power of his +"Meditations Poetiques." + +On Conjugal Love the classic models are first consulted,--Oenone, +Evadne, Medea,--these characters being followed through the delineation +of modern dramatists. We know of no more exquisite criticism than +the pages devoted to Griseldis. Analyzing the accounts of Boccaccio, +Chaucer, and Perault, our author concludes with the play of "Munck +Bellinghausen." The last chapters, on "Love and Duty," are among the +most eloquently written in the volume. For style, M. Saint-Marc Girardin +is second to no living author of France. + +In this course we find an evident predilection for the models of +antiquity. When a comparison is instituted between the ancients and the +moderns, we feel pretty certain of the result before the writer has +proceeded very far. Not that we ever find a systematic idolizing of all +that is classic merely. Far from it. Modern writers are not neglected. +In this particular a genuine service is done to critical literature. It +often seems as if literary lecturers and historians were attacked by an +aesthetic presbyopy. For them the present age never produces anything +worth even a passing remark. The masterpieces they notice must be old +and time-honored. Not so in the present studies on the passions. Ponsard +finds his place side by side with older names. After an appreciative +notice of the Lucretia of Livy, we find a comment on the Lucretia which +may have been played the week before at the Theatre Francais. Nor is +it a slight service done to contemporary letters, when a master-critic +turns his thoughts to works which, if they do not hold the first rank, +yet, by the talent of their authors and the nature of their subjects, +have attracted all eyes for a time. Such are the writings of Madame +George Sand. Of these, "Andre," "La Mare au Diable," and "La Petite +Fadette" are reviewed with praise in the work under consideration, while +the force of criticism is expended on "Indiana," "Lelia," and "Jacques." + + * * * * * + +Whatever claims the academician Victor de Laprade may have to poetic +talent, he certainly sinks below mediocrity when he attempts to +discuss the principles of the art he practises. Since it has been his +good-fortune to be numbered among the illustrious Forty he has several +times attempted literary criticism, but never so extensively as in +his last work, "Questions d'Art et de Morale."[I] This is a series of +discursive essays, a few upon art in general, the greater part, however, +restricted to letters; the whole written in a poetic prose not without a +certain charm, but wearisome for continuous reading. + +[Footnote I: _Questions d'Art et de Morale._ Par Victor de Laprade, de +l'Academie Francaise. Paris: Didier et Cie. 8vo.] + +The object of M. de Laprade is to defend what he calls "Spiritualism in +Art." He wages an unrelenting war against the modern school of Realism. +It is not the representation of visible Nature that the artist must +seek; his aim must be "the representation of the invisible." He grows +eloquent when he develops his favorite theories, and always succeeds in +interesting when he applies them successively to all the arts. As to the +author's political opinions, he takes no pains to conceal them. His work +is an outcry against equality and universal suffrage. He traces the +apathy of poetic creativeness in France to the sovereignty usurped +everywhere "by the inferior elements of intelligence in the State." He +seems to think, that, as humanity grows older, art falls from its divine +ideal. Of contemporary architecture, he says that it can produce nothing +original save railroad depots and crystal palaces. "A glass architecture +is the only one that fully belongs to our age." Music, the "vaguest and +most sensuous of all the arts," he regards as the art of the present. +The religious worship of the future appears to him "a symphony with a +thousand instruments executed under a dome of glass." + +As to the purely literary essays of M. de Laprade, they may be read both +with more pleasure and more profit than those in which he attempts to +discuss the principles of aesthetics. "French Tradition in Literature," +and "Poetry, and Industrialism," are full of suggestive thoughts, and, +coming in the latter half of the volume, make us forget the pretentious +nature of the first. + + * * * * * + +M. Gustave Merlet is a more modest opponent of some of the tendencies +of the age. He presents his first book to the public under the title, +"Realisme et Fantaisie,"[J] earnestly and loyally attacking the two +extremes of literature. + +[Footnote J: _Le Realisme et la Fantaisie dans la Litterature_. Par +Gustave Merlet. Paris: Didier et Cie. 12mo. pp. 431.] + +Two styles of writing, diametrically opposed in every particular, have +of late years flourished in the lighter productions of France. Some +there are who would seek to incarnate in letters Nature as it is, +without adornings, without ideal additions. The cry of the upholders +of this doctrine is: Truth in art, war against the freaks of the +imagination that colors all in unreal tints. The writers who have +adopted such sentiments have been termed "Realists," much to their +dissatisfaction. Balzac was the greatest of them. Champfleury may be +called the most strenuous supporter of the system. There is a certain +force, a false air of truth, in this daguerreotype process of writing, +that seduces at first sight. When a man of some genius, as Gustave +Flaubert in "Madame Bovary," undertakes to paint Nature, he sets details +otherwise revolting in such relief that the very novelty and boldness of +the attempt put us off our guard, and we are in danger of admitting as +beauties what, after all, are only audacities. + +The other extreme into which the literature of the day in France has +fallen is an excess of fancy. A writer like Arsene Houssaye will write +his "King Voltaire" or his "Madame de Pompadour," or Capefigue his +"Madame de la Valliere," in which the judgment seems to have been +set aside, and historical facts accumulated in some opium-dream are +strangely woven into a narrative representing reality, with about as +much truth as Oriental arabesques, or the adornings of richly wrought +tapestry. This extreme is even more dangerous than the former, for it +makes of letters a mere plaything, and recommends itself to many by its +very faults. Paradox and overdrawn scenes usurp the place of the real. +The world presented by the exclusive worshippers of fancy is +little better than that "Pompadour" style of painting in which the +carnation-tipped checks of shepherds and shepherdesses take the place of +a too healthy Rubens-like portraiture. There are dainty, well-trimmed +lambs, with pretty blue favors tied about their necks, just like +_dragees_ and _bonbons_. As we wander among those opera-swains in silk +hose and those shepherdesses in satin bodices, their perfumes tire +and nauseate, till we fairly wish for a good breeze wafted from some +farm-yard, reconciled in a measure to the extravagances of the so-called +"school of Nature." + +M. Merlet's subject, it may be seen, is of interest merely to the +student of the latest French literature. A more comprehensive study +would not have been out of place in his volume. To those who may be +interested in writers like Murger, Feydeau, Houssaye, and Brifaut, the +book is full of interesting matter. To the general reader it may be of +value as characterizing with fidelity some of the tendencies of French +thought. + + * * * * * + +We must not omit mentioning a work published in Germany on the +"Literature of the Second Empire since the _Coup d'Etat_ of the Second +of December, 1852."[K] The nature of this sketch could almost be +predicated with certainty from the state of feeling towards France in +the capital in which it was issued, and the encomiums it received from +the Prussian political press. The author, William Reymond, who has +proved himself no mean critic in some of his former essays upon the +modern productions of France, addresses himself almost exclusively to a +German public. His work, as he himself seemed to fear, is not calculated +for the taste of Paris, even if it were considered unobjectionable there +on the score of the political strictures that are introduced, whether in +the discussion of the last play or in the analysis of the last volume of +poems. + +[Footnote K: _Etudes sur la Litterature du Second Empire Francais, +depuis le Coup d'Etat du deux Decembre._ Par William Reymond. Berlin: A. +Charisius. 12mo. pp. 227.] + +The truth is, M. Reymond, with much apparent praise, very nearly comes +to the conclusion that the second Empire has no literature, and very +little philosophy is granted to it in the chapter, "What remains of +Philosophy in France." The Novel and the Theatre fare little better at +his hands. He has literally made a police investigation of what is most +objectionable in French letters, citing now and then some great name, +but dwelling with complacency on what is deserving of censure. The +influence of France, and of Paris in particular, on the tastes of the +Continent, irritates him. He seeks to impress upon his readers the +venality of letters and the general debasement of character and of +talent that are prevalent in that capital. Such is the spirit of these +"Etudes." The author has, unfortunately, not to seek far for a practical +corroboration of his theory, though it is but justice to say that the +verses he quotes as characteristic are far from being so. It is to be +feared that M. Reymond has rather sought out the blemishes. He has found +many, we admit. His readers will thank him for his clever exposition of +them, satisfied in many cases to accept the results he presents, without +feeling inclined to make such a personal investigation into the lower +regions of letters. + + * * * * * + +"The Political and Literary History of the Press in France,"[L] by +Eugene Hatin, is now concluded. As early as 1846, this author published +a small work, "Histoire du Journal en France." Since that time he has +devoted himself exclusively to the study of French journalism. Though +liberal in his views, he is not in favor of unlimited liberty of the +press. He believes it to be the interest of society that a curb should +be put on its excesses. "What we must hope for is a liberty that may +have full power for good, but not for evil." + +[Footnote L: _Histoire Politique et Litteraire de la Presse en France._ +Avec une Introduction Historique sur les Origines du Journal et la +Bibliographie Generale des Journaux, depuis leur Origine. Par Eugene +Hatin. Paris: Poulet-Malassis et De Boise. 8 vols. 12mo.] + +The two volumes published in 1861 contain the history of journalism +during the latter part of the French Revolution, under the first Empire, +the Restoration, and the Government of July. The work may be said to +conclude with 1848, as less than twenty pages are devoted to the twelve +years following. In this, however, the writer has done all he could be +expected to do. This is no time for the candid historian to utter his +thoughts of the present _regime_ in France. Since the fatal decree of +the 17th of February, 1852, the press has had only so much of life as +the present sovereign has thought fit to grant it. Then it was that a +representative of the people uttered the words,--"We must overthrow the +press, as we have overthrown the barricades." Such were the sentiments +of the National Assembly,--not understanding, that, when it struck at +such an ally, it destroyed itself. And, indeed, it was but a short time +before the tribune shared the fate of journalism. Better things had been +hoped on the accession of the present Minister of the Interior, but as +yet they have not been realized. + + + + +RECENT AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS + +RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS OF THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + + +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 of the U.S. +Army. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & Brothers. 16mo. paper, pp. 63. 25 +cts. + +The Artist's Married Life; being that of Albert Duerer. Translated from +the German of Leopold Scheffer, by Mrs. J.R. Stoddart. Revised Edition, +with Memoir. Boston and Cambridge. J. Munroe & Co. 16mo. pp. xxviii., +204. $1.00. + +Young Benjamin Franklin; or, The Right Road through Life. A Boy's Book +on a Boy's Own Subject. By Henry Mayhew, Author of "The Peasant-Boy +Philosopher," etc. With Illustrations by John Gilbert. New York. Harper +& Brothers. 16mo. pp. 561. $1.00. + +The Stokesley Secret; or, How the Pig paid the Rent. By the Author of +"The Heir of Redclyffe," etc. New York. D. Appleton & Co. 18mo. pp. 245. +50 cts. + +Chinese and Indo-European Roots and Analogues. First Number. By Pliny +Earle Chase, A.M. Philadelphia. Butler & Co. 8vo. paper, pp. 48. 50 cts. + +The Works of Charles Dickens. Household Edition. Illustrated from +Drawings by F.O.C. Darley and John Gilbert. Christmas Stories. In Two +Volumes. New York. J.G. Gregory. 16mo. pp. 300, 300. $1.50. + +Hickory Hall; or, The Outcast. A Romance of the Blue Ridge. By Mrs. Emma +D.E.N. Southworth. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & Brothers. 8vo. paper, +pp. 136. 50 cts. + +Alleghania: A Geographical and Statistical Memoir, exhibiting the +Strength of the Union and the Weakness of Slavery in the Mountain +Districts of the South. By James W. Taylor. St. Paul. J. Davenport. 8vo. +paper, pp. 24. 10 cts. + +A Treatise on Ordnance and Naval Gunnery. Compiled and arranged as a +Text-Book for the U.S. Naval Academy. By Lieutenant Edward Simpson, U.S. +Navy. Second Edition, revised and enlarged. New York. D. Van Nostrand. +8vo. pp. 493. $4.00. + +The Constitutional History of England, since the Accession of George the +Third. 1760-1860. By Thomas Erskine May, C.B. In Two Volumes. Vol. I. +Boston. Crosby & Nichols. 12mo. pp. 484. $1.25. + +Dinah. New York. C. Scribner. 12mo. pp. 466. $1.25. + +Tom Tiddler's Ground. Christmas and New-Year's Story for 1862. From +"All the Year Round." By Charles Dickens. Philadelphia. T.B. Peterson & +Brothers. 8vo. paper. pp. 64. 25 cts. + +A Pedestrian Tour of Thirty-Seven Days in the Alps of Switzerland and +Savoy. By Charles Henry Jones. Reading, Pa. J.L. Getz. 18mo. paper. pp. +118. 25 cts. + +Practical Christianity. A Treatise specially designed for Young Men. By +John S.C. Abbott. New York. Harper & Brothers. 16mo. pp. 302. 50 cts. + +The Sutherlands. By the Author of "Rutledge." New York. G.W. Carleton. +12mo. pp. 474. $1.25. + +Memoir of the Duchess of Orleans. By the Marquess de H. Together with +Biographical Souvenirs and Original Letters. Collected by Professor G.H. +de Schubert. Translated from, the French. Second Edition. New York. C. +Scribner. 12mo. pp. 391. $1.00. + +The Uprising of a Great People. The United States in 1861. To which is +added, A Word of Peace on the Difference between England and the United +States. From the French of Count Agenor de Gasparin. By Mary L. Booth. +New American Edition, from the Author's Revised Edition. New York. C. +Scribner. 12mo. pp. xiv., 298. 75 cts. + +Fort Lafayette; or, Love and Secession. A Novel. By Benjamin Wood. New +York. G.W. Carleton. 12mo. pp. 300. $1.00. + +The National School for the Soldier. An Elementary Work on Military +Tactics, in Question and Answer. Conforming to the Army-Regulations +adopted and approved by the War Department of the United States. By +Captain W.W. Van Ness. New York. G.W. Carleton. 24mo. pp. 75. 50 cts. + +The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus under the Constitution. By +Horace Binney. Philadelphia. T.B. Pugh. 16mo. pp. 52. 25 cts. + +The Army-Officer's Pocket-Companion; principally designed for +Staff-Officers in the Field. Partly translated from the French of M. de +Rouvre, Lieutenant-Colonel of the French Staff-Corps; with Additions +from Standard American, English, and French Authorities. By William P. +Craighill, First Lieutenant U.S. Corps of Engineers, Assistant Professor +of Engineering at the U.S. Military Academy. New York. D. Van Nostrand. +18mo. pp. 314. $1.50. + +Saint Gildas; or, The Three Paths. By Julia Kavanagh, Author of +"Nathalie," etc. Concord, N.H. E.C. Eastman. 16mo. pp. 219. 63 cts. + +Infantry Tactics, for the Instruction, Exercise, and Manoeuvres of the +Soldier, a Company, Line of Skirmishers, Battalion, Brigade, or Corps +d'Armee. By Brigadier-General Silas Casey, U.S. Army. In Three Volumes. +New York. D. Van Nostrand. 18mo. pp. 279, 272, 183. $2.50. + +A Text-Book of the History of Doctrines. By Dr. K.R. Hagenbach, +Professor of Theology in the University of Basle. The Edinburgh +Translation of C.W. Buch, revised, with Large Additions from the Fourth +German Edition, and other Sources. By Henry B. Smith, D.D., Professor in +the Union Theological Seminary of the City of New York. Volume II. New +York. Sheldon & Co. 8vo. pp. 558. $2.50. + +The True Story of the Barons of the South; or, The Rationale of the +American Conflict. By E.W. Reynolds, Author of "The Records of Bubbleton +Parish," etc. Boston. Walker, Wise, & Co. 16mo. pp. xii., 240. 75 cts. + +Charles O'Malley, the Irish Dragoon. By Charles Lever. Philadelphia. +T.B. Peterson & Brothers. 8vo. paper, pp. 324. 50 cts. + +The Flower of the Prairie. By Gustave Aimard. Philadelphia. T.B. +Peterson & Brothers. 8vo. paper, pp. 165. 50 cts. + +Mistakes of Educated Men. By John S. Hart, LL.D. Philadelphia. J.C. +Garrigues. 16mo. paper, pp. 77. 25 cts. + +A Strange Story. A Novel. By Sir E. Bulwer Lytton, Author of "The +Caxtons." With Illustrations. New York. Harper & Brothers. 8vo. paper, +pp. 195. 25 cts. + +Teach Us to Pray; being Experimental, Doctrinal, and Practical +Observations on the Lord's Prayer. By the Rev. John Cumming, D.D., +F.R.S.E., Author of "The Great Tribulation," etc. New York. G.W. +Carleton. 12mo. pp. 303. $1.00. + +The Law of Freedom and Bondage in the United States. By John Codman +Kurd, Counsellor-at-Law. In Two Volumes. Vol. II. Boston. Little, Brown, +& Co. New York. D. Van Nostrand. 8vo. pp. xliv., 800. $3.50. + +The Young Step-Mother; or, A Chronicle of Mistakes. By the Author of +"The Heir of Redclyffe," "Heartsease," etc. In Two Volumes. New York. D. +Appleton & Co. 16mo. pp. 294, 307. $1.50. + +A Primary Geography, on the Basis of the Object Method of Instruction. +Illustrated with Numerous Engravings and Pictorial Maps. By Fordyce A. +Allen, Principal of the Chester-County Normal School, West Chester, Pa. +Philadelphia. Lippincott & Co. 4to. pp. 56. 50 cts. + +Report of the Superintendent of Common Schools of Pennsylvania, for the +Year ending June 3, 1861. Harrisburg. Printed for the State. 8vo. pp. +254. + +The Works of Francis Bacon, Baron of Verulam, Viscount St. Albans, and +Lord High Chancellor of England. Collected and Edited by James Spedding, +M.A., of Trinity College, Cambridge; Robert Leslie Ellis, M.A., +late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge; and Douglas Denon Heath, +Barrister-at-Law, late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. Vol. III. +Boston. Brown & Taggard. 12mo. pp. 502. $1.50. + +The Spirit of the Hebrew Poetry. By Isaac Taylor, Author of "Saturday +Evening," etc., etc. With a Biographical Introduction by Wm. Adams, +D.D., Pastor of the Madison-Square Presbyterian Church, N.Y. New York. +G.W. Carleton. 8vo. pp. 386. + +Ethical and Physiological Inquiries, chiefly Relative to Subjects of +Popular Interest. By A.H. Dana. New York. C. Scribner. 12mo. pp. 308. +$1.00. + +The New American Cyclopaedia: A Popular Dictionary of General Knowledge. +Edited by George Ripley and Charles A. Dana. Volume XIV. Reed-Spire. New +York. D. Appleton & Co. 8vo. pp. 850, viii. $3.00. + +Tracts for Priests and People. By Various Writers. Boston. Walker, Wise, +& Co. 12mo. pp. 372. $1.00. + +Method of Teachers' Institutes, and the Theory of Education. By +Samuel P. Bates. A.M., Deputy-Superintendent of the Common Schools of +Pennsylvania, and Author of "Institute Lectures." New York. Barnes & +Burr. 8vo. pp. 75. 50 cts. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 54, +April, 1862, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY *** + +***** This file should be named 12097.txt or 12097.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/2/0/9/12097/ + +Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Tonya Allen and PG Distributed +Proofreaders. Produced from page scans provided by Cornell University. + + +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. + + https://www.gutenberg.org/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 + + diff --git a/old/12097.zip b/old/12097.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..418f86d --- /dev/null +++ b/old/12097.zip |