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diff --git a/12369-h/12369-h.htm b/12369-h/12369-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..bff22f4 --- /dev/null +++ b/12369-h/12369-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,22867 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1, by Charles Dudley Warner</title> + <style type="text/css"> + + P { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + BODY{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + .blkquot {margin-left: 4em; margin-right: 4em;} /* block indent */ + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem p {margin: 0; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem p.i1 {margin-left: 1em;} + .poem p.i2 {margin-left: 2em;} + .poem p.i3 {margin-left: 3em;} + .poem p.i4 {margin-left: 4em;} + .poem p.i6 {margin-left: 6em;} + .poem p.i7 {margin-left: 7em;} + + blockquote {text-align: justify; + margin-left: 15%; + margin-right: 15%;} + IMG { + BORDER-RIGHT: 0px; + BORDER-TOP: 0px; + BORDER-LEFT: 0px; + BORDER-BOTTOM: 0px } + .ctr { TEXT-ALIGN: center } + .rgt { float: right; + margin-top: 0em; + margin-bottom: 0em; + margin-left: -5%; + margin-right: 0%; + TEXT-ALIGN: center } + .lft { float: left; + margin-top: 0em; + margin-bottom: 0em; + margin-left: 5%; + margin-right: 0%; + TEXT-ALIGN: center } + .par { float: left; + margin-top: -1em; + margin-bottom: 0em; + margin-left: -6%; + margin-right: -12%; + TEXT-ALIGN: center } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; } + HR { width: 33%; } + hr.full { width: 100%; + height: 5px; } + a:link {color:blue; + text-decoration:none} + link {color:blue; + text-decoration:none} + a:visited {color:blue; + text-decoration:none} + a:hover {color:red} + pre {font-size: 9pt;} + + </style> +</head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12369 ***</div> +<h1>The Project Gutenberg eBook, Library of the World's Best Literature, +Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1, Edited by Charles Dudley Warner</h1> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<hr class="full" noshade> +<br> +<br> +<h2>LIBRARY OF THE</h2> + +<h1>WORLD'S BEST LITERATURE</h1> + +<h3>ANCIENT AND MODERN</h3> + +<h3>VOL. I.</h3> + + + + +<br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br> +<h2>CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER</h2> + +<h4>EDITOR</h4> + +<br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br> +<h3>HAMILTON WRIGHT MABIE<br> +LUCIA GILBERT RUNKLE<br> +GEORGE HENRY WARNER</h3> + +<h4>ASSOCIATE EDITORS</h4> + +<br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3>Connoisseur Edition</h3> + +<br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2>PREFACE</h2> +<br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-t.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>he plan of this Work is simple, and yet it is novel. In its distinctive +features it differs from any compilation that has yet +been made. Its main purpose is to present to American +households a mass of good reading. But it goes much beyond this. +For in selecting this reading it draws upon all literatures of all time +and of every race, and thus becomes a conspectus of the thought +and intellectual evolution of man from the beginning. Another and +scarcely less important purpose is the interpretation of this literature +in essays by scholars and authors competent to speak with authority.</p> + +<p>The title, "A Library of the World's Best Literature," is strictly +descriptive. It means that what is offered to the reader is taken from +the best authors, and is fairly representative of the best literature +and of all literatures. It may be important historically, or because +at one time it expressed the thought and feeling of a nation, or +because it has the character of universality, or because the readers +of to-day will find it instructive, entertaining, or amusing. The +Work aims to suit a great variety of tastes, and thus to commend +itself as a household companion for any mood and any hour. There +is no intention of presenting merely a mass of historical material, +however important it is in its place, which is commonly of the sort +that people recommend others to read and do not read themselves. +It is not a library of reference only, but a library to be read. The +selections do not represent the partialities and prejudices and cultivation +of any one person, or of a group of editors even; but, under +the necessary editorial supervision, the sober judgment of almost as +many minds as have assisted in the preparation of these volumes. +By this method, breadth of appreciation has been sought.</p> + +<p>The arrangement is not chronological, but alphabetical, under the +names of the authors, and, in some cases, of literatures and special +subjects. Thus, in each volume a certain variety is secured, the +heaviness or sameness of a mass of antique, classical, or mediaeval +material is avoided, and the reader obtains a sense of the varieties +and contrasts of different periods. But the work is not an encyclopaedia, +or merely a dictionary of authors. Comprehensive information +as to all writers of importance may be included in a supplementary +reference volume; but the attempt to quote from all would destroy +the Work for reading purposes, and reduce it to a herbarium of +specimens.</p> + +<p>In order to present a view of the entire literary field, and to make +these volumes especially useful to persons who have not access to +large libraries, as well as to treat certain literatures or subjects when +the names of writers are unknown or would have no significance to +the reader, it has been found necessary to make groups of certain +nationalities, periods, and special topics. For instance, if the reader +would like to know something of ancient and remote literatures +which cannot well be treated under the alphabetical list of authors, he +will find special essays by competent scholars on the Accadian-Babylonian +literature, on the Egyptian, the Hindu, the Chinese, the +Japanese, the Icelandic, the Celtic, and others, followed by selections +many of which have been specially translated for this Work. In +these literatures names of ascertained authors are given in the Index. +The intention of the essays is to acquaint the reader with the spirit, +purpose, and tendency of these writings, in order that he may have +a comparative view of the continuity of thought and the value of +tradition in the world. Some subjects, like the Arthurian Legends, +the Nibelungen Lied, the Holy Grail, Provençal Poetry, the Chansons +and Romances, and the Gesta Romanorum, receive a similar treatment. +Single poems upon which the authors' title to fame mainly +rests, familiar and dear hymns, and occasional and modern verse of +value, are also grouped together under an appropriate heading, with +reference in the Index whenever the poet is known.</p> + +<p>It will thus be evident to the reader that the Library is fairly +comprehensive and representative, and that it has an educational +value, while offering constant and varied entertainment. This comprehensive +feature, which gives the Work distinction, is, however, +supplemented by another of scarcely less importance; namely, the +critical interpretive and biographical comments upon the authors and +their writings and their place in literature, not by one mind, or by a +small editorial staff, but by a great number of writers and scholars, +specialists and literary critics, who are able to speak from knowledge +and with authority. Thus the Library becomes in a way representative +of the scholarship and wide judgment of our own time. But the +essays have another value. They give information for the guidance +of the reader. If he becomes interested in any selections here given, +and would like a fuller knowledge of the author's works, he can turn +to the essay and find brief observations and characterizations which +will assist him in making his choice of books from a library.</p> + +<p>The selections are made for household and general reading; in the +belief that the best literature contains enough that is pure and elevating +and at the same time readable, to satisfy any taste that should +be encouraged. Of course selection implies choice and exclusion. +It is hoped that what is given will be generally approved; yet it +may well happen that some readers will miss the names of authors +whom they desire to read. But this Work, like every other, has its +necessary limits; and in a general compilation the classic writings, +and those productions that the world has set its seal on as among +the best, must predominate over contemporary literature that is still +on its trial. It should be said, however, that many writers of present +note and popularity are omitted simply for lack of space. The +editors are compelled to keep constantly in view the wider field. +The general purpose is to give only literature; and where authors +are cited who are generally known as philosophers, theologians, publicists, +or scientists, it is because they have distinct literary quality, +or because their influence upon literature itself has been so profound +that the progress of the race could not be accounted for without +them.</p> + +<p>These volumes contain not only or mainly the literature of the +past, but they aim to give, within the limits imposed by such a +view, an idea of contemporary achievement and tendencies in all +civilized countries. In this view of the modern world the literary +product of America and Great Britain occupies the largest space.</p> + +<p>It should be said that the plan of this Work could not have been +carried out without the assistance of specialists in many departments +of learning, and of writers of skill and insight, both in this country +and in Europe. This assistance has been most cordially given, with +a full recognition of the value of the enterprise and of the aid that +the Library may give in encouraging and broadening literary tastes. +Perhaps no better service could be rendered the American public at +this period than the offer of an opportunity for a comprehensive +study of the older and the greater literatures of other nations. By +this comparison it can gain a just view of its own literature, and of +its possible mission in the world of letters.</p> + +<p class="rgt"><img src="images/006.png" width="60%" alt=""></p><br><br> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2>THE ADVISORY COUNCIL</h2> +<br> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p>CRAWFORD H. TOY, A.M., LL.D.,</p> +<p class="i2">Professor of Hebrew,</p> +<p class="i2">HARVARD UNIVERSITY, Cambridge, Mass.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>THOMAS R. LOUNSBURY, LL.D., L.H.D.,</p> +<p class="i2">Professor of English in the Sheffield Scientific School of</p> +<p class="i2">YALE UNIVERSITY, New Haven, Conn.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>WILLIAM M. SLOANE, PH.D., L.H.D.,</p> +<p class="i2">Professor of History and Political Science,</p> +<p class="i2">PRINCETON UNIVERSITY, Princeton, N.J.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>BRANDER MATTHEWS, A.M., LL.B.,</p> +<p class="i2">Professor of Literature,</p> +<p class="i2">COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, New York City.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>JAMES B. ANGELL, LL.D.,</p> +<p class="i2">President of the</p> +<p class="i2">UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN, Ann Arbor, Mich.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>WILLARD FISKE, A.M., PH.D.,</p> +<p class="i2">Late Professor of the Germanic and Scandinavian Languages +and Literatures,</p> +<p class="i2">CORNELL UNIVERSITY, Ithaca, N.Y.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>EDWARD S. HOLDEN, A.M., LL.D.,</p> +<p class="i2">Director of the Lick Observatory, and Astronomer</p> +<p class="i2">UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, Berkeley, Cal.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>ALCÉE FORTIER, LIT.D.,</p> +<p class="i2">Professor of the Romance Languages,</p> +<p class="i2">TULANE UNIVERSITY, New Orleans, La.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>WILLIAM P. TRENT, M.A.,</p> +<p class="i2">Dean of the Department of Arts and Sciences, and Professor of +English and History,</p> +<p class="i2">UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH, Sewanee, Tenn.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>PAUL SHOREY, PH.D.,</p> +<p class="i2">Professor of Greek and Latin Literature,</p> +<p class="i2">UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, Chicago, Ill.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>WILLIAM T. HARRIS, LL.D.,</p> +<p class="i2">United States Commissioner of Education,</p> +<p class="i2">BUREAU OF EDUCATION, Washington, D.C.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN, A.M., LL.D.,</p> +<p class="i2">Professor of Literature in the</p> +<p class="i2">CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA, Washington, D.C.</p> +</div></div> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2>NOTE OF ACKNOWLEDGMENT</h2> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-o.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>wing to the many changes in the assignment of topics and +engaging of writers incident to so extended a publication +as the Library of the World's Best Literature, the Editor +finds it impossible, before the completion of the work, adequately +to recognize the very great aid which he has received from a large +number of persons. A full list of contributors will be given in one +of the concluding volumes. He will expressly acknowledge also his +debt to those who have assisted him editorially, or in other special +ways, in the preparation of these volumes.</p> + +<p>Both Editor and Publishers have endeavored to give full credit to +every author quoted, and to accompany every citation with ample +notice of copyright ownership. At the close of the work it is their +purpose to express in a more formal way their sense of obligation to +the many publishers who have so courteously given permission for +this use of their property, and whose rights of ownership it is intended +thoroughly to protect.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2>TABLE OF CONTENTS</h2> +<br> + +<h3>VOL. I</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#ABELARD">ABÉLARD AND HÉLOISE</a> (by Thomas Davidson) -- 1079-1142</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#HELOISE_TO_ABELARD">Letter of Héloise to Abélard</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#ABELARDSANSWERTOHELOISE">Abélard's Answer to Héloise</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_VESPER_HYMN_OF_ABELARD">Vesper Hymn of Abélard</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#EDMOND_ABOUT">EDMOND ABOUT</a> -- 1828-1885</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_CAPTURE">The Capture</a> ('The King of the Mountains')</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#HADGI-STAVROS">Hadgi-Stavros</a> (same)</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_VICTIM">The Victim</a> ('The Man with the Broken Ear')</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_MAN_WITHOUT_A_COUNTRY">The Man without a Country</a> (same)</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#ACCADIAN-BABYLONIAN_AND_ASSYRIAN_LITERATURE">ACCADIAN-BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN LITERATURE</a> (by Crawford H. Toy)</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#I._THEOGONY">Theogony</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#II._REVOLT_OF_TIAMAT">Revolt of Tiamat</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#III._FRAGMENTS_OF_A_DESCENT_TO_THE_UNDERWORLD">Descent to the Underworld</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#IV._THE_FLOOD">The Flood</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#V._THE_EAGLE_AND_THE_SNAKE">The Eagle and the Snake</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#VI._THE_FLIGHT_OF_ETANA">The Flight of Etana</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#VII._THE_GOD_ZU">The God Zu</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#VIII._ADAPA_AND_THE_SOUTHWIND">Adapa and the Southwind</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#IX._PENITENTIAL_PSALMS">Penitential Psalms</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#X._INSCRIPTION_OF_SENNACHERIB">Inscription of Sennacherib</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#XI._INVOCATION_TO_THE_GODDESS_BELTIS">Invocation to the Goddess Beltis</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#XII._ORACLES_OF_ISHTAR_OF_ARBELA">Oracles of Ishtar of Arbela</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#XIIIANERECHITESLAMENT">An Erechite's Lament</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#ABIGAIL_ADAMS">ABIGAIL ADAMS</a> (by Lucia Gilbert Runkle) -- 1744-1818</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#TO_HER_HUSBAND">Letters--To her Husband:</a></p> +<p class="i4"> + <a href="#HUSBAND1">May 24, 1775</a>; + <a href="#HUSBAND2">June 15, 1775</a>; + <a href="#HUSBAND3">June 18, 1775</a>;</p> +<p class="i4"> + <a href="#HUSBAND4">Nov. 27, 1775</a>; + <a href="#HUSBAND5">April 20, 1777</a>; + <a href="#HUSBAND6">June 8, 1779</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#TO_HER_SISTER">To her Sister:</a></p> +<p class="i4"> + <a href="#SISTER1">Sept. 5, 1784</a>; + <a href="#SISTER2">May 10, 1785</a>;</p> +<p class="i4"> + <a href="#SISTER3">July 24, 1784</a>; + <a href="#SISTER4">June 24, 1785</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#to_her_niece">To her Niece</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#HENRY_ADAMS">HENRY ADAMS</a> -- 1838-</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_AUSPICES_OF_THE_WAR_OF_1812">Auspices of the War of 1812</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#WHAT_THE_WAR_OF_1812_DEMONSTRATED">What the War of 1812 Demonstrated</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_BATTLE_BETWEEN_THE_CONSTITUTION_AND_THE_GUERRIERE">Battle between the Constitution and the Guerrière</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#JOHN_ADAMS">JOHN ADAMS</a> -- 1735-1826</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AT_THE_FRENCH_COURT">At the French Court ('Diary')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_CHARACTER_OF_FRANKLIN">Character of Franklin (Letter to the Boston Patriot)</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#JOHN_QUINCY_ADAMS">JOHN QUINCY ADAMS</a> -- 1767-1848</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#LETTER_TO_HIS_FATHER">Letter to his Father, at the Age of Ten</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#FROM_THE_MEMOIRS">From the Memoirs, at the Age of Eighteen</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#FROM_THE_MEMOIRS_2">From the Memoirs, Jan. 14, 1831</a>; <a href="#FROM_THE_MEMOIRS_3">June 7, 1833</a>; <a href="#FROM_THE_MEMOIRS_4">Sept. 9, 1833</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_MISSION_OF_AMERICA">The Mission of America (Fourth of July Oration, 1821)</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_RIGHT_OF_PETITION">The Right of Petition (Speech in Congress)</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#NULLIFICATION">Nullification (Fourth of July Oration, 1831)</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#SARAH_FLOWER_ADAMS">SARAH FLOWER ADAMS</a> -- 1805-1848</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#HESENDETHSUNHESENDETHSHOWER">He Sendeth Sun, He Sendeth Shower</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#NEARERMYGODTOTHEE">Nearer, My God, to Thee</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#JOSEPH_ADDISON">JOSEPH ADDISON</a> (by Hamilton Wright Mabie) -- 1672-1720</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#SIR_ROGER_DE_COVERLEY_AT_THE_PLAY">Sir Roger de Coverley at the Play</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#A_VISIT_TO_SIR_ROGER_DE_COVERLEY">Visit to Sir Roger de Coverley</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_VANITY_OF_HUMAN_LIFE">Vanity of Human Life</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AN_ESSAY_ON_FANS">Essay on Fans</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#HYMN">Hymn, 'The Spacious Firmament'</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#AELIANUS_CLAUDIUS">AELIANUS CLAUDIUS</a> -- Second Century</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AELIANUS1">Of Certain Notable Men that made themselves Playfellowes with Children</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AELIANUS2">Of a Certaine Sicilian whose Eyesight was Woonderfull Sharpe and Quick</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AELIANUS3">The Lawe of the Lacedaemonians against Covetousness</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AELIANUS4">That Sleep is the Brother of Death, and of Gorgias drawing to his End</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AELIANUS5">Of the Voluntary and Willing Death of Calanus</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AELIANUS6">Of Delicate Dinners, Sumptuous Suppers, and Prodigall Banqueting</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AELIANUS7">Of Bestowing Time, and how Walking Up and Downe was not Allowable among the Lacedaemonians</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AELIANUS8">How Socrates Suppressed the Pryde and Hautinesse of Alcibiades</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AELIANUS9">Of Certaine Wastgoodes and Spendthriftes</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#AESCHINES">AESCHINES</a> -- B.C. 389-314</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#A_DEFENSE_AND_AN_ATTACK">A Defense and an Attack ('Oration against Ctesiphon')</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#AESCHYLUS">AESCHYLUS</a> (by John Williams White) -- B.C. 525-456</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_COMPLAINT_OF_PROMETHEUS">Complaint of Prometheus ('Prometheus')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#A_PRAYER_TO_ARTEMIS">Prayer to Artemis ('The Suppliants')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_DEFIANCE_OF_ETEOCLES">Defiance of Eteocles ('The Seven against Thebes')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_VISION_OF_CASSANDRA">Vision of Cassandra ('Agamemnon')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_LAMENT_OF_THE_OLD_NURSE">Lament of the Old Nurse ('The Libation-Pourers')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_DECREE_OF_ATHENA">Decree of Athena ('The Eumenides')</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#AESOP">AESOP</a> (by Harry Thurston Peck) -- Seventh Century B.C.</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_FOX_AND_THE_LION">The Fox and the Lion</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THEASSINTHELIONSSKIN">The Ass in the Lion's Skin</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_ASS_EATING_THISTLES">The Ass Eating Thistles</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_WOLF_IN_SHEEPS_CLOTHING">The Wolf in Sheep's Clothing</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_COUNTRYMAN_AND_THE_SNAKE">The Countryman and the Snake</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_BELLY_AND_THE_MEMBERS">The Belly and the Members</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_SATYR_AND_THE_TRAVELER">The Satyr and the Traveler</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_LION_AND_THE_OTHER_BEASTS">The Lion and the other Beasts</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_ASS_AND_THE_LITTLE_DOG">The Ass and the Little Dog</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_COUNTRY_MOUSE_AND_THE_CITY_MOUSE">The Country Mouse and the City Mouse</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_DOG_AND_THE_WOLF">The Dog and the Wolf</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#JEAN_LOUIS_RODOLPHE_AGASSIZ">JEAN LOUIS RODOLPHE AGASSIZ</a> -- 1807-1873</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_SILURIAN_BEACH">The Silurian Beach ('Geological Sketches')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#VOICES">Voices ('Methods of Study in Natural History')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#FORMATION_OF_CORAL_REEFS">Formation of Coral Reefs (same)</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#AGATHIAS">AGATHIAS</a> -- A.D. 536-581</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#ON_PLUTARCH">Apostrophe to Plutarch</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#GRACE_AGUILAR">GRACE AGUILAR</a> -- 1816-1847</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_GREATNESS_OF_FRIENDSHIP">Greatness of Friendship ('Woman's Friendship')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_ORDER_OF_KNIGHTHOOD">Order of Knighthood ('The Days of Bruce')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_CULPRIT_AND_THE_JUDGE">Culprit and Judge ('Home Influence')</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#WILLIAM_HARRISON_AINSWORTH">WILLIAM HARRISON AINSWORTH</a> -- 1805-1882</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_STUDENTS_OF_PARIS">Students of Paris ('Crichton')</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#MARK_AKENSIDE">MARK AKENSIDE</a> -- 1721-1770</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#FROM_THE_EPISTLE_TO_CURIO">From the Epistle to Curio</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#ASPIRATIONS_AFTER_THE_INFINITE">Aspirations after the Infinite ('Pleasures of the Imagination')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#ON_A_SERMON_AGAINST_GLORY">On a Sermon against Glory</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#PEDRO_ANTONIO_DE_ALARCON">PEDRO ANTONIO DE ALARCÓN</a> -- 1833-1891</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#A_WOMAN_VIEWED_FROM_WITHOUT">A Woman Viewed from Without ('The Three-Cornered Hat')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#HOW_THE_ORPHAN_MANUEL_GAINED_HIS_SOBRIQUET">How the Orphan Manuel gained his Sobriquet ('The Child of the Ball')</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#ALCAEUS">ALCAEUS</a> -- Sixth Century B.C.</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_PALACE">The Palace</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#A_BANQUET_SONG">A Banquet Song</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AN_INVITATION">An Invitation</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_STORM">The Storm</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_POOR_FISHERMAN">The Poor Fisherman</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_STATE">The State</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#POVERTY">Poverty</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#BALTAZAR_DE_ALCAZAR">BALTÁZAR DE ALCÁZAR</a> -- 1530?-1606</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#SLEEP">Sleep</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_JOVIAL_SUPPER">The Jovial Supper</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#ALCIPHRON">ALCIPHRON</a> (by Harry Thurston Peck) -- Second Century</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#FROM_A_MERCENARY_GIRL">From a Mercenary Girl--Petala to Simalion</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_PLEASURES_OF_ATHENS">Pleasures of Athens--Euthydicus to Epiphanio</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#FROM_AN_ANXIOUS_MOTHER">From an Anxious Mother--Phyllis to Thrasonides</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#FROM_A_CURIOUS_YOUTH">From a Curious Youth--Philocomus to Thestylus</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#FROM_A_PROFESSIONAL_DINER-OUT">From a Professional Diner-out--Capnosphrantes to Aristomachus</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#UNLUCKY_LUCK">Unlucky Luck--Chytrolictes to Patellocharon</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#ALCMAN">ALCMAN</a> -- Seventh Century B.C.</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#NIGHT">Poem on Night</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#LOUISA_MAY_ALCOTT">LOUISA MAY ALCOTT</a> -- 1832-1888</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_NIGHT_WARD">The Night Ward ('Hospital Sketches')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AMYS_VALLEY_OF_HUMILIATION">Amy's Valley of Humiliation ('Little Women')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THOREAUS_FLUTE">Thoreau's Flute (Atlantic Monthly)</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#A_SONG_FROM_THE_SUDS">Song from the Suds ('Little Women')</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#ALCUIN">ALCUIN</a> (by William H. Carpenter) -- 735?-8o4</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#ON_THE_SAINTS_OF_THE_CHURCH_AT_YORK">On the Saints of the Church at York ('Alcuin and the Rise of the Christian Schools')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#DisputationBetweenPepinTheMostNobleandRoyal">Disputation between Pepin, the Most Noble and Royal Youth, and Albinus the Scholastic</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#A_LETTER_FROM_ALCUIN_TO_CHARLEMAGNE">A Letter from Alcuin to Charlemagne</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#HENRY_M._ALDEN">HENRY M. ALDEN</a> -- 1836-</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#A_DEDICATION">A Dedication--To My Beloved Wife ('A Study of Death')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_DOVE_AND_THE_SERPENT">The Dove and the Serpent (same)</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#Death_and_Sleep">Death and Sleep (same)</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_PARABLE_OF_THE_PRODIGAL">The Parable of the Prodigal (same)</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#THOMAS_BAILEY_ALDRICH">THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH</a> -- 1837-</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#DESTINY">Destiny</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#IDENTITY">Identity</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#PRESCIENCE">Prescience</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#ALEC_YEATONS_SON">Alec Yeaton's Son</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#MEMORY">Memory</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#TENNYSON1890">Tennyson (1890)</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#SWEETHEART_SIGH_NO_MORE">Sweetheart, Sigh No More</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#BROKEN_MUSIC">Broken Music</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#ELMWOOD">Elmwood</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#SEA_LONGINGS">Sea Longings</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#A_SHADOW_OF_THE_NIGHT">A Shadow of the Night</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#OUTWARD_BOUND">Outward Bound</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#REMINISCENCE">Reminiscence</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#PERE_ANTOINES_DATE-PALM">Père Antoine's Date-Palm</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#MISS_MEHETABELS_SON">Miss Mehetabel's Son</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#ALEARDO_ALEARDI">ALEARDO ALEARDI</a> -- 1812-1878</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#COWARDS">Cowards ('The Primal Histories')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_HARVESTERS">The Harvesters ('Monte Circello')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_DEATH_OF_THE_YEAR">The Death of the Year ('An Hour of My Youth')</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#JEAN_LE_ROND_DALEMBERT">JEAN LE ROND D'ALEMBERT</a> -- 1717-1783</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#MONTESQUIEU">Montesquieu (Eulogy in the 'Encyclopédie')</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#VITTORIO_ALFIERI">VITTORIO ALFIERI</a> (by L. Oscar Kuhns) -- 1749-1803</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AGAMEMNON">Scenes from 'Agamemnon'</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#ALFONSO_THE_WISE">ALFONSO THE WISE</a> -- 1221-1284</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#WHAT_MEANETH_A_TYRANT">What Meaneth a Tyrant, and How he Useth his Power ('Las Siete Partidas')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#ON_THE_TURKS">On the Turks, and Why they are So Called ('La Gran Conquista de Ultramar')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#TO_THE_MONTH_OF_MARY">To the Month of Mary ('Cantigas')</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#ALFRED_THE_GREAT">ALFRED THE GREAT</a> -- 849-901</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#KING_ALFRED_ON_KING-CRAFT">King Alfred on King-Craft</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#ALFREDS_PREFACE">Alfred's Preface to the Version of Pope Gregory's 'Pastoral Care'</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#WHERE_TO_FIND_TRUE_JOY">From Boethius</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#BLOSSOM_GATHERINGS_FROM_ST._AUGUSTINE">Blossom Gatherings from St. Augustine</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#CHARLES_GRANT_ALLEN">CHARLES GRANT ALLEN</a> -- 1848-</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_COLORATION_OF_FLOWERS">The Coloration of Flowers ('The Colors of Flowers')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AMONG_THE_HEATHER">Among the Heather ('The Evolutionist at Large')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_HERONS_HAUNT">The Heron's Haunt ('Vignettes from Nature')</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#JAMES_LANE_ALLEN">JAMES LANE ALLEN</a> -- 1850-</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#A_COURTSHIP">A Courtship ('A Summer in Arcady')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#OLD_KING_SOLOMONS_CORONATION">Old King Solomon's Coronation ('Flute and Violin')</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#WILLIAM_ALLINGHAM">WILLIAM ALLINGHAM</a> -- 1828-1889</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_RUINED_CHAPEL">The Ruined Chapel</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_WINTER_PEAR">The Winter Pear</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#SONG">O Spirit of the Summer-time</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_BUBBLE">The Bubble</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#ST._MARGARETS_EVE">St. Margaret's Eve</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_FAIRIES">The Fairies</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#ROBIN_REDBREAST">Robin Redbreast</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#AN_EVENING">An Evening</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#DAFFODIL">Daffodil</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#LOVELY_MARY_DONNELLY">Lovely Mary Donnelly</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#KARL_JONAS_LUDVIG_ALMQUIST">KARL JONAS LUDVIG ALMQUIST</a> -- 1793-1866</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#CHARACTERISTICS_OF_CATTLE">Characteristics of Cattle</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#A_NEW_UNDINE">A New Undine (from 'The Book of the Rose')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#GODS_WAR">God's War</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#JOHANNA_AMBROSIUS">JOHANNA AMBROSIUS</a> -- 1854-</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#A_PEASANTS_THOUGHTS">A Peasant's Thoughts</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#STRUGGLE_AND_PEACE">Struggle and Peace</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#DO_THOU_LOVETOO">Do Thou Love, Too!</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#INVITATION">Invitation</a></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#EDMONDO_DE_AMICIS">EDMONDO DE AMICIS</a> -- 1846-</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_LIGHT">The Light ('Constantinople')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#RESEMBLANCES">Resemblances (same)</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#BIRDS">Birds (same</a>)</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#CORDOVA">Cordova ('Spain')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_LAND_OF_PLUCK">The Land of Pluck ('Holland and Its People')</a></p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#THE_DUTCH_MASTERS">The Dutch Masters ('Holland and Its People'</a>)</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p><a href="#HENRI_FREDERIC_AMIEL">HENRI FRÉDÉRIC AMIEL</a> (by Richard Burton) -- 1821-1881</p> +<p class="i2"><a href="#EXTRACTS_FROM_AMIELS_JOURNAL">Extracts from Amiel's Journal:</a></p> +<p class="i4"><a href="#Christs_Real_Message">Christ's Real Message</a></p> +<p class="i4"><a href="#Duty">Duty</a></p> +<p class="i4"><a href="#Joubert">Joubert</a></p> +<p class="i4"><a href="#Greeks_vs_Moderns">Greeks vs. Moderns</a></p> +<p class="i4"><a href="#Nature_Teutonic">Nature, and Teutonic and Scandinavian Poetry</a></p> +<p class="i4"><a href="#Training_of_Children">Training of Children</a></p> +<p class="i4"><a href="#Mozart_and_Beethoven">Mozart and Beethoven</a></p> +</div></div> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2>FULL-PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS</h2> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2>VOLUME I.</h2> +<br> + +<center> +The Book of the Dead (Colored Plate).<br> +<a href="#019.png">First English Printing (Fac-simile).</a><br> +<a href="#077.jpg">Assyrian Clay Tablet (Fac-simile).</a><br> +<a href="#135.jpg">John Adams (Portrait).</a><br> +<a href="#145.jpg">John Quincy Adams (Portrait).</a><br> +<a href="#161.jpg">Joseph Addison (Portrait).</a><br> +<a href="#225.jpg">Louis Agassiz (Portrait).</a><br> +<a href="#337.jpg">"Poetry" (Photogravure).</a><br> +<a href="#393.jpg">Vittorio Alfieri (Portrait).</a><br> +<a href="#435.jpg">"A Courtship" (Photogravure).</a><br> +<a href="#491.jpg">"A Dutch Girl" (Photogravure).</a><br> +</center><br><br> + +<h3>VIGNETTE PORTRAITS</h3> +<center> +<a href="#ABELARD">Pierre Abélard.</a><br> +<a href="#EDMOND_ABOUT">Edmond About.</a><br> +<a href="#ABIGAIL_ADAMS">Abigail Adams.</a><br> +<a href="#AESCHINES">Aeschines.</a><br> +<a href="#AESCHYLUS">Aeschylus.</a><br> +<a href="#AESOP">Aesop.</a><br> +<a href="#GRACE_AGUILAR">Grace Aguilar.</a><br> +<a href="#WILLIAM_HARRISON_AINSWORTH">William Harrison Ainsworth.</a><br> +<a href="#MARK_AKENSIDE">Mark Akenside.</a><br> +<a href="#ALCAEUS">Alcaeus.</a><br> +<a href="#LOUISA_MAY_ALCOTT">Louisa May Alcott.</a><br> +<a href="#THOMAS_BAILEY_ALDRICH">Thomas Bailey Aldrich.</a><br> +<a href="#JEAN_LE_ROND_DALEMBERT">Jean le Rond D'Alembert.</a><br> +<a href="#EDMONDO_DE_AMICIS">Edmondo de Amicis.</a><br> +</center> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<blockquote> +<i>Books are not absolutely dead things, but do contain +a potency of life in them to be as active as that +soul was whose progeny they are; nay, they do preserve +as in a vial the purest efficacy and extraction of that +living intellect that bred them. I know they are as +lively, and as vigorously productive, as those fabulous +dragon's teeth; and being sown up and down, may chance +to spring up armed men. And yet on the other hand, +unless wariness be used, as good almost kill a man as kill +a good book: who kills a man kills a reasonable creature, +God's image; but he who destroys a good book, kills reason +itself, kills the image of God, as it were in the eye. +Many a man lives a burden to the earth; but a good +book is the precious life-blood of a master-spirit, embalmed +and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life.</i><br><br> +<i>JOHN MILTON.</i> +</blockquote> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<center> +<i>CAXTON</i>.<br><br> + +Reduced facsimile of the first page of the only copy extant of<br><br> + +GODEFREY OF BOLOYNE<br><br> + +<i>or</i><br><br> + +LAST SIEGE AND CONQUESTE OF JHERUSALEM.<br><br> + +The Prologue, at top of page, begins:<br><br> + +Here begynneth the boke Intituled Eracles, and also Godefrey of Boloyne,<br> +the whiche speketh of the Conquest of the holy lande of Jherusalem.<br><br> + +Printed by Caxton, London, 1481. In the British Museum.<br><br> + +A good specimen page of the earliest English printing. Caxton's first<br> +printed book, and the first book printed in English, was "The Game and<br> +Play of the Chess," which was printed in 1474. The blank<br> +space on this page was for the insertion by<br> +hand of an illuminated initial T.<br> +</center> +<br><br> +<a name="019.png"></a> +<p class="ctr"><img src="images/019.png" width="45%" alt=""> +<br> +<b>First English Printing (Fac-simile).</b></p><br> + + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="ABELARD"></a>ABÉLARD</h2> + +<h2>(1079--1142)</h2> + +<h3>BY THOMAS DAVIDSON</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-p.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>ierre, the eldest son of Bérenger and Lucie (Abélard?) was +born at Palais, near Nantes and the frontier of Brittany, +in 1079. His knightly father, having in his youth been a +student, was anxious to give his family, and especially his favorite +Pierre, a liberal education. The boy was accordingly sent to school, +under a teacher who at that time was making his mark in the +world,--Roscellin, the reputed father of Nominalism. As the whole +import and tragedy of his life may be traced back to this man's teaching, +and the relation which it bore to the +thought of the time, we must pause to consider +these.</p> + +<p class="rgt"><img src="images/021.png" width="50%" alt=""></p> + +<p>In the early centuries of our era, the two +fundamental articles of the Gentile-Christian +creed, the Trinity and the Incarnation, +neither of them Jewish, were formulated +in terms of Platonic philosophy, of which +the distinctive tenet is, that the real and +eternal is the universal, not the individual. +On this assumption it was possible +to say that the same real substance could +exist in three, or indeed in any number of +persons. In the case of God, the dogma-builders +were careful to say, essence is one with existence, and therefore +in Him the individuals are as real as the universal. Platonism, +having lent the formula for the Trinity, became the favorite philosophy +of many of the Church fathers, and so introduced into Christian +thought and life the Platonic dualism, that sharp distinction between +the temporal and the eternal which belittles the practical life and +glorifies the contemplative.</p> + +<p>This distinction, as aggravated by Neo-Platonism, further affected +Eastern Christianity in the sixth century, and Western Christianity +in the ninth, chiefly through the writings of (the pseudo-) Dionysius +Areopagita, and gave rise to Christian mysticism. It was then erected +into a rule of conduct through the efforts of Pope Gregory VII., who +strove to subject practical and civil life entirely to the control of +ecclesiastics and monks, standing for contemplative, supernatural life. +The latter included all purely mental work, which more and more +tended to concentrate itself upon religion and confine itself to the +clergy. In this way it came to be considered an utter disgrace for +any man engaged in mental work to take any part in the institutions +of civil life, and particularly to marry. He might indeed enter into +illicit relations, and rear a family of "nephews" and "nieces," without +losing prestige; but to marry was to commit suicide. Such was +the condition of things in the days of Abélard.</p> + +<p>But while Platonism, with its real universals, was celebrating its +ascetic, unearthly triumphs in the West, Aristotelianism, which maintains +that the individual is the real, was making its way in the East. +Banished as heresy beyond the limits of the Catholic Church, in the +fifth and sixth centuries, in the persons of Nestorius and others, it +took refuge in Syria, where it flourished for many years in the schools +of Edessa and Nisibis, the foremost of the time. From these it found +its way among the Arabs, and even to the illiterate Muhammad, who +gave it (1) theoretic theological expression in the cxii. surah of the +Koran: "He is One God, God the Eternal; He neither begets nor is +begotten; and to Him there is no peer," in which both the fundamental +dogmas of Christianity are denied, and that too on the ground +of revelation; (2) practical expression, by forbidding asceticism and +monasticism, and encouraging a robust, though somewhat coarse, +natural life. Islam, indeed, was an attempt to rehabilitate the human.</p> + +<p>In Abélard's time Arab Aristotelianism, with its consequences for +thought and life, was filtering into Europe and forcing Christian +thinkers to defend the bases of their faith. Since these, so far as +defensible at all, depended upon the Platonic doctrine of universals, +and this could be maintained only by dialectic, this science became +extremely popular,--indeed, almost the rage. Little of the real +Aristotle was at that time known in the West; but in Porphyry's +Introduction to Aristotle's Logic was a famous passage, in which all +the difficulties with regard to universals were stated without being +solved. Over this the intellectual battles of the first age of +Scholasticism were fought. The more clerical and mystic thinkers, like +Anselm and Bernard, of course sided with Plato; but the more +worldly, robust thinkers inclined to accept Aristotle, not seeing that +his doctrine is fatal to the Trinity.</p> + +<p>Prominent among these was a Breton, Roscellin, the early instructor +of Abélard. From him the brilliant, fearless boy learnt two +terrible lessons: (1) that universals, instead of being real substances, +external and superior to individual things, are mere names (hence +Nominalism) for common qualities of things as recognized by the +human mind; (2) that since universals are the tools and criteria of +thought, the human mind, in which alone these exist, is the judge +of all truth,--a lesson which leads directly to pure rationalism, and +indeed to the rehabilitation of the human as against the superhuman. +No wonder that Roscellin came into conflict with the church authorities, +and had to flee to England. Abélard afterwards modified his +nominalism and behaved somewhat unhandsomely to him, but never +escaped from the influence of his teaching. Abélard was a rationalist +and an asserter of the human. Accordingly, when, definitely adopting +the vocation of the scholar, he went to Paris to study dialectic under +the then famous William of Champeaux, a declared Platonist, or realist +as the designation then was, he gave his teacher infinite trouble +by his subtle objections, and not seldom got the better of him.</p> + +<p>These victories, which made him disliked both by his teacher and +his fellow-pupils, went to increase his natural self-appreciation, and +induced him, though a mere youth, to leave William and set up a +rival school at Mélun. Here his splendid personality, his confidence, +and his brilliant powers of reasoning and statement, drew to him a +large number of admiring pupils, so that he was soon induced to move +his school to Corbeil, near Paris, where his impetuous dialectic found +a wider field. Here he worked so hard that he fell ill, and was +compelled to return home to his family. With them he remained for +several years, devoting himself to study,--not only of dialectic, but +plainly also of theology. Returning to Paris, he went to study rhetoric +under his old enemy, William of Champeaux, who had meanwhile, +to increase his prestige, taken holy orders, and had been made +bishop of Châlons. The old feud was renewed, and Abélard, being +now better armed than before, compelled his master openly to withdraw +from his extreme realistic position with regard to universals, +and assume one more nearly approaching that of Aristotle.</p> + +<p>This victory greatly diminished the fame of William, and increased +that of Abélard; so that when the former left his chair and +appointed a successor, the latter gave way to Abélard and became +his pupil (1113). This was too much for William, who removed his +successor, and so forced Abélard to retire again to Mélun. Here he +remained but a short time; for, William having on account of unpopularity +removed his school from Paris Abélard returned thither and +opened a school outside the city, on Mont Ste. Généviève. William, +hearing this, returned to Paris and tried to put him down, but in +vain. Abélard was completely victorious.</p> + +<p>After a time he returned once more to Palais, to see his mother, +who was about to enter the cloister, as his father had done some +time before. When this visit was over, instead of returning to Paris +to lecture on dialectic, he went to Laon to study theology under the +then famous Anselm. Here, convinced of the showy superficiality of +Anselm, he once more got into difficulty, by undertaking to expound +a chapter of Ezekiel without having studied it under any teacher. +Though at first derided by his fellow-students, he succeeded so well +as to draw a crowd of them to hear him, and so excited the envy +of Anselm that the latter forbade him to teach in Laon. Abélard +accordingly returned once more to Paris, convinced that he was +fit to shine as a lecturer, not only on dialectic, but also on theology. +And his audiences thought so also; for his lectures on Ezekiel were +very popular and drew crowds. He was now at the height of his +fame (1118).</p> + +<p>The result of all these triumphs over dialecticians and theologians +was unfortunate. He not only felt himself the intellectual +superior of any living man, which he probably was, but he also +began to look down upon the current thought of his time as obsolete +and unworthy, and to set at naught even current opinion. He was +now on the verge of forty, and his life had so far been one of spotless +purity; but now, under the influence of vanity, this too gave +way. Having no further conquests to make in the intellectual world, +he began to consider whether, with his great personal beauty, manly +bearing, and confident address, he might not make conquests in the +social world, and arrived at the conclusion that no woman could reject +him or refuse him her favor.</p> + +<p>It was just at this unfortunate juncture that he went to live +in the house of a certain Canon Fulbert, of the cathedral, whose +brilliant niece, Héloïse, had at the age of seventeen just returned +from a convent at Argenteuil, where she had been at school. Fulbert, +who was proud of her talents, and glad to get the price of +Abélard's board, took the latter into his house and intrusted him +with the full care of Héloïse's further education, telling him even +to chastise her if necessary. So complete was Fulbert's confidence +in Abélard, that no restriction was put upon the companionship of +teacher and pupil. The result was that Abélard and Héloïse, both +equally inexperienced in matters of the heart, soon conceived for each +other an overwhelming passion, comparable only to that of Faust and +Gretchen. And the result in both cases was the same. Abélard, as a +great scholar, could not think of marriage; and if he had, Héloïse +would have refused to ruin his career by marrying him. So it came +to pass that when their secret, never very carefully guarded, became +no longer a secret, and threatened the safety of Héloïse, the only +thing that her lover could do for her was to carry her off secretly to +his home in Palais, and place her in charge of his sister. Here she +remained until the birth of her child, which received the name of +Astralabius, Abélard meanwhile continuing his work in Paris. And +here all the nobility of his character comes out. Though Fulbert and +his friends were, naturally enough, furious at what they regarded as +his utter treachery, and though they tried to murder him, he protected +himself, and as soon as Héloïse was fit to travel, hastened to +Palais, and insisted upon removing her to Paris and making her his +lawful wife. Héloïse used every argument which her fertile mind +could suggest to dissuade him from a step which she felt must be his +ruin, at the same time expressing her entire willingness to stand in +a less honored relation to him. But Abélard was inexorable. Taking +her to Paris, he procured the consent of her relatives to the marriage +(which they agreed to keep secret), and even their presence at the +ceremony, which was performed one morning before daybreak, after +the two had spent a night of vigils in the church.</p> + +<p>After the marriage, they parted and for some time saw little of +each other. When Héloïse's relatives divulged the secret, and she +was taxed with being Abélard's lawful wife, she "anathematized and +swore that it was absolutely false." As the facts were too patent, +however, Abélard removed her from Paris, and placed her in the +convent at Argenteuil, where she had been educated. Here she +assumed the garb of a novice. Her relatives, thinking that he must +have done this in order to rid himself of her, furiously vowed vengeance, +which they took in the meanest and most brutal form of +personal violence. It was not a time of fine sensibilities, justice, or +mercy; but even the public of those days was horrified, and gave +expression to its horror. Abélard, overwhelmed with shame, despair, +and remorse, could now think of nothing better than to abandon the +world. Without any vocation, as he well knew, he assumed the +monkish habit and retired to the monastery of St. Denis, while +Héloïse, by his order, took the veil at Argenteuil. Her devotion and +heroism on this occasion Abélard has described in touching terms. +Thus supernaturalism had done its worst for these two strong, +impetuous human souls.</p> + +<p>If Abélard had entered the cloister in the hope of finding peace, +he soon discovered his mistake. The dissolute life of the monks +utterly disgusted him, while the clergy stormed him with petitions to +continue his lectures. Yielding to these, he was soon again surrounded +by crowds of students--so great that the monks at St. Denis +were glad to get rid of him. He accordingly retired to a lonely cell, +to which he was followed by more admirers than could find shelter +or food. As the schools of Paris were thereby emptied, his rivals did +everything in their power to put a stop to his teaching, declaring +that as a monk he ought not to teach profane science, nor as a layman +in theology sacred science. In order to legitimatize his claim to +teach the latter, he now wrote a theological treatise, regarding which +he says:--</p> + +<blockquote> +"It so happened that I first endeavored to illuminate the basis of our +faith by similitudes drawn from human reason, and to compose for our students +a treatise on 'The Divine Unity and Trinity,' because they kept asking +for human and philosophic reasons, and demanding rather what could be +understood than what could be said, declaring that the mere utterance of +words was useless unless followed by understanding; that nothing could be +believed that was not first understood, and that it was ridiculous for any one +to preach what neither he nor those he taught could comprehend, God himself +calling such people blind leaders of the blind." +</blockquote> + +<p>Here we have Abélard's central position, exactly the opposite to +that of his realist contemporary, Anselm of Canterbury, whose principle +was "Credo ut intelligam" (I believe, that I may understand). +We must not suppose, however, that Abélard, with his rationalism, +dreamed of undermining Christian dogma. Very far from it! He +believed it to be rational, and thought he could prove it so. No wonder +that the book gave offense, in an age when faith and ecstasy +were placed above reason. Indeed, his rivals could have wished for +nothing better than this book, which gave them a weapon to use +against him. Led on by two old enemies, Alberich and Lotulf, they +caused an ecclesiastical council to be called at Soissons, to pass judgment +upon the book (1121). This judgment was a foregone conclusion, +the trial being the merest farce, in which the pursuers were the judges, +the Papal legate allowing his better reason to be overruled by their +passion. Abélard was condemned to burn his book in public, and to +read the Athanasian Creed as his confession of faith (which he did +in tears), and then to be confined permanently in the monastery of +St. Médard as a dangerous heretic.</p> + +<p>His enemies seemed to have triumphed and to have silenced him +forever. Soon after, however, the Papal legate, ashamed of the part +he had taken in the transaction, restored him to liberty and allowed +him to return to his own monastery at St. Denis. Here once more +his rationalistic, critical spirit brought him into trouble with the bigoted, +licentious monks. Having maintained, on the authority of Beda, +that Dionysius, the patron saint of the monastery, was bishop of Corinth +and not of Athens, he raised such a storm that he was forced +to flee, and took refuge on a neighboring estate, whose proprietor, +Count Thibauld, was friendly to him. Here he was cordially received +by the monks of Troyes, and allowed to occupy a retreat belonging +to them.</p> + +<p>After some time, and with great difficulty, he obtained leave from +the abbot of St. Denis to live where he chose, on condition of not +joining any other order. Being now practically a free man, he +retired to a lonely spot near Nogent-sur-Seine, on the banks of the +Ardusson. There, having received a gift of a piece of land, he established +himself along with a friendly cleric, building a small oratory +of clay and reeds to the Holy Trinity. No sooner, however, was +his place of retreat known than he was followed into the wilderness +by hosts of students of all ranks, who lived in tents, slept on the +ground, and underwent every kind of hardship, in order to listen to +him (1123). These supplied his wants, and built a chapel, which he +dedicated to the "Paraclete,"--a name at which his enemies, furious +over his success, were greatly scandalized, but which ever after +designated the whole establishment.</p> + +<p>So incessant and unrelenting were the persecutions he suffered +from those enemies, and so deep his indignation at their baseness, +that for some time he seriously thought of escaping beyond the +bounds of Christendom, and seeking refuge among the Muslim. But +just then (1125) he was offered an important position, the abbotship +of the monastery of St. Gildas-de-Rhuys, in Lower Brittany, on the +lonely, inhospitable shore of the Atlantic. Eager for rest and a position +promising influence, Abélard accepted the offer and left the Paraclete, +not knowing what he was doing.</p> + +<p>His position at St. Gildas was little less than slow martyrdom. +The country was wild, the inhabitants were half barbarous, speaking +a language unintelligible to him; the monks were violent, unruly, and +dissolute, openly living with concubines; the lands of the monastery +were subjected to intolerable burdens by the neighboring lord, leaving +the monks in poverty and discontent. Instead of finding a home +of God-fearing men, eager for enlightenment, he found a nest of greed +and corruption. His attempts to introduce discipline, or even decency, +among his "sons," only stirred up rebellion and placed his life in danger. +Many times he was menaced with the sword, many times with +poison. In spite of all that, he clung to his office, and labored to do +his duty. Meanwhile the jealous abbot of St. Denis succeeded in +establishing a claim to the lands of the convent at Argenteuil,--of +which Héloïse, long since famous not only for learning but also for +saintliness, was now the head,--and she and her nuns were violently +evicted and cast on the world. Hearing of this with indignation, +Abélard at once offered the homeless sisters the deserted Paraclete +and all its belongings. The offer was thankfully accepted, and Héloïse +with her family removed there to spend the remainder of her life. +It does not appear that Abélard and Héloïse ever saw each other at +this time, although he used every means in his power to provide for +her safety and comfort. This was in 1129. Two years later the Paraclete +was confirmed to Héloïse by a Papal bull. It remained a convent, +and a famous one, for over six hundred years.</p> + +<p>After this Abélard paid several visits to the convent, which he +justly regarded as his foundation, in order to arrange a rule of life +for its inmates, and to encourage them in their vocation. Although +on these occasions he saw nothing of Héloïse, he did not escape the +malignant suspicions of the world, nor of his own flock, which now +became more unruly than ever,--so much so that he was compelled +to live outside the monastery. Excommunication was tried in vain, +and even the efforts of a Papal legate failed to restore order. For +Abélard there was nothing but "fear within and conflict without." +It was at this time, about 1132, that he wrote his famous 'Historia +Calamitatum,' from which most of the above account of his life has +been taken. In 1134, after nine years of painful struggle, he definitely +left St. Gildas, without, however, resigning the abbotship. For +the next two years he seems to have led a retired life, revising his +old works and composing new ones.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, by some chance, his 'History of Calamities' fell into +the hands of Héloïse at the Paraclete, was devoured with breathless +interest, and rekindled the flame that seemed to have smoldered in +her bosom for thirteen long years. Overcome with compassion for +her husband, for such he really was, she at once wrote to him a letter +which reveals the first healthy human heart-beat that had found +expression in Christendom for a thousand years. Thus began a correspondence +which, for genuine tragic pathos and human interest, +has no equal in the world's literature. In Abélard, the scholarly +monk has completely replaced the man; in Héloïse, the saintly nun +is but a veil assumed in loving obedience to him, to conceal the +deep-hearted, faithful, devoted flesh-and-blood woman. And such a +woman! It may well be doubted if, for all that constitutes genuine +womanhood, she ever had an equal. If there is salvation in love, +Héloïse is in the heaven of heavens. She does not try to express her +love in poems, as Mrs. Browning did; but her simple, straightforward +expression of a love that would share Francesca's fate with her lover, +rather than go to heaven without him, yields, and has yielded, +matter for a hundred poems. She looks forward to no salvation; for +her chief love is for him. <i>Domino specialiter, sua singulariter</i>: "As a +member of the species woman I am the Lord's, as Héloïse I am +yours"--nominalism with a vengeance!</p> + +<p>But to return to Abélard. Permanent quiet in obscurity was +plainly impossible for him; and so in 1136 we find him back at Ste. +Généviève, lecturing to crowds of enthusiastic students. He probably +thought that during the long years of his exile, the envy and hatred +of his enemies had died out; but he soon discovered that he was +greatly mistaken. He was too marked a character, and the tendency +of his thought too dangerous, for that. Besides, he emptied the +schools of his rivals, and adopted no conciliatory tone toward them. +The natural result followed. In the year 1140, his enemies, headed +by St. Bernard, who had long regarded him with suspicion, raised a +cry of heresy against him, as subjecting everything to reason. Bernard, +who was nothing if not a fanatic, and who managed to give +vent to all his passions by placing them in the service of his God, at +once denounced him to the Pope, to cardinals, and to bishops, in +passionate letters, full of rhetoric, demanding his condemnation as a +perverter of the bases of the faith.</p> + +<p>At that time a great ecclesiastical council was about to assemble +at Sens; and Abélard, feeling certain that his writings contained +nothing which he could not show to be strictly orthodox, demanded +that he should be allowed to explain and dialectically defend his +position, in open dispute, before it. But this was above all things +what his enemies dreaded. They felt that nothing was safe before +his brilliant dialectic. Bernard even refused to enter the lists with +him; and preferred to draw up a list of his heresies, in the form of +sentences sundered from their context in his works,--some of them, +indeed, from works which he never wrote,--and to call upon the council +to condemn them. (These theses may be found in Denzinger's +'Enchiridion Symbolorum et Definitionum,' pp. 109 <i>seq.</i>) Abélard, +clearly understanding the scheme, feeling its unfairness, and knowing +the effect of Bernard's lachrymose pulpit rhetoric upon sympathetic +ecclesiastics who believed in his power to work miracles, appeared +before the council, only to appeal from its authority to Rome. The +council, though somewhat disconcerted by this, proceeded to condemn +the disputed theses, and sent a notice of its action to the Pope. +Fearing that Abélard, who had friends in Rome, might proceed +thither and obtain a reversal of the verdict, Bernard set every agency +at work to obtain a confirmation of it before his victim could reach +the Eternal City. And he succeeded.</p> + +<p>The result was for a time kept secret from Abélard, who, now +over sixty years old, set out on his painful journey. Stopping on his +way at the famous, hospitable Abbey of Cluny, he was most kindly +entertained by its noble abbot, who well deserved the name of Peter +the Venerable. Here, apparently, he learned that he had been condemned +and excommunicated; for he went no further. Peter offered +the weary man an asylum in his house, which was gladly accepted; +and Abélard, at last convinced of the vanity of all worldly ambition, +settled down to a life of humiliation, meditation, study, and prayer. +Soon afterward Bernard made advances toward reconciliation, which +Abélard accepted; whereupon his excommunication was removed. +Then the once proud Abélard, shattered in body and broken in spirit, +had nothing more to do but to prepare for another life. And the end +was not far off. He died at St. Marcel, on the 21st of April, 1142, +at the age of sixty-three. His generous host, in a letter to Héloïse, +gives a touching account of his closing days, which were mostly +spent in a retreat provided for him on the banks of the Saône. +There he read, wrote, dictated, and prayed, in the only quiet days +which his life ever knew.</p> + +<p>The body of Abélard was placed in a monolith coffin and buried +in the chapel of the monastery of St. Marcel; but Peter the Venerable +twenty-two years afterward allowed it to be secretly removed, +and carried to the Paraclete, where Abélard had wished to lie. When +Héloïse, world-famous for learning, virtue, and saintliness, passed +away, and her body was laid beside his, he opened his arms and +clasped her in close embrace. So says the legend, and who would +not believe it? The united remains of the immortal lovers, after +many vicissitudes, found at last (let us hope), in 1817, a permanent +resting place, in the Parisian cemetery of Père Lachaise, having been +placed together in Abélard's monolith coffin. "In death they were +not divided."</p> + +<p>Abélard's character may be summed up in a few words. He was +one of the most brilliant and variously gifted men that ever lived, a +sincere lover of truth and champion of freedom. But unfortunately, +his extraordinary personal beauty and charm of manner made him +the object of so much attention and adulation that he soon became +unable to live without seeing himself mirrored in the admiration +and love of others. Hence his restlessness, irritability, craving for +publicity, fondness for dialectic triumph, and inability to live in +fruitful obscurity; hence, too, his intrigue with Héloïse, his continual +struggles and disappointments, his final humiliation and tragic end. +Not having conquered the world, he cannot claim the crown of the +martyr.</p> + +<p>Abélard's works were collected by Cousin, and published in three +4to volumes (Paris, 1836, 1849, 1859). They include, besides the +correspondence with Héloïse, and a number of sermons, hymns, answers +to questions, etc., written for her, the following:--(1) 'Sic et Non,' +a collection of (often contradictory) statements of the Fathers concerning +the chief dogmas of religion, (2) 'Dialectic,' (3) 'On Genera +and Species,' (4) Glosses to Porphyry's 'Introduction,' Aristotle's +'Categories and Interpretation,' and Boethius's 'Topics,' (5) 'Introduction +to Theology,' (6) 'Christian Theology,' (7) 'Commentary on +the Epistle to the Romans,' (9) 'Abstract of Christian Theology,' (10) +'Ethics, or Know Thyself,' (11) 'Dialogue between a Philosopher, a +Jew, and a Christian,' (12) 'On the Intellects,' (12) 'On the Hexameron,' +with a few short and unimportant fragments and tracts. +None of Abélard's numerous poems in the vernacular, in which he +celebrated his love for Héloïse, which he sang ravishingly (for he was +a famous singer), and which at once became widely popular, seem +to have come down to us; but we have a somewhat lengthy poem, +of considerable merit (though of doubtful authenticity), addressed to +his son Astralabius, who grew to manhood, became a cleric, and died, +it seems, as abbot of Hauterive in Switzerland, in 1162.</p> + +<p>Of Abélard's philosophy, little need be added to what has been +already said. It is, on the whole, the philosophy of the Middle Age, +with this difference: that he insists upon making theology rational, +and thus may truly be called the founder of modern rationalism, and +the initiator of the struggle against the tyrannic authority of blind +faith. To have been so is his crowning merit, and is one that can +hardly be overestimated. At the same time it must be borne in mind +that he was a loyal son of the Church, and never dreamed of opposing +or undermining her. His greatest originality is in 'Ethics,' in +which, by placing the essence of morality in the intent and not in +the action, he anticipated Kant and much modern speculation. +Here he did admirable work. Abélard founded no school, strictly +speaking; nevertheless, he determined the method and aim of Scholasticism, +and exercised a boundless influence, which is not dead. +Descartes and Kant are his children. Among his immediate disciples +were a pope, twenty-nine cardinals, and more than fifty bishops. His +two greatest pupils were Peter the Lombard, bishop of Paris, and +author of the 'Sentences,' the theological text-book of the schools for +hundreds of years; and Arnold of Brescia, one of the noblest champions +of human liberty, though condemned and banished by the second +Council of the Lateran.</p> + +<p>The best biography of Abélard is that by Charles de Rémusat (2 +vols., 8vo, Paris, 1845). See also, in English, Wight's 'Abelard and +Eloise' (New York, 1853).</p> + +<p class="rgt"><img src="images/031.png" width="60%" alt=""></p><br> +<br><br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 33%;"><br><br> +<center><a name="HELOISE_TO_ABELARD"></a>HÉLOÏSE TO ABÉLARD</center> + +<p>A letter of yours sent to a friend, best beloved, to console him +in affliction, was lately, almost by a chance, put into my +hands. Seeing the superscription, guess how eagerly I +seized it! I had lost the reality; I hoped to draw some comfort +from this faint image of you. But alas!--for I well remember--every +line was written with gall and wormwood.</p> + +<p>How you retold our sorrowful history, and dwelt on your incessant +afflictions! Well did you fulfill that promise to your friend, +that, in comparison with your own, his misfortunes should seem +but as trifles. You recalled the persecutions of your masters, the +cruelty of my uncle, and the fierce hostility of your fellow-pupils, +Albericus of Rheims, and Lotulphus of Lombardy--how through +their plottings that glorious book your Theology was burned, and +you confined and disgraced--you went on to the machinations of +the Abbot of St. Denys and of your false brethren of the convent, +and the calumnies of those wretches, Norbert and Bernard, +who envy and hate you. It was even, you say, imputed to you +as an offense to have given the name of Paraclete, contrary to +the common practice, to the Oratory you had founded.</p> + +<p>The persecutions of that cruel tyrant of St. Gildas, and of +those execrable monks,--monks out of greed only, whom notwithstanding +you call your children,--which still harass you, close the +miserable history. Nobody could read or hear these things and +not be moved to tears. What then must they mean to me?</p> + +<p>We all despair of your life, and our trembling hearts dread to +hear the tidings of your murder. For Christ's sake, who has +thus far protected you,--write to us, as to His handmaids and +yours, every circumstance of your present dangers. I and my +sisters alone remain of all who were your friends. Let us be +sharers of your joys and sorrows. Sympathy brings some relief, +and a load laid on many shoulders is lighter. And write the more +surely, if your letters may be messengers of joy. Whatever message +they bring, at least they will show that you remember us. +You can write to comfort your friend: while you soothe his +wounds, you inflame mine. Heal, I pray you, those you yourself +have made, you who bustle about to cure those for which you are +not responsible. You cultivate a vineyard you did not plant, +which grows nothing. Give heed to what you owe your own. +You who spend so much on the obstinate, consider what you owe +the obedient. You who lavish pains on your enemies, reflect on +what you owe your daughters. And, counting nothing else, think +how you are bound to me! What you owe to all devoted women, +pay to her who is most devoted.</p> + +<p>You know better than I how many treatises the holy fathers +of the Church have written for our instruction; how they have +labored to inform, to advise, and to console us. Is my ignorance +to suggest knowledge to the learned Abélard? Long ago, indeed, +your neglect astonished me. Neither religion, nor love of me, nor +the example of the holy fathers, moved you to try to fix my +struggling soul. Never, even when long grief had worn me down, +did you come to see me, or send me one line of comfort,--me, to +whom you were bound by marriage, and who clasp you about with +a measureless love! And for the sake of this love have I no +right to even a thought of yours?</p> + +<p>You well know, dearest, how much I lost in losing you, and +that the manner of it put me to double torture. You only can +comfort me. By you I was wounded, and by you I must be +healed. And it is only you on whom the debt rests. I have +obeyed the last tittle of your commands; and if you bade me, I +would sacrifice my soul.</p> + +<p>To please you my love gave up the only thing in the universe +it valued--the hope of your presence--and that forever. The +instant I received your commands I quitted the habit of the +world, and denied all the wishes of my nature. I meant to give +up, for your sake, whatever I had once a right to call my own.</p> + +<p>God knows it was always you, and you only that I thought of. +I looked for no dowry, no alliance of marriage. And if the name +of wife is holier and more exalted, the name of friend always +remained sweeter to me, or if you would not be angry, a meaner +title; since the more I gave up, the less should I injure your +present renown, and the more deserve your love.</p> + +<p>Nor had you yourself forgotten this in that letter which I +recall. You are ready enough to set forth some of the reasons +which I used to you, to persuade you not to fetter your freedom, +but you pass over most of the pleas I made to withhold you from +our ill-fated wedlock. I call God to witness that if Augustus, +ruler of the world, should think me worthy the honor of marriage, +and settle the whole globe on me to rule forever, it would seem +dearer and prouder to me to be called your mistress than his +empress.</p> + +<p>Not because a man is rich or powerful is he better: riches +and power may come from luck, constancy is from virtue. <i>I</i> +hold that woman base who weds a rich man rather than a poor +one, and takes a husband for her own gain. Whoever marries +with such a motive--why, she will follow his prosperity rather +than the man, and be willing to sell herself to a richer suitor.</p> + +<p>That happiness which others imagine, best beloved, I experienced. +Other women might think their husbands perfect, and be +happy in the idea, but I knew that you were so and the universe +knew the same. What philosopher, what king, could rival your +fame? What village, city, kingdom, was not on fire to see you? +When you appeared in public, who did not run to behold you? +Wives and maidens alike recognized your beauty and grace. +Queens envied Héloïse her Abélard.</p> + +<p>Two gifts you had to lead captive the proudest soul, your voice +that made all your teaching a delight, and your singing, which +was like no other. Do you forget those tender songs you wrote +for me, which all the world caught up and sang,--but not like +you,--those songs that kept your name ever floating in the air, +and made me known through many lands, the envy and the scorn +of women?</p> + +<p>What gifts of mind, what gifts of person glorified you! Oh, +my loss! Who would change places with me now!</p> + +<p>And <i>you</i> know, Abelard, that though I am the great cause +of your misfortunes, I am most innocent. For a consequence is +no part of a crime. Justice weighs not the thing done, but the +intention. And how pure was my intention toward you, you alone +can judge. Judge me! I will submit.</p> + +<p>But how happens it, tell me, that since my profession of the +life which you alone determined, I have been so neglected and so +forgotten that you will neither see me nor write to me? Make +me understand it, if you can, or I must tell you what everybody +says: that it was not a pure love like mine that held your heart, +and that your coarser feeling vanished with absence and ill-report. +Would that to me alone this seemed so, best beloved, and not to +all the world! Would that I could hear others excuse you, or +devise excuses myself!</p> + +<p>The things I ask ought to seem very small and easy to you. +While I starve for you, do, now and then, by words, bring back +your presence to me! How can you be generous in deeds if you +are so avaricious in words? I have done everything for your +sake. It was not religion that dragged me, a young girl, so fond +of life, so ardent, to the harshness of the convent, but only your +command. If I deserve nothing from you, how vain is my labor! +God will not recompense me, for whose love I have done nothing.</p> + +<p>When you resolved to take the vows, I followed,--rather, I +ran before. You had the image of Lot's wife before your eyes; +you feared I might look back, and therefore you deeded <i>me</i> to +God by the sacred vestments and irrevocable vows before you +took them yourself. For this, I own, I grieved, bitterly ashamed +that I could depend on you so little, when I would lead or follow +you straight to perdition. For my soul is always with you and +no longer mine own. And if it is not with you in these last +wretched years, it is nowhere. Do receive it kindly. Oh, if only +you had returned favor for favor, even a little for the much, +words for things! Would, beloved, that your affection would not +take my tenderness and obedience always for granted; that it +might be more anxious! But just because I have poured out all +I have and am, you give me nothing. Remember, oh, remember +how much you owe!</p> + +<p>There was a time when people doubted whether I had given +you all my heart, asking nothing. But the end shows how I +began. I have denied myself a life which promised at least peace +and work in the world, only to obey your hard exactions. I have +kept back nothing for myself, except the comfort of pleasing you. +How hard and cruel are you then, when I ask so little and that +little is so easy for you to give!</p> + +<p>In the name of God, to whom you are dedicate, send me some +lines of consolation. Help me to learn obedience! When you +wooed me because earthly love was beautiful, you sent me letter +after letter. With your divine singing every street and house +echoed my name! How much more ought you now to persuade +to God her whom then you turned from Him! Heed what I ask; +think what you owe. I have written a long letter, but the ending +shall be short. Farewell, darling!</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 33%;"><br><br> +<center><a name="ABELARDSANSWERTOHELOISE"></a>ABÉLARD'S ANSWER TO HÉLOÏSE</center> +<br><br> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><i>To Héloïse, his best beloved Sister in Christ</i>,</p> +<p class="i3"><i>Abélard, her Brother in Him:</i></p> +</div></div> + +<p>If, since we resigned the world I have not written to you, it was +because of the high opinion I have ever entertained of your +wisdom and prudence. How could I think that she stood in +need of help on whom Heaven had showered its best gifts? You +were able, I knew, by example as by word, to instruct the ignorant, +to comfort the timid, to kindle the lukewarm.</p> + +<p>When prioress of Argenteuil, you practiced all these duties; +and if you give the same attention to your daughters that you +then gave to your sisters, it is enough. All my exhortations would +be needless. But if, in your humility, you think otherwise, and if +my words can avail you anything, tell me on what subjects you +would have me write, and as God shall direct me I will instruct +you. I thank God that the constant dangers to which I am +exposed rouse your sympathies. Thus I may hope, under the +divine protection of your prayers, to see Satan bruised under my +feet.</p> + +<p>Therefore I hasten to send you the form of prayer you +beseech of me--you, my sister, once dear to me in the world, but +now far dearer in Christ. Offer to God a constant sacrifice of +prayer. Urge him to pardon our great and manifold sins, and to +avert the dangers which threaten me. We know how powerful +before God and his saints are the prayers of the faithful, but +chiefly of faithful women for their friends, and of wives for their +husbands. The Apostle admonishes us to pray without ceasing.... But +I will not insist on the supplications of your sisterhood, +day and night devoted to the service of their Maker; to +you only do I turn. I well know how powerful your intercession +may be. I pray you, exert it in this my need. In your prayers, +then, ever remember him who, in a special sense, is yours. Urge +your entreaties, for it is just that you should be heard. An equitable +judge cannot refuse it.</p> + +<p>In former days, you remember, best beloved, how fervently +you recommended me to the care of Providence. Often in the +day you uttered a special petition. Removed now from the Paraclete, +and surrounded by perils, how much greater my need! Convince +me of the sincerity of your regard, I entreat, I implore you.</p> + +<p>[The Prayer:] "O God, who by Thy servant didst here assemble +Thy handmaids in Thy Holy Name, grant, we beseech Thee, +that he be protected from all adversity, and be restored safe to +us, Thy handmaids."</p> + +<p>If Heaven permit my enemies to destroy me, or if I perish by +accident, see that my body is conveyed to the Paraclete. There, +my daughters, or rather my sisters in Christ, seeing my tomb, will +not cease to implore Heaven for me. No resting-place is so safe +for the grieving soul, forsaken in the wilderness of its sins, none +so full of hope as that which is dedicated to the Paraclete--that +is, the Comforter.</p> + +<p>Where could a Christian find a more peaceful grave than in +the society of holy women, consecrated by God? They, as the +Gospel tells us, would not leave their divine Master; they embalmed +His body with precious spices; they followed Him to the +tomb, and there they held their vigil. In return, it was to them +that the angel of the resurrection appeared for their consolation.</p> + +<p>Finally, let me entreat you that the solicitude you now too +strongly feel for my life you will extend to the repose of my soul. +Carry into my grave the love you showed me when alive; that is, +never forget to pray Heaven for me.</p> + +<p>Long life, farewell! Long life, farewell, to your sisters also! +Remember me, but let it be in Christ!</p> + +<p>Translated for the 'World's Best Literature.'</p> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 33%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4"><a name="THE_VESPER_HYMN_OF_ABELARD"></a>THE VESPER HYMN OF ABÉLARD</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">Oh, what shall be, oh, when shall be that holy Sabbath day,</p> +<p class="i4">Which heavenly care shall ever keep and celebrate alway,</p> +<p class="i4">When rest is found for weary limbs, when labor hath reward,</p> +<p class="i4">When everything forevermore is joyful in the Lord?</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">The true Jerusalem above, the holy town, is there,</p> +<p class="i4">Whose duties are so full of joy, whose joy so free from care;</p> +<p class="i4">Where disappointment cometh not to check the longing heart,</p> +<p class="i4">And where the heart, in ecstasy, hath gained her better part.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">O glorious King, O happy state, O palace of the blest!</p> +<p class="i4">O sacred place and holy joy, and perfect, heavenly rest!</p> +<p class="i4">To thee aspire thy citizens in glory's bright array,</p> +<p class="i4">And what they feel and what they know they strive in vain to say.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">For while we wait and long for home, it shall be ours to raise</p> +<p class="i4">Our songs and chants and vows and prayers in that dear country's praise;</p> +<p class="i4">And from these Babylonian streams to lift our weary eyes,</p> +<p class="i4">And view the city that we love descending from the skies.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">There, there, secure from every ill, in freedom we shall sing</p> +<p class="i4">The songs of Zion, hindered here by days of suffering,</p> +<p class="i4">And unto Thee, our gracious Lord, our praises shall confess</p> +<p class="i4">That all our sorrow hath been good, and Thou by pain canst bless.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">There Sabbath day to Sabbath day sheds on a ceaseless light,</p> +<p class="i4">Eternal pleasure of the saints who keep that Sabbath bright;</p> +<p class="i4">Nor shall the chant ineffable decline, nor ever cease,</p> +<p class="i4">Which we with all the angels sing in that sweet realm of peace.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">Translation of Dr. Samuel W. Duffield.</p> +</div></div> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="EDMOND_ABOUT"></a>EDMOND ABOUT</h2> + +<h3>(1828-1885)</h3> +<br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-e.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>arly in the reign of Louis Napoleon, a serial story called +'Tolla,' a vivid study of social life in Rome, delighted the +readers of the Revue des Deux Mondes. When published +in book form in 1855 it drew a storm of opprobrium upon its young +author, who was accused of offering as his own creation a translation +of the Italian work 'Vittoria Savorelli.' This charge, undoubtedly +unjust, he indignantly refuted. It served at least to make his name +well known. Another book, 'La Question Romaine,' a brilliant if +somewhat superficial argument against the temporal power of pope +and priests, was a philosophic employment +of the same material. Appearing in 1860, +about the epoch of the French invasion of +Austrian Italy, its tone agreed with popular +sentiment and it was favorably received.</p> + +<p class="lft"><img src="images/038.png" width="40%" alt=""></p> + +<p>Edmond François Valentin About had a +freakish, evasive, many-sided personality, a +nature drawn in too many directions to +achieve in any one of these the success his +talents warranted. He was born in Dreuze, +and like most French boys of literary ambition, +soon found his way to Paris, where +he studied at the Lycée Charlemagne. Here +he won the honor prize; and in 1851 was sent to Athens to study +archaeology at the École Française. He loved change and out-of-the-way +experiences, and two studies resulted from this trip: 'La +Grèce Contemporaine,' a book of charming philosophic description; +and the delightful story 'Le Roi des Montagnes' (The King of the +Mountains). This tale of the long-limbed German student, enveloped +in the smoke from his porcelain pipe as he recounts a series of +impossible adventures,--those of himself and two Englishwomen, +captured for ransom by Hadgi Stavros, brigand king in the Grecian +mountains,--is especially characteristic of About in the humorous +atmosphere of every situation.</p> + +<p>About wrote stories so easily and well that his early desertion of +fiction is surprising. His mocking spirit has often suggested comparison +with Voltaire, whom he studied and admired. He too is a skeptic +and an idol-breaker; but his is a kindlier irony, a less incisive +philosophy. Perhaps, however, this influence led to lack of faith in +his own work, to his loss of an ideal, which Zola thinks the real +secret of his sudden change from novelist to journalist. Voltaire +taught him to scoff and disbelieve, to demand "à quoi bon?" and that +took the heart out of him. He was rather fond of exposing abuses, +a habit that appears in those witty letters to the Gaulois which in +1878 obliged him to suspend that journal. His was a positive mind, +interested in political affairs, and with something always ready to +say upon them. In 1872 he founded a radical newspaper, Le XIXme +Siècle (The Nineteenth Century), in association with another aggressive +spirit, that of Francisque Sarcey. For many years he proved his ability +as editor, business man, and keen polemist.</p> + +<p>He tried drama, too, inevitable ambition of young French authors; +but after the failure of 'Guillery' at the Théâtre Française and +'Gaétena' at the Odéon, renounced the theatre. Indeed, his power +is in odd conceptions, in the covert laugh and humorous suggestion +of the phrasing, rather than in plot or characterization. He will +always be best known for the tales and novels in that thoroughly +French style--clear, concise, and witty--which in 1878 elected him +president of the Société des Gens de Lettres, and in 1884 won him a +seat in the Academy.</p> + +<p>About wrote a number of novels, most of them as well known +in translation to English and American readers as to his French +audience. The bright stories originally published in the Moniteur, +afterward collected with the title 'Les Mariages de Paris' had a +conspicuous success, and were followed by a companion volume, 'Les +Mariages de Province.' 'L'Homme à l'Oreille Cassée' (The Man +with the Broken Ear)--the story of a mummy resuscitated to a world +of new conditions after many years of apparent death--shows his +freakish delight in oddity. So does 'Le Nez du Notaire' (The +Notary's Nose), a gruesome tale of the tribulations of a handsome +society man, whose nose is struck off in a duel by a revengeful Turk. +The victim buys a bit of living skin from a poor water-carrier, and +obtains a new nose by successful grafting. But he can nevermore get +rid of the uncongenial Aquarius, who exercises occult influence over +the skin with which he has parted. When he drinks too much, the +Notary's nose is red; when he starves, it dwindles away; when he +loses the arm from which the graft was made, the important feature +drops off altogether, and the sufferer must needs buy a silver one. +About's latest novel, 'Le Roman d'un Brave Homme' (The Story of +an Honest Man), is in quite another vein, a charming picture of +bourgeois virtue in revolutionary days. 'Madelon' and 'La Vielle +Roche' (The Old School) are also popular.</p> + +<p>French critics have not found much to say of this non-evolutionist +of letters, who is neither pure realist nor pure romanticist, and who +has no new theory of art. Some, indeed, may have scorned him for +the wise taste which refuses to tread the debatable ground common +to French fiction. But the reading public has received him with less +conscious analysis, and has delighted in him. If he sees only what +any clever man may see, and is no profound psychologist, yet he +tells what he sees and what he imagines with delightful spirit and +delightful wit, and tinges the fabric of his fancy with the ever-changing +colors of his own versatile personality, fanciful suggestions, +homely realism, and bright antithesis. Above all, he has the great +gift of the story-teller.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<center><a name="THE_CAPTURE"></a>THE CAPTURE</center> +<br> +<center>From 'The King of the Mountains'</center> +<br> + +<p>"ST! ST!"</p> + +<p>I raised my eyes. Two thickets of mastic-trees and arbutus +enclosed the road on the right and left. From each tuft +of trees protruded three or four musket-barrels. A voice cried +out in Greek, "Seat yourselves on the ground!" This operation +was the more easy to me, as my legs gave way under me. But I +consoled myself by thinking that Ajax, Agamemnon, and the fiery +Achilles, if they had found themselves in the same situation, would +not have refused the seat that was offered.</p> + +<p>The musket-barrels were leveled upon us. It seemed to me +that they stretched out immeasurably, and that their muzzles were +about to join above our heads. It was not that fear disturbed my +vision; but I had never remarked so sensibly the desperate length +of the Greek muskets! The whole arsenal soon debouched into +the road, and every barrel showed its stock and its master.</p> + +<p>The only difference which exists between devils and brigands +is, that devils are less black than they are said to be, and brigands +more dirty than people suppose. The eight bullies, who packed +themselves in a circle around us, were so filthy in appearance that +I should have wished to give them my money with a pair of tongs. +You might guess, with a little effort, that their caps had been +red; but lye-wash itself could not have restored the original color +of their clothes. All the rocks of the kingdom had stained their +cotton shirts, and their vests preserved a sample of the different +soils on which they had reposed. Their hands, their faces, and +even their moustachios were of a reddish-gray, like the soil which +supports them. Every animal is colored according to its abode +and its habits: the foxes of Greenland are of the color of snow; +lions, of the desert; partridges, of the furrow; Greek brigands, of +the highway.</p> + +<p>The chief of the little troop which had made us prisoners was +distinguished by no outward mark. Perhaps, however, his face, +his hands, and his clothes were richer in dust than those of his +comrades. He leaned toward us from the height of his tall figure, +and examined us so closely that I felt the grazing of his moustachios. +You would have pronounced him a tiger, who smells of +his prey before tasting it. When his curiosity was satisfied, he +said to Dimitri, "Empty your pockets!"</p> + +<p>Dimitri did not give him cause to repeat the order: he threw +down before him a knife, a tobacco-pouch, and three Mexican +dollars, which compose a sum of about sixteen francs.</p> + +<p>"Is that all?" demanded the brigand.</p> + +<p>"Yes, brother."</p> + +<p>"You are the servant?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, brother."</p> + +<p>"Take back one dollar. You must not return to the city +without money."</p> + +<p>Dimitri haggled. "You could well allow me two," said he: "I +have two horses below; they are hired from the riding-school; I +shall have to pay for the day."</p> + +<p>"You will explain to Zimmerman that we have taken your +money from you."</p> + +<p>"And if he wishes to be paid, notwithstanding?"</p> + +<p>"Answer that he is lucky enough to see his horses again."</p> + +<p>"He knows very well that you do not take horses. What +would you do with them in the mountains?"</p> + +<p>"Enough! What is this big raw-boned animal next you?"</p> + +<p>I answered for myself: "An honest German, whose spoils will +not enrich you."</p> + +<p>"You speak Greek well. Empty your pockets."</p> + +<p>I deposited on the road a score of francs, my tobacco, my +pipe, and my handkerchief.</p> + +<p>"What is that?" asked the grand inquisitor.</p> + +<p>"A handkerchief."</p> + +<p>"For what purpose?"</p> + +<p>"To wipe my nose."</p> + +<p>"Why did you tell me that you were poor? It is only milords +who wipe their noses with handkerchiefs. Take off the box which +you have behind your back. Good! Open it!"</p> + +<p>My box contained some plants, a book, a knife, a little package +of arsenic, a gourd nearly empty, and the remnants of my +breakfast, which kindled a look of covetousness in the eyes of +Mrs. Simons. I had the assurance to offer them to her before my +baggage changed masters. She accepted greedily, and began to +devour the bread and meat. To my great astonishment, this act +of gluttony scandalized our robbers, who murmured among themselves +the word "Schismatic:" The monk made half a dozen +signs of the cross, according to the rite of the Greek Church.</p> + +<p>"You must have a watch," said the brigand: "put it with the +rest."</p> + +<p>I gave up my silver watch, a hereditary toy of the weight +of four ounces. The villains passed it from hand to hand, and +thought it very beautiful. I was in hopes that admiration, which +makes men better, would dispose them to restore me something, +and I begged their chief to let me have my tin box. He imposed +silence upon me roughly. "At least," said I, "give me back two +crowns for my return to the city!" He answered with a sardonic +smile, "You will not have need of them."</p> + +<p>The turn of Mrs. Simons had come. Before putting her hand +in her pocket, she warned our conquerors in the language of her +fathers. The English is one of those rare idioms which one can +speak with a mouth full. "Reflect well on what you are going to +do," said she, in a menacing tone. "I am an Englishwoman, and +English subjects are inviolable in all the countries of the world. +What you will take from me will serve you little, and will cost +you dear. England will avenge me, and you will all be hanged, +to say the least. Now if you wish my money, you have only to +speak; but it will burn your fingers: it is English money!"</p> + +<p>"What does she say?" asked the spokesman of the brigands.</p> + +<p>Dimitri answered, "She says that she is English."</p> + +<p>"So much the better! All the English are rich. Tell her to +do as you have done."</p> + +<p>The poor lady emptied on the sand a purse, which contained +twelve sovereigns. As her watch was not in sight, and as they +made no show of searching us, she kept it. The clemency of the +conquerors left her her pocket-handkerchief.</p> + +<p>Mary Ann threw down her watch, with a whole bunch of +charms against the evil eye. She cast before her, by a movement +full of mute grace, a shagreen bag, which she carried in her belt. +The brigand opened it with the eagerness of a custom-house +officer. He drew from it a little English dressing-case, a vial of +English salts, a box of pastilles of English mint, and a hundred +and some odd francs in English money.</p> + +<p>"Now," said the impatient beauty, "you can let us go: we +have nothing more for you." They indicated to her, by a menacing +gesture, that the session was not ended. The chief of the +band squatted down before our spoils, called "the good old man," +counted the money in his presence, and delivered to him the sum +of forty-five francs. Mrs. Simons nudged me on the elbow. "You +see," said she, "the monk and Dimitri have betrayed us: he is +dividing the spoils with them."</p> + +<p>"No, madam," replied I, immediately. "Dimitri has received +a mere pittance from that which they had stolen from him. It is +a thing which is done everywhere. On the banks of the Rhine, +when a traveler is ruined at roulette, the conductor of the game +gives him something wherewith to return home."</p> + +<p>"But the monk?"</p> + +<p>"He has received a tenth part of the booty in virtue of an +immemorial custom. Do not reproach him, but rather be thankful +to him for having wished to save us, when his convent was +interested in our capture."</p> + +<p>This discussion was interrupted by the farewells of Dimitri. +They had just set him at liberty.</p> + +<p>"Wait for me," said I to him: "we will return together." He +shook his head sadly, and answered me in English, so as to be +understood by the ladies:-- +"You are prisoners for some days, and you will not see Athens +again before paying a ransom. I am going to inform the +milord. Have these ladies any messages to give me for him?"</p> + +<p>"Tell him," cried Mrs. Simons, "to run to the embassy, to +go then to the Piraeus and find the admiral, to complain at the +foreign office, to write to Lord Palmerston! They shall take us +away from here by force of arms, or by public authority, but I +do not intend that they shall disburse a penny for my liberty."</p> + +<p>"As for me," replied I, without so much passion, "I beg you +to tell my friends in what hands you have left me. If some hundreds +of drachms are necessary to ransom a poor devil of a naturalist, +they will find them without trouble. These gentlemen of +the highway cannot rate me very high. I have a mind, while +you are still here, to ask them what I am worth at the lowest +price."</p> + +<p>"It would be useless, my dear Mr. Hermann! It is not they +who fix the figures of your ransom."</p> + +<p>"And who then?"</p> + +<p>"Their chief, Hadgi-Stavros."</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<center><a name="HADGI-STAVROS"></a>HADGI-STAVROS</center> +<br> +<center>From 'The King of the Mountains'</center> +<br> + +<p>The camp of the King was a plateau, covering a surface of +seven or eight hundred metres. I looked in vain for the +tents of our conquerors. The brigands are not sybarites, +and they sleep under the open sky on the 30th of April. I saw +neither spoils heaped up nor treasures displayed, nor any of those +things which one expects to find at the headquarters of a band +of robbers. Hadgi-Stavros makes it his business to have the +booty sold; every man receives his pay in money, and employs it +as he chooses. Some make investments in commerce, others take +mortgages on houses in Athens, others buy land in their villages; +no one squanders the products of robbery. Our arrival interrupted +the breakfast of twenty-five or thirty men, who flocked +around us with their bread and cheese. The chief supports his +soldiers; there is distributed to them every day one ration of +bread, oil, wine, cheese, caviare, allspice, bitter olives, and meat +when their religion permits it. The epicures who wish to eat +mallows or other herbs are at liberty to gather delicacies in the +mountains.</p> + +<p>The office of the King was as much like an office as the camp +of the robbers was like a camp. Neither tables nor chairs nor +movables of any sort were to be seen there. Hadgi-Stavros was +seated cross-legged on a square carpet in the shade of a fir-tree. +Four secretaries and two servants were grouped around him. A +boy of sixteen or eighteen was occupied incessantly in filling, +lighting, and cleaning the chibouk of his master. He carried in +his belt a tobacco-pouch, embroidered with gold and fine mother-of-pearl, +and a pair of silver pincers intended for taking up coals. +Another servant passed the day in preparing cups of coffee, +glasses of water, and sweetmeats to refresh the royal mouth. The +secretaries, seated on the bare rock, wrote on their knees, with +pens made of reeds. Each of them had at hand a long copper +box containing reeds, penknife, and inkhorn. Some tin cylinders, +like those in which our soldiers roll up their discharges, served +as a depository for the archives. The paper was not of native +manufacture, and for a good reason, Every leaf bore the word +BATH in capital letters.</p> + +<p>The King was a fine old man, marvelously well preserved, +straight, slim, supple as a spring, spruce and shining as a new +sabre. His long white moustachios hung under his chin like two +marble stalactites. The rest of his face was carefully shaved, the +skull bare even to the occiput, where a long tress of white hair +was rolled up under his hat. The expression of his features appeared +to me calm and thoughtful. A pair of small, clear blue +eyes and a square chin announced an indomitable will. His face +was long, and the position of the wrinkles lengthened it still more. +All the creases of the forehead were broken in the middle, and +seemed to direct themselves toward the meeting of the eyebrows; +two wide and deep furrows descended perpendicularly to the +corners of the lips, as if the weight of the moustachios had +drawn in the muscles of the face.</p> + +<p>I have seen a good many septuagenarians; I have even dissected +one who would have reached a hundred years, if the diligence +of Osnabrück had not passed over his body: but I do not +remember to have observed a more green and robust old age +than that of Hadgi-Stavros. He wore the dress of Tino and of +all the islands of the Archipelago. His red cap formed a large +crease at its base around his forehead. He had a vest of black +cloth, faced with black silk, immense blue pantaloons which contained +more than twenty metres of cotton cloth, and great boots +of Russia leather, elastic and stout. The only rich thing in his +costume was a scarf embroidered with gold and precious stones, +which might be worth two or three thousand francs. It inclosed +in its folds an embroidered cashmere purse, a Damascus sanjar +in a silver sheath, a long pistol mounted in gold and rubies, and +the appropriate baton.</p> + +<p>Quietly seated in the midst of his employees, Hadgi-Stavros +moved only the ends of his fingers and his lips; the lips to dictate +his correspondence, the fingers to count the beads in his +chaplet. It was one of those beautiful chaplets of milky amber +which do not serve to number prayers, but to amuse the solemn +idleness of the Turk.</p> + +<p>He raised his head at our approach, guessed at a glance the +occurrence which had brought us there, and said to us, with a +gravity which had in it nothing ironical, "You are welcome! Be +seated."</p> + +<p>"Sir," cried Mrs. Simons, "I am an Englishwoman, and--" +He interrupted the discourse by making his tongue smack against +the teeth of his upper jaw--superb teeth, indeed! "Presently," +said he: "I am occupied." He understood only Greek, and Mrs. +Simons knew only English; but the physiognomy of the King was +so speaking that the good lady comprehended easily without the +aid of an interpreter.</p> + +<p>Selections from 'The King of the Mountains' used by permission of +J.E. Tilton and Company.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<center><a name="THE_VICTIM"></a>THE VICTIM</center> +<br> +<center>From 'The Man with the Broken Ear': by permission of Henry Holt, the +Translator.</center> +<br> + +<p>Léon took his bunch of keys and opened the long oak box on +which he had been seated. The lid being raised, they saw +a great leaden casket which inclosed a magnificent walnut +box carefully polished on the outside, lined on the inside with +white silk, and padded.</p> + +<p>The others brought their lamps and candles near, and the +colonel of the Twenty-third of the line appeared as if he were in +a chapel illuminated for his lying in state.</p> + +<p>One would have said that the man was asleep. The perfect +preservation of the body attested the paternal care of the murderer. +It was truly a remarkable preparation, and would have +borne comparison with the finest European mummies described by +Vicq d'Azyr in 1779, and by the younger Puymaurin in 1787. The +part best preserved, as is always the case, was the face. All the +features had maintained a proud and manly expression. If any +old friend of the colonel had been at the opening of the third +box, he would have recognized him at first sight. Undoubtedly +the point of the nose was a little sharper, the nostrils less expanded +and thinner, and the bridge a little more marked, than in +the year 1813. The eyelids were thinned, the lips pinched, the +corners of the mouth drawn down, the cheek bones too prominent, +and the neck visibly shrunken, which exaggerated the prominence +of the chin and larynx. But the eyelids were closed without +contraction, and the sockets much less hollow than one could +have expected; the mouth was not at all distorted, like the mouth +of a corpse; the skin was slightly wrinkled, but had not changed +color,--it had only become a little more transparent, showing +after a fashion the color of the tendons, the fat, and the muscles, +wherever it rested directly upon them. It also had a rosy tint +which is not ordinarily seen in embalmed corpses. Dr. Martout +explained this anomaly by saying that if the colonel had actually +been dried alive, the globules of the blood were not decomposed, +but simply collected in the capillary vessels of the skin and subjacent +tissues, where they still preserved their proper color, and +could be seen more easily than otherwise on account of the +semi-transparency of the skin.</p> + +<p>The uniform had become much too large, as may be readily +understood, though it did not seem at a casual glance that the +members had become deformed. The hands were dry and angular, +but the nails, although a little bent inward toward the root, +had preserved all their freshness. The only very noticeable +change was the excessive depression of the abdominal walls, which +seemed crowded downward to the posterior side; at the right, a +slight elevation indicated the place of the liver. A tap of the +finger on the various parts of the body produced a sound like +that from dry leather. While Léon was pointing out these details +to his audience and doing the honors of his mummy, he awkwardly +broke off the lower part of the right ear, and a little +piece of the colonel remained in his hand. This trifling accident +might have passed unnoticed had not Clémentine, who followed +with visible emotion all the movements of her lover, dropped her +candle and uttered a cry of affright. All gathered around her. +Léon took her in his arms and carried her to a chair. M. Renault +ran after salts. She was as pale as death, and seemed on +the point of fainting. She soon recovered, however, and reassured +them all by a charming smile.</p> + +<p>"Pardon me," she said, "for such a ridiculous exhibition of +terror; but what Monsieur Léon was saying to us--and then--that +figure which seemed sleeping--it appeared to me that the +poor man was going to open his mouth and cry out, when he +was injured."</p> + +<p>Léon hastened to close the walnut box, while M. Martout +picked up the piece of ear and put it in his pocket. But Clémentine, +while continuing to smile and make apologies, was +overcome by a fresh access of emotion and melted into tears. +The engineer threw himself at her feet, poured forth excuses +and tender phrases, and did all he could to console her inexplicable +grief.</p> + +<p>Clémentine dried her eyes, looked prettier than ever, and +sighed fit to break her heart, without knowing why.</p> + +<p>"Beast that I am!" muttered Léon, tearing his hair. "On the +day when I see her again after three years' absence, I can think +of nothing more soul-inspiring than showing her mummies!" He +launched a kick at the triple coffin of the colonel, saying, "I wish +the devil had the confounded colonel!"</p> + +<p>"No!" cried Clémentine, with redoubled energy and emotion. +"Do not curse him, Monsieur Léon! He has suffered so much! +Ah! poor, poor, unfortunate man!"</p> + +<p>Mlle. Sambucco felt a little ashamed. She made excuses for +her niece, and declared that never, since her tenderest childhood, +had she manifested such extreme sensitiveness ... Clémentine +was no sensitive plant. She was not even a romantic school-girl. +Her youth had not been nourished by Anne Radcliffe, she +did not trouble herself about ghosts, and she would go through the +house very tranquilly at ten o'clock at night without a candle. +When her mother died, some months before Léon's departure, she +did not wish to have any one share with her the sad satisfaction +of watching and praying in the death chamber.</p> + +<p>"This will teach us," said the aunt, "what staying up after +ten o'clock does. What! it is midnight, within a quarter of an +hour! Come, my child; you will recover fast enough after you +get to bed."</p> + +<p>Clémentine arose submissively; but at the moment of leaving +the laboratory she retraced her steps, and with a caprice more +inexplicable than her grief, she absolutely demanded to see the +mummy of the colonel again. Her aunt scolded in vain; in spite +of the remarks of Mlle. Sambucco and all the others present, she +reopened the walnut box, knelt down beside the mummy, and +kissed it on the forehead.</p> + +<p>"Poor man!" said she, rising. "How cold he is! Monsieur +Léon, promise me that if he is dead you will have him laid in +consecrated ground!"</p> + +<p>"As you please, mademoiselle. I intended to send him to the +anthropological museum, with my father's permission; but you +know that we can refuse you nothing."</p> +<br> + +<p>Selections from 'The Man with the Broken Ear' used by permission of +Henry Holt and Company.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<center><a name="THE_MAN_WITHOUT_A_COUNTRY"></a>THE MAN WITHOUT A COUNTRY</center> +<br> +<center>From 'The Man with the Broken Ear': by permission of Henry Holt, the +Translator.</center> +<br> + +<p>Forthwith the colonel marched and opened the windows with +a precipitation which upset the gazers among the crowd.</p> + +<p>"People," said he, "I have knocked down a hundred beggarly +pandours, who respect neither sex nor infirmity. For the benefit +of those who are not satisfied, I will state that I call myself +Colonel Fougas of the Twenty-third. And <i>Vive l'Empéreur!</i>"</p> + +<p>A confused mixture of plaudits, cries, laughs, and jeers answered +this unprecedented allocution. Léon Renault hastened out +to make apologies to all to whom they were due. He invited a +few friends to dine the same evening with the terrible colonel, +and of course he did not forget to send a special messenger to +Clémentine. Fougas, after speaking to the people, returned to his +hosts, swinging himself along with a swaggering air, set himself +astride a chair, took hold of the ends of his mustache, and said:--</p> + +<p>"Well! Come, let's talk this over. I've been sick, then?"</p> + +<p>"Very sick."</p> + +<p>"That's incredible! I feel entirely well; I'm hungry; and moreover, +while waiting for dinner I'll try a glass of your schnick."</p> + +<p>Mme. Renault went out, gave an order, and returned in an +instant.</p> + +<p>"But tell me, then, where I am?" resumed the colonel. "By +these paraphernalia of work, I recognize a disciple of Urania; possibly +a friend of Monge and Berthollet. But the cordial friendliness +impressed on your countenances proves to me that you are +not natives of this land of sauerkraut. Yes, I believe it from the +beatings of my heart. Friends, we have the same fatherland. +The kindness of your reception, even were there no other indications, +would have satisfied me that you are French. What accidents +have brought you so far from our native soil? Children of +my country, what tempest has thrown you upon this inhospitable +shore?"</p> + +<p>"My dear colonel," replied M. Nibor, "if you want to become +very wise, you will not ask so many questions at once. Allow us +the pleasure of instructing you quietly and in order, for you have +a great many things to learn."</p> + +<p>The colonel flushed with anger, and answered sharply:--</p> + +<p>"At all events, you are not the man to teach them to me, my +little gentleman!"</p> + +<p>A drop of blood which fell on his hand changed the current of +his thoughts.</p> + +<p>"Hold on!" said he: "am I bleeding?"</p> + +<p>"That will amount to nothing: circulation is re-established, +and--and your broken ear--"</p> + +<p>He quickly carried his hand to his ear, and said:--</p> + +<p>"It's certainly so. But devil take me if I recollect this accident!"</p> + +<p>"I'll make you a little dressing, and in a couple of days there +will be no trace of it left."</p> + +<p>"Don't give yourself the trouble, my dear Hippocrates: a pinch +of powder is a sovereign cure!"</p> + +<p>M. Nibor set to work to dress the ear in a little less military +fashion. During his operations Léon re-entered.</p> + +<p>"Ah! ah!" said he to the doctor: "you are repairing the harm +I did."</p> + +<p>"Thunderation!" cried Fougas, escaping from the hands of +M. Nibor so as to seize Léon by the collar, "was it you, you +rascal, that hurt my ear?"</p> + +<p>Léon was very good-natured, but his patience failed him. He +pushed his man roughly aside.</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir: it was I who tore your ear, in pulling it; and if +that little misfortune had not happened to me, it is certain that +you would have been to-day six feet under ground. It is I who +saved your life, after buying you with my money when you were +not valued at more than twenty-five louis. It is I who have +passed three days and two nights in cramming charcoal under +your boiler. It is my father who gave you the clothes you now +have on. You are in our house. Drink the little glass of brandy +Gothon just brought you; but for God's sake give up the habit +of calling me rascal, of calling my mother 'Good Mother,' and +of flinging our friends into the street and calling them beggarly +pandours!"</p> + +<p>The colonel, all dumbfounded, held out his hand to Léon, M. +Renault, and the doctor, gallantly kissed the hand of Mme. +Renault, swallowed at a gulp a claret glass filled to the brim with +brandy, and said, in a subdued voice:--</p> + +<p>"Most excellent friends, forget the vagaries of an impulsive +but generous soul. To subdue my passions shall hereafter be my +law. After conquering all the nations in the universe, it is well +to conquer one's self."</p> + +<p>This said, he submitted his ear to M. Nibor, who finished +dressing it.</p> + +<p>"But," said he, summoning up his recollections, "they did not +shoot me, then?"</p> + +<p>"No."</p> + +<p>"And I wasn't frozen to death in the tower?"</p> + +<p>"Not quite."</p> + +<p>"Why has my uniform been taken off? I see! I am a prisoner!"</p> + +<p>"You are free."</p> + +<p>"Free! <i>Vive l'Empéreur!</i> But then there's not a moment to +lose! How many leagues is it to Dantzic?"</p> + +<p>"It's very far."</p> + +<p>"What do you call this chicken-coop of a town?"</p> + +<p>"Fontainebleau."</p> + +<p>"Fontainebleau! In France?"</p> + +<p>"Prefecture of Seine-et-Marne. We are going to introduce +to you the sub-préfect, whom you just pitched into the street."</p> + +<p>"What the devil are your sub-prefects to me? I have a +message from the Emperor to General Rapp, and I must start +this very day for Dantzic. God knows whether I'll be there in +time!"</p> + +<p>"My poor colonel, you will arrive too late. Dantzic is given +up."</p> + +<p>"That's impossible! Since when?"</p> + +<p>"About forty-six years ago."</p> + +<p>"Thunder! I did not understand that you were--mocking +me!"</p> + +<p>M. Nibor placed in his hand a calendar, and said, "See for +yourself! It is now the 17th of August, 1859; you went to sleep +in the tower of Liebenfeld on the 11th of November, 1813: there +have been, then, forty-six years, within three months, during +which the world has moved on without you."</p> + +<p>"Twenty-four and forty-six: but then I would be seventy years +old, according to your statement!"</p> + +<p>"Your vitality clearly shows that you are still twenty-four."</p> + +<p>He shrugged his shoulders, tore up the calendar, and said, +beating the floor with his foot, "Your almanac is a humbug!"</p> + +<p>M. Renault ran to his library, took up half a dozen books at +haphazard, and made him read, at the foot of the title-pages, the +dates 1826, 1833, 1847, and 1858.</p> + +<p>"Pardon me!" said Fougas, burying his head in his hands. +"What has happened to me is so new! I do not think that +another human being was ever subjected to such a trial. I am +seventy years old!"</p> + +<p>Good Mme. Renault went and got a looking-glass from the +bath-room and gave it to him, saying:--</p> + +<p>"Look!"</p> + +<p>He took the glass in both hands, and was silently occupied in +resuming acquaintance with himself, when a hand-organ came into +the court and began playing 'Partant pour la Syrie.'</p> + +<p>Fougas threw the mirror to the ground, and cried out:--</p> + +<p>"What is that you are telling me? I hear the little song of +Queen Hortense!"</p> + +<p>M. Renault patiently explained to him, while picking up the +pieces of the mirror, that the pretty little song of Queen Hortense +had become a national air, and even an official one, since +the regimental bands had substituted that gentle melody for the +fierce 'Marseillaise'; and that our soldiers, strange to say, had +not fought any the worse for it. But the colonel had already +opened the window, and was crying out to the Savoyard with the +organ:--</p> + +<p>"Eh! Friend! A napoleon for you if you will tell me in +what year I am drawing the breath of life!"</p> + +<p>The artist began dancing as lightly as possible, playing on his +musical instrument.</p> + +<p>"Advance at the order!" cried the colonel, "and keep that +devilish machine still!"</p> + +<p>"A little penny, my good monsieur!"</p> + +<p>"It is not a penny that I'll give you, but a napoleon, if you'll +tell what year it is."</p> + +<p>"Oh, but that's funny! Hi--hi--hi!"</p> + +<p>"And if you don't tell me quicker than this amounts to, I'll +cut your ears off!"</p> + +<p>The Savoyard ran away, but he came back pretty soon, having +meditated, during his flight, on the maxim "Nothing risk, nothing +gain."</p> + +<p>"Monsieur," said he, in a wheedling voice, "this is the year +eighteen hundred and fifty-nine."</p> + +<p>"Good!" cried Fougas. He felt in his pockets for money, and +found nothing there. Léon saw his predicament, and flung twenty +francs into the court. Before shutting the window, he pointed +out, to the right, the façade of a pretty little new building, where +the colonel could distinctly read:--</p> + +<blockquote>AUDRET ARCHITECTE<br> +MDCCCLIX</blockquote> + +<p>A perfectly satisfactory piece of evidence, and one which did +not cost twenty francs.</p> + +<p>Fougas, a little confused, pressed Léon's hand and said to +him:--</p> + +<p>"My friend, I do not forget that Confidence is the first duty +from Gratitude toward Beneficence. But tell me of our country! +I tread the sacred soil where I received my being, and I am +ignorant of the career of my native land. France is still the +queen of the world, is she not?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly," said Léon.</p> + +<p>"How is the Emperor?"</p> + +<p>"Well."</p> + +<p>"And the Empress?"</p> + +<p>"Very well."</p> + +<p>"And the King of Rome?"</p> + +<p>"The Prince Imperial? He is a very fine child."</p> + +<p>"How? A fine child! And you have the face to say that this +is 1859!"</p> + +<p>M. Nibor took up the conversation, and explained in a few +words that the reigning sovereign of France was not Napoleon I., +but Napoleon III.</p> + +<p>"But then," cried Fougas, "my Emperor is dead!"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Impossible! Tell me anything you will but that! My Emperor +is immortal."</p> + +<p>M. Nibor and the Renaults, who were not quite professional +historians, were obliged to give him a summary of the history of +our century. Some one went after a big book, written by M. de +Norvins and illustrated with fine engravings by Raffet. He only +believed in the presence of Truth when he could touch her with +his hand, and still cried out almost every moment, "That's impossible! +This is not history that you are reading to me: it is a +romance written to make soldiers weep!"</p> + +<p>This young man must indeed have had a strong and well-tempered +soul; for he learned in forty minutes all the woful events +which fortune had scattered through eighteen years, from the first +abdication up to the death of the King of Rome. Less happy +than his old companions in arms, he had no interval of repose +between these terrible and repeated shocks, all beating upon his +heart at the same time. One could have feared that the blow +might prove mortal, and poor Fougas die in the first hour of his +recovered life. But the imp of a fellow yielded and recovered +himself in quick succession like a spring. He cried out with +admiration on hearing of the five battles of the campaign in +France; he reddened with grief at the farewells of Fontainebleau. +The return from the Isle of Elba transfigured his handsome and +noble countenance; at Waterloo his heart rushed in with the last +army of the Empire, and there shattered itself. Then he clenched +his fists and said between his teeth, "If I had been there at the +head of the Twenty-Third, Blücher and Wellington would have +seen another fate!" The invasion, the truce, the martyr of St. +Helena, the ghastly terror of Europe, the murder of Murat,--the +idol of the cavalry,--the deaths of Ney, Bruno, Mouton-Duvernet, +and so many other whole-souled men whom he had known, admired, +and loved, threw him into a series of paroxysms of rage; +but nothing crushed him. In hearing of the death of Napoleon, +he swore that he would eat the heart of England; the slow agony +of the pale and interesting heir of the Empire inspired him with +a passion to tear the vitals out of Austria. When the drama was +over, and the curtain fell on Schönbrunn, he dashed away his +tears and said, "It is well. I have lived in a moment a man's +entire life. Now show me the map of France!"</p> + +<p>Léon began to turn over the leaves of an atlas, while M. +Renault attempted to continue narrating to the colonel the history +of the Restoration, and of the monarchy of 1830. But Fougas's +interest was in other things.</p> + +<p>"What do I care," said he, "if a couple of hundred babblers +of deputies put one king in place of another? Kings! I've seen +enough of them in the dirt. If the Empire had lasted ten years +longer, I could have had a king for a bootblack."</p> + +<p>When the atlas was placed before him, he at once cried out +with profound disdain, "That France?" But soon two tears of +pitying affection, escaping from his eyes, swelled the rivers +Ardèche and Gironde. He kissed the map and said, with an +emotion which communicated itself to nearly all those who were +present:--</p> + +<p>"Forgive me, poor old love, for insulting your misfortunes. +Those scoundrels whom we always whipped have profited by my +sleep to pare down your frontiers; but little or great, rich or poor, +you are my mother, and I love you as a faithful son! Here is +Corsica, where the giant of our age was born; here is Toulouse, +where I first saw the light; here is Nancy, where I felt my heart +awakened--where, perhaps, she whom I call my Aeglé waits for +me still! France! Thou hast a temple in my soul; this arm is +thine; thou shalt find me ever ready to shed my blood to the last +drop in defending or avenging thee!"</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="ACCADIAN-BABYLONIAN_AND_ASSYRIAN_LITERATURE"></a>ACCADIAN-BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN LITERATURE</h2> + +<h3>BY CRAWFORD H. TOY</h3> +<br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-r.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>ecent discoveries have carried the beginnings of civilization +farther and farther back into the remote past. Scholars are +not agreed as to what region can lay claim to the greatest +literary antiquity. The oldest historical records are found in Egypt +and Babylonia, and each of these lands has its advocates, who claim +for it priority in culture. The data now at our command are not sufficient +for the decision of this question. It may be doubted whether +any one spot on the globe will ever be shown to have precedence in +time over all others,--whether, that is, it will appear that the +civilization of the world has proceeded from a single centre. But though +we are yet far from having reached the very beginnings of culture, +we know that they lie farther back than the wildest dreams of half a +century ago would have imagined. Established kingdoms existed in +Babylonia in the fourth millennium before the beginning of our era; +royal inscriptions have been found which are with great probability +assigned to about the year 3800 B.C. These are, it is true, of the +simplest description, consisting of a few sentences of praise to a deity +or brief notices of a campaign or of the building of a temple; but +they show that the art of writing was known, and that the custom +existed of recording events of the national history. We may thence +infer the existence of a settled civilization and of some sort of literary +productiveness.</p> + +<p>The Babylonian-Assyrian writings with which we are acquainted +may be divided into the two classes of prose and poetry. The former +class consists of royal inscriptions (relating to military campaigns and +the construction of temples), chronological tables (eponym canons), +legal documents (sales, suits, etc.), grammatical tables (paradigms and +vocabularies), lists of omens and lucky and unlucky days, and letters +and reports passing between kings and governors; the latter class +includes cosmogonic poems, an epic poem in twelve books, detached +mythical narratives, magic formulas and incantations, and prayers to +deities (belonging to the ritual service of the temples). The prose +pieces, with scarcely an exception, belong to the historical period, and +may be dated with something like accuracy. The same thing is true +of a part of the poetical material, particularly the prayers; but the +cosmogonic and other mythical poems appear to go back, at least so +far as their material is concerned, to a very remote antiquity, and it +is difficult to assign them a definite date.</p> + +<p>Whether this oldest poetical material belongs to the Semitic Babylonians +or to a non-Semitic (Sumerian-Accadian) people is a question +not yet definitely decided. The material which comes into consideration +for the solution of this problem is mainly linguistic. Along +with the inscriptions, which are obviously in the Semitic-Babylonian +language, are found others composed of words apparently strange. +These are held by some scholars to represent a priestly, cryptographic +writing, by others to be true Semitic words in slightly altered form, +and by others still to belong to a non-Semitic tongue. This last view +supposes that the ancient poetry comes, in substance at any rate, +from a non-Semitic people who spoke this tongue; while on the other +hand, it is maintained that this poetry is so interwoven into Semitic +life that it is impossible to regard it as of foreign origin. The +majority of Semitic scholars are now of the opinion that the origin +of this early literature is foreign. However this may be, it comes to +us in Babylonian dress, it has been elaborated by Babylonian hands, +has thence found its way into the literature of other Semitic peoples, +and for our purposes may be accepted as Babylonian. In any case it +carries us back to very early religious conceptions.</p> + +<p>The cosmogonic poetry is in its outlines not unlike that of Hesiod, +but develops the ruder ideas at greater length. In the shortest (but +probably not the earliest) form of the cosmogony, the beginning of +all things is found in the watery abyss. Two abysmal powers +(Tiamat and Apsu), represented as female and male, mingle their +waters, and from them proceed the gods. The list of deities (as in +the Greek cosmogony) seems to represent several dynasties, a conception +which may embody the belief in the gradual organization of the +world. After two less-known gods, called Lahmu and Lahamu, come +the more familiar figures of later Babylonian writing, Anu and Ea. At +this point the list unfortunately breaks off, and the creative function +which may have been assigned to the gods is lost, or has not yet +been discovered. The general similarity between this account and +that of Gen. i. is obvious: both begin with the abysmal chaos. Other +agreements between the two cosmogonies will be pointed out below. +The most interesting figure in this fragment is that of Tiamat. We +shall presently see her in the character of the enemy of the gods. +The two conceptions of her do not agree together perfectly, and the +priority in time must be assigned to the latter. The idea that the +world of gods and men and material things issued out of the womb +of the abyss is a philosophic generalization that is more naturally +assigned to a period of reflection.</p> + +<p>In the second cosmogonic poem the account is more similar to that +of the second chapter of Genesis, and its present form originated in +or near Babylon. Here we have nothing of the primeval deep, but +are told how the gods made a beautiful land, with rivers and trees; +how Babylon was built and Marduk created man, and the Tigris and +the Euphrates, and the beasts and cities and temples. This also must +be looked on as a comparatively late form of the myth, since its hero +is Marduk, god of Babylon. As in the Bible account, men are created +before beasts, and the region of their first abode seems to be the same +as the Eden of Genesis.</p> + +<p>Let us now turn to the poem in which the combat between Tiamat +and Marduk forms the principal feature. For some unexplained +reason Tiamat rebels against the gods. Collecting her hosts, among +them frightful demon shapes of all imaginable forms, she advances +for the purpose of expelling the gods from their seats. The affrighted +deities turn for protection to the high gods, Anu and Ea, who, however, +recoil in terror from the hosts of the dragon Tiamat. Anshar +then applies to Marduk. The gods are invited to a feast, the situation +is described, and Marduk is invited to lead the heavenly hosts +against the foe. He agrees on condition that he shall be clothed +with absolute power, so that he shall only have to say "Let it be," +and it shall be. To this the gods assent: a garment is placed before +him, to which he says "Vanish," and it vanishes, and when he commands +it to appear, it is present. The hero then dons his armor and +advances against the enemy. He takes Tiamat and slays her, routs +her host, kills her consort Kingu, and utterly destroys the rebellion. +Tiamat he cuts in twain. Out of one half of her he forms the +heavens, out of the other half the earth, and for the gods Anu and +Bel and Ea he makes a heavenly palace, like the abyss itself in +extent. To the great gods also he assigns positions, forms the stars, +establishes the year and month and the day. At this point the history +is interrupted, the tablet being broken. The creation of the +heavenly bodies is to be compared with the similar account in +Gen. i.; whether this poem narrates the creation of the rest of the +world it is impossible to say.</p> + +<p>In this history of the rebellion of Tiamat against the gods we have +a mythical picture of some natural phenomenon, perhaps of the conflict +between the winter and the enlivening sun of summer. The +poem appears to contain elements of different dates. The rude character +of some of the procedures suggests an early time: Marduk slays +Tiamat by driving the wind into her body; the warriors who accompany +her have those composite forms familiar to us from Babylonian +and Egyptian statues, paintings, and seals, which are the product +of that early thought for which there was no essential difference +between man and beast. The festival in which the gods carouse is +of a piece with the divine Ethiopian feasts of Homer. On the other +hand, the idea of the omnipotence of the divine word, when Marduk +makes the garment disappear and reappear, is scarcely a primitive +one. It is substantially identical with the Biblical "Let it be, and it +was." It is probable that the poem had a long career, and in successive +recensions received the coloring of different generations. Tiamat +herself has a long history. Here she is a dragon who assaults the +gods; elsewhere, as we have seen, she is the mother of the gods; +here also her body forms the heaven and the earth. She appears in +Gen. i. 2 as the Tehom, the primeval abyss. In the form of the +hostile dragon she is found in numerous passages of the Old Testament, +though under different names. She is an enemy of Yahwe, +god of Israel, and in the New Testament (Rev. xii.) the combat +between Marduk and Tiamat is represented under the form of a fight +between Michael and the Dragon. In Christian literature Michael has +been replaced by St. George. The old Babylonian conception has been +fruitful of poetry, representing, as it does, in grand form the struggle +between the chaotic and the formative forces of the universe.</p> + +<p>The most considerable of the old Babylonian poems, so far as +length and literary form are concerned, is that which has been commonly +known as the Izdubar epic. The form of the name is not +certain: Mr. Pinches has recently proposed, on the authority of a +Babylonian text, to write it Gilgamesh, and this form has been +adopted by a number of scholars. The poem (discovered by George +Smith in 1872) is inscribed on twelve tablets, each tablet apparently +containing a separate episode.</p> + +<p>The first tablet introduces the hero as the deliverer of his country +from the Elamites, an event which seems to have taken place before +2000 B.C. Of the second, third, fourth, and fifth tablets, only fragments +exist, but it appears that Gilgamesh slays the Elamite tyrant.</p> + +<p>The sixth tablet recounts the love of Ishtar for the hero, to whom +she proposes marriage, offering him the tribute of the land. The +reason he assigns for his rejection of the goddess is the number and +fatal character of her loves. Among the objects of her affection were +a wild eagle, a lion, a war-horse, a ruler, and a husbandman; and all +these came to grief. Ishtar, angry at her rejection, complains to her +father, Anu, and her mother, Anatu, and begs them to avenge her +wrong. Anu creates a divine bull and sends it against Gilgamesh, +who, however, with the aid of his friend Eabani, slays the bull. +Ishtar curses Gilgamesh, but Eabani turns the curse against her.</p> + +<p>The seventh tablet recounts how Ishtar descends to the underworld +seeking some better way of attacking the hero. The description of +the Babylonian Sheol is one of the most effective portions of the +poem, and with it George Smith connects a well-known poem which +relates the descent of Ishtar to the underworld. The goddess goes +down to the house of darkness from which there is no exit, and +demands admittance of the keeper; who, however, by command of +the queen of the lower world, requires her to submit to the conditions +imposed on all who enter. There are seven gates, at each of +which he removes some portion of her ornaments and dress. Ishtar, +thus unclothed, enters and becomes a prisoner. Meantime the upper +earth has felt her absence. All love and life has ceased. Yielding +to the persuasions of the gods, Ea sends a messenger to demand +the release of the goddess. The latter passes out, receiving at each +gate a portion of her clothing. This story of Ishtar's love belongs to +one of the earliest stages of religious belief. Not only do the gods +appear as under the control of ordinary human passions, but there is +no consciousness of material difference between man and beast. The +Greek parallels are familiar to all. Of these ideas we find no trace +in the later Babylonian and Assyrian literature, and the poem was +doubtless interpreted by the Babylonian sages in allegorical fashion.</p> + +<p>In the eighth and ninth tablets the death of Eabani is recorded, +and the grief of Gilgamesh. The latter then wanders forth in search +of Hasisadra, the hero of the Flood-story. After various adventures +he reaches the abode of the divinized man, and from him learns the +story of the Flood, which is given in the eleventh tablet.</p> + +<p>This story is almost identical with that of the Book of Genesis. +The God Bel is determined to destroy mankind, and Hasisadra +receives directions from Ea to build a ship, and take into it provisions +and goods and slaves and beasts of the field. The ship is covered +with bitumen. The flood is sent by Shamash (the sun-god). +Hasisadra enters the ship and shuts the door. So dreadful is the +tempest that the gods in affright ascend for protection to the heaven +of Anu. Six days the storm lasts. On the seventh conies calm. +Hasisadra opens a window and sees the mountain of Nizir, sends forth +a dove, which returns; then a swallow, which returns; then a raven, +which does not return; then, knowing that the flood has passed, sends +out the animals, builds an altar, and offers sacrifice, over which the +gods gather like flies. Ea remonstrates with Bel, and urges that hereafter, +when he is angry with men, instead of sending a deluge, he +shall send wild beasts, who shall destroy them. Thereupon Bel makes +a compact with Hasisadra, and the gods take him and his wife and +people and place them in a remote spot at the mouth of the rivers. +It is now generally agreed that the Hebrew story of the Flood is +taken from the Babylonian, either mediately through the Canaanites +(for the Babylonians had occupied Canaan before the sixteenth century +B.C.), or immediately during the exile in the sixth century. +The Babylonian account is more picturesque, the Hebrew more restrained +and solemn. The early polytheistic features have been +excluded by the Jewish editors.</p> + +<p>In addition to these longer stories there are a number of legends +of no little poetical and mythical interest. In the cycle devoted to +the eagle there is a story of the struggle between the eagle and the +serpent. The latter complains to the sun-god that the eagle has +eaten his young. The god suggests a plan whereby the hostile bird +may be caught: the body of a wild ox is to be set as a snare. Out +of this plot, however, the eagle extricates himself by his sagacity. +In the second story the eagle comes to the help of a woman who is +struggling to bring a man-child (apparently Etana) into the world. +In the third is portrayed the ambition of the hero Etana to ascend to +heaven. The eagle promises to aid him in accomplishing his design. +Clinging to the bird, he rises with him higher and higher toward the +heavenly space, reaching the abode of Anu, and then the abode of +Ishtar. As they rise to height after height the eagle describes the +appearance of the world lying stretched out beneath: at first it rises +like a huge mountain out of the sea; then the ocean appears as a +girdle encircling the land, and finally but as a ditch a gardener digs +to irrigate his land. When they have risen so high that the earth is +scarcely visible, Etana cries to the eagle to stop; so he does, but his +strength is exhausted, and bird and man fall to the earth.</p> + +<p>Another cycle of stories deals with the winds. The god Zu longs +to have absolute power over the world. To that end he lurks about +the door of the sun-god, the possessor of the tablets of fate whereby +he controls all things. Each morning before beginning his journey, +the sun-god steps out to send light showers over the world. Watching +his opportunity, Zu glides in, seizes the tablets of fate, and flies +away and hides himself in the mountains. So great horror comes +over the world: it is likely to be scorched by the sun-god's burning +beams. Anu calls on the storm-god Ramman to conquer Zu, but he +is frightened and declines the task, as do other gods. Here, unfortunately, +the tablet is broken, so that we do not know by whom the +normal order was finally restored.</p> + +<p>In the collection of cuneiform tablets disinterred at Amarna in 1887 +was found the curious story of Adapa. The demigod Adapa, the son +of Ea, fishing in the sea for the family of his lord, is overwhelmed by +the stormy south wind and cast under the waves. In anger he breaks +the wings of the wind, that it may no longer rage in the storm. +Anu, informed that the south wind no longer blows, summons Adapa +to his presence. Ea instructs his son to put on apparel of mourning, +present himself at Anu's gate, and there make friends with the porters, +Tammuz and Iszida, so that they may speak a word for him to +Anu; going into the presence of the royal deity, he will be offered +food and drink which he must reject, and raiment and oil which +he must accept. Adapa carries out the instructions of his father to +the letter. Anu is appeased, but laments that Adapa, by rejecting +heavenly food and drink, has lost the opportunity to become immortal. +This story, the record of which is earlier than the sixteenth +century B.C., appears to contain two conceptions: it is a mythical +description of the history of the south wind, but its conclusion presents +a certain parallelism with the end of the story of Eden in +Genesis; as there Adam, so here Adapa, fails of immortality because +he infringes the divine command concerning the divine food. We +have here a suggestion that the story in Genesis is one of the cycle +which dealt with the common earthly fact of man's mortality.</p> + +<p>The legend of Dibbarra seems to have a historical basis. The god +Dibbarra has devastated the cities of Babylonia with bloody wars. +Against Babylon he has brought a hostile host and slain its people, so +that Marduk, the god of Babylon, curses him. And in like manner +he has raged against Erech, and is cursed by its goddess Ishtar. He +is charged with confounding the righteous and unrighteous in indiscriminate +destruction. But Dibbarra determines to advance against +the dwelling of the king of the gods, and Babylonia is to be further +desolated by civil war. It is a poetical account of devastating wars +as the production of a hostile diety. It is obvious that these legends +have many features in common with those of other lands, myths of +conflict between wind and sun, and the ambition of heroes to scale +the heights of heaven. How far these similarities are the independent +products of similar situations, and how far the results of loans, +cannot at present be determined.</p> + +<p>The moral-religious literature of the Babylonians is not inferior in +interest to the stories just mentioned. The hymns to the gods are +characterized by a sublimity and depth of feeling which remind us of +the odes of the Hebrew Psalter. The penitential hymns appear to +contain expressions of sorrow for sin, which would indicate a high +development of the religious consciousness. These hymns, apparently +a part of the temple ritual, probably belong to a relatively late stage +of history; but they are none the less proof that devotional feeling in +ancient times was not limited to any one country.</p> + +<p>Other productions, such as the hymn to the seven evil spirits +(celebrating their mysterious power), indicate a lower stage of religious +feeling; this is specially visible in the magic formulas, which +portray a very early stratum of religious history. They recall the +Shamanism of Central Asia and the rites of savage tribes; but there +is no reason to doubt that the Semitic religion in its early stages +contained this magic element, which is found all the world over.</p> + +<p>Riddles and Proverbs are found among the Babylonians, as among +all peoples. Comparatively few have been discovered, and these present +nothing of peculiar interest. The following may serve as specimens:--"What +is that which becomes pregnant without conceiving, +fat without eating?" The answer seems to be "A cloud." "My coal-brazier +clothes me with a divine garment, my rock is founded in the +sea" (a volcano). "I dwell in a house of pitch and brick, but over +me glide the boats" (a canal). "He that says, 'Oh, that I might +exceedingly avenge myself!' draws from a waterless well, and rubs +the skin without oiling it." "When sickness is incurable and hunger +unappeasable, silver and gold cannot restore health nor appease hunger." +"As the oven waxes old, so the foe tires of enmity." "The +life of yesterday goes on every day." "When the seed is not good, +no sprout comes forth."</p> + +<p>The poetical form of all these pieces is characterized by that parallelism +of members with which we are familiar in the poetry of the +Old Testament. It is rhythmical, but apparently not metrical: the +harmonious flow of syllables in any one line, with more or less beats +or cadences, is obvious; but it does not appear that syllables were +combined into feet, or that there was any fixed rule for the number +of syllables or beats in a line. So also strophic divisions may +be observed, such divisions naturally resulting from the nature of all +narratives. Sometimes the strophe seems to contain four lines, sometimes +more. No strophic rule has yet been established; but it seems +not unlikely that when the longer poetical pieces shall have been +more definitely fixed in form, certain principles of poetical composition +will present themselves. The thought of the mythical pieces and the +prayers and hymns is elevated and imaginative. Some of this poetry +appears to have belonged to a period earlier than 2000 B.C. Yet +the Babylonians constructed no epic poem like the (Iliad,) or at any +rate none such has yet been found. Their genius rather expressed +itself in brief or fragmentary pieces, like the Hebrews and the Arabs.</p> + +<p>The Babylonian prose literature consists almost entirely of short +chronicles and annals. Royal inscriptions have been found covering +the period from 3000 B.C. to 539 B.C. There are eponym canons, +statistical lists, diplomatic letters, military reports; but none of these +rise to the dignity of history. Several connected books of chronicles +have indeed been found; there is a synchronistic book of annals of +Babylonia and Assyria, there is a long Assyrian chronicle, and there +are annalistic fragments. But there is no digested historical narrative, +which gives a clear picture of the general civil and political situation, +or any analysis of the characters of kings, generals, and governors, or +any inquiry into causes of events. It is possible that narratives having +a better claim to the name of history may yet be discovered, resembling +those of the Biblical Book of Kings; yet the Book of Kings is +scarcely history--neither the Jews nor the Babylonians and Assyrians +seem to have had great power in this direction.</p> + +<p>One of the most interesting collections of historical pieces is that +recently discovered at Amarna. Here, out of a mound which represents +a palace of the Egyptian King Amenhotep IV., were dug up +numerous letters which were exchanged between the kings of Babylonia +and Egypt in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and numerous +reports sent to the Egyptian government by Egyptian governors of +Canaanite cities. These tablets show that at this early time there was +lively communication between the Euphrates and the Nile, and they +give a vivid picture of the chaotic state of affairs in Canaan, which +was exposed to the assaults of enemies on all sides. This country +was then in possession of Egypt, but at a still earlier period it must +have been occupied by the Babylonians. Only in this way can we +account for the surprising fact that the Babylonian cuneiform script +and the Babylonian language form the means of communication +between the east and west and between Egypt and Canaan. The +literary value of these letters is not great; their interest is chiefly +historic and linguistic. The same thing is true of the contract +tablets, which are legal documents: these cover the whole area of +Babylonian history, and show that civil law attained a high state of +perfection; they are couched in the usual legal phrases.</p> + +<p>The literary monuments mentioned above are all contained in +tablets, which have the merit of giving in general contemporaneous +records of the things described. But an account of Babylonian literature +would be incomplete without mention of the priest Berosus. +Having, as priest of Bel, access to the records of the temples, he +wrote a history of his native land, in which he preserved the substance +of a number of poetical narratives, as well as the ancient +accounts of the political history. The fragments of his work which +have been preserved (see Cory's 'Ancient Fragments') exhibit a +number of parallels with the contents of the cuneiform tablets. +Though he wrote in Greek (he lived in the time of Alexander the +Great), and was probably trained in the Greek learning of his time, +his work doubtless represents the spirit of Babylonian historical writing. +So far as can be judged from the remains which have come +down to us, its style is of the annalistic sort which appears in the +old inscriptions and in the historical books of the Bible.</p> + +<p>The Babylonian literature above described must be understood to +include the Assyrian. Civilization was first established in Babylonia, +and there apparently were produced the great epic poems and the +legends. But Assyria, when she succeeded to the headship of the +Mesopotamian valley, in the twelfth century B.C., adopted the literature +of her southern sister. A great part of the old poetry has been +found in the library of Assurbanipal, at Nineveh (seventh century +B.C.), where a host of scribes occupied themselves with the study of +the ancient literature. They seem to have had almost all the apparatus +of modern critical work. Tablets were edited, sometimes with +revisions. There are bilingual tablets, presenting in parallel columns +the older texts (called Sumerian-Accadian) and the modern version. +There are numerous grammatical and lexicographical lists. The records +were accessible, and often consulted. Assurbanipal, in bringing +back a statue of the goddess Nana from the Elamite region, says that +it was carried off by the Elamites 1635 years before; and Nabonidus, +the last king of Babylon (circa B.C. 550), a man devoted to temple +restoration, refers to an inscription of King Naram-Sin, of Agane, who, +he says, reigned 3200 years before. In recent discoveries made at +Nippur, by the American Babylonian Expedition, some Assyriologists +find evidence of the existence of a Babylonian civilization many centuries +before B.C. 4000 (the dates B.C. 5000 and B.C. 6000 have been +mentioned); the material is now undergoing examination, and it is too +early to make definite statements of date. See Peters in American +Journal of Archaeology for January-March, 1895, and July-September, +1895; and Hilprecht, 'The Babylonian Expedition of the University of +Pennsylvania,' Vol. i., Part 2, 1896.</p> + +<p>The Assyrian and Babylonian historical inscriptions, covering as +they do the whole period of Jewish history down to the capture of +Babylon by Cyrus, are of very great value for the illustration of the +Old Testament. They have a literary interest also. Many of them +are written in semi-rhythmical style, a form which was favored by +the inscriptional mode of writing. The sentences are composed of +short parallel clauses, and the nature of the material induced a division +into paragraphs which resemble strophes. They are characterized +also by precision and pithiness of statement, and are probably as +trust-worthy as official records ever are.</p> + +<p class="rgt"><img src="images/064.png" width="40%" alt=""></p> +<br><br><br><br> + + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><a name="I._THEOGONY"></a>I. THEOGONY</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>In the time when above the heaven was not named,</p> +<p>The earth beneath bore no name,</p> +<p>When the ocean, the primeval parent of both,</p> +<p>The abyss Tiamat the mother of both....</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The waters of both mingled in one.</p> +<p>No fields as yet were tilled, no moors to be seen,</p> +<p>When as yet of the gods not one had been produced,</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">No names they bore, no titles they had,</p> +<p class="i2">Then were born of the gods....</p> +<p class="i2">Lachmu Lachamu came into existence.</p> +<p class="i2">Many ages past....</p> +<p class="i2">Anshar, Kishar were born.</p> +<p class="i2">Many days went by. Anu....</p> +</div></div> + +<p>[Here there is a long lacuna. The lost lines completed the history of +the creation of the gods, and gave the reason for the uprising of Tiamat +with her hosts. What it was that divided the divine society into two +hostile camps can only be conjectured; probably Tiamat, who represents +the unfriendly or chaotic forces of nature, saw that her domain was +being encroached on by the light-gods, who stand for cosmic order.]</p> + + +<br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><a name="II._REVOLT_OF_TIAMAT"></a>II. REVOLT OF TIAMAT</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>To her came flocking all the gods,</p> +<p>They gathered together, they came to Tiamat;</p> +<p>Angry they plan, restless by night and by day,</p> +<p>Prepare for war with gestures of rage and hate,</p> +<p>With combined might to begin the battle.</p> +<p>The mother of the abyss, she who created them all,</p> +<p>Unconquerable warriors, gave them giant snakes,</p> +<p>Sharp of tooth, pitiless in might,</p> +<p>With poison like blood she filled their bodies,</p> +<p>Huge poisonous adders raging, she clothed them with dread,</p> +<p>Filled them with splendor....</p> +<p>He who sees them shuddering shall seize him,</p> +<p>They rear their bodies, none can resist their breast.</p> +<p>Vipers she made, terrible snakes....</p> +<p>... raging dogs, scorpion-men ... fish men....</p> +<p>Bearing invincible arms, fearless in the fight.</p> +<p>Stern are her commands, not to be resisted.</p> +<p>Of all the first-born gods, because he gave her help,</p> +<p>She raised up Kingu in the midst, she made him the greatest,</p> +<p>To march in front of the host, to lead the whole,</p> +<p>To begin the war of arms, to advance the attack,</p> +<p>Forward in the fight to be the triumpher.</p> +<p>This she gave into his hand, made him sit on the throne:--</p> +<p>By my command I make thee great in the circle of the gods;</p> +<p>Rule over all the gods I have given to thee,</p> +<p>The greatest shalt thou be, thou my chosen consort;</p> +<p>Be thy name made great over all the earth.</p> +<p>She gave him the tablets of fate, laid them on his breast.</p> +<p>Thy command be not gainsaid, thy word stand fast.</p> +<p>Thus lifted up on high, endued with Anu's rank,</p> +<p>Among the gods her children Kingu did bear rule.</p> +</div></div> + +<p>[The gods, dismayed, first appeal to Anu for aid against Tiamat, but he +refuses to lead the attack. Anshar then sends to invite the gods to +a feast.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">Anshar opened his mouth,</p> +<p class="i2">To Gaga, his servant, spake he:--</p> +<p class="i2">Go, O Gaga, my servant thou who delightest my soul,</p> +<p class="i2">To Lachmu Lachamu I will send thee...</p> +<p class="i2">That the gods may sit at the feast,</p> +<p class="i2">Bread to eat, wine to drink,</p> +<p class="i2">To give the rule to Marduk.</p> +<p class="i2">Up Gaga, to them go,</p> +<p class="i2">And tell what I say to thee:--</p> +<p class="i2">Anshar, your son, has sent me,</p> +<p class="i2">Told me the desire of his heart.</p> +</div></div> + +<p>[He repeats the preceding description of Tiamat's preparations, and +announces that Marduk has agreed to face the foe.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">I sent Anu, naught can he against her.</p> +<p class="i2">Nudimmud was afraid and turned cowering back,</p> +<p class="i2">Marduk accepted the task, the ruler of gods, your son,</p> +<p class="i2">Against Tiamat to march his heart impels him.</p> +<p class="i2">So speaks he to me:</p> +<p class="i2">If I succeed, I, your avenger,</p> +<p class="i2">Conquer Tiamat and save your lives.</p> +<p class="i2">Come, ye all, and declare me supreme,</p> +<p class="i2">In Upsukkenaku enter ye joyfully all.</p> +<p class="i2">With my mouth will I bear rule,</p> +<p class="i2">Unchangeable be whate'er I do,</p> +<p class="i2">The word of my lips be never reversed or gainsaid.</p> +<p class="i2">Come and to him give over the rule,</p> +<p class="i2">That he may go and meet the evil foe.</p> +<p class="i2">Gaga went, strode on his way,</p> +<p class="i2">Humbly before Lachmu and Lachamu, the gods, his fathers,</p> +<p class="i2">He paid his homage and kissed the ground,</p> +<p class="i2">Bent lowly down and to them spake:--</p> +<p class="i2">Anshar, your son, has sent me,</p> +<p class="i2">Told me the desire of his heart.</p> +</div></div> + +<p>[Gaga then repeats Anshar's message at length, and the narrative proceeds.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">Lachmu and Lachamu heard and were afraid,</p> +<p class="i2">The Igigi all lamented sore:</p> +<p class="i2">What change has come about that she thus hates us?</p> +<p class="i2">We cannot understand this deed of Tiamat.</p> +<p class="i2">With hurry and haste they went,</p> +<p class="i2">The great gods, all the dealers of fate,</p> +<p class="i2">... with eager tongue, sat themselves down to the feast.</p> +<p class="i2">Bread they ate, wine they drank,</p> +<p class="i2">The sweet wine entered their souls,</p> +<p class="i2">They drank their fill, full were their bodies.</p> +</div></div> + +<p>[In this happy state they were ready to accept Marduk's conditions.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p>To Marduk, their avenger, they gave over the rule.</p> +<p>They lifted him up on a lofty throne,</p> +<p>Above his fathers he took his place as judge:--</p> +<p>Most honored be thou among the great gods,</p> +<p>Unequaled thy rule, thy word is Anu.</p> +<p>From this time forth thy command be not gainsaid;</p> +<p>To lift up and cast down be the work of thy hand;</p> +<p>The speech of thy mouth stand fast, thy word be irresistible,</p> +<p>None of the gods shall intrude on thy domain,</p> +<p>Fullness of wealth, the desire of the temples of the gods,</p> +<p>Be the portion of thy shrine, though they be in need.</p> +<p>Marduk, thou, our avenger,</p> +<p>Thine be the kingdom over all forever.</p> +<p>Sit thee down in might, noble be thy word,</p> +<p>Thy arms shall never yield, the foes they shall crush.</p> +<p>O lord, he who trusts in thee, him grant thou life,</p> +<p>But the deity who set evil on foot, her life pour out.</p> +<p>Then in the midst they placed a garment.</p> +<p>To Marduk their first-born thus spake they:--</p> +<p>Thy rule, O lord, be chief among the gods,</p> +<p>To destroy and to create--speak and let it be.</p> +<p>Open thy mouth, let the garment vanish.</p> +<p>Utter again thy command, let the garment appear.</p> +<p>He spake with his mouth, vanished the garment;</p> +<p>Again he commanded, and the garment appeared.</p> +<p>When the gods, his fathers, saw thus his word fulfilled,</p> +<p>Joyful were they and did homage: Marduk is king.</p> +<p>On him conferred sceptre and throne....</p> +<p>Gave him invincible arms to crush them that hate him.</p> +<p>Now go and cut short the life of Tiamat,</p> +<p>May the winds into a secret place carry her blood.</p> +<p>The ruler of the gods they made him, the gods, his fathers,</p> +<p>Wished him success and glory in the way on which he went.</p> +<p>He made ready a bow, prepared it for use,</p> +<p>Made ready a spear to be his weapon.</p> +<p>He took the ... seized it in his right hand,</p> +<p>Bow and quiver hung at his side,</p> +<p>Lightning he fashioned flashing before him,</p> +<p>With glowing flame he filled its body,</p> +<p>A net he prepared to seize Tiamat,</p> +<p>Guarded the four corners of the world that nothing of her should escape,</p> +<p>On South and North, on East and West</p> +<p>He laid the net, his father Anu's gift.</p> +<p>He fashioned the evil wind, the south blast, the tornado,</p> +<p>The four-and-seven wind, the wind of destruction and woe,</p> +<p>Sent forth the seven winds which he had made</p> +<p>Tiamat's body to destroy, after him they followed.</p> +<p>Then seized the lord the thunderbolt, his mighty weapon,</p> +<p>The irresistible chariot, the terrible, he mounted,</p> +<p>To it four horses he harnessed, pitiless, fiery, swift,</p> +<p>Their teeth were full of venom covered with foam.</p> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<br> +<p>On it mounted Marduk the mighty in battle.</p> +<p>To right and left he looked, lifting his eye.</p> +<p>His terrible brightness surrounded his head.</p> +<p>Against her he advanced, went on his way,</p> +<p>To Tiamat lifted his face.</p> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<br> +They looked at him, at him looked the gods,<br> +The gods, his fathers, looked at him; at him looked the gods.<br> +And nearer pressed the lord, with his eye piercing Tiamat.<br> +On Kingu her consort rested his look.<br> +As he so looked, every way is stopped.<br> +His senses Kingu loses, vanishes his thought,<br> +And the gods, his helpers, who stood by his side<br> +Saw their leader powerless....<br> +But Tiamat stood, not turning her back.<br> +With fierce lips to him she spake:--<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<br> +Then grasped the lord his thunderbolt, his mighty weapon,<br> +Angry at Tiamat he hurled his words:--<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<br> +When Tiamat heard these words,<br> +She fell into fury, beside herself was she.<br> +Tiamat cried wild and loud<br> +Till through and through her body shook.<br> +She utters her magic formula, speaks her word,<br> +And the gods of battle rush to arms.<br> +Then advance Tiamat, and Marduk the ruler of the gods<br> +To battle they rush, come on to the fight.<br> +His wide-stretched net over her the lord did cast,<br> +The evil wind from behind him he let loose in her face.<br> +Tiamat opened her throat as wide as she might,<br> +Into it he sent the evil wind before she could close her lips.<br> +The terrible winds filled her body,<br> +Her senses she lost, wide open stood her throat.<br> +He seized his spear, through her body he ran it,<br> +Her inward parts he hewed, cut to pieces her heart.<br> +Her he overcame, put an end to her life,<br> +Cast away her corpse and on it stood.<br> +So he, the leader, slew Tiamat,<br> +Her power he crushed, her might he destroyed.<br> +Then the gods, her helpers, who stood at her side,<br> +Fear and trembling seized them, their backs they turned,<br> +Away they fled to save their lives.<br> +Fast were they girt, escape they could not,<br> +Captive he took them, broke in pieces their arms.<br> +They were caught in the net, sat in the toils,<br> +All the earth they filled with their cry.<br> +Their doom they bore, held fast in prison,<br> +And the eleven creatures, clothed with dread,<br> +A herd of demons who with her went,<br> +These he subdued, destroyed their power,<br> +Crushed their valor, trod them under foot;<br> +And Kingu, who had grown great over them all,<br> +Him he overcame with the god Kugga,<br> +Took from him the tablets of fate which were not rightfully his,<br> +Stamped thereon his seal, and hung them on his breast.<br> +When thus the doughty Marduk had conquered his foes,<br> +His proud adversary to shame had brought,<br> +Had completed Anshar's triumph over the enemy,<br> +Had fulfilled Nudimmud's will,<br> +Then the conquered gods he put in prison,<br> +And to Tiamat, whom he had conquered, returned.<br> +Under his foot the lord Tiamat's body trod,<br> +With his irresistible club he shattered her skull,<br> +Through the veins of her blood he cut;<br> +Commanded the north wind to bear it to a secret place.<br> +His fathers saw it, rejoiced and shouted.<br> +Gifts and offerings to him they brought.<br> +The lord was appeased seeing her corpse.<br> +Dividing her body, wise plans he laid.<br> +Into two halves like a fish he divided her,<br> +Out of one half he made the vault of heaven,<br> +A bar he set and guards he posted,<br> +Gave them command that the waters pass not through.<br> +Through the heaven he strode, viewed its spaces,<br> +Near the deep placed Nudimmud's dwelling.<br> +And the lord measured the domain of the deep,<br> +A palace like it, Eshara, he built,<br> +The palace Eshara which he fashioned as heaven.<br> +Therein made he Anu, Bel, and Ea to dwell.<br> +He established the station of the great gods,<br> +Stars which were like them, constellations he set,<br> +The year he established, marked off its parts,<br> +Divided twelve months by three stars,<br> +From the day that begins the year to the day that ends it<br> +He established the station Nibir to mark its limits.<br> +That no harm come, no one go astray,<br> +The stations of Bel and Ea be set by its side.<br> +Great doors he made on this side and that,<br> +Closed them fast on left and right.<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<br> +The moon-god he summoned, to him committed the night.<br> +</div></div> +<br> +<p>[Here the account breaks off; there probably followed the history of the +creation of the earth and of man.]</p> +<br><br> + + +<p><a name="III._FRAGMENTS_OF_A_DESCENT_TO_THE_UNDERWORLD"></a>III. FRAGMENTS OF A DESCENT TO THE UNDERWORLD</p> +<br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +To the underworld I turn,<br> +I spread my wings like a bird,<br> +I descend to the house of darkness, to the dwelling of Irkalla,<br> +To the house from which there is no exit,<br> +The road on which there is no return,<br> +To the house whose dwellers long for light,<br> +Dust is their nourishment and mud their food,<br> +Whose chiefs are like feathered birds,<br> +Where light is never seen, in darkness they dwell.<br> +In the house which I will enter<br> +There is treasured up for me a crown,<br> +With the crowned ones who of old ruled the earth,<br> +To whom Anu and Bel have given terrible names,<br> +Carrion is their food, their drink stagnant water.<br> +There dwell the chiefs and unconquered ones,<br> +There dwell the bards and the mighty men,<br> +Monsters of the deep of the great gods.<br> +It is the dwelling of Etana, the dwelling of Ner,<br> +Of Ninkigal, the queen of the underworld....<br> +Her I will approach and she will see me.<br> +<br><br> + +<p class="i2">ISHTAR'S DESCENT TO THE UNDERWORLD</p> +</div></div> +<p>[After a description substantially identical with the first half of the +preceding poem, the story goes on:--]</p> + +To the gate of the underworld Ishtar came,<br> +To the keeper of the gate her command she addressed:--<br> +Keeper of the waters, open thy gate,<br> +Open thy gate that I may enter.<br> +If thou open not the gate and let me in,<br> +I will strike the door, the posts I will shatter,<br> +I will strike the hinges, burst open the doors,<br> +I will raise up the dead devourers of the living,<br> +Over the living the dead shall triumph.<br> +The keeper opened his mouth and spake,<br> +To the Princess Ishtar he cried:--<br> +Stay, lady, do not thus,<br> +Let me go and repeat thy words to Queen Ninkigal.<br> + +<p>[He goes and gets the terrible queen's permission for Ishtar to enter on +certain conditions.]</p> + +Through the first gate he caused her to pass<br> +The crown of her head he took away.<br> +Why, O keeper, takest thou away the great crown of my head?<br> +Thus, O lady, the goddess of the underworld doeth to all her visitors at the entrance.<br> +Through the second gate he caused her to pass,<br> +The earrings of her ears he took away.<br> +Why, O keeper, takest thou away the earrings of my ears?<br> +So, O lady, the goddess of the underworld doeth to all that enter her realm.<br> + +<p>[And so at each gate till she is stripped of clothing. A long time Ninkigal +holds her prisoner, and in the upper world love vanishes and men and +gods mourn. Ea sees that Ishtar must return, and sends his messenger to +bring her.]</p> + +Go forth, O messenger,<br> +Toward the gates of the underworld set thy face,<br> +Let the seven gates of Hades be opened at thy presence,<br> +Let Ninkigal see thee and rejoice at thy arrival,<br> +That her heart be satisfied and her anger be removed.<br> +Appease her by the names of the great gods . . .<br> +Ninkigal, when this she heard,<br> +Beat her breast and wrung her hands,<br> +Turned away, no comfort would she take.<br> +Go, thou messenger,<br> +Let the great jailer keep thee,<br> +The refuse of the city be thy food,<br> +The drains of the city thy drink,<br> +The shadow of the dungeon be thy resting-place,<br> +The slab of stone be thy seat.<br> +Ninkigal opened her mouth and spake,<br> +To Simtar, her attendant, her command she gave.<br> +Go, Simtar, strike the palace of judgment,<br> +Pour over Ishtar the water of life, and bring her before me.<br> +Simtar went and struck the palace of judgment,<br> +On Ishtar he poured the water of life and brought her.<br> +Through the first gate he caused her to pass,<br> +And restored to her her covering cloak.<br> + +<p>[And so through the seven gates till all her ornaments are restored. The +result of the visit to the underworld is not described.]</p> +<br><br> + + +<p><a name="IV._THE_FLOOD"></a>IV. THE FLOOD</p> +<br> + +<p>[The hero Gilgamesh (Izdubar), wandering in search of healing for his +sickness, finds Hasisadra (Xisuthros), the Babylonian Noah, who tells +him the story of the Flood.]</p> + +Hasisadra spake to him, to Gilgamesh:---<br> +To thee I will reveal, Gilgamesh, the story of my deliverance,<br> +And the oracle of the gods I will make known to thee.<br> +The city Surippak, which, as thou knowest,<br> +Lies on the Euphrates' bank,<br> +Already old was this city<br> +When the gods that therein dwell<br> +To send a flood their heart impelled them,<br> +All the great gods: their father Anu,<br> +Their counsellor the warlike Bel,<br> +Adar their throne-bearer and the Prince Ennugi.<br> +The lord of boundless wisdom,<br> +Ea, sat with them in council.<br> +Their resolve he announced and so he spake:--<br> +O thou of Surippak, son of Ubaratutu,<br> +Leave thy house and build a ship.<br> +They will destroy the seed of life.<br> +Do thou preserve in life, and hither bring the seed of life<br> +Of every sort into the ship.<br> + +<p>[Here follows a statement of the dimensions of the ship, but the numbers +are lost.]</p> + +When this I heard to Ea my lord I spake:--<br> +The building of the ship, O lord, which thou commandest<br> +If I perform it, people and elders will mock me.<br> +Ea opened his mouth and spake,<br> +Spake to me, his servant:--<br> + +<p>[The text is here mutilated: Hasisadra is ordered to threaten the mockers +with Ea's vengeance.]</p> + +Thou, however, shut not thy door till I shall send thee word.<br> +Then pass through the door and bring<br> +All grain and goods and wealth,<br> +Family, servants and maids and all thy kin,<br> +The cattle of the field, the beasts of the field.<br> +Hasisadra opened his mouth, to Ea his lord he said:--<br> +O my lord, a ship in this wise hath no one ever built....<br> + +<p>[Hasisadra tells how he built the ship according to Ea's directions.]</p> + +All that I had I brought together,<br> +All of silver and all of gold,<br> +And all of the seed of life into the ship I brought.<br> +And my household, men and women,<br> +The cattle of the field, the beasts of the field,<br> +And all my kin I caused to enter.<br> +Then when the sun the destined time brought on,<br> +To me he said at even-fall:--<br> +Destruction shall the heaven rain.<br> +Enter the ship and close the door.<br> +With sorrow on that day I saw the sun go down.<br> +The day on which I was to enter the ship I was afraid.<br> +Yet into the ship I went, behind me the door I closed.<br> +Into the hands of the steersman I gave the ship with its cargo.<br> +Then from the heaven's horizon rose the dark cloud<br> +Raman uttered his thunder,<br> +Nabu and Sarru rushed on,<br> +Over hill and dale strode the throne-bearers,<br> +Adar sent ceaseless streams, floods the Anunnaki brought.<br> +Their power shakes the earth,<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"><br> +<br> +Raman's billows up to heaven mount,<br> +All light to darkness is turned.<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"><br> +<br> +Brother looks not after brother, no man for another cares.<br> +The gods in heaven are frightened, refuge they seek,<br> +Upward they mount to the heaven of Anu.<br> +Like a dog in his lair,<br> +So cower the gods together at the bars of heaven.<br> +Ishtar cries out in pain, loud cries the exalted goddess:--<br> +All is turned to mire.<br> +This evil to the gods I announced, to the gods foretold the evil.<br> +This exterminating war foretold<br> +Against my race of mankind.<br> +Not for this bare I men that like the brood of the fishes<br> +They should fill the sea.<br> +Then wept the gods with her over the Anunnaki,<br> +In lamentation sat the gods, their lips hard pressed together.<br> +Six days and seven nights ruled wind and flood and storm.<br> +But when the seventh day broke, subsided the storm, and the flood<br> +<br><br> +<center> +<a name="077.jpg"></a> +<i>ASSYRIAN CLAY TABLET</i>,<br><br> + +Containing a part of the story of the flood, from the library of<br> +Assurbanipal. Found in recent explorations in Ancient Babylon, London:<br> +British Museum,<br> +</center> + +<p class="ctr"><img src="images/077.jpg" width="40%" alt=""> +<br> +<b>Assyrian Clay Tablet (Fac-simile).</b></p><br> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +Which raged like a mighty host, settled itself to quiet.<br> +Down went the sea, ceased storm and flood.<br> +Through the sea I rode lamenting.<br> +The upper dwellings of men were ruined,<br> +Corpses floated like trees.<br> +A window I opened, on my face the daylight fell.<br> +I shuddered and sat me down weeping,<br> +Over my face flowed my tears.<br> +I rode over regions of land, on a terrible sea.<br> +Then rose one piece of land twelve measures high.<br> +To the land Nizir the ship was steered,<br> +The mountain Nizir held the ship fast, and let it no more go.<br> +</div></div> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> + At the dawn of the seventh day<br> + I took a dove and sent it forth.<br> + Hither and thither flew the dove,<br> + No resting-place it found, back to me it came.<br> + A swallow I took and sent it forth,<br> + No resting-place it found, and back to me it came.<br> + A raven I took and sent it forth,<br> + Forth flew the raven and saw that the water had fallen,<br> + Carefully waded on but came not back.<br> + All the animals then to the four winds I sent.<br> + A sacrifice I offered,<br> + An altar I built on the mountain-top,<br> + By sevens I placed the vessels,<br> + Under them spread sweet cane and cedar.<br> + The gods inhaled the smoke, inhaled the sweet-smelling smoke,<br> + Like flies the gods collected over the offering.<br> + Thither then came Ishtar,<br> + Lifted on high her bow, which Anu had made:--<br> + These days I will not forget, will keep them in remembrance,<br> + Them I will never forget.<br> + Let the gods come to the altar,<br> + But let not Bel to the altar come,<br> + Because he heedlessly wrought, the flood he brought on,<br> + To destruction my people gave over.<br> + Thither came Bel and saw the ship,<br> + Full of anger was he<br> + Against the gods and the spirits of heaven:--<br> + What soul has escaped!<br> + In the destruction no man shall live.<br> + Then Adar opened his mouth and spake,<br> + Spake to the warlike Bel:--<br> + Who but Ea knew it?<br> + He knew and all he hath told.<br> + Then Ea opened his mouth,<br> + Spake to the warlike Bel:--<br> +Thou art the valiant leader of the gods,<br> +Why hast thou heedlessly wrought, and brought on the flood?<br> +Let the sinner bear his sin, the wrongdoer his wrong;<br> +Yield to our request, that he be not wholly destroyed.<br> +Instead of sending a flood, send lions that men be reduced;<br> +Instead of sending a flood, send hyenas that men be reduced;<br> +Instead of sending a flood, send flames to waste the land;<br> +Instead of sending a flood, send pestilence that men be reduced.<br> +The counsel of the great gods to him I did not impart;<br> +A dream to Hasisadra I sent, and the will of the gods he learned.<br> + Then came right reason to Bel,<br> + Into the ship he entered,<br> + Took my hand and lifted me up,<br> + Raised my wife and laid her hand in mine,<br> + To us he turned, between us he stepped,<br> + His blessing he gave.<br> + Human Hasisadra has been,<br> + But he and his wife united<br> + Now to the gods shall be raised,<br> + And Hasisadra shall dwell far off at the mouth of the streams.<br> + Then they took me and placed me<br> + Far off at the mouth of the streams.<br> +</div></div><br> + +<br><br> +<p><a name="V._THE_EAGLE_AND_THE_SNAKE"></a>V. THE EAGLE AND THE SNAKE</p> +<br> +To Samas came the snake and said:--<br> +The eagle has come to my nest, my young are scattered.<br> +See, O Samas, what evil he has done me.<br> +Help me, thy nest is as broad as the earth,<br> +Thy snare is like the heavens,<br> +Who can escape out of thy net?<br> +Hearing the snake's complaint,<br> +Samas opened his mouth and spake:--<br> +Get thee on thy way, go to the mountain.<br> +A wild ox shall be thy hiding-place.<br> +Open his body, tear out his inward parts,<br> +Make thy dwelling within him.<br> +All the birds of heaven will descend, with them will come the eagle,<br> +Heedless and hurrying on the flesh he will swoop,<br> +Thinking of that which is hidden inside.<br> +So soon as he enters the ox, seize his wing,<br> +Tear off his wing-feathers and claws,<br> +Pull him to pieces and cast him away,<br> +Let him die of hunger and thirst.<br> +So as the mighty Samas commanded,<br> +Rose the snake, went to the mountain,<br> +There he found a wild ox,<br> +Opened his body, tore out his inward parts,<br> +Entered and dwelt within him.<br> +And the birds of heaven descended, with them came the eagle.<br> +Yet the eagle, fearing a snare, ate not of the flesh with the birds.<br> +The eagle spake to his young:--<br> +We will not fly down, nor eat of the flesh of the wild ox.<br> +An eaglet, keen of eye, thus to his father spake:--<br> +In the flesh of the ox lurks the snake<br> +<br> +<p>[The rest is lost.]</p> +<br><br> + +<p><a name="VI._THE_FLIGHT_OF_ETANA"></a>VI. THE FLIGHT OF ETANA</p> +<br> +The priests have offered my sacrifice<br> +With joyful hearts to the gods.<br> +O Lord, issue thy command,<br> +Give me the plant of birth, show me the plant of birth,<br> +Bring the child into the world, grant me a son.<br> +Samas opened his mouth and spake to Etana:--<br> +Away with thee, go to the mountain....<br> +The eagle opened his mouth and spake to Etana:--<br> +Wherefore art thou come?<br> +Etana opened his mouth and said to the eagle:--<br> +My friend, give me the plant of birth, show me the plant of birth,<br> +Bring the child into the world, grant me a son....<br> + To Etana then spake the eagle:--<br> + My friend, be of good cheer.<br> + Come, let me bear thee to Anu's heaven,<br> + On my breast lay thy breast,<br> + Grasp with thy hands the feathers of my wings.<br> + On my side lay thy side.<br> + On his breast he laid his breast,<br> + On his feathers he placed his hands,<br> + On his side laid his side,<br> + Firmly he clung, great was his weight.<br> + Two hours he bore him on high.<br> + The eagle spake to him, to Etana:--<br> + See my friend, the land, how it lies,<br> + Look at the sea, the ocean-girded,<br> + Like a mountain looks the land, the sea like petty waters.<br> + Two hours more he bore him up.<br> + The eagle spake to him, to Etana:--<br> + See my friend the land, how it lies,<br> + The sea is like the girdle of the land.<br> + Two hours more he bore him up.<br> + The eagle spake to him, to Etana:--<br> + See my friend the land, how it lies,<br> + The sea is like the gardener's ditches.<br> + Up they rose to Anu's heaven,<br> + Came to the gate of Anu, Bel and Ea....<br> + Come, my friend, let me bear thee to Ishtar,<br> + To Ishtar, the queen, shalt thou go, and dwell at her feet.<br> + On my side lay thy side,<br> + Grasp my wing-feathers with thy hands.<br> + On his side he laid his side,<br> + His feathers he grasped with his hands.<br> + Two hours he bore him on high.<br> + My friend see the land, how it lies,<br> + How it spreads itself out.<br> + The broad sea is as great as a court.<br> + Two hours he bore him on high.<br> + My friend see the land, how it lies,<br> + The land is like the bed of a garden,<br> + The broad sea is as great as a [.]<br> + Two hours he bore him on high.<br> + My friend see the land, how it lies.<br> +<br> +<p>[Etana, frightened, begs the eagle to ascend no further; then, as it seems, +the bird's strength is exhausted.]</p> +<br> +To the earth the eagle fell down<br> +Shattered upon the ground.<br> + + + +<br><br> +<p><a name="VII._THE_GOD_ZU"></a>VII. THE GOD ZU</p> +<br> +He sees the badges of rule,<br> +His royal crown, his raiment divine.<br> +On the tablets of fate of the god Zu fixes his look.<br> +On the father of the gods, the god of Duranki, Zu fixes his gaze.<br> +Lust after rule enters into his soul.<br> +I will take the tablets of fate of the gods,<br> +Will determine the oracle of all the gods,<br> +Will set up my throne, all orders control,<br> +Will rule all the heavenly spirits.<br> +His heart was set on combat.<br> +At the entrance of the hall he stands, waiting the break of day,<br> +When Bel dispensed the tender rains,<br> +Sat on his throne, put off his crown,<br> +He snatched the tablets of fate from his hands,<br> +Seized the power, the control of commands.<br> +Down flew Zu, in a mountain he hid.<br> +There was anguish and crying.<br> +On the earth Bel poured out his wrath.<br> +Anu opened his mouth and spake,<br> +Said to the gods his children:--<br> +Who will conquer Zu?<br> +Great shall be his name among the dwellers of all lands.<br> +They called for Ramman, the mighty, Anu's son.<br> +To him gives Anu command:--<br> +Up, Ramman, my son, thou hero,<br> +From thine attack desist not, conquer Zu with thy weapons,<br> +That thy name may be great in the assembly of the great gods.<br> +Among the gods thy brethren, none shall be thy equal,<br> +Thy shrines on high shall be built;<br> +Found thee cities in all the world;<br> +Thy cities shall reach to the mountain of the world;<br> +Show thyself strong for the gods, strong be thy name!<br> +To Anu his father's command Ramman answered and spake:--<br> +My father, who shall come to the inaccessible mound?<br> +Who is like unto Zu among the gods thy sons?<br> +The tablets of fate he has snatched from his hands,<br> +Seized on the power, the control of commands.<br> +Zu has fled and hides in his mountain.<br> +<br> +<p>[The rest is lost.]</p> + + + +<br><br> +<p><a name="VIII._ADAPA_AND_THE_SOUTHWIND"></a>VIII. ADAPA AND THE SOUTHWIND</p> +<br> +Under the water the Southwind blew him<br> +Sunk him to the home of the fishes.<br> +O Southwind, ill hast thou used me, thy wings I will break.<br> +As thus with his mouth he spake the wings of the Southwind were broken.<br> +Seven days long the Southwind over the earth blew no more.<br> +To his messenger Ila-Abrat<br> +Anu then spake thus:--<br> +Why for seven days long<br> +Blows the Southwind no more on the earth?<br> +His messenger Ila-Abrat answered and said: My lord,<br> +Adapa, Ea's son, hath broken the wings of the Southwind.<br> +When Anu heard these words,<br> +"Aha!" he cried, and went forth.<br> +<br> +<p>[Ea, the ocean-god, then directs his son how to proceed in order to avert +Anu's wrath. Some lines are mutilated.]</p> +<br> +At the gate of Anu stand.<br> +The gods Tammuz and Iszida will see thee and ask:--<br> +Why lookest thou thus, Adapa,<br> +For whom wearest thou garments of mourning?<br> +From the earth two gods have vanished, therefore do I thus.<br> +Who are these two gods who from the earth have vanished?<br> +At each other they will look, Tammuz and Iszida, and lament.<br> +A friendly word they will speak to Anu<br> +Anu's sacred face they will show thee.<br> +When thou to Anu comest,<br> +Food of death will be offered thee, eat not thereof.<br> +Water of death will be offered thee, drink not thereof.<br> +A garment will be offered thee, put it on.<br> +Oil will be offered thee, anoint thyself therewith.<br> +What I tell thee neglect not, keep my word in mind.<br> +Then came Anu's messenger:--<br> +The wing of the Southwind Adapa has broken,<br> +Deliver him up to me.<br> +Up to heaven he came, approached the gate of Anu.<br> +At Anu's gate Tammuz and Iszida stand,<br> +Adapa they see, and "Aha!" they cry.<br> +O Adapa, wherefore lookest thou thus,<br> +For whom wearest thou apparel of mourning?<br> +From the earth two gods have vanished<br> +Therefore I wear apparel of mourning.<br> +Who are these two gods who from the earth have vanished?<br> +At one another look Tammuz and Iszida and lament.<br> +Adapa go hence to Anu.<br> +When he came, Anu at him looked, saying, O Adapa,<br> +Why hast thou broken the Southwind's wing?<br> +Adapa answered: My lord,<br> +'Fore my lord's house I was fishing,<br> +In the midst of the sea, it was smooth,<br> +Then the Southwind began to blow<br> +Under it forced me, to the home of the fishes I sank.<br> +<br> +<p>[By this speech Ann's anger is turned away.]</p> +<br> + A beaker he set before him.<br> + What shall we offer him? Food of life<br> + Prepare for him that he may eat.<br> + Food of life was brought for him, but he ate not.<br> + Water of life was brought for him, but he drank not.<br> + A garment was brought him, he put it on,<br> + Oil they gave him, he anointed himself therewith.<br> + Anu looked at him and mourned:--<br> + And now, Adapa, wherefore<br> + Has thou not eaten or drunken?<br> + Now canst thou not live forever ...<br> + Ea, my lord, commanded me:--<br> + Thou shalt not eat nor drink.<br> +<br><br> +<p><a name="IX._PENITENTIAL_PSALMS"></a>IX. PENITENTIAL PSALMS</p> +<br><br> +<p><b>I</b></p> + +<p><i>The Suppliant</i>:</p> + +I, thy servant, full of sin cry to thee.<br> +The sinner's earnest prayer thou dost accept,<br> +The man on whom thou lookest lives,<br> +Mistress of all, queen of mankind,<br> +Merciful one, to whom it is good to turn,<br> +Who acceptest the sigh of the heart.<br> + +<p><i>The Priest</i>:</p> + +Because his god and his goddess are angry, he cries to thee.<br> +To him turn thy face, take his hand.<br> + +<p><i>The Suppliant</i>: + Beside thee there is no god to guide me.<br> + Look in mercy on me, accept my sigh,<br> + Say why do I wait so long.<br> + Let thy face be softened!<br> + How long, O my lady!<br> + May thy kindness be turned to me!<br> + Like a dove I mourn, full of sighing.<br> + +<p><i>The Priest</i>: + With sorrow and woe<br> + His soul is full of sighing,<br> + Tears he sheds, he pours out laments.<br> +<br> +<p><b>II</b></p> + +O mother of the gods, who performest the commands of Bel,<br> +Who makest the young grass sprout, queen of mankind,<br> +Creator of all, guide of every birth,<br> +Mother Ishtar, whose might no god approaches,<br> +Exalted mistress, mighty in command!<br> +A prayer I will utter, let her do what seems her good.<br> +O my lady, make me to know my doing,<br> +Food I have not eaten, weeping was my nourishment,<br> +Water I have not drunk, tears were my drink,<br> +My heart has not been joyful nor my spirits glad.<br> +Many are my sins, sorrowful my soul.<br> +O my lady, make me to know my doing,<br> +Make me a place of rest,<br> +Cleanse my sin, lift up my face.<br> +May my god, the lord of prayer, before thee set my prayer!<br> +May my goddess, the lady of supplication, before thee set my supplication!<br> +May the storm-god set my prayer before thee!<br> + +<p>[The intercession of a number of gods is here invoked.]</p> + +Let thy eye rest graciously on me....<br> +Turn thy face graciously to me....<br> +Let thy heart be gentle, thy spirit mild....<br> +<br> +<p><b>III</b></p> + +O lady, in sorrow of heart sore oppressed I cry to thee.<br> +O lady, to thy servant favor show.<br> +Let thy heart be favorable,<br> +To thy servant full of sorrow show thy pity,<br> +Turn to him thy face, accept his prayer.<br> +<br> +<p><b>IV</b></p> + +To thy servant with whom thou art angry graciously turn.<br> +May the anger of my lord be appeased,<br> +Appeased the god I know not!<br> +The goddess I know, the goddess I know not,<br> +The god who was angry with me,<br> +The goddess who was angry with me be appeased!<br> +The sin which I have committed I know not.<br> +May my god name a gracious name,<br> +My goddess name a gracious name,<br> +The god I know, the god I know not<br> +Name a gracious name,<br> +The goddess I know, the goddess I know not<br> +Name a gracious name!<br> +Pure food I have not eaten,<br> +Pure water I have not drunk,<br> +The wrath of my god, though I knew it not, was my food,<br> +The anger of my goddess, though I knew it not, cast me down.<br> +O lord, many are my sins, great my misdeeds.<br> + +<p>[These phrases are repeated many times.]</p> + +The lord has looked on me in anger,<br> +The god has punished me in wrath,<br> +The goddess was angry with me and hath brought me to sorrow.<br> +I sought for help, but no one took my hand,<br> +I wept, but no one to me came,<br> +I cry aloud, there is none that hears me,<br> +Sorrowful I lie on the ground, look not up.<br> +To my merciful god I turn, I sigh aloud,<br> +The feet of my goddess I kiss [.]<br> +To the known and unknown god I loud do sigh,<br> +To the known and unknown goddess I loud do sigh,<br> +O lord, look on me, hear my prayer,<br> +O goddess, look on me, hear my prayer.<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"><br> +<br> + Men are perverse, nothing they know.<br> + Men of every name, what do they know?<br> + Do they good or ill, nothing they know.<br> + O lord, cast not down thy servant!<br> + Him, plunged into the flood, seize by the hand!<br> + The sin I have committed turn thou to favor!<br> + The evil I have done may the wind carry it away!<br> + Tear in pieces my wrong-doings like a garment!<br> +My god, my sins are seven times seven--forgive my sins!<br> +My goddess, my sins are seven times seven--forgive my sins!<br> +Known and unknown god, my sins are seven times seven--forgive my sins!<br> +Known and unknown goddess, my sins are seven times seven--forgive my sins!<br> +Forgive my sins, and I will humbly bow before thee.<br> +<br> +<p><b>V</b></p> + +May the lord, the mighty ruler Adar, announce my prayer to thee!<br> +May the suppliant lady Nippur announce my prayer to thee!<br> +May the lord of heaven and earth, the lord of Eridu, announce my prayer to thee!<br> +The mother of the great house, the goddess Damkina, announce my prayer to thee!<br> +May Marduk, the lord of Babylon, announce my prayer to thee!<br> +May his consort, the exalted child of heaven and earth, announce my prayer to thee!<br> +May the exalted minister, the god who names the good name, announce my prayer to thee!<br> +May the bride, the first-born of the god, announce my prayer to thee!<br> +May the god of storm-flood, the lord Harsaga, announce my prayer to thee!<br> +May the gracious lady of the land announce my prayer to thee!<br> +<br><br> +<p><a name="X._INSCRIPTION_OF_SENNACHERIB"></a>X. INSCRIPTION OF SENNACHERIB</p> +<br> +<p>(Taylor-cylinder, B.C. 701. Cf. 2 Kings xviii., xix.)</p> + +Sennacherib, the great king, the powerful king,<br> +The king of the world, the king of Assyria,<br> +The king of the four zones,<br> +The wise shepherd, the favorite of the great gods,<br> +The protector of justice, the lover of righteousness,<br> +The giver of help, the aider of the weak,<br> +The perfect hero, the stalwart warrior, the first of princes,<br> +The destroyer of the rebellious, the destroyer of enemies,<br> +Assur, the mighty rock, a kingdom without rival has granted me.<br> +Over all who sit on sacred seats he has exalted my arms,<br> +From the upper sea of the setting sun<br> +To the lower sea of the rising sun,<br> +All the blackheaded people he has cast beneath my feet,<br> +The rebellious princes shun battle with me.<br> +They forsook their dwellings; like a falcon<br> +Which dwells in the clefts, they fled alone to an inaccessible place.<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"><br> +<br> +To the city of Ekron I went,<br> +The governors and princes who had done evil I slew,<br> +I bound their corpses to poles around the city.<br> +The inhabitants of the city who had done evil I reckoned as spoil;<br> +To the rest who had done no wrong I spoke peace.<br> +Padi, their king, I brought from Jerusalem,<br> +King over them I made him.<br> +The tribute of my lordship I laid upon him.<br> +Hezekiah of Judah, who had not submitted to me,<br> +Forty-six of his strong cities, small cities without number, I besieged.<br> +Casting down the walls, advancing engines, by assault I took them.<br> +Two hundred thousand, one hundred and fifty men and women, young and old,<br> +Horses, mules, asses, camels, oxen, sheep,<br> +I brought out and reckoned as spoil.<br> +Hezekiah himself I shut up like a caged bird<br> +In Jerusalem, his royal city,<br> +The walls I fortified against him,<br> +Whoever came out of the gates I turned him back.<br> +His cities which I had plundered I divided from his land<br> +And gave them to Mitinti, king of Ashdod,<br> +To Padi, king of Ekron, and to Silbal, king of Gaza.<br> +To the former tribute paid yearly<br> +I added the tribute of alliance of my lordship and<br> +Laid that upon him. Hezekiah himself<br> +Was overwhelmed by the fear of the brightness of my lordship.<br> +The Arabians and his other faithful warriors<br> +Whom, for the defence of Jerusalem, his royal city,<br> +He had brought in, fell into fear,<br> +With thirty talents of gold and eight hundred talents of silver, precious stones,<br> +Couches of ivory, thrones of ivory,<br> +And his daughters, his women of the palace,<br> +The young men and the young women, to Nineveh, the city of my lordship,<br> +I caused to be brought after me, and he sent his ambassadors<br> +To give tribute and to pay homage.<br> + + +<br><br> +<p><a name="XI._INVOCATION_TO_THE_GODDESS_BELTIS"></a>XI. INVOCATION TO THE GODDESS BELTIS</p> +<br> + +To Beltis, the great Lady, chief of heaven and earth,<br> + Queen of all the gods, mighty in all the lands.<br> + Honored is her festival among the Ishtars.<br> +She surpasses her offspring in power.<br> +She, the shining one, like her brother, the sun,<br> +Enlightens Heaven and earth,<br> +Mistress of the spirits of the underworld,<br> +First-born of Anu, great among the gods,<br> +Ruler over her enemies,<br> +The seas she stirs up,<br> +The wooded mountains tramples under foot.<br> +Mistress of the spirits of upper air,<br> +Goddess of battle and fight,<br> +Without whom the heavenly temple<br> +None would render obedience,<br> +She, the bestower of strength, grants the desire of the faithful,<br> +Prayers she hears, supplication receives, entreaty accepts.<br> +Ishtar, the perfect light, all-powerful,<br> +Who enlightens Heaven and earth,<br> +Her name is proclaimed throughout all the lands,<br> +Esarhaddon, king of lands, fear not.<br> +To her it is good to pray.<br> + + + +<br><br> +<p><a name="XII._ORACLES_OF_ISHTAR_OF_ARBELA"></a>XII. ORACLES OF ISHTAR OF ARBELA</p> +<br> +<p>(B.C. 680-668)</p> + +Esarhaddon, king of lands, fear not.<br> +The lord, the spirit who speaks to thee<br> +I speak to him, I have not kept it back.<br> +Thine enemies, like the floods of Sivan<br> +Before thee flee perpetually.<br> +I the great goddess, Ishtar of Arbela<br> +Have put thine enemies to flight.<br> +Where are the words I spake to thee?<br> +Thou hast not trusted them.<br> +I, Ishtar of Arbela, thy foes<br> +Into thy hands I give<br> +In the van and by thy side I go, fear not<br> +In the midst of thy princes thou art.<br> +In the midst of my host I advance and rest.<br> +<br> +O Esarhaddon, fear not.<br> +Sixty great gods are with me to guard thee,<br> +The Moon-god on thy right, the Sun-god on thy left,<br> +Around thee stand the sixty great gods,<br> +And make the centre firm.<br> +Trust not to man, look thou to me<br> +Honor me and fear not.<br> +To Esarhaddon, my king,<br> +Long days and length of years I give.<br> +Thy throne beneath the heavens I have established;<br> +In a golden dwelling thee I will guard in heaven<br> +Guard like the diadem of my head.<br> +The former word which I spake thou didst not trust,<br> +But trust thou now this later word and glorify me,<br> +When the day dawns bright complete thy sacrifice.<br> +Pure food thou shalt eat, pure waters drink,<br> +In thy palace thou shalt be pure.<br> +Thy son, thy son's son the kingdom<br> +By the blessing of Nergal shall rule.<br> + + +<br><br> +<p><a name="XIIIANERECHITESLAMENT"></a>XIII. AN ERECHITE'S LAMENT</p> +<br> + +How long, O my Lady, shall the strong enemy hold thy sanctuary?<br> + There is want in Erech, thy principal city;<br> +Blood is flowing like water in Eulbar, the house of thy oracle;<br> +He has kindled and poured out fire like hailstones on all thy lands.<br> +My Lady, sorely am I fettered by misfortune;<br> +My Lady, thou hast surrounded me, and brought me to grief.<br> +The mighty enemy has smitten me down like a single reed.<br> +Not wise myself, I cannot take counsel;<br> +I mourn day and night like the fields.<br> +I, thy servant, pray to thee.<br> +Let thy heart take rest, let thy disposition be softened.<br> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="ABIGAIL_ADAMS"></a>ABIGAIL ADAMS</h2> +<h3>(1744-1818)</h3> + +<h3>BY LUCIA GILBERT RUNKLE</h3> +<br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-t.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>he Constitution of the State of Massachusetts, adopted in the +year 1780, contains an article for the Encouragement of +Literature, which, it declares, should be fostered because its +influence is "to countenance and inculcate the principles of humanity +and general benevolence, public and private charity, industry and frugality, +honesty and punctuality in dealings, sincerity and good humor, +and all social affections and generous sentiments among the people." +In these words, as in a mirror, is reflected the Massachusetts of the +eighteenth century, where households like +the Adamses', the Warrens', the Otises', +made the standard of citizenship. Six +years before this remarkable document +was framed, Abigail Adams had written +to her husband, then engaged in nation-making +in Philadelphia:--"I most sincerely +wish that some more liberal plan might +be laid and executed for the benefit of +the rising generation, and that our new +Constitution may be distinguished for encouraging +learning and virtue." And he, +spending his days and nights for his country, +sacrificing his profession, giving up +the hope of wealth, writes her:--"I believe my children will think +that I might as well have labored a little, night and day, for their +benefit. But I will tell them that I studied and labored to procure +a free constitution of government for them to solace themselves +under; and if they do not prefer this to ample fortune, to ease and +elegance, they are not my children. They shall live upon thin diet, +wear mean clothes, and work hard with cheerful hearts and free +spirits, or they may be the children of the earth, or of no one, +for me."</p> + +<p class="lft"><img src="images/092.png" width="50%" alt=""></p> + +<p>In old Weymouth, one of those quiet Massachusetts towns, half-hidden +among the umbrageous hills, where the meeting-house and the +school-house rose before the settlers' cabins were built, where the one +elm-shaded main street stretches its breadth between two lines of +self-respecting, isolated frame houses, each with its grassy dooryard, +its lilac bushes, its fresh-painted offices, its decorous wood-pile laid +with architectural balance and symmetry,--there, in the dignified +parsonage, on the 11th of November, 1744, was born to Parson William +Smith and Elizabeth his wife, Abigail, the second of three beautiful +daughters. Her mother was a Quincy, of a distinguished line, and +<i>her</i> mother was a Norton, of a strain not less honorable. Nor were +the Smiths unimportant.</p> + +<p>In that day girls had little instruction. Abigail says of herself, in +one of her letters:--"I never was sent to any school. Female education, +in the best families, went no further than writing and arithmetic; +in some few and rare instances, music and dancing. It was fashionable +to ridicule female learning." But the household was bookish. +Her mother knew the "British Poets" and all the literature of Queen +Anne's Augustan age. Her beloved grandmother Quincy, at Mount +Wollaston, seems to have had both learning and wisdom, and to her +father she owed the sense of fun, the shrewdness, the clever way of +putting things which make her letters so delightful.</p> + +<p>The good parson was skillful in adapting Scripture to special exigencies, +and throughout the Revolution he astonished his hearers by +the peculiar fitness of his texts to political uses. It is related of him +that when his eldest daughter married Richard Cranch, he preached +to his people from Luke, tenth chapter, forty-second verse: "And +Mary hath chosen that good part which shall not be taken away +from her." When, a year later, young John Adams came courting +the brilliant Abigail, the parish, which assumed a right to be heard +on the question of the destiny of the minister's daughter, grimly objected. +He was upright, singularly abstemious, studious; but he was +poor, he was the son of a small farmer, and she was of the gentry. +He was hot-headed and somewhat tactless, and offended his critics. +Worst of all, he was a lawyer, and the prejudice of colonial society +reckoned a lawyer hardly honest. He won this most important of +his cases, however, and Parson Smith's marriage sermon for the bride +of nineteen was preached from the text, "For John came neither +eating bread nor drinking wine, and ye say, He hath a devil."</p> + +<p>For ten years Mrs. Adams seems to have lived a most happy life, +either in Boston or Braintree, her greatest grief being the frequent +absences of her husband on circuit. His letters to her are many and +delightful, expressing again and again, in the somewhat formal +phrases of the period, his affection and admiration. She wrote +seldom, her household duties and the care of the children, of whom +there were four in ten years, occupying her busy hands.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, the clouds were growing black in the political sky. +Mr. Adams wrote arguments and appeals in the news journals over +Latin signatures, papers of instructions to Representatives to the +General Court, and legal portions of the controversy between the +delegates and Governor Hutchinson. In all this work Mrs. Adams +constantly sympathized and advised. In August, 1774, he went to +Philadelphia as a delegate to a general council of the colonies called +to concert measures for united action. And now begins the famous +correspondence, which goes on for a period of nine years, which was +intended to be seen only by the eyes of her husband, which she +begs him, again and again, to destroy as not worth the keeping, yet +which has given her a name and place among the world's most charming +letter-writers.</p> + +<p>Her courage, her cheerfulness, her patriotism, her patience never +fail her. Braintree, where, with her little brood, she is to stay, is +close to the British lines. Raids and foraging expeditions are imminent. +Hopes of a peaceful settlement grow dim. "What course you +can or will take," she writes her husband, "is all wrapped in the +bosom of futurity. Uncertainty and expectation leave the mind great +scope. Did ever any kingdom or State regain its liberty, when once +it was invaded, without bloodshed? I cannot think of it without horror. +Yet we are told that all the misfortunes of Sparta were occasioned +by their too great solicitude for present tranquillity, and, from +an excessive love of peace, they neglected the means of making it +sure and lasting. They ought to have reflected, says Polybius, that, +'as there is nothing more desirable or advantageous than peace, when +founded in justice and honor, so there is nothing more shameful, and +at the same time more pernicious, when attained by bad measures, +and purchased at the price of liberty.'"</p> + +<p>Thus in the high Roman fashion she faces danger; yet her sense +of fun never deserts her, and in the very next letter she writes, +parodying her husband's documents:--"The drouth has been very +severe. My poor cows will certainly prefer a petition to you, setting +forth their grievances, and informing you that they have been deprived +of their ancient privileges, whereby they are become great +sufferers, and desiring that these may be restored to them. More +especially as their living, by reason of the drouth, is all taken from +them, and their property which they hold elsewhere is decaying, they +humbly pray that you would consider them, lest hunger should break +through stone walls."</p> + +<p>By midsummer the small hardships entailed by the British occupation +of Boston were most vexatious. "We shall very soon have no +coffee, nor sugar, nor pepper, but whortleberries and milk we are +not obliged to commerce for," she writes, and in letter after letter +she begs for pins. Needles are desperately needed, but without pins +how can domestic life go on, and not a pin in the province!</p> + +<p>On the 14th of September she describes the excitement in Boston, +the Governor mounting cannon on Beacon Hill, digging intrenchments +on the Neck, planting guns, throwing up breastworks, encamping a +regiment. In consequence of the powder being taken from Charlestown, +she goes on to say, a general alarm spread through all the +towns and was soon caught in Braintree. And then she describes +one of the most extraordinary scenes in history. About eight o'clock +on Sunday evening, she writes to her husband, at least two hundred +men, preceded by a horse-cart, passed by her door in dead silence, +and marched down to the powder-house, whence they took out the +town's powder, because they dared not trust it where there were so +many Tories, carried it into the other parish, and there secreted it. +On their way they captured a notorious "King's man," and found on +him two warrants aimed at the Commonwealth. When their patriotic +trust was discharged, they turned their attention to the trembling +Briton. Profoundly excited and indignant though they were, they +never thought of mob violence, but, true to the inherited instincts of +their race, they resolved themselves into a public meeting! The +hostile warrants being produced and exhibited, it was put to a vote +whether they should be burned or preserved. The majority voted +for burning them. Then the two hundred gathered in a circle round +the single lantern, and maintained a rigid silence while the offending +papers were consumed. That done--the blazing eyes in that grim +circle of patriots watching the blazing writs--"they called a vote +whether they should huzza; but, it being Sunday evening, it passed +in the negative!"</p> + +<p>Only in the New England of John Winthrop and the Mathers, of +John Quincy and the Adamses, would such a scene have been possible: +a land of self-conquest and self-control, of a deep love of the +public welfare and a willingness to take trouble for a public object.</p> + +<p>A little later Mrs. Adams writes her husband that there has been +a conspiracy among the negroes, though it has been kept quiet, "I +wish most sincerely," she adds, "that there was not a slave in the +province. It always appeared a most iniquitous scheme to me--to +fight ourselves for what we are daily robbing and plundering from +those who have as good a right to freedom as we have."</p> + +<p>Nor were the sympathies of this clever logician confined to +the slaves. A month or two before the Declaration of Independence +was made she writes her constructive statesman:--"I long to hear +that you have declared an independence. And by the way, in the +new code of laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to +make, I desire you would remember the ladies, and be more generous +and favorable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited +power into the hands of the husbands! Remember, all men +would be tyrants if they could! If particular care and attention is +not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and +will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice +or representation. That your sex are naturally tyrannical is a truth +so thoroughly established as to admit of no dispute; but such of you +as wish to be happy willingly give up the harsh title of master for +the more tender and endearing one of friend. Why, then, not put +it out of the power of the vicious and the lawless to use us with +cruelty and indignity with impunity? Men of sense in all ages abhor +those customs which treat us only as the vassals of your sex. Regard +us, then, as being placed by Providence under your protection; and +in imitation of the Supreme Being, make use of that power only for +our happiness."--a declaration of principles which the practical housewife +follows up by saying:--"I have not yet attempted making salt-petre, +but after soap-making, believe I shall make the experiment. I +find as much as I can do to manufacture clothing for my family, +which would else be naked. I have lately seen a small manuscript +describing the proportions of the various sorts of powder fit for cannon, +small arms, and pistols. If it would be of any service your +way, I will get it transcribed and send it to you."</p> + +<p>She is interested in everything, and she writes about everything +in the same whole-hearted way,--farming, paper money, the making +of molasses from corn-stalks, the new remedy of inoculation, +'Common Sense' and its author, the children's handwriting, the state +of Harvard College, the rate of taxes, the most helpful methods +of enlistment, Chesterfield's Letters, the town elections, the higher +education of women, and the getting of homespun enough for Mr. +Adams's new suit.</p> + +<p>She manages, with astonishing skill, to keep the household in +comfort. She goes through trials of sickness, death, agonizing suspense, +and ever with the same heroic cheerfulness, that her anxious +husband may be spared the pangs which she endures. When he is +sent to France and Holland, she accepts the new parting as another +service pledged to her country. She sees her darling boy of ten go +with his father, aware that at the best she must bear months of +silence, knowing that they may perish at sea or fall into the hands +of privateers; but she writes with indomitable cheer, sending the lad +tender letters of good advice, a little didactic to modern taste, but +throbbing with affection. "Dear as you are to me," says this tender +mother, "I would much rather you should have found your grave in +the ocean you have crossed than see you an immoral, profligate, or +graceless child."</p> + +<p>It was the lot of this country parson's daughter to spend three +years in London as wife of the first American minister, to see her +husband Vice-President of the United States for eight years and President +for four, and to greet her son as the eminent Monroe's valued +Secretary of State, though she died, "seventy-four years young," +before he became President. She could not, in any station, be more +truly a lady than when she made soap and chopped kindling on her +Braintree farm. At Braintree she was no more simply modest than +at the Court of St. James or in the Executive Mansion. Her letters +exactly reflect her ardent, sincere, energetic nature. She shows a +charming delight when her husband tells her that his affairs could +not possibly be better managed than she manages them, and that she +shines not less as a statesman than as a farmeress. And though she +was greatly admired and complimented, no praise so pleased her as +his declaration that for all the ingratitude, calumnies, and misunderstandings +that he had endured,--and they were numberless,--her +perfect comprehension of him had been his sufficient compensation.</p> + +<p class="rgt"><img src="images/097.png" width="65%" alt=""></p> +<br><br><br><br><br> + +<center><a name="TO_HER_HUSBAND"></a>TO HER HUSBAND</center><br> +<a name="HUSBAND1"></a> +<p>BRAINTREE, May 24th, 1775.</p> + +<p><i>My Dearest Friend</i>:</p> +<p>Our house has been, upon this alarm, in the same scene of +confusion that it was upon the former. Soldiers coming +in for a lodging, for breakfast, for supper, for drink, etc. +Sometimes refugees from Boston, tired and fatigued, seek an +asylum for a day, a night, a week. You can hardly imagine +how we live; yet--</p> + +<blockquote> +"To the houseless child of want,<br> + Our doors are open still;<br> +And though our portions are but scant,<br> + We give them with good will."<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>My best wishes attend you, both for your health and happiness, +and that you may be directed into the wisest and best measures +for our safety and the security of our posterity. I wish you +were nearer to us: we know not what a day will bring forth, +nor what distress one hour may throw us into. Hitherto I have +been able to maintain a calmness and presence of mind, and +hope I shall, let the exigency of the time be what it will. +Adieu, breakfast calls.</p> + +<blockquote>Your affectionate<br>PORTIA.</blockquote> + + +<br><br> +<a name="HUSBAND2"></a> +<p>WEYMOUTH, June 15th, 1775.</p> + +<p>I hope we shall see each other again, and rejoice together in +happier days; the little ones are well, and send duty to papa. +Don't fail of letting me hear from you by every opportunity. +Every line is like a precious relic of the saints.</p> + +<p>I have a request to make of you; something like the barrel +of sand, I suppose you will think it, but really of much more +importance to me. It is, that you would send out Mr. Bass, and +purchase me a bundle of pins and put them in your trunk for +me. The cry for pins is so great that what I used to buy for +seven shillings and sixpence are now twenty shillings, and not +to be had for that. A bundle contains six thousand, for which +I used to give a dollar; but if you can procure them for fifty +shillings, or three pounds, pray let me have them. I am, with +the tenderest regard,</p> + +<blockquote>Your PORTIA.</blockquote> + + +<br><br><a name="HUSBAND3"></a> +<p>BRAINTREE, June 18th, 1775.</p> + +<p><i>My Dearest Friend</i>:</p> + +<p>The day--perhaps the decisive day is come, on which the +fate of America depends. My bursting heart must find vent +at my pen. I have just heard that our dear friend, Dr. Warren, +is no more, but fell gloriously fighting for his country, saying, +"Better to die honorably in the field than ignominiously hang +upon the gallows." Great is our loss. He has distinguished +himself in every engagement by his courage and fortitude, by animating +the soldiers, and leading them on by his own example. A +particular account of these dreadful but, I hope, glorious days, +will be transmitted you, no doubt, in the exactest manner.</p> + +<p>"The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong; +but the God of Israel is He that giveth strength and power unto +His people. Trust in Him at all times, ye people: pour out your +hearts before Him; God is a refuge for us." Charlestown is laid +in ashes. The battle began upon our intrenchments upon Bunker's +Hill, Saturday morning about three o'clock, and has not ceased +yet, and it is now three o'clock Sabbath afternoon.</p> + +<p>It is expected they will come out over the Neck to-night, and +a dreadful battle must ensue. Almighty God, cover the heads of +our countrymen, and be a shield to our dear friends! How many +have fallen we know not. The constant roar of the cannon is so +distressing that we cannot eat, drink, or sleep. May we be supported +and sustained in the dreadful conflict. I shall tarry here +till it is thought unsafe by my friends, and then I have secured +myself a retreat at your brother's, who has kindly offered me part +of his house. I cannot compose myself to write any further at +present. I will add more as I hear further.</p> + +<blockquote>Your PORTIA.</blockquote> + + +<br><br><a name="HUSBAND4"></a> +<p>BRAINTREE, November 27th, 1775.</p> + +<p>Colonel Warren returned last week to Plymouth, so that I +shall not hear anything from you until he goes back again, +which will not be till the last of this month. He damped +my spirits greatly by telling me that the court had prolonged +your stay another month. I was pleasing myself with the thought +that you would soon be upon your return. It is in vain to repine. +I hope the public will reap what I sacrifice.</p> + +<p>I wish I knew what mighty things were fabricating. If a +form of government is to be established here, what one will be +assumed? Will it be left to our Assemblies to choose one? And +will not many men have many minds? And shall we not run into +dissensions among ourselves?</p> + +<p>I am more and more convinced that man is a dangerous creature; +and that power, whether vested in many or a few, is ever +grasping, and, like the grave, cries, "Give, give!" The great fish +swallow up the small; and he who is most strenuous for the rights +of the people, when vested with power, is as eager after the prerogatives +of government. You tell me of degrees of perfection to +which human nature is capable of arriving, and I believe it, but +at the same time lament that our admiration should arise from the +scarcity of the instances.</p> + +<p>The building up a great empire, which was only hinted at by +my correspondent, may now, I suppose, be realized even by the +unbelievers; yet will not ten thousand difficulties arise in the +formation of it? The reins of government have been so long +slackened that I fear the people will not quietly submit to those +restraints which are necessary for the peace and security of the +community. If we separate from Britain, what code of laws will +be established? How shall we be governed so as to retain our +liberties? Can any government be free which is not administered +by general stated laws? Who shall frame these laws? Who will +give them force and energy? It is true, your resolutions, as a +body, have hitherto had the force of laws; but will they continue +to have?</p> + +<p>When I consider these things, and the prejudices of people in +favor of ancient customs and regulations, I feel anxious for the +fate of our monarchy, or democracy, or whatever is to take place. +I soon get lost in the labyrinth of perplexities; but, whatever +occurs, may justice and righteousness be the stability of our times, +and order arise out of confusion. Great difficulties may be surmounted +by patience and perseverance.</p> + +<p>I believe I have tired you with politics. As to news, we have +not any at all. I shudder at the approach of winter, when I +think I am to remain desolate.</p> + +<p>I must bid you good-night; 'tis late for me, who am much +of an invalid. I was disappointed last week in receiving a packet +by post, and, upon unsealing it, finding only four newspapers. +I think you are more cautious than you need be. All letters, I +believe, have come safe to hand. I have sixteen from you, and +wish I had as many more.</p> + +<blockquote>Your PORTIA.</blockquote> +<br><br> +<center>[By permission of the family.]</center> +<a name="HUSBAND5"></a> +<p>BRAIN TREE, April 20th, 1777.</p> + +<p>There is a general cry against the merchants, against monopolizers, +etc., who, 'tis said, have created a partial scarcity. +That a scarcity prevails of every article, not only of luxury +but even the necessaries of life, is a certain fact. Everything +bears an exorbitant price. The Act, which was in some measure +regarded and stemmed the torrent of oppression, is now no more +heeded than if it had never been made. Indian corn at five shillings; +rye, eleven and twelve shillings, but scarcely any to be had +even at that price; beef, eightpence; veal, sixpence and eightpence; +butter, one and sixpence; mutton, none; lamb, none; pork, +none; mean sugar, four pounds per hundred; molasses, none; +cotton-wool, none; New England rum, eight shillings per gallon; +coffee, two and sixpence per pound; chocolate, three shillings.</p> + +<p>What can be done? Will gold and silver remedy this evil? +By your accounts of board, housekeeping, etc., I fancy you are +not better off than we are here. I live in hopes that we see the +most difficult time we have to experience. Why is Carolina so +much better furnished than any other State, and at so reasonable +prices?</p> +<blockquote>Your PORTIA.</blockquote> +<br><br> +<a name="HUSBAND6"></a> +<p>BRAINTREE, June 8th, 1779.</p> + +<p>Six months have already elapsed since I heard a syllable from +you or my dear son, and five since I have had one single +opportunity of conveying a line to you. Letters of various +dates have lain months at the Navy Board, and a packet and frigate, +both ready to sail at an hour's warning, have been months +waiting the orders of Congress. They no doubt have their reasons, +or ought to have, for detaining them. I must patiently wait +their motions, however painful it is; and that it is so, your own +feelings will testify. Yet I know not but you are less a sufferer +than you would be to hear from us, to know our distresses, and +yet be unable to relieve them. The universal cry for bread, to +a humane heart, is painful beyond description, and the great price +demanded and given for it verifies that pathetic passage of Sacred +Writ, "All that a man hath will he give for his life." Yet He +who miraculously fed a multitude with five loaves and two fishes +has graciously interposed in our favor, and delivered many of the +enemy's supplies into our hands, so that our distresses have been +mitigated. I have been able as yet to supply my own family, +sparingly, but at a price that would astonish you. Corn is sold at +four dollars, hard money, per bushel, which is equal to eighty at +the rate of exchange.</p> + +<p>Labor is at eight dollars per day, and in three weeks it will be +at twelve, it is probable, or it will be more stable than anything +else. Goods of all kinds are at such a price that I hardly dare +mention it. Linens are sold at twenty dollars per yard; the most +ordinary sort of calicoes at thirty and forty; broadcloths at forty +pounds per yard; West India goods full as high; molasses at +twenty dollars per gallon; sugar, four dollars per pound; Bohea +tea at forty dollars; and our own produce in proportion; butcher's +meat at six and eight shillings per pound; board at fifty and +sixty dollars per week; rates high. That, I suppose, you will rejoice +at; so would I, did it remedy the evil. I pay five hundred +dollars, and a new Continental rate has just appeared, my proportion +of which will be two hundred more. I have come to this +determination,--to sell no more bills, unless I can procure hard +money for them, although I shall be obliged to allow a discount. +If I sell for paper, I throw away more than half, so rapid is the +depreciation; nor do I know that it will be received long. I sold +a bill to Blodget at five for one, which was looked upon as high +at that time. The week after I received it, two emissions were +taken out of circulation, and the greater part of what I had +proved to be of that sort; so that those to whom I was indebted +are obliged to wait, and before it becomes due, or is exchanged, +it will be good for--as much as it will fetch, which will be nothing, +if it goes on as it has done for this three months past. I +will not tire your patience any longer. I have not drawn any +further upon you. I mean to wait the return of the Alliance, +which with longing eyes I look for. God grant it may bring +me comfortable tidings from my dear, dear friend, whose welfare +is so essential to my happiness that it is entwined around my +heart, and cannot be impaired or separated from it without rending +it asunder.</p> + +<p>I cannot say that I think our affairs go very well here. Our +currency seems to be the source of all our evils. We cannot fill +up our Continental army by means of it. No bounty will prevail +with them. What can be done with it? It will sink in less than +a year. The advantage the enemy daily gains over us is owing +to this. Most truly did you prophesy, when you said that they +would do all the mischief in their power with the forces they had +here.</p> + +<p>My tenderest regards ever attend you. In all places and situations, +know me to be ever, ever yours.</p> +<br><br> + +<center><a name="TO_HER_SISTER"></a>TO HER SISTER</center> +<a name="SISTER1"></a> +<p>AUTEUIL, 5th September, 1784.</p> + +<p><i>My, Dear Sister</i>:</p> + +<p>Auteuil is a village four miles distant from Paris, and one from +Passy. The house we have taken is large, commodious, +and agreeably situated near the woods of Boulogne, which +belong to the King, and which Mr. Adams calls his park, for he +walks an hour or two every day in them. The house is much +larger than we have need of; upon occasion, forty beds may be +made in it. I fancy it must be very cold in winter. There are +few houses with the privilege which this enjoys, that of having +the salon, as it is called, the apartment where we receive company, +upon the first floor. This room is very elegant, and about +a third larger than General Warren's hall. The dining-room is +upon the right hand, and the salon upon the left, of the entry, +which has large glass doors opposite to each other, one opening +into the court, as they call it, the other into a large and beautiful +garden. Out of the dining-room you pass through an entry +into the kitchen, which is rather small for so large a house. In +this entry are stairs which you ascend, at the top of which is a +long gallery fronting the street, with six windows, and opposite to +each window you open into the chambers, which all look into the +garden.</p> + +<p>But with an expense of thirty thousand livres in looking-glasses, +there is no table in the house better than an oak board, +nor a carpet belonging to the house. The floors I abhor, made +of red tiles in the shape of Mrs. Quincy's floor-cloth tiles. These +floors will by no means bear water, so that the method of cleaning +them is to have them waxed, and then a manservant with +foot brushes drives round your room, dancing here and there like +a Merry Andrew. This is calculated to take from your foot every +atom of dirt, and leave the room in a few moments as he found +it. The house must be exceedingly cold in winter. The dining-rooms, +of which you make no other use, are laid with small +stones, like the red tiles for shape and size. The servants' apartments +are generally upon the first floor, and the stairs which you +commonly have to ascend to get into the family apartments are +so dirty that I have been obliged to hold up my clothes as though +I was passing through a cow-yard.</p> + +<p>I have been but little abroad. It is customary in this country +for strangers to make the first visit. As I cannot speak the language, +I think I should make rather an awkward figure. I have +dined abroad several times with Mr. Adams's particular friends, +the Abbés, who are very polite and civil,--three sensible and +worthy men. The Abbé de Mably has lately published a book, +which he has dedicated to Mr. Adams. This gentleman is nearly +eighty years old; the Abbé Chalut, seventy-five; and Arnoux +about fifty, a fine sprightly man, who takes great pleasure in +obliging his friends. Their apartments were really nice. I have +dined once at Dr. Franklin's, and once at Mr. Barclay's, our consul, +who has a very agreeable woman for his wife, and where I +feel like being with a friend. Mrs. Barclay has assisted me in +my purchases, gone with me to different shops, etc. To-morrow +I am to dine at Monsieur Grand's; but I have really felt so +happy within doors, and am so pleasingly situated, that I have +had little inclination to change the scene. I have not been to one +public amusement as yet, not even the opera, though we have +one very near us.</p> + +<p>You may easily suppose I have been fully employed, beginning +housekeeping anew, and arranging my family to our no small +expenses and trouble; for I have had bed-linen and table-linen to +purchase and make, spoons and forks to get made of silver,--three +dozen of each,--besides tea furniture, china for the table, +servants to procure, etc. The expense of living abroad I always +supposed to be high, but my ideas were nowise adequate to the +thing. I could have furnished myself in the town of Boston with +everything I have, twenty or thirty per cent, cheaper than I have +been able to do it here. Everything which will bear the name of +elegant is imported from England, and if you will have it, you +must pay for it, duties and all. I cannot get a dozen handsome +wineglasses under three guineas, nor a pair of small decanters for +less than a guinea and a half. The only gauze fit to wear is +English, at a crown a yard; so that really a guinea goes no further +than a copper with us. For this house, garden, stables, etc., we +give two hundred guineas a year. Wood is two guineas and a +half per cord; coal, six livres the basket of about two bushels; +this article of firing we calculate at one hundred guineas a year. +The difference between coming upon this negotiation to France, +and remaining at the Hague, where the house was already furnished +at the expense of a thousand pounds sterling, will increase +the expense here to six or seven hundred guineas; at a time, too, +when Congress has cut off five hundred guineas from what they +have heretofore given. For our coachman and horses alone (Mr. +Adams purchased a coach in England) we give fifteen guineas a +month. It is the policy of this country to oblige you to a certain +number of servants, and one will not touch what belongs to the +business of another, though he or she has time enough to perform +the whole. In the first place, there is a coachman who does +not an individual thing but attend to the carriages and horses; +then the gardener, who has business enough; then comes the cook; +then the <i>maitre d'hotel</i>,--his business is to purchase articles in +the family, and oversee that nobody cheats but himself; a <i>valet de +chambre,</i>--John serves in this capacity; a <i>femme de chambre</i>,--Esther +serves for this, and is worth a dozen others; a <i>coiffeuse</i>,--for +this place I have a French girl about nineteen, whom I have +been upon the point of turning-away, because madam will not +brush a chamber: "it is not de fashion, it is not her business." +I would not have kept her a day longer, but found, upon inquiry, +that I could not better myself, and hair-dressing here is very +expensive unless you keep such a madam in the house. She +sews tolerably well, so I make her as useful as I can. She is +more particularly devoted to mademoiselle. Esther diverted me +yesterday evening by telling me that she heard her go muttering +by her chamber door, after she had been assisting Abby in dressing. +"Ah, mon Dieu, 'tis provoking"--(she talks a little English).--"Why, +what is the matter, Pauline: what is provoking?"--"Why, +Mademoiselle look so pretty, I so <i>mauvais</i>." There is +another indispensable servant, who is called a <i>frotteur</i>: his business +is to rub the floors.</p> + +<p>We have a servant who acts as <i>maitre d'hotel,</i> whom I like at +present, and who is so very gracious as to act as footman too, +to save the expense of another servant, upon condition that we +give him a gentleman's suit of clothes in lieu of a livery. Thus, +with seven servants and hiring a charwoman upon occasion of +company, we may possibly make out to keep house; with less, we +should be hooted at as ridiculous, and could not entertain any +company. To tell this in our own country would be considered as +extravagance; but would they send a person here in a public character +to be a public jest? At lodgings in Paris last year, during +Mr. Adams's negotiation for a peace, it was as expensive to him +as it is now at housekeeping, without half the accommodations.</p> + +<p>Washing is another expensive article: the servants are all +allowed theirs, besides their wages; our own costs us a guinea a +week. I have become steward and bookkeeper, determined to +know with accuracy what our expenses are, to prevail with Mr. +Adams to return to America if he finds himself straitened, as I +think he must be. Mr. Jay went home because he could not +support his family here with the whole salary; what then can be +done, curtailed as it now is, with the additional expense? Mr. +Adams is determined to keep as little company as he possibly +can; but some entertainments we must make, and it is no +unusual thing for them to amount to fifty or sixty guineas at +a time. More is to be performed by way of negotiation, many +times, at one of these entertainments, than at twenty serious conversations; +but the policy of our country has been, and still is, +to be penny-wise and pound-foolish. We stand in sufficient +need of economy, and in the curtailment of other salaries I +suppose they thought it absolutely necessary to cut off their +foreign ministers. But, my own interest apart, the system is bad; +for that nation which degrades their own ministers by obliging +them to live in narrow circumstances, cannot expect to be held in +high estimation themselves. We spend no evenings abroad, make +no suppers, attend very few public entertainments,--or spectacles, +as they are called,--and avoid every expense that is not +held indispensable. Yet I cannot but think it hard that a gentleman +who has devoted so great a part of his life to the service +of the public, who has been the means, in a great measure, of +procuring such extensive territories to his country, who saved their +fisheries, and who is still laboring to procure them further advantages, +should find it necessary so cautiously to calculate his pence, +for fear of overrunning them. I will add one more expense. +There is now a court mourning, and every foreign minister, with +his family, must go into mourning for a Prince of eight years old, +whose father is an ally to the King of France. This mourning is +ordered by the Court, and is to be worn eleven days only. Poor +Mr. Jefferson had to his away for a tailor to get a whole black-silk +suit made up in two days; and at the end of eleven days, +should another death happen, he will be obliged to have a new +suit of mourning, of cloth, because that is the season when silk +must be left off. We may groan and scold, but these are expenses +which cannot be avoided; for fashion is the deity every one +worships in this country, and from the highest to the lowest, you +must submit. Even poor John and Esther had no comfort among +the servants, being constantly the subjects of ridicule, until we +were obliged to direct them to have their hair dressed. Esther +had several crying fits upon the occasion, that she should be +forced to be so much of a fool; but there was no way to keep +them from being trampled upon but this, and now that they are +<i>à la mode de Paris</i>, they are much respected. To be out of +fashion is more criminal than to be seen in a state of nature, to +which the Parisians are not averse.</p> +<br><br> +<a name="SISTER2"></a> +<p>AUTEUIL, NEAR PARIS, 10th May, 1785.</p> + +<p>Did you ever, my dear Betsey, see a person in real life such +as your imagination formed of Sir Charles Grandison? The +Baron de Staël, the Swedish Ambassador, comes nearest to +that character, in his manners and personal appearance, of any +gentleman I ever saw. The first time I saw him I was prejudiced +in his favor, for his countenance commands your good opinion: +it is animated, intelligent, sensible, affable, and without being perfectly +beautiful, is most perfectly agreeable; add to this a fine +figure, and who can fail in being charmed with the Baron de +Staël? He lives in a grand hotel, and his suite of apartments, his +furniture, and his table, are the most elegant of anything I have +seen. Although you dine upon plate in every noble house in +France, I cannot say that you may see your face in it; but here +the whole furniture of the table was burnished, and shone with +regal splendor. Seventy thousand livres in plate will make no +small figure; and that is what his Majesty gave him. The dessert +was served on the richest china, with knives, forks, and spoons +of gold. As you enter his apartments, you pass through files of +servants into his ante-chamber, in which is a throne covered with +green velvet, upon which is a chair of state, over which hangs +the picture of his royal master. These thrones are common to all +ambassadors of the first order, as they are immediate representatives +of the king. Through this ante-chamber you pass into the +grand salon, which is elegantly adorned with architecture, a beautiful +lustre hanging from the middle. Settees, chairs, and hangings +of the richest silk, embroidered with gold; marble slabs upon +Muted pillars, round which wreaths of artificial flowers in gold +entwine. It is usual to find in all houses of fashion, as in this, +several dozens of chairs, all of which have stuffed backs and +cushions, standing in double rows round the rooms. The dining-room +was equally beautiful, being hung with Gobelin tapestry, the +colors and figures of which resemble the most elegant painting. +In this room were hair-bottom mahogany-backed chairs, and the +first I have seen since I came to France. Two small statues of a +Venus de Medicis, and a Venus de ---- (ask Miss Paine for the +other name), were upon the mantelpiece. The latter, however, +was the most modest of the kind, having something like a loose +robe thrown partly over her. From the Swedish Ambassador's +we went to visit the Duchess d'Enville, who is mother to the +Duke de Rochefoucault. We found the old lady sitting in an easy-chair; +around her sat a circle of Academicians, and by her side a +young lady. Your uncle presented us, and the old lady rose, and, +as usual, gave us a salute. As she had no paint, I could put up +with it; but when she approached your cousin I could think of +nothing but Death taking hold of Hebe. The duchess is near +eighty, very tall and lean. She was dressed in a silk chemise, +with very large sleeves, coming half-way down her arm, a large +cape, no stays, a black-velvet girdle round her waist, some very +rich lace in her chemise, round her neck, and in her sleeves; but +the lace was not sufficient to cover the upper part of her neck, +which old Time had harrowed; she had no cap on, but a little +gauze bonnet, which did not reach her ears, and tied under her +chin, her venerable white hairs in full view. The dress of old +women and young girls in this country is <i>detestable</i>, to speak in +the French style; the latter at the age of seven being clothed +exactly like a woman of twenty, and the former have such a fantastical +appearance that I cannot endure it. The old lady has all +the vivacity of a young one. She is the most learned woman in +France; her house is the resort of all men of literature, with +whom she converses upon the most abstruse subjects. She is of +one of the most ancient, as well as the richest families in the +kingdom. She asked very archly when Dr. Franklin was going to +America. Upon being told, says she, "I have heard that he is a +prophet there;" alluding to that text of Scripture, "A prophet is +not without honor," etc. It was her husband who commanded +the fleet which once spread such terror in our country.</p> +<br><br> +<a name="SISTER3"></a> +<p>LONDON, Friday, 24th July 1784.</p> + +<p><i>My Dear Sister</i>:</p> + +<p>I am not a little surprised to find dress, unless upon public occasions, +so little regarded here. The gentlemen are very plainly +dressed, and the ladies much more so than with us. 'Tis true, +you must put a hoop on and have your hair dressed; but a common +straw hat, no cap, with only a ribbon upon the crown, is +thought dress sufficient to go into company. Muslins are much in +taste; no silks but lutestrings worn; but send not to London for +any article you want: you may purchase anything you can name +much lower in Boston. I went yesterday into Cheapside to purchase +a few articles, but found everything higher than in Boston. +Silks are in a particular manner so; they say, when they are +exported, there is a drawback upon them, which makes them +lower with us. Our country, alas, our country! they are extravagant +to astonishment in entertainments compared with what Mr. +Smith and Mr. Storer tell me of this. You will not find at a +gentleman's table more than two dishes of meat, though invited +several days beforehand. Mrs. Atkinson went out with me yesterday, +and Mrs. Hay, to the shops. I returned and dined with +Mrs. Atkinson, by her invitation the evening before, in company +with Mr. Smith, Mrs. Hay, Mr. Appleton. We had a turbot, a +soup, and a roast leg of lamb, with a cherry pie....</p> + +<p>The wind has prevented the arrival of the post. The city of +London is pleasanter than I expected; the buildings more regular, +the streets much wider, and more sunshine than I thought to +have found: but this, they tell me, is the pleasantest season to be +in the city. At my lodgings I am as quiet as at any place in Boston; +nor do I feel as if it could be any other place than Boston. +Dr. Clark visits us every day; says he cannot feel at home anywhere +else: declares he has not seen a handsome woman since he +came into the city; that every old woman looks like Mrs. H----, +and every young one like--like the D---l. They paint here nearly +as much as in France, but with more art. The head-dress disfigures +them in the eyes of an American. I have seen many ladies, +but not one elegant one since I came; there is not to me that +neatness in their appearance which you see in our ladies.</p> + +<p>The American ladies are much admired here by the gentlemen, +I am told, and in truth I wonder not at it. Oh, my +country, my country! preserve, preserve the little purity and +simplicity of manners you yet possess. Believe me, they are +jewels of inestimable value; the softness, peculiarly characteristic +of our sex, and which is so pleasing to the gentlemen, is wholly +laid aside here for the masculine attire and manners of Amazonians.</p> +<br> +<a name="SISTER4"></a> +<p>LONDON, BATH HOTEL, WESTMINSTER, 24th June, 1785.</p> + +<p><i>My Dear Sister</i>:</p> + +<p>I have been here a month without writing a single line to my +American friends. On or about the twenty-eighth of May we +reached London, and expected to have gone into our old quiet +lodgings at the Adelphi; but we found every hotel full. The sitting +of Parliament, the birthday of the King, and the famous +celebration of the music of Handel, at Westminster Abbey, had +drawn together such a concourse of people that we were glad to +get into lodgings at the moderate price of a guinea per day, for +two rooms and two chambers, at the Bath Hotel, Westminster, +Piccadilly, where we yet are. This being the Court end of the +city, it is the resort of a vast concourse of carriages. It is too +public and noisy for pleasure, but necessity is without law. The +ceremony of presentation, upon one week to the King, and the +next to the Queen, was to take place, after which I was to prepare +for mine. It is customary, upon presentation, to receive visits +from all the foreign ministers; so that we could not exchange our +lodgings for more private ones, as we might and should, had we +been only in a private character. The foreign ministers and several +English lords and earls have paid their compliments here, +and all hitherto is civil and polite. I was a fortnight, all the +time I could get, looking at different houses, but could not find any +one fit to inhabit under £200, beside the taxes, which mount up +to £50 or £60. At last my good genius carried me to one in +Grosvenor Square, which was not let, because the person who had +the care of it could let it only for the remaining lease, which was +one year and three-quarters. The price, which is not quite two +hundred pounds, the situation, and all together, induced us to +close the bargain, and I have prevailed upon the person who lets +it to paint two rooms, which will put it into decent order; so that, +as soon as our furniture comes, I shall again commence +housekeeping. Living at a hotel is, I think, more expensive than +housekeeping, in proportion to what one has for his money. We +have never had more than two dishes at a time upon our table, +and have not pretended to ask any company, and yet we live at a +greater expense than twenty-five guineas per week. The wages +of servants, horse hire, house rent, and provisions are much +dearer here than in France. Servants of various sorts, and for +different departments, are to be procured; their characters are to +be inquired into, and this I take upon me, even to the coachman, +You can hardly form an idea how much I miss my son on this, +as well as on many other accounts; but I cannot bear to trouble +Mr. Adams with anything of a domestic kind, who, from morning +until evening, has sufficient to occupy all his time. You can have +no idea of the petitions, letters, and private applications for +assistance, which crowd our doors. Every person represents his +case as dismal. Some may really be objects of compassion, and +some we assist; but one must have an inexhaustible purse to +supply them all. Besides, there are so many gross impositions +practiced, as we have found in more instances than one, that it +would take the whole of a person's time to trace all their stories. +Many pretend to have been American soldiers, some have served +as officers. A most glaring instance of falsehood, however, +Colonel Smith detected in a man of these pretensions, who sent +to Mr. Adams from the King's Bench prison, and modestly +desired five guineas; a qualified cheat, but evidently a man of +letters and abilities: but if it is to continue in this way, a galley +slave would have an easier task.</p> + +<p>The Tory venom has begun to spit itself forth in the public +papers, as I expected, bursting with envy that an American +minister should be received here with the same marks of attention, +politeness, and civility, which are shown to the ministers of any +other power. When a minister delivers his credentials to the +King, it is always in his private closet, attended only by the +Minister for Foreign Affairs, which is called a private audience, +and the minister presented makes some little address to his +Majesty, and the same ceremony to the Queen, whose reply was +in these words: "Sir, I thank you for your civility to me and +my family, and I am glad to see you in this country;" then she +very politely inquired whether he had got a house yet. The +answer of his Majesty was much longer; but I am not at liberty +to say more respecting it, than that it was civil and polite, and +that his Majesty said he was glad the choice of his country had +fallen upon him. The news-liars know nothing of the matter; +they represent it just to answer their purpose. Last Thursday, +Colonel Smith was presented at Court, and to-morrow, at the +Queen's circle, my ladyship and your niece make our +compliments. There is no other presentation in Europe in which I +should feel as much as in this. Your own reflections will easily +suggest the reasons.</p> + +<p>I have received a very friendly and polite visit from the +Countess of Effingham. She called, and not finding me at home, +left a card. I returned her visit, but was obliged to do it by leaving +my card too, as she was gone out of town; but when her +ladyship returned, she sent her compliments and word that if +agreeable she would take a dish of tea with me, and named her +day. She accordingly came, and appeared a very polite, sensible +woman. She is about forty, a good person, though a little masculine, +elegant in her appearance, very easy and social. The Earl +of Effingham is too well remembered by America to need any +particular recital of his character. His mother is first lady to the +Queen. When her ladyship took leave, she desired I would let +her know the day I would favor her with a visit, as she should be +loath to be absent. She resides, in summer, a little distance +from town. The Earl is a member of Parliament, which obliges +him now to be in town, and she usually comes with him, and +resides at a hotel a little distance from this.</p> + +<p>I find a good many ladies belonging to the Southern States +here, many of whom have visited me; I have exchanged visits +with several, yet neither of us have met. The custom is, however, +here much more agreeable than in France, for it is as with +us: the stranger is first visited.</p> + +<p>The ceremony of presentation here is considered as indispensable. +There are four minister-plenipotentiaries' ladies here; but +one ambassador, and he has no lady. In France, the ladies of +ambassadors only are presented. One is obliged here to attend the +circles of the Queen, which are held in summer once a fortnight, +but once a week the rest of the year; and what renders it exceedingly +expensive is, that you cannot go twice the same season in +the same dress, and a Court dress you cannot make use of anywhere +else. I directed my mantuamaker to let my dress be elegant, +but plain as I could possibly appear, with decency; accordingly, +it is white lutestring, covered and full trimmed with white +crape, festooned with lilac ribbon and mock point lace, over a +hoop of enormous extent; there is only a narrow train of about +three yards in length to the gown waist, which is put into a ribbon +upon the left side, the Queen only having her train borne. +Ruffle cuffs for married ladies, treble lace lappets, two white +plumes, and a blond lace handkerchief. This is my rigging, I +should have mentioned two pearl pins in my hair, earrings and +necklace of the same kind.</p> +<br> + +<p>THURSDAY MORNING.</p> + +<p>My head is dressed for St. James's, and in my opinion looks +very tasty. While my daughter's is undergoing the same operation, +I set myself down composedly to write you a few lines. +"Well," methinks I hear Betsey and Lucy say, "what is cousin's +dress?" White, my dear girls, like your aunt's, only differently +trimmed and ornamented: her train being wholly of white crape, +and trimmed with white ribbon; the petticoat, which is the most +showy part of the dress, covered and drawn up in what are called +festoons, with light wreaths of beautiful flowers; the sleeves white +crape, drawn over the silk, with a row of lace round the sleeve +near the shoulder, another half-way down the arm, and a third +upon the top of the ruffle, a little flower stuck between; a kind +of hat-cap, with three large feathers and a bunch of flowers; a +wreath of flowers upon the hair. Thus equipped, we go in our +own carriage, and Mr. Adams and Colonel Smith in his. But I +must quit my pen to put myself in order for the ceremony, which +begins at two o'clock. When I return, I will relate to you my +reception; but do not let it circulate, as there may be persons +eager to catch at everything, and as much given to misrepresentation +as here. I would gladly be excused the ceremony.</p> +<br> + +<p>FRIDAY MORNING.</p> + +<p>Congratulate me, my dear sister: it is over. I was too much +fatigued to write a line last evening. At two o'clock we went to +the circle, which is in the drawing-room of the Queen. We +passed through several apartments, lined as usual with spectators +upon these occasions. Upon entering the ante-chamber, the +Baron de Lynden, the Dutch Minister, who has been often here, +came and spoke with me. A Count Sarsfield, a French nobleman, +with whom I was acquainted, paid his compliments. As I +passed into the drawing-room, Lord Carmarthen and Sir Clement +Cotterel Dormer were presented to me. Though they had been +several times here, I had never seen them before. The Swedish +and the Polish Ministers made their compliments, and several +other gentlemen; but not a single lady did I know until the +Countess of Effingham came, who was very civil. There were +three young ladies, daughters of the Marquis of Lothian, who were +to be presented at the same time, and two brides. We were +placed in a circle round the drawing-room, which was very full; +I believe two hundred persons present. Only think of the task! +The royal family have to go round to every person and find small +talk enough to speak to them all, though they very prudently +speak in a whisper, so that only the person who stands next to +you can hear what is said. The King enters the room and goes +round to the right; the Queen and Princesses to the left. The +lord-in-waiting presents you to the King; and the lady-in-waiting +does the same to her Majesty. The King is a personable man; +but, my dear sister, he has a certain countenance, which you and +I have often remarked: a red face and white eyebrows. The +Queen has a similar countenance, and the numerous royal family +confirm the observation. Persons are not placed according to +their rank in the drawing-room, but promiscuously; and when the +King comes in, he takes persons as they stand. When he came +to me, Lord Onslow said, "Mrs. Adams;" upon which I drew off +my right-hand glove, and his Majesty saluted my left cheek; then +asked me if I had taken a walk to-day. I could have told his +Majesty that I had been all the morning preparing to wait upon +him; but I replied, "No, Sire." "Why, don't you love walking?" +says he. I answered that I was rather indolent in that respect. +He then bowed, and passed on. It was more than two hours +after this before it came to my turn to be presented to the Queen. +The circle was so large that the company were four hours standing. +The Queen was evidently embarrassed when I was presented +to her. I had disagreeable feelings, too. She, however, said, +"Mrs. Adams, have you got into your house? Pray, how do you +like the situation of it?" While the Princess Royal looked compassionate, +and asked me if I was not much fatigued; and observed, +that it was a very full drawing-room. Her sister, who +came next, Princess Augusta, after having asked your niece if she +was ever in England before, and her answering "Yes," inquired +of me how long ago, and supposed it was when she was very +young. All this is said with much affability, and the ease and +freedom of old acquaintance. The manner in which they make +their tour round the room is, first, the Queen, the lady-in-waiting +behind her, holding up her train; next to her, the Princess Royal; +after her, Princess Augusta, and their lady-in-waiting behind them. +They are pretty, rather than beautiful; well-shaped, fair complexions, +and a tincture of the King's countenance. The two sisters +look much alike; they were both dressed in black and silver silk, +with silver netting upon the coat, and their heads full of diamond +pins. The Queen was in purple and silver. She is not well +shaped nor handsome. As to the ladies of the Court, rank and +title may compensate for want of personal charms; but they are, +in general, very plain, ill-shaped, and ugly; but don't you tell anybody +that I say so. If one wants to see beauty, one must go to +Ranelagh; there it is collected, in one bright constellation. There +were two ladies very elegant, at Court,--Lady Salisbury and +Lady Talbot; but the observation did not in general hold good +that fine feathers make fine birds. I saw many who were vastly +richer dressed than your friends, but I will venture to say that I +saw none neater or more elegant: which praise I ascribe to the +taste of Mrs. Temple and my mantuamaker; for, after having +declared that I would not have any foil or tinsel about me, they +fixed upon the dress I have described.</p> +<br> +<center>[Inclosure <a name="to_her_niece"></a>to her niece]</center> + +<p><i>My Dear Betsey</i>:</p> + +<p>I believe I once promised to give you an account of that kind +of visiting called a ladies' rout. There are two kinds; one +where a lady sets apart a particular day in the week to see +company. These are held only five months in the year, it being +quite out of fashion to be seen in London during the summer. +When a lady returns from the country she goes round and leaves +a card with all her acquaintance, and then sends them an invitation +to attend her routs during the season. The other kind is +where a lady sends to you for certain evenings, and the cards are +always addressed in her own name, both to gentlemen and ladies. +The rooms are all set open, and card tables set in each room, the +lady of the house receiving her company at the door of the +drawing-room, +where a set number of courtesies are given and received, +with as much order as is necessary for a soldier who goes through +the different evolutions of his exercise. The visitor then proceeds +into the room without appearing to notice any other person, and +takes her seat at the card table.</p> + +<blockquote>"Nor can the muse her aid impart,<br> +Unskilled in all the terms of art,<br> +Nor in harmonious numbers put<br> +The deal, the shuffle, and the cut.<br> +Go, Tom, and light the ladies up,<br> +It must be one before we sup."<br></blockquote> + +<p>At these parties it is usual for each lady to play a rubber, as +it is termed, when you must lose or win a few guineas. To give +each a fair chance, the lady then rises and gives her seat to +another set. It is no unusual thing to have your rooms so +crowded that not more than half the company can sit at once, +yet this is called <i>society and polite life</i>. They treat their company +with coffee, tea, lemonade, orgeat, and cake. I know of +but one agreeable circumstance attending these parties, which is, +that you may go away when you please without disturbing anybody. +I was early in the winter invited to Madame de Pinto's, +the Portuguese Minister's. I went accordingly. There were about +two hundred persons present. I knew not a single lady but by +sight, having met them at Court; and it is an established rule, +though you were to meet as often as three nights in the week, +never to speak together, or know each other unless particularly +introduced. I was, however, at no loss for conversation, Madame +de Pinto being very polite, and the foreign ministers being the +most of them present, who had dined with us, and to whom I +had been early introduced. It being Sunday evening, I declined +playing cards; indeed, I always get excused when I can. And +Heaven forbid I should</p> + +<blockquote>"Catch the manners living as they rise."</blockquote> + +<p>Yet I must submit to a party or two of this kind. Having +attended several, I must return the compliment in the same way. +Yesterday we dined at Mrs. Paradice's. I refer you to Mr. +Storer for an account of this family. Mr. Jefferson, Colonel +Smith, the Prussian and Venetian ministers, were of the company, +and several other persons who were strangers. At eight +o'clock we returned home in order to dress ourselves for the ball +at the French Ambassador's, to which we had received an invitation +a fortnight before. He has been absent ever since our +arrival here, till three weeks ago. He has a levee every Sunday +evening, at which there are usually several hundred persons. +The Hotel de France is beautifully situated, fronting St. James's +Park, one end of the house standing upon Hyde Park. It is a +most superb building. About half-past nine we went, and found +some company collected. Many very brilliant ladies of the first +distinction were present. The dancing commenced about ten, +and the rooms soon filled. The room which he had built for this +purpose is large enough for five or six hundred persons. It is +most elegantly decorated, hung with a gold tissue, ornamented +with twelve brilliant cut lustres, each containing twenty-four +candles. At one end there are two large arches; these were +adorned with wreaths and bunches of artificial flowers upon the +walls; in the alcoves were cornucopiae loaded with oranges, sweetmeats, +and other trifles. Coffee, tea, lemonade, orgeat, and so +forth, were taken here by every person who chose to go for +them. There were covered seats all around the room for those +who chose to dance. In the other rooms, card tables, and a +large faro table, were set; this is a new kind of game, which is +much practiced here. Many of the company who did not dance +retired here to amuse themselves. The whole style of the house +and furniture is such as becomes the ambassador from one of the +first monarchies in Europe. He had twenty thousand guineas +allowed him in the first instance to furnish his house, and an +annual salary of ten thousand more. He has agreeably blended +the magnificence and splendor of France with the neatness and +elegance of England. Your cousin had unfortunately taken a +cold a few days before, and was very unfit to go out. She +appeared so unwell that about one we retired without staying for +supper, the sight of which only I regretted, as it was, in style, +no doubt, superior to anything I have seen. The Prince of +Wales came about eleven o'clock. Mrs. Fitzherbert was also +present, but I could not distinguish her. But who is this lady? +methinks I hear you say. She is a lady to whom, against the +laws of the realm, the Prince of Wales is privately married, as is +universally believed. She appears with him in all public parties, +and he avows his marriage wherever he dares. They have been +the topic of conversation in all companies for a long time, and it +is now said that a young George may be expected in the course +of the summer. She was a widow of about thirty-two years of +age, whom he a long time persecuted in order to get her upon +his own terms; but finding he could not succeed, he quieted her +conscience by matrimony, which, however valid in the eye of +heaven, is set aside by the laws of the land, which forbids a +prince of the blood to marry a subject. As to dresses, I believe +I must leave them to be described to your sister. I am sorry I +have nothing better to send you than a sash and a Vandyke +ribbon. The narrow is to put round the edge of a hat, or you +may trim whatever you please with it.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="HENRY_ADAMS"></a>HENRY ADAMS</h2> + +<h3>(1838-)</h3> +<br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-t.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>he gifts of expression and literary taste which have always +characterized the Adams family are most prominently represented +by this historian. He has also its great memory, +power of acquisition, intellectual independence, and energy of nature. +The latter is tempered in him with inherited self-control, the moderation +of judgment bred by wide historical knowledge, and a pervasive +atmosphere of literary good-breeding which constantly substitutes +allusive irony for crude statement, the rapier for the tomahawk.</p> + +<p>Henry Adams is the third son of Charles Francis Adams, Sr.,--the +able Minister to England during the Civil War,--and grandson +of John Quincy Adams. He was born in Boston, February 16th, 1838, +graduated from Harvard in 1858, and served as private secretary to +his father in England. In 1870 he became editor of the North +American Review and Professor of History at Harvard, in which +place he won wide repute for originality and power of inspiring +enthusiasm for research in his pupils. He has written several essays +and books on historical subjects, and edited others,--'Essays on +Anglo-Saxon Law' (1876), 'Documents Relating to New England Federalism' +(1877), 'Albert Gallatin' (1879), 'Writings of Albert Gallatin' +(1879), 'John Randolph' (1882) in the 'American Statesmen' Series, +and 'Historical Essays'; but his great life-work and monument is his +'History of the United States, 1801-17' (the Jefferson and Madison +administrations), to write which he left his professorship in 1877, and +after passing many years in London, in other foreign capitals, in +Washington, and elsewhere, studying archives, family papers, published +works, shipyards, and many other things, in preparation for +it, published the first volume in 1889, and the last in 1891. It is in +nine volumes, of which the introductory chapters and the index make +up one.</p> + +<p>The work in its inception (though not in its execution) is a +polemic tract--a family vindication, an act of pious duty; its sub-title +might be, 'A Justification of John Quincy Adams for Breaking +with the Federalist Party.' So taken, the reader who loves historical +fights and seriously desires truth should read the chapters on the +Hartford Convention and its preliminaries side by side with the +corresponding pages in Henry Cabot Lodge's 'Life of George Cabot.' +If he cannot judge from the pleadings of these two able advocates +with briefs for different sides, it is not for lack of full exposition.</p> + +<p>But the 'History' is far more and higher than a piece of special +pleading. It is in the main, both as to domestic and international +matters, a resolutely cool and impartial presentation of facts and +judgments on all sides of a period where passionate partisanship lies +almost in the very essence of the questions--a tone contrasting oddly +with the political action and feeling of the two Presidents. Even +where, as toward the New England Federalists, many readers will +consider him unfair in his deductions, he never tampers with or +unfairly proportions the facts.</p> + +<p>The work is a model of patient study, not alone of what is conventionally +accepted as historic material, but of all subsidiary matter +necessary to expert discussion of the problems involved. He goes +deeply into economic and social facts; he has instructed himself in +military science like a West Point student, in army needs like a quartermaster, +in naval construction, equipment, and management like +a naval officer. Of purely literary qualities, the history presents a +high order of constructive art in amassing minute details without +obscuring the main outlines; luminous statement; and the results of +a very powerful memory, which enables him to keep before his +vision every incident of the long chronicle with its involved groupings, +so that an armory of instructive comparisons, as well as of +polemic missiles, is constantly ready to his hand. He follows the +latest historical canons as to giving authorities.</p> + +<p>The history advances many novel views, and controverts many +accepted facts. The relation of Napoleon's warfare against Hayti +and Toussaint to the great Continental struggle, and the position he +assigns it as the turning point of that greater contest, is perhaps +the most important of these. But almost as striking are his views +on the impressment problem and the provocations to the War of +1812; wherein he leads to the most unexpected deduction,--namely, +that the grievances on <i>both</i> sides were much greater than is generally +supposed. He shows that the profit and security of the American +merchant service drew thousands of English seamen into it, where +they changed their names and passed for American citizens, greatly +embarrassing English naval operations. On the other hand, he shows +that English outrages and insults were so gross that no nation with +spirit enough to be entitled to separate existence ought to have +endured them. He reverses the severe popular judgment on Madison +for consenting to the war--on the assumed ground of coveting +another term as President--which every other historian and biographer +from Hildreth to Sydney Howard Gay has pronounced, and +which has become a stock historical convention; holds Jackson's +campaign ending at New Orleans an imbecile undertaking redeemed +only by an act of instinctive pugnacity at the end; gives Scott and +Jacob Brown the honor they have never before received in fair +measure; and in many other points redistributes praise and blame +with entire independence, and with curious effect on many popular +ideas. His views on the Hartford Convention of 1814 are part of the +Federalist controversy already referred to.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_AUSPICES_OF_THE_WAR_OF_1812"></a>THE AUSPICES OF THE WAR OF 1812</h3> + +<center>From 'History of the United States': 1890, by Charles +Scribner's Sons.</center> +<br> + +<p>The American declaration of war against England, July 18th, +1812, annoyed those European nations that were gathering +their utmost resources for resistance to Napoleon's attack. +Russia could not but regard it as an unfriendly act, equally bad +for political and commercial interests. Spain and Portugal, whose +armies were fed largely if not chiefly on American grain imported +by British money under British protection, dreaded to see their +supplies cut off. Germany, waiting only for strength to recover +her freedom, had to reckon against one more element in Napoleon's +vast military resources. England needed to make greater +efforts in order to maintain the advantages she had gained in +Russia and Spain. Even in America no one doubted the earnestness +of England's wish for peace; and if Madison and Monroe +insisted on her acquiescence in their terms, they insisted because +they believed that their military position entitled them to expect +it. The reconquest of Russia and Spain by Napoleon, an event +almost certain to happen, could hardly fail to force from England +the concessions, not in themselves unreasonable, which the United +States required.</p> + +<p>This was, as Madison to the end of his life maintained, "a +fair calculation;" but it was exasperating to England, who thought +that America ought to be equally interested with Europe in overthrowing +the military despotism of Napoleon, and should not conspire +with him for gain. At first the new war disconcerted the +feeble Ministry that remained in office on the death of Spencer +Perceval: they counted on preventing it, and did their utmost to +stop it after it was begun. The tone of arrogance which had so +long characterized government and press disappeared for the +moment. Obscure newspapers, like the London Evening Star, still +sneered at the idea that Great Britain was to be "driven from +the proud pre-eminence which the blood and treasure of her sons +have attained for her among the nations, by a piece of striped +bunting flying at the mastheads of a few fir-built frigates, manned +by a handful of bastards and outlaws,"--a phrase which had +great success in America,--but such defiances expressed a temper +studiously held in restraint previous to the moment when the war +was seen to be inevitable.</p> + +<p>The realization that no escape could be found from an American +war was forced on the British public at a moment of much +discouragement. Almost simultaneously a series of misfortunes +occurred which brought the stoutest and most intelligent Englishmen +to the verge of despair. In Spain Wellington, after winning +the battle of Salamanca in July, occupied Madrid in August, +and obliged Soult to evacuate Andalusia; but his siege of Burgos +failed, and as the French generals concentrated their scattered +forces, Wellington was obliged to abandon Madrid once more. +October 21st he was again in full retreat on Portugal. The +apparent failure of his campaign was almost simultaneous with the +apparent success of Napoleon's; for the Emperor entered Moscow +September 14th, and the news of this triumph, probably decisive +of Russian submission, reached England about October 3d. Three +days later arrived intelligence of William Hull's surrender at +Detroit; but this success was counterbalanced by simultaneous +news of Isaac Hull's startling capture of the Guerrière, and the +certainty of a prolonged war.</p> + +<p>In the desponding condition of the British people,--with a deficient +harvest, bad weather, wheat at nearly five dollars a bushel, +and the American supply likely to be cut off; consols at 57 1/2, +gold at thirty per cent premium; a Ministry without credit or +authority, and a general consciousness of blunders, incompetence, +and corruption,--every new tale of disaster sank the hopes of +England and called out wails of despair. In that state of mind +the loss of the Guerrière assumed portentous dimensions. The +Times was especially loud in lamenting the capture:--</p> + +<blockquote> +"We witnessed the gloom which that event cast over high and +honorable minds.... Never before in the history of the world +did an English frigate strike to an American; and though we cannot +say that Captain Dacres, under all circumstances, is punishable for +this act, yet we do say there are commanders in the English navy +who would a thousand times rather have gone down with their colors +flying, than have set their fellow sailors so fatal an example." +</blockquote> + +<p>No country newspaper in America, railing at Hull's cowardice +and treachery, showed less knowledge or judgment than the London +Times, which had written of nothing but war since its name +had been known in England. Any American could have assured +the English press that British frigates before the Guerrière had +struck to American; and even in England men had not forgotten +the name of the British frigate Serapis, or that of the American +captain Paul Jones. Yet the Times's ignorance was less unreasonable +than its requirement that Dacres should have gone down +with his ship,--a cry of passion the more unjust to Dacres +because he fought his ship as long as she could float. Such +sensitiveness seemed extravagant in a society which had been +hardened by centuries of warfare; yet the Times reflected fairly +the feelings of Englishmen. George Canning, speaking in open +Parliament not long afterward, said that the loss of the Guerrière +and the Macedonian produced a sensation in the country +scarcely to be equaled by the most violent convulsions of nature. +"Neither can I agree with those who complain of the shock of +consternation throughout Great Britain as having been greater +than the occasion required.... It cannot be too deeply felt +that the sacred spell of the invincibility of the British navy was +broken by those unfortunate captures."</p> + +<p>Of all spells that could be cast on a nation, that of believing +itself invincible was perhaps the one most profitably broken; but +the process of recovering its senses was agreeable to no nation, +and to England, at that moment of distress, it was as painful as +Canning described. The matter was not mended by the Courier +and Morning Post, who, taking their tone from the Admiralty, +complained of the enormous superiority of the American frigates, +and called them "line-of-battle ships in disguise." Certainly the +American forty-four was a much heavier ship than the British +thirty-eight, but the difference had been as well known in the +British navy before these actions as it was afterward; and Captain +Dacres himself, the Englishman who best knew the relative +force of the ships, told his court of inquiry a different story:--"I +am so well aware that the success of my opponent was owing +to fortune, that it is my earnest wish, and would be the happiest +period of my life, to be once more opposed to the Constitution, +with them [the old crew] under my command, in a frigate of +similar force with the Guerrière." After all had been said, the +unpleasant result remained that in future, British frigates, like +other frigates, could safely fight only their inferiors in force. +What applied to the Guerrière and Macedonian against the Constitution +and United States, where the British force was inferior, +applied equally to the Frolic against the Wasp, where no inferiority +could be shown. The British newspapers thenceforward +admitted what America wished to prove, that, ship for ship, +British were no more than the equals of Americans.</p> + +<p>Society soon learned to take a more sensible view of the subject; +but as the first depression passed away, a consciousness of +personal wrong took its place. The United States were supposed +to have stabbed England in the back at the moment when her +hands were tied, when her existence was in the most deadly peril +and her anxieties were most heavy. England never could forgive +treason so base and cowardice so vile. That Madison had been +from the first a tool and accomplice of Bonaparte was thenceforward +so fixed an idea in British history that time could not +shake it. Indeed, so complicated and so historical had the causes +of war become that no one even in America could explain or +understand them, while Englishmen could see only that America +required England as the price of peace to destroy herself by +abandoning her naval power, and that England preferred to die +fighting rather than to die by her own hand. The American +party in England was extinguished; no further protest was heard +against the war; and the British people thought moodily of +revenge.</p> + +<p>This result was unfortunate for both parties, but was doubly +unfortunate for America, because her mode of making the issue +told in her enemy's favor. The same impressions which silenced +in England open sympathy with America, stimulated in America +acute sympathy with England. Argument was useless against +people in a passion, convinced of their own injuries. Neither +Englishmen nor Federalists were open to reasoning. They found +their action easy from the moment they classed the United States +as an ally of France, like Bavaria or Saxony; and they had no +scruples of conscience, for the practical alliance was clear, and the +fact proved sufficiently the intent....</p> + +<p>The loss of two or three thirty-eight-gun frigates on the +ocean was a matter of trifling consequence to the British government, +which had a force of four ships-of-the-line and six or eight +frigates in Chesapeake Bay alone, and which built every year +dozens of ships-of-the-line and frigates to replace those lost or +worn out; but although American privateers wrought more injury +to British interests than was caused or could be caused by +the American navy, the pride of England cared little about mercantile +losses, and cared immensely for its fighting reputation. +The theory that the American was a degenerate Englishman--a +theory chiefly due to American teachings--lay at the bottom of +British politics. Even the late British minister at Washington, +Foster, a man of average intelligence, thought it manifest good +taste and good sense to say of the Americans in his speech of +February 18th, 1813, in Parliament, that "generally speaking, +they were not a people we should be proud to acknowledge as +our relations." Decatur and Hull were engaged in a social +rather than in a political contest, and were aware that the +serious work on their hands had little to do with England's +power, but much to do with her manners. The mortification of +England at the capture of her frigates was the measure of her +previous arrogance....</p> + +<p>Every country must begin war by asserting that it will never +give way; and of all countries England, which had waged innumerable +wars, knew best when perseverance cost more than concession. +Even at that early moment Parliament was evidently +perplexed, and would willingly have yielded had it seen means of +escape from its naval fetich, impressment. Perhaps the perplexity +was more evident in the Commons than in the Lords; for Castlereagh, +while defending his own course with elaborate care, visibly +stumbled over the right of impressment. Even while claiming +that its abandonment would have been "vitally dangerous if not +fatal" to England's security, he added that he "would be the +last man in the world to underrate the inconvenience which the +Americans sustained in consequence of our assertion of the right +of search." The embarrassment became still plainer when he +narrowed the question to one of statistics, and showed that the +whole contest was waged over the forcible retention of some +eight hundred seamen among one hundred and forty-five thousand +employed in British service. Granting the number were +twice as great, he continued, "would the House believe that there +was any man so infatuated, or that the British empire was driven +to such straits that for such a paltry consideration as seventeen +hundred sailors, his Majesty's government would needlessly irritate +the pride of a neutral nation or violate that justice which +was due to one country from another?" If Liverpool's argument +explained the causes of war, Castlereagh's explained its inevitable +result; for since the war must cost England at least 10,000,000 +pounds a year, could Parliament be so infatuated as to pay 10,000 +pounds a year for each American sailor detained in service, when +one-tenth of the amount, if employed in raising the wages of the +British sailor, would bring any required number of seamen back +to their ships? The whole British navy in 1812 cost 20,000,000 +pounds; the pay-roll amounted to only 3,000,000 pounds; the +common sailor was paid four pounds bounty and eighteen pounds +a year, which might have been trebled at half the cost of an +American war.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="WHAT_THE_WAR_OF_1812_DEMONSTRATED"></a>WHAT THE WAR OF 1812 DEMONSTRATED</h3> + +<center>From 'History of the United States': 1890, by Charles +Scribner's Sons.</center> + +<p>A people whose chief trait was antipathy to war, and to any +system organized with military energy, could scarcely develop +great results in national administration; yet the Americans +prided themselves chiefly on their political capacity. Even the +war did not undeceive them, although the incapacity brought into +evidence by the war was undisputed, and was most remarkable +among the communities which believed themselves to be most +gifted with political sagacity. Virginia and Massachusetts by turns +admitted failure in dealing with issues so simple that the newest +societies, like Tennessee and Ohio, understood them by instinct. +That incapacity in national politics should appear as a leading +trait in American character was unexpected by Americans, but +might naturally result from their conditions. The better test of +American character was not political but social, and was to be +found not in the government but in the people.</p> + +<p>The sixteen years of Jefferson and Madison's rule furnished +international tests of popular intelligence upon which Americans +could depend. The ocean was the only open field for competition +among nations. Americans enjoyed there no natural or artificial +advantages over Englishmen, Frenchmen, or Spaniards; indeed, +all these countries possessed navies, resources, and experience +greater than were to be found in the United States. Yet the +Americans developed, in the course of twenty years, a surprising +degree of skill in naval affairs. The evidence of their success was +to be found nowhere so complete as in the avowals of Englishmen +who knew best the history of naval progress. The American +invention of the fast-sailing schooner or clipper was the more +remarkable because, of all American inventions, this alone sprang +from direct competition with Europe. During ten centuries of +struggle the nations of Europe had labored to obtain superiority +over each other in ship-construction; yet Americans instantly +made improvements which gave them superiority, and which +Europeans were unable immediately to imitate even after seeing +them. Not only were American vessels better in model, faster in +sailing, easier and quicker in handling, and more economical in +working than the European, but they were also better equipped. +The English complained as a grievance that the Americans +adopted new and unwarranted devices in naval warfare; that their +vessels were heavier and better constructed, and their missiles of +unusual shape and improper use. The Americans resorted to +expedients that had not been tried before, and excited a mixture +of irritation and respect in the English service, until "Yankee +smartness" became a national misdemeanor.</p> + +<p>The English admitted themselves to be slow to change their +habits, but the French were both quick and scientific; yet Americans +did on the ocean what the French, under stronger inducements, +failed to do. The French privateer preyed upon British +commerce for twenty years without seriously injuring it; but no +sooner did the American privateer sail from French ports than +the rates of insurance doubled in London, and an outcry for protection +arose among English shippers which the Admiralty could +not calm. The British newspapers were filled with assertions +that the American cruiser was the superior of any vessel of its +class, and threatened to overthrow England's supremacy on the +ocean.</p> + +<p>Another test of relative intelligence was furnished by the +battles at sea. Instantly after the loss of the Guerrière the +English discovered and complained that American gunnery was +superior to their own. They explained their inferiority by the +length of time that had elapsed since their navy had found on +the ocean an enemy to fight. Every vestige of hostile fleets had +been swept away, until, after the battle of Trafalgar, British +frigates ceased practice with their guns. Doubtless the British +navy had become somewhat careless in the absence of a dangerous +enemy, but Englishmen were themselves aware that some +other cause must have affected their losses. Nothing showed that +Nelson's line-of-battle ships, frigates, or sloops were, as a rule, +better fought than the Macedonian and Java, the Avon and +Reindeer. Sir Howard Douglas, the chief authority on the +subject, attempted in vain to explain British reverses by the +deterioration of British gunnery. His analysis showed only that +American gunnery was extraordinarily good. Of all vessels, the +sloop-of-war--on account of its smallness, its quick motion, and +its more accurate armament of thirty-two-pound carronades--offered +the best test of relative gunnery, and Sir Howard Douglas +in commenting upon the destruction of the Peacock and Avon +could only say:--"In these two actions it is clear that the fire of +the British vessels was thrown too high, and that the ordnance +of their opponents were expressly and carefully aimed at and +took effect chiefly in the hull."</p> + +<p>The battle of the Hornet and Penguin, as well as those of +the Reindeer and Avon, showed that the excellence of American +gunnery continued till the close of the war. Whether at point-blank +range or at long-distance practice, the Americans used guns +as they had never been used at sea before.</p> + +<p>None of the reports of former British victories showed that +the British fire had been more destructive at any previous time +than in 1812, and no report of any commander since the British +navy existed showed so much damage inflicted on an opponent in +so short a time as was proved to have been inflicted on themselves +by the reports of British commanders in the American +war. The strongest proof of American superiority was given by +the best British officers, like Broke, who strained every nerve to +maintain an equality with American gunnery. So instantaneous +and energetic was the effort that according to the British historian +of the war, "A British forty-six-gun frigate of 1813 was half as +effective again as a British forty-six-gun frigate of 1812;" and as +he justly said, "the slaughtered crews and the shattered hulks" of +the captured British ships proved that no want of their old fighting +qualities accounted for their repeated and almost habitual +mortifications.</p> + +<p>Unwilling as the English were to admit the superior skill of +Americans on the ocean, they did not hesitate to admit it, in +certain respects, on land. The American rifle in American hands +was affirmed to have no equal in the world. This admission +could scarcely be withheld after the lists of killed and wounded +which followed almost every battle; but the admission served to +check a wider inquiry. In truth, the rifle played but a small part +in the war. Winchester's men at the river Raisin may have +owed their over-confidence, as the British Forty-first owed its +losses, to that weapon, and at New Orleans five or six hundred +of Coffee's men, who were out of range, were armed with the +rifle; but the surprising losses of the British were commonly due +to artillery and musketry fire. At New Orleans the artillery was +chiefly engaged. The artillery battle of January 1st, according to +British accounts, amply proved the superiority of American +gunnery on that occasion, which was probably the fairest test +during the war. The battle of January 8th was also chiefly an +artillery battle: the main British column never arrived within fair +musket range; Pakenham was killed by a grape-shot, and the +main column of his troops halted more than one hundred yards +from the parapet.</p> + +<p>The best test of British and American military qualities, both +for men and weapons, was Scott's battle of Chippawa. Nothing +intervened to throw a doubt over the fairness of the trial. Two +parallel lines of regular soldiers, practically equal in numbers, +armed with similar weapons, moved in close order toward each +other across a wide, open plain, without cover or advantage of +position, stopping at intervals to load and fire, until one line +broke and retired. At the same time two three-gun batteries, +the British being the heavier, maintained a steady fire from positions +opposite each other. According to the reports, the two +infantry lines in the centre never came nearer than eighty yards. +Major-General Riall reported that then, owing to severe losses, +his troops broke and could not be rallied. Comparison of official +reports showed that the British lost in killed and wounded four +hundred and sixty-nine men; the Americans, two hundred and +ninety-six. Some doubts always affect the returns of wounded, +because the severity of the wound cannot be known; but dead +men tell their own tale. Riall reported one hundred and forty-eight +killed; Scott reported sixty-one. The severity of the losses +showed that the battle was sharply contested, and proved the +personal bravery of both armies. Marksmanship decided the result, +and the returns proved that the American fire was superior +to that of the British in the proportion of more than fifty per +cent, if estimated by the entire loss, and of two hundred and +forty-two to one hundred if estimated by the deaths alone.</p> + +<p>The conclusion seemed incredible, but it was supported by the +results of the naval battles. The Americans showed superiority +amounting in some cases to twice the efficiency of their enemies +in the use of weapons. The best French critic of the naval war, +Jurien de la Gravière, said:--"An enormous superiority in the +rapidity and precision of their fire can alone explain the difference +in the losses sustained by the combatants." So far from +denying this conclusion, the British press constantly alleged it, +and the British officers complained of it. The discovery caused +great surprise, and in both British services much attention was +at once directed to improvement in artillery and musketry. Nothing +could exceed the frankness with which Englishmen avowed +their inferiority. According to Sir Francis Head, "gunnery was +in naval warfare in the extraordinary state of ignorance we have +just described, when our lean children, the American people, +taught us, rod in hand, our first lesson in the art." The English +text-book on Naval Gunnery, written by Major-General Sir Howard +Douglas immediately after the peace, devoted more attention +to the short American war than to all the battles of Napoleon, +and began by admitting that Great Britain had "entered with too +great confidence on war with a marine much more expert than +that of any of our European enemies." The admission appeared +"objectionable" even to the author; but he did not add, what +was equally true, that it applied as well to the land as to the sea +service.</p> + +<p>No one questioned the bravery of the British forces, or the +ease with which they often routed larger bodies of militia; but +the losses they inflicted were rarely as great as those they suffered. +Even at Bladensburg, where they met little resistance, their +loss was several times greater than that of the Americans. At +Plattsburg, where the intelligence and quickness of Macdonough +and his men alone won the victory, his ships were in effect stationary +batteries, and enjoyed the same superiority in gunnery. +"The Saratoga," said his official report, "had fifty-five round-shot +in her hull; the Confiance, one hundred and five. The enemy's +shot passed principally just over our heads, as there were not +twenty whole hammocks in the nettings at the close of the action."</p> + +<p>The greater skill of the Americans was not due to special +training; for the British service was better trained in gunnery, as +in everything else, than the motley armies and fleets that fought +at New Orleans and on the Lakes. Critics constantly said that +every American had learned from his childhood the use of the +rifle; but he certainly had not learned to use cannon in shooting +birds or hunting deer, and he knew less than the Englishman +about the handling of artillery and muskets. The same intelligence +that selected the rifle and the long pivot-gun for favorite +weapons was shown in handling the carronade, and every other +instrument however clumsy.</p> + +<p>Another significant result of the war was the sudden development +of scientific engineering in the United States. This branch +of the military service owed its efficiency and almost its existence +to the military school at West Point, established in 1802. The +school was at first much neglected by government. The number +of graduates before the year 1812 was very small; but at the +outbreak of the war the corps of engineers was already efficient. +Its chief was Colonel Joseph Gardner Swift, of Massachusetts, +the first graduate of the academy: Colonel Swift planned the +defenses of New York Harbor. The lieutenant-colonel in 1812 +was Walker Keith Armistead, of Virginia,--the third graduate, +who planned the defenses of Norfolk. Major William McRee, of +North Carolina, became chief engineer to General Brown and +constructed the fortifications at Fort Erie, which cost the British +General Gordon Drummond the loss of half his army, besides the +mortification of defeat. Captain Eleazer Derby Wood, of New +York, constructed Fort Meigs, which enabled Harrison to defeat +the attack of Proctor in May, 1813. Captain Joseph Gilbert +Totten, of New York, was chief engineer to General Izard at +Plattsburg, where he directed the fortifications that stopped the +advance of Prevost's great army. None of the works constructed +by a graduate of West Point was captured by the enemy; and +had an engineer been employed at Washington by Armstrong +and Winder, the city would have been easily saved.</p> + +<p>Perhaps without exaggeration the West Point Academy might +be said to have decided, next to the navy, the result of the war. +The works at New Orleans were simple in character, and as far +as they were due to engineering skill were directed by Major +Latour, a Frenchman; but the war was already ended when the +battle of New Orleans was fought. During the critical campaign +of 1814, the West Point engineers doubled the capacity of the +little American army for resistance, and introduced a new and +scientific character into American life.</p> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_BATTLE_BETWEEN_THE_CONSTITUTION_AND_THE_GUERRIERE"></a>THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE CONSTITUTION AND THE GUERRIÈRE</h3> + +<center>From 'History of the United States': 1890, by Charles +Scribner's Sons.</center> + +<p>As Broke's squadron swept along the coast it seized whatever +it met, and on July 16th caught one of President Jefferson's +sixteen-gun brigs, the Nautilus. The next day it came on +a richer prize. The American navy seemed ready to outstrip the +army in the race for disaster. The Constitution, the best frigate +in the United States service, sailed into the midst of Broke's five +ships. Captain Isaac Hull, in command of the Constitution, had +been detained at Annapolis shipping a new crew until July 5th, +the day when Broke's squadron left Halifax; then the ship got +under way and stood down Chesapeake Bay on her voyage to +New York. The wind was ahead and very light. Not until July +10th did the ship anchor off Cape Henry lighthouse, and not till +sunrise of July 12th did she stand to the eastward and northward. +Light head winds and a strong current delayed her progress till +July 17th, when at two o'clock in the afternoon, off Barnegat on +the New Jersey coast, the lookout at the masthead discovered +four sails to the northward, and two hours later a fifth sail to the +northeast. Hull took them for Rodgers's squadron. The wind +was light, and Hull being to windward determined to speak the +nearest vessel, the last to come in sight. The afternoon passed +without bringing the ships together, and at ten o'clock in the +evening, finding that the nearest ship could not answer the night +signal, Hull decided to lose no time in escaping.</p> + +<p>Then followed one of the most exciting and sustained chases +recorded in naval history. At daybreak the next morning one +British frigate was astern within five or six miles, two more were +to leeward, and the rest of the fleet some ten miles astern, all +making chase. Hull put out his boats to tow the Constitution; +Broke summoned the boats of the squadron to tow the Shannon. +Hull then bent all his spare rope to the cables, dropped a small +anchor half a mile ahead, in twenty-six fathoms of water, and +warped his ship along. Broke quickly imitated the device, and +slowly gained on the chase. The Guerrière crept so near Hull's +lee beam as to open fire, but her shot fell short. Fortunately the +wind, though slight, favored Hull. All night the British and +American crews toiled on, and when morning came the Belvidera, +proving to be the best sailer, got in advance of her consorts, +working two kedge anchors, until at two o'clock in the afternoon +she tried in her turn to reach the Constitution with her bow +guns, but in vain. Hull expected capture, but the Belvidera +could not approach nearer without bringing her boats under the +Constitution's stern guns; and the wearied crews toiled on, towing +and kedging, the ships barely out of gunshot, till another morning +came. The breeze, though still light, then allowed Hull to +take in his boats, the Belvidera being two and a half miles in his +wake, the Shannon three and a half miles on his lee, and the +three other frigates well to leeward. The wind freshened, and +the Constitution drew ahead, until, toward seven o'clock in the +evening of July 19th, a heavy rain squall struck the ship, and by +taking skillful advantage of it Hull left the Belvidera and Shannon +far astern; yet until eight o'clock the next morning they +were still in sight, keeping up the chase.</p> + +<p>Perhaps nothing during the war tested American seamanship +more thoroughly than these three days of combined skill and +endurance in the face of the irresistible enemy. The result +showed that Hull and the Constitution had nothing to fear in +these respects. There remained the question whether the superiority +extended to his guns; and such was the contempt of the +British naval officers for American ships, that with this expedience +before their eyes they still believed one of their thirty-eight-gun +frigates to be more than a match for an American forty-four, +although the American, besides the heavier armament, had proved +his capacity to outsail and out-manoeuvre the Englishman. Both +parties became more eager than ever for the test. For once, even +the Federalists of New England felt their blood stir; for their +own President and their own votes had called these frigates into +existence, and a victory won by the Constitution, which had been +built by their hands, was in their eyes a greater victory over +their political opponents than over the British. With no half-hearted +spirit the seagoing Bostonians showered well-weighed +praises on Hull when his ship entered Boston Harbor, July 26th, +after its narrow escape, and when he sailed again New England +waited with keen interest to learn his fate.</p> + +<p>Hull could not expect to keep command of the Constitution. +Bainbridge was much his senior, and had the right to a preference +in active service. Bainbridge then held and was ordered to +retain command of the Constellation, fitting out at the Washington +Navy Yard; but Secretary Hamilton, July 28th, ordered +him to take command also of the Constitution on her arrival in +port. Doubtless Hull expected this change, and probably the +expectation induced him to risk a dangerous experiment; for +without bringing his ship to the Charlestown Navy Yard, but +remaining in the outer harbor, after obtaining such supplies as he +needed, August 2d, he set sail without orders, and stood to the +eastward. Having reached Cape Race without meeting an enemy, +he turned southward, until on the night of August 18th he spoke +a privateer, which told him of a British frigate near at hand. +Following the privateersman's directions, the Constitution the next +day, August 19th, [1812,] at two o'clock in the afternoon, latitude +41 deg. 42 min., longitude 55 deg. 48 min., sighted the Guerrière.</p> + +<p>The meeting was welcome on both sides. Only three days +before, Captain Dacres had entered on the log of a merchantman +a challenge to any American frigate to meet him off Sandy Hook. +Not only had the Guerrière for a long time been extremely offensive +to every seafaring American, but the mistake which caused +the Little Belt to suffer so seriously for the misfortune of being +taken for the Guerrière had caused a corresponding feeling of +anger in the officers of the British frigate. The meeting of August +19th had the character of a preconcerted duel.</p> + +<p>The wind was blowing fresh from the northwest, with the sea +running high. Dacres backed his main topsail and waited. Hull +shortened sail, and ran down before the wind. For about an +hour the two ships wore and wore again, trying to get advantage +of position; until at last, a few minutes before six o'clock, they +came together side by side, within pistol shot, the wind almost +astern, and running before it, they pounded each other with all +their strength. As rapidly as the guns could be worked, the +Constitution poured in broadside after broadside, double-shotted +with round and grape; and without exaggeration, the echo of +these guns startled the world. "In less than thirty minutes from +the time we got alongside of the enemy," reported Hull, "she +was left without a spar standing, and the hull cut to pieces in +such a manner as to make it difficult to keep her above water."</p> + +<p>That Dacres should have been defeated was not surprising; +that he should have expected to win was an example of British +arrogance that explained and excused the war. The length of the +Constitution was one hundred and seventy-three feet, that of the +Guerrière was one hundred and fifty-six feet; the extreme breadth +of the Constitution was forty-four feet, that of the Guerrière was +forty feet: or within a few inches in both cases. The Constitution +carried thirty-two long twenty-four-pounders, the Guerrière +thirty long eighteen-pounders and two long twelve-pounders; +the Constitution carried twenty thirty-two-pound carronades, the +Guerrière sixteen. In every respect, and in proportion of ten to +seven, the Constitution was the better ship; her crew was more +numerous in proportion of ten to six. Dacres knew this very +nearly as well as it was known to Hull, yet he sought a duel. +What he did not know was that in a still greater proportion +the American officers and crew were better and more intelligent +seamen than the British, and that their passionate wish to repay +old scores gave them extraordinary energy. So much greater +was the moral superiority than the physical, that while the +Guerrière's force counted as seven against ten, her losses counted +as though her force were only two against ten.</p> + +<p>Dacres's error cost him dear; for among the Guerrière's crew +of two hundred and seventy-two, seventy-nine were killed or +wounded, and the ship was injured beyond saving before Dacres +realized his mistake, although he needed only thirty minutes of +close fighting for the purpose. He never fully understood the +causes of his defeat, and never excused it by pleading, as he +might have done, the great superiority of his enemy.</p> + +<p>Hull took his prisoners on board the Constitution, and after +blowing up the Guerrière sailed for Boston, where he arrived on +the morning of August 30th. The Sunday silence of the Puritan +city broke into excitement as the news passed through the quiet +streets that the Constitution was below in the outer harbor with +Dacres and his crew prisoners on board. No experience of history +ever went to the heart of New England more directly than +this victory, so peculiarly its own: but the delight was not confined +to New England, and extreme though it seemed, it was still not +extravagant; for however small the affair might appear on the +general scale of the world's battles, it raised the United States +in one half-hour to the rank of a first class Power in the world.</p> + +<p>Selections used by permission of Charles Scribner's Sons, Publishers.</p> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="JOHN_ADAMS"></a>JOHN ADAMS</h2> + +<h3>(1735-1826)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-j.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>ohn Adams, second President of the United States, was born +at Braintree, Mass., October 19th, 1735, and died there July +4th, 1826, the year after his son too was inaugurated President. +He was the first conspicuous member of an enduringly powerful +and individual family. The Adams race have mostly been +vehement, proud, pugnacious, and independent, with hot tempers and +strong wills; but with high ideals, dramatic devotion to duty, and the +intense democratic sentiment so often found united with personal +aristocracy of feeling. They have been men of affairs first, with large +practical ability, but with a deep strain of the man of letters which +in this generation has outshone the other faculties; strong-headed and +hard-working students, with powerful memories and fluent gifts of +expression.</p> + +<br> +<a name="135.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><img src="images/135.jpg" width="45%" alt=""> +</p><br> + +<p>All these characteristics went to make up John Adams; but their +enumeration does not furnish a complete picture of him, or reveal the +virile, choleric, masterful man. And he was far more lovable and far +more popular than his equally great son, also a typical Adams, from +the same cause which produced some of his worst blunders and +misfortunes,--a generous impulsiveness of feeling which made it +impossible for him to hold his tongue at the wrong time and place for +talking. But so fervid, combative, and opinionated a man was sure +to gain much more hate than love; because love results from comprehension, +which only the few close to him could have, while hate--toward +an honest man--is the outcome of ignorance, which most of +the world cannot avoid. Admiration and respect, however, he had +from the majority of his party at the worst of times; and the best +encomium on him is that the closer his public acts are examined, the +more credit they reflect not only on his abilities but on his +unselfishness.</p> + +<p>Born of a line of Massachusetts farmers, he graduated from Harvard +in 1755. After teaching a grammar school and beginning to read +theology, he studied law and began practice in 1758, soon becoming +a leader at the bar and in public life. In 1764 he married the noble +and delightful woman whose letters furnish unconscious testimony to +his lovable qualities. All through the germinal years of the Revolution +he was one of the foremost patriots, steadily opposing any +abandonment or compromise of essential rights. In 1765 he was +counsel for Boston with Otis and Gridley to support the town's +memorial against the Stamp Act. In 1766 he was selectman. In 1768 +the royal government offered him the post of advocate-general in the +Court of Admiralty,--a lucrative bribe to desert the opposition; but +he refused it. Yet in 1770, as a matter of high professional duty, he +became counsel (successfully) for the British soldiers on trial for the +"Boston Massacre." Though there was a present uproar of abuse, +Mr. Adams was shortly after elected Representative to the General +Court by more than three to one. In March, 1774, he contemplated +writing the "History of the Contest between Britain and America!" +On June 17th he presided over the meeting at Faneuil Hall to consider +the Boston Port Bill, and at the same hour was elected Representative +to the first Congress at Philadelphia (September 1) by the +Provincial Assembly held in defiance of the government. Returning +thence, he engaged in newspaper debate on the political issues till +the battle of Lexington.</p> + +<p>Shortly after, he again journeyed to Philadelphia to the Congress +of May 5th, 1775; where he did on his own motion, to the disgust +of his Northern associates and the reluctance even of the Southerners, +one of the most important and decisive acts of the Revolution,--induced +Congress to adopt the forces in New England as a national +army and put George Washington of Virginia at its head, thus +engaging the Southern colonies irrevocably in the war and securing +the one man who could make it a success. In 1776 he was a chief +agent in carrying a declaration of independence. He remained in +Congress till November, 1777, as head of the War Department, very +useful and laborious though making one dreadful mistake: he was +largely responsible for the disastrous policy of ignoring the just +claims and decent dignity of the military commanders, which lost the +country some of its best officers and led directly to Arnold's treason. +His reasons, exactly contrary to his wont, were good abstract logic +but thorough practical nonsense.</p> + +<p>In December, 1777, he was appointed commissioner to France to +succeed Silas Deane, and after being chased by an English man-of-war +(which he wanted to fight) arrived at Paris in safety. There +he reformed a very bad state of affairs; but thinking it absurd to +keep three envoys at one court (Dr. Franklin and Arthur Lee were +there before him), he induced Congress to abolish his office, and +returned in 1779. Chosen a delegate to the Massachusetts constitutional +convention, he was called away from it to be sent again to +France. There he remained as Franklin's colleague, detesting and +distrusting him and the French foreign minister, Vergennes, embroiling +himself with both and earning a cordial return of his warmest +dislike from both, till July, 1780. He then went to Holland as volunteer +minister, and in 1782 was formally recognized as from an independent +nation. Meantime Vergennes intrigued with all his might to +have Adams recalled, and actually succeeded in so tying his hands +that half the advantages of independence would have been lost but +for his contumacious persistence. In the final negotiations for peace, +he persisted against his instructions in making the New England fisheries +an ultimatum, and saved them. In 1783 he was commissioned +to negotiate a commercial treaty with Great Britain, and in 1785 was +made minister to that power. The wretched state of American affairs +under the Confederation made it impossible to obtain any advantages +for his country, and the vindictive feeling of the English made his +life a purgatory, so that he was glad to come home in 1788.</p> + +<p>In the first Presidential election of that year he was elected +Vice-President on the ticket with Washington; and began a feud with +Alexander Hamilton, the mighty leader of the Federalist party and +chief organizer of our governmental machine, which ended in the +overthrow of the party years before its time, and had momentous +personal and literary results as well. He was as good a Federalist +as Hamilton, and felt as much right to be leader if he could; Hamilton +would not surrender his leadership, and the rivalry never ended +till Hamilton's murder. In 1796 he was elected President against +Jefferson. His Presidency is recognized as one of the ablest and most +useful on the roll; but its personal memoirs are most painful and +scandalous. The cabinet were nearly all Hamiltonians, regularly laid +all the official secrets before Hamilton, and took advice from him to +thwart the President. They disliked Mr. Adams's overbearing ways +and obtrusive vanity, considered his policy destructive to the party +and injurious to the country, and felt that loyalty to these involved +and justified disloyalty to him. Finally his best act brought on an +explosion. The French Directory had provoked a war with this country, +which the Hamiltonian section of the leaders and much of the +party hailed with delight; but showing signs of a better spirit, Mr. +Adams, without consulting his Cabinet, who he knew would oppose it +almost or quite unanimously, nominated a commission to frame a +treaty with France. The storm of fury that broke on him from his +party has rarely been surpassed, even in the case of traitors outright, +and he was charged with being little better. He was renominated +for President in 1800, but beaten by Jefferson, owing to the defections +in his own party, largely of Hamilton's producing. The Federalist +party never won another election; the Hamilton section laid its death +to Mr. Adams, and American history is hot with the fires of this +battle even yet.</p> + +<p>Mr. Adams's later years were spent at home, where he was always +interested in public affairs and sometimes much too free in comments +on them; where he read immensely and wrote somewhat. He +heartily approved his son's break with the Federalists on the Embargo. +He died on the same day as Jefferson, both on the fiftieth +anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.</p> + +<p>As a writer, Mr. Adams's powers show best in the work which +can hardly be classed as literature,--his forcible and bitter political +letters, diatribes, and polemics. As in his life, his merits and defects +not only lie side by side, but spring from the same source,--his +vehemence, self-confidence, and impatience of obstruction. He writes +impetuously because he feels impetuously. With little literary grace, +he possesses the charm that belongs to clear and energetic thought +and sense transfused with hot emotion. John Fiske goes so far as to +say that "as a writer of English, John Adams in many respects surpassed +all his American contemporaries." He was by no means without +humor,--a characteristic which shows in some of his portraits,--and +sometimes realized the humorous aspects of his own intense and +exaggerative temperament. His remark about Timothy Pickering, +that "under the simple appearance of a bald head and straight hair, +he conceals the most ambitious designs," is perfectly self-conscious in +its quaint naiveté.</p> + +<p>His 'Life and Works,' edited by his grandson, Charles Francis +Adams, Sr., in ten volumes, is the great storehouse of his writings. +The best popular account of his life is by John T. Morse, Jr., in the +'American Statesmen' series.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="AT_THE_FRENCH_COURT"></a>AT THE FRENCH COURT</h3> +<center>From his Diary, June 7th, 1778, with his later comments in brackets.</center> + +<p>Went to Versailles, in company with Mr. Lee, Mr. Izard +and his lady, Mr. Lloyd and his lady, and Mr. François. +Saw the grand procession of the Knights <i>du Saint-Esprit</i>, +or <i>du Cordon Bleu</i>. At nine o'clock at night, went to the <i>grand +convert</i>, and saw the king, queen, and royal family, at supper; +had a fine seat and situation close by the royal family, and had +a distinct and full view of the royal pair.</p> + +<p>[Our objects were to see the ceremonies of the knights, and +in the evening the public supper of the royal family. The +kneelings, the bows, and the courtesies of the knights, the +dresses and decorations, the king seated on his throne, his +investiture of a new created knight with the badges and ornaments +of the order, and his majesty's profound and reverential +bow before the altar as he retired, were novelties and curiosities +to me, but surprised me much less than the patience and perseverance +with which they all kneeled, for two hours together, +upon the hard marble of which the floor of the chapel was made. +The distinction of the blue ribbon was very dearly purchased at +the price of enduring this painful operation four times in a year, +The Count de Vergennes confessed to me that he was almost +dead with the pain of it. And the only insinuation I ever heard, +that the king was in any degree touched by the philosophy of +the age, was, that he never discovered so much impatience, +under any of the occurrences of his life, as in going through +those tedious ceremonies of religion, to which so many hours of +his life were condemned by the catholic church.</p> + +<p>The queen was attended by her ladies to the gallery opposite +to the altar, placed in the centre of the seat, and there left alone +by the other ladies, who all retired. She was an object too +sublime and beautiful for my dull pen to describe. I leave this +enterprise to Mr. Burke. But in his description, there is more +of the orator than of the philosopher. Her dress was everything +that art and wealth could make it. One of the maids of honor +told me she had diamonds upon her person to the value of +eighteen millions of livres; and I always thought her majesty +much beholden to her dress. Mr. Burke saw her probably but +once. I have seen her fifty times perhaps, and in all the varieties +of her dresses. She had a fine complexion, indicating +perfect health, and was a handsome woman in her face and +figure. But I have seen beauties much superior, both in countenance +and form, in France, England, and America.</p> + +<p>After the ceremonies of this institution are over, there is a +collection for the poor; and that this closing scene may be as +elegant as any of the former, a young lady of some of the first +families in France is appointed to present the box to the knights. +Her dress must be as rich and elegant, in proportion, as the +Queen's, and her hair, motions, and curtsies must have as much +dignity and grace as those of the knights. It was a curious +entertainment to observe the easy air, the graceful bow, and the +conscious dignity of the knight, in presenting his contribution; +and the corresponding ease, grace, and dignity of the lady, in +receiving it, were not less charming. Every muscle, nerve, and +fibre of both seemed perfectly disciplined to perform its functions. +The elevation of the arm, the bend of the elbow, and +every finger in the hand of the knight, in putting his louis d'ors +into the box appeared to be perfectly studied, because it was +perfectly natural. How much devotion there was in all this I +know not, but it was a consummate school to teach the rising +generation the perfection of the French air, and external politeness +and good-breeding. I have seen nothing to be compared +to it in any other country....</p> + +<p>At nine o'clock we went and saw the king, queen, and royal +family, at the <i>grand couvert</i>. Whether M. François, a gentleman +who undertook upon this occasion to conduct us, had contrived a +plot to gratify the curiosity of the spectators, or whether the +royal family had a fancy to see the raw American at their +leisure, or whether they were willing to gratify him with a convenient +seat, in which he might see all the royal family, and all +the splendors of the place, I know not; but the scheme could +not have been carried into execution, certainly, without the +orders of the king. I was selected, and summoned indeed, from +all my company, and ordered to a seat close beside the royal +family. The seats on both sides of the hall, arranged like the +seats in a theatre, were all full of ladies of the first rank and +fashion in the kingdom, and there was no room or place for me +but in the midst of them. It was not easy to make room for +one more person. However, room was made, and I was situated +between two ladies, with rows and ranks of ladies above and +below me, and on the right hand and on the left, and ladies +only. My dress was a decent French dress, becoming the station +I held, but not to be compared with the gold, and diamonds, +and embroidery, about me. I could neither speak nor understand +the language in a manner to support a conversation, but I +had soon the satisfaction to find it was a silent meeting, and +that nobody spoke a word but the royal family to each other, +and they said very little. The eyes of all the assembly were +turned upon me, and I felt sufficiently humble and mortified, for +I was not a proper object for the criticisms of such a company. +I found myself gazed at, as we in America used to gaze at the +sachems who came to make speeches to us in Congress; but I +thought it very hard if I could not command as much power of +face as one of the chiefs of the Six Nations, and therefore determined +that I would assume a cheerful countenance, enjoy the +scene around me, and observe it as coolly as an astronomer contemplates +the stars. Inscriptions of <i>Fructus Belli</i> were seen on +the ceiling and all about the walls of the room, among paintings +of the trophies of war; probably done by the order of +Louis XIV., who confessed in his dying hour, as his successor +and exemplar Napoleon will probably do, that he had been too +fond of war. The king was the royal carver for himself and all +his family. His majesty ate like a king, and made a royal +supper of solid beef, and other things in proportion. The queen +took a large spoonful of soup, and displayed her fine person and +graceful manners, in alternately looking at the company in various +parts of the hall, and ordering several kinds of seasoning to +be brought to her, by which she fitted her supper to her taste.]</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="THE_CHARACTER_OF_FRANKLIN"></a>THE CHARACTER OF FRANKLIN</h3> + +<center>From Letter to the Boston Patriot, May 15th, 1811</center> + +<p>Franklin had a great genius, original, sagacious, and inventive, +capable of discoveries in science no less than of improvements +in the fine arts and the mechanic arts. He had a +vast imagination, equal to the comprehension of the greatest +objects, and capable of a cool and steady comprehension of them. +He had wit at will. He had humor that when he pleased was +delicate and delightful. He had a satire that was good-natured +or caustic, Horace or Juvenal, Swift or Rabelais, at his pleasure. +He had talents for irony, allegory, and fable, that he could adapt +with great skill to the promotion of moral and political truth. +He was master of that infantine simplicity which the French call +<i>naiveté</i> which never fails to charm in Phaedrus and La Fontaine, +from the cradle to the grave. Had he been blessed with the +same advantages of scholastic education in his early youth, and +pursued a course of studies as unembarrassed with occupations +of public and private life as Sir Isaac Newton, he might have +emulated the first philosopher. Although I am not ignorant that +most of his positions and hypotheses have been controverted, I +cannot but think he has added much to the mass of natural +knowledge, and contributed largely to the progress of the human +mind, both by his own writings and by the controversies and +experiments he has excited in all parts of Europe. He had abilities +for investigating statistical questions, and in some parts of +his life has written pamphlets and essays upon public topics with +great ingenuity and success; but after my acquaintance with him, +which commenced in Congress in 1775, his excellence as a legislator, +a politician, or a negotiator most certainly never appeared. +No sentiment more weak and superficial was ever avowed by the +most absurd philosopher than some of his, particularly one that +he procured to be inserted in the first constitution of Pennsylvania, +and for which he had such a fondness as to insert it in +his will. I call it weak, for so it must have been, or hypocritical; +unless he meant by one satiric touch to ridicule his own republic, +or throw it into everlasting contempt.</p> + +<p>I must acknowledge, after all, that nothing in life has mortified +or grieved me more than the necessity which compelled me +to oppose him so often as I have. He was a man with whom I +always wished to live in friendship, and for that purpose omitted +no demonstration of respect, esteem, and veneration in my power, +until I had unequivocal proofs of his hatred, for no other reason +under the sun but because I gave my judgment in opposition to +his in many points which materially affected the interests of our +country, and in many more which essentially concerned our +happiness, safety, and well-being. I could not and would not +sacrifice the clearest dictates of my understanding and the purest +principles of morals and policy in compliance to Dr. Franklin.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="JOHN_QUINCY_ADAMS"></a>JOHN QUINCY ADAMS</h2> + +<h3>(1767-1848)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-t.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>he chief distinction in character between John Adams and +his son is the strangest one imaginable, when one remembers +that to the fiery, combative, bristling Adams blood was +added an equal strain from the gay, genial, affectionate Abigail Smith. +The son, though of deep inner affections, and even hungering for good-will +if it would come without his help, was on the surface incomparably +colder, harsher, and thornier than his father, with all the +socially repellent traits of the race and none of the softer ones. The +father could never control his tongue or his temper, and not always +his head; the son never lost the bridle of either, and much of his terrible +power in debate came from his ability to make others lose +theirs while perfectly keeping his own. The father had plenty of +warm friends and allies,--at the worst he worked with half a party; +the son in the most superb part of his career had no friends, no +allies, no party except the group of constituents who kept him in +Congress. The father's self-confidence deepened in the son to a solitary +and even contemptuous gladiatorship against the entire government +of the country, for long years of hate and peril. The father's +irritable though generous vanity changed in the son to an icy +contempt or white-hot scorn of nearly all around him. The father's +spasms of acrimonious judgment steadied in the son to a constant +rancor always finding new objects. But only John Quincy Adams +could have done the work awaiting John Quincy Adams, and each of +his unamiable qualities strengthened his fibre to do it. And if a +man is to be judged by his fruits, Mr. Morse is justified in saying +that he was "not only pre-eminent in ability and acquirements, but +even more to be honored for profound, immutable honesty of purpose, +and broad, noble humanity of aims."</p> + +<br> +<a name="145.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><img src="images/145.jpg" width="45%" alt=""> +</p><br> + +<p>It might almost be said that the sixth President of the United +States was cradled in statesmanship. Born July 11th, 1767, he was a +little lad of ten when he accompanied his father on the French mission. +Eighteen months elapsed before he returned, and three months +later he was again upon the water, bound once more for the French +capital. There were school days in Paris, and other school days in +Amsterdam and in Leyden; but the boy was only fourteen,--the mature +old child!--when he went to St. Petersburg as private secretary +and interpreter to Francis Dana, just appointed minister plenipotentiary +to the court of the Empress Catherine. Such was his apprenticeship +to a public career which began in earnest in 1794, and lasted, +with slight interruptions, for fifty-four years. Minister to the United +Netherlands, to Russia, to Prussia, and to England; commissioner to +frame the Treaty of Ghent which ended the war of 1812; State Senator, +United States Senator; Secretary of State, a position in which +he made the treaty with Spain which conceded Florida, and enunciated +the Monroe Doctrine before Monroe and far more thoroughly +than he; President, and then for many years Member of the National +House of Representatives,--it is strange to find this man writing in +his later years, "My whole life has been a succession of disappointments. +I can scarcely recollect a single instance of success to anything +that I ever undertook."</p> + +<p>It is true, however, that his successes and even his glories always +had some bitter ingredient to spoil their flavor. As United States +Senator he was practically "boycotted" for years, even by his own +party members, because he was an Adams. In 1807 he definitely +broke with the Federalist party--for what he regarded as its slavish +crouching under English outrages, conduct which had been for years +estranging him--by supporting Jefferson's Embargo, as better than +no show of resistance at all; and was for a generation denounced by +the New England Federalists as a renegade for the sake of office and +a traitor to New England. The Massachusetts Legislature practically +censured him in 1808, and he resigned.</p> + +<p>His winning of the Presidency brought pain instead of pleasure: +he valued it only as a token of national confidence, got it only as +a minority candidate in a divided party, and was denounced by the +Jacksonians as a corrupt political bargainer. And his later Congressional +career, though his chief title to glory, was one long martyrdom +(even though its worst pains were self-inflicted), and he never knew +the immense victory he had actually won. The "old man eloquent," +after ceasing to be President, was elected in 1830 by his home +district a Representative in Congress, and regularly re-elected till his +death. For a long time he bore the anti-slavery standard almost +alone in the halls of Congress, a unique and picturesque figure, rousing +every demon of hatred in his fellow-members, in constant and +envenomed battle with them, and more than a match for them all. +He fought single-handed for the right of petition as an indefeasible +right, not hesitating to submit a petition from citizens of Virginia +praying for his own expulsion from Congress as a nuisance. In 1836 +he presented a petition from one hundred and fifty-eight ladies, +citizens of Massachusetts, "for, I said, I had not yet brought myself +to doubt whether females were citizens." After eight years of persistent +struggle against the "Atherton gag law," which practically +denied the right of petition in matters relating to slavery, he carried +a vote rescinding it, and nothing of the kind was again enacted. He +had a fatal stroke of paralysis on the floor of Congress February +21st, 1848, and died two days later.</p> + +<p>As a writer he was perspicuous, vigorous, and straightforward. +He had entered Harvard in the middle of the college course, and +been graduated with honors. He had then studied and practiced +law. He was Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory at Harvard from +1806 to 1809, and was well drilled in the use of language, but was +too downright in his temper and purposes to spend much labor upon +artistic effects. He kept an elaborate diary during the greater part +of his life,--since published in twelve volumes of "Memoirs" by +his son Charles Francis Adams; a vast storehouse of material relating +to the political history of the country, but, as published, largely +restricted to public affairs. He delivered orations on Lafayette, on +Madison, on Monroe, on Independence, and on the Constitution; published +essays on the Masonic Institution and various other matters; +a report on weights and measures, of enormous labor and permanent +value; Lectures on Rhetoric and Oratory; a tale in verse on the Conquest +of Ireland, with the title 'Dermot MacMorrogh'; an account of +Travels in Silesia; and a volume of 'Poems of Religion and Society.' +He had some facility in rhyme, but his judgment was not at fault in +informing him that he was not a poet. Mr. Morse says that "No +man can have been more utterly void of a sense of humor or an +appreciation of wit"; and yet he very fairly anticipated Holmes in +his poem on 'The Wants of Man,' and hits rather neatly a familiar +foible in the verse with which he begins 'Dermot MacMorrogh':--</p> + +<blockquote> +"'Tis strange how often readers will indulge<br> + Their wits a mystic meaning to discover;<br> +Secrets ne'er dreamt of by the bard divulge,<br> + And where he shoots a cluck, will find a plover;<br> +Satiric shafts from every line promulge,<br> + Detect a tyrant where he draws a lover:<br> +Nay, so intent his hidden thoughts to see,<br> +Cry, if he paint a scoundrel--'That means me.'"<br> +<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>Selections from Letters and Memoirs used by permission of +J.B. Lippincott Company.</p> + +<br><br> +<h3><a name="LETTER_TO_HIS_FATHER"></a>LETTER TO HIS FATHER</h3> + +<center>(At the Age of Ten)</center> + +<p>DEAR SIR,--I love to receive letters very well; much better than +I love to write them. I make but a poor figure at composition, +my head is too fickle, my thoughts are running after +birds eggs play and trifles, till I get vexed with myself. Mamma +has a troublesome task to keep me steady, and I own I am +ashamed of myself. I have but just entered the third volume of +Smollett, tho' I had designed to have got it half through by this +time. I have determined this week to be more diligent, as Mr. +Thaxter will be absent at Court, and I cannot pursue my other +studies. I have Set myself a Stent and determine to read the 3rd +volume Half out. If I can but keep my resolution, I will write +again at the end of the week and give a better account of myself. +I wish, Sir, you would give me some instructions, with regard to +my time, and advise me how to proportion my Studies and my +Play, in writing, and I will keep them by me, and endeavor to +follow them. I am, dear Sir, with a present determination of +growing better, yours.</p> + +<p>P.S.--Sir, if you will be so good as to favor me with a Blank +Book, I will transcribe the most remarkable occurances I meet +with in my reading, which will serve to fix them upon my mind.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="FROM_THE_MEMOIRS"></a>FROM THE MEMOIRS</h3> + +<center>(At the Age of Eighteen)</center> + +<p>April 26th, 1785.--A letter from Mr. Gerry of Feb. 25th Says +that Mr. Adams is appointed Minister to the Court of +London.</p> + +<p>I believe he will promote the interests of the United States, +as much as any man, but I fear his duty will induce him to make +exertions which may be detrimental to his health. I wish however +it may be otherwise. Were I now to go with him, probably +my immediate satisfaction might be greater than it will be in +returning to America. After having been traveling for these +seven years almost all over Europe, and having been in the +World, and among company, for three; to return to spend one +or two years in the pale of a College, subjected to all the rules +which I have so long been freed from; then to plunge into the +dry and tedious study of the Law for three years; and afterwards +not expect (however good an opinion I may have of myself) to +bring myself into notice under three or four years more; if ever! +It is really a prospect somewhat discouraging for a youth of my +ambition (for I have ambition, though I hope its object is laudable). +But still</p> + +<blockquote> +"Oh! how wretched<br> +Is that poor Man, that hangs on Princes' favors"<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>or on those of anybody else. I am determined that so long as I +shall be able to get my own living in an honorable manner, I +will depend upon no one. My Father has been so much taken up +all his lifetime with the interests of the public, that his own fortune +has suffered by it; so that his children will have to provide +for themselves, which I shall never be able to do, if I loiter away +my precious time in Europe and shun going home until I am +forced to it. With an ordinary share of Common sense which I +hope I enjoy, at least in America I can live <i>independent</i> and <i>free</i>; +and rather than live otherwise I would wish to die before the +time when I shall be left at my own discretion. I have before +me a striking example of the distressing and humiliating situation +a person is reduced to by adopting a different line of conduct, +and I am determined not to fall into the same error.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="FROM_THE_MEMOIRS_2"></a>FROM THE MEMOIRS</h3> + +<p>JANUARY 14TH, 1831.--I received a letter from John C. Calhoun, +now Vice-President of the United States, relating to his present +controversy with President Jackson and William H. Crawford. +He questions me concerning the letter of General Jackson +to Mr. Monroe which Crawford alleges to have been produced at +the Cabinet meetings on the Seminole War, and asks for copies, +if I think proper to give them, of Crawford's letter to me which +I received last summer, and of my answer. I answered Mr. Calhoun's +letter immediately, rigorously confining myself to the direct +object of his inquiries. This is a new bursting out of the old and +rancorous feud between Crawford and Calhoun, both parties to +which, after suspending their animosities and combining together +to effect my ruin, are appealing to me for testimony to sustain +themselves each against the other. This is one of the occasions +upon which I shall eminently need the direction of a higher power +to guide me in every step of my conduct. I see my duty to discard +all consideration of their treatment of me; to adhere, in +everything that I shall say or write, to the truth; to assert nothing +positively of which I am not absolutely certain; to deny +nothing upon which there remains a scruple of doubt upon my +memory; to conceal nothing which it may be lawful to divulge, +and which may promote truth and justice between the parties. +With these principles, I see further the necessity for caution and +prudence in the course I shall take. The bitter enmity of all +three of the parties--Jackson, Calhoun, and Crawford--against +me, an enmity the more virulent because kindled by their own +ingratitude and injustice to me; the interest which every one of +them, and all their partisans, have in keeping up that load +of obloquy and public odium which their foul calumnies have +brought down upon me; and the disfavor in which I stand before +a majority of the people, excited against me by their artifices;--their +demerits to me are proportioned to the obligations to me--Jackson's +the greatest, Crawford's the next, Calhoun's the least of +positive obligation, but darkened by his double-faced setting himself +up as a candidate for the Presidency against me in 1821, his +prevarications between Jackson and me in 1824, and his icy-hearted +dereliction of all the decencies of social intercourse with +me, solely from the terror of Jackson, since the 4th of March, +1829. I walk between burning ploughshares; let me be mindful +where I place my foot.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="FROM_THE_MEMOIRS_3"></a>FROM THE MEMOIRS</h3> + +<p>JUNE 7TH, 1833.--The first seedling apple-tree that I had observed +on my return here just out of the ground was on the 22d +of April. It had grown slowly but constantly since, and had +put out five or six leaves. Last evening, after my return from +Boston, I saw it perfectly sound. This morning I found it broken +off, leaving one lobe of the seed-leaves, and one leaf over it. This +may have been the work of a bug, or perhaps of a caterpillar. It +would not be imaginable to any person free from hobby-horse or +fanciful attachments, how much mortification such an incident occasions. +St. Evremond, after removing into the country, returned +to a city life because he found himself in despair for the loss of +a pigeon. His conclusion was, that rural life induced exorbitant +attachment to insignificant objects. My experience is conformable +to this. My natural propensity was to raise trees, fruit and forest, +from the seed. I had it in early youth, but the course of my life +deprived me of the means of pursuing the bent of my inclination. +One shellbark-walnut-tree in my garden, the root of which +I planted 8th October, 1804, and one Mazzard cherry-tree in the +grounds north of the house, the stone of which I planted about +the same time, are the only remains of my experiments of so +ancient a date. Had my life been spent in the country, and my +experiments commenced while I was at College, I should now +have a large fruit garden, flourishing orchards of native fruit, and +very valuable forests; instead of which I have a nursery of about +half an acre of ground, half full of seedlings, from five years to +five days old, bearing for the first time perhaps twenty peaches, +and a few blossoms of apricots and cherries; and hundreds of +seedlings of the present year perishing from day to day before my +eyes.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="FROM_THE_MEMOIRS_4"></a>FROM THE MEMOIRS</h3> + +<p>SEPTEMBER 9TH, 1833.--Cold and cloudy day, clearing off toward +evening. In the multitudinous whimseys of a disabled mind +and body, the thick-coming fancies often come to me that +the events which affect my life and adventures are specially +shaped to disappoint my purposes. My whole life has been a +succession of disappointments. I can scarcely recollect a single +instance of success to anything that I ever undertook. Yet, with +fervent gratitude to God, I confess that my life has been equally +marked by great and signal successes which I neither aimed at +nor anticipated. Fortune, by which I understand Providence, has +showered blessings upon me profusely. But they have been +blessings unforeseen and unsought. "Non nobis Domine, non +nobis, sed nomini tuo da gloriam!" I ought to have been taught +by it three lessons:--1. Of implicit reliance upon Providence. +2. Of humility and humiliation; the thorough conviction of my +own impotence to accomplish anything. 3. Of resignation; and +not to set my heart upon anything which can be taken from me +or denied.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="THE_MISSION_OF_AMERICA"></a>THE MISSION OF AMERICA</h3> + +<center>From his Fourth of July Oration at Washington, 1821</center> + +<p>And now, friends and countrymen, if the wise and learned +philosophers of the older world, the first observers of nutation +and aberration, the discoverers of maddening ether and +invisible planets, the inventors of Congreve rockets and shrapnel +shells, should find their hearts disposed to inquire, What has +America done for mankind? let our answer be this:--America, +with the same voice which spoke herself into existence as a +nation, proclaimed to mankind the inextinguishable rights of +human nature, and the only lawful foundations of government. +America, in the assembly of nations, since her admission among +them, has invariably, though often fruitlessly, held forth to them +the hand of honest friendship, of equal freedom, of generous +reciprocity. She has uniformly spoken among them, though often +to heedless and often to disdainful ears, the language of equal +liberty, equal justice, and equal rights. She has, in the lapse of +nearly half a century, without a single exception, respected the +independence of other nations, while asserting and maintaining +her own. She has abstained from interference in the concerns of +others, even when the conflict has been for principles to which +she clings, as to the last vital drop that visits the heart. She +has seen that probably for centuries to come, all the contests of +that Aceldama, the European World, will be contests between +inveterate power and emerging right. Wherever the standard of +freedom and independence has been or shall be unfurled, there +will her heart, her benedictions, and her prayers be. But she +goes not abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the +well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the +champion and vindicator only of her own. She will recommend +the general cause, by the countenance of her voice, and the +benignant sympathy of her example. She well knows that by +once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even +the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself, +beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and +intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume +the colors and usurp the standard of freedom. The fundamental +maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to +force. The frontlet upon her brows would no longer beam with +the ineffable splendor of freedom and independence; but in its +stead would soon be substituted an imperial diadem, flashing in +false and tarnished lustre the murky radiance of dominion and +power. She might become the dictatress of the world; she would +no longer be the ruler of her own spirit.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="THE_RIGHT_OF_PETITION"></a>THE RIGHT OF PETITION</h3> +<center>Quoted in Memoir by Josiah Quincy.</center> + +<p>Sir, it is ... well known that, from the time I entered this +house, down to the present day, I have felt it a sacred duty +to present any petition, couched in respectful language, from +any citizen of the United States, be its object what it may,--be +the prayer of it that in which I could concur, or that to which I +was utterly opposed. I adhere to the right of petition; and let +me say here that, let the petition be, as the gentleman from +Virginia has stated, from free negroes, prostitutes, as he supposes,--for +he says there is one put on this paper, and he infers that +the rest are of the same description,--<i>that</i> has not altered my +opinion at all. Where is your law that says that the mean, the +low, and the degraded, shall be deprived of the right of petition, +if their moral character is not good? Where, in the land of free-men, +was the right of petition ever placed on the exclusive basis +of morality and virtue? Petition is supplication--it is entreaty--it +is prayer! And where is the degree of vice or immorality +which shall deprive the citizen of the right to supplicate for a +boon, or to pray for mercy? Where is such a law to be found? +It does not belong to the most abject despotism. There is no +absolute monarch on earth who is not compelled, by the constitution +of his country, to receive the petitions of his people, whosoever +they may be. The Sultan of Constantinople cannot walk +the streets and refuse to receive petitions from the meanest and +vilest in the land. This is the law even of despotism; and what +does your law say? Does it say, that, before presenting a petition, +you shall look into it and see whether it comes from the +virtuous, and the great, and the mighty? No, sir; it says no such +thing. The right of petition belongs to all; and so far from +refusing to present a petition because it might come from those +low in the estimation of the world, it would be an additional +incentive, if such an incentive were wanting.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="NULLIFICATION"></a>NULLIFICATION</h3> +<center>From his Fourth of July Oration at Quincy, 1831</center> + +<p>Nullification is the provocation to that brutal and foul contest +of force, which has hitherto baffled all the efforts of the +European and Southern American nations, to introduce +among them constitutional governments of liberty and order. It +strips us of that peculiar and unimitated characteristic of all our +legislation--free debate; it makes the bayonet the arbiter of law; +it has no argument but the thunderbolt. It were senseless to +imagine that twenty-three States of the Union would suffer their +laws to be trampled upon by the despotic mandate of one. The +act of nullification would itself be null and void. Force must be +called in to execute the law of the Union. Force must be applied +by the nullifying State to resist its execution--</p> + +<blockquote> + "Ate, hot from Hell,<br> +Cries Havoc! and lets slip the dogs of war."<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>The blood of brethren is shed by each other. The citizen of +the nullifying State is a traitor to his country, by obedience to +the law of his State; a traitor to his State, by obedience to the law +of his country. The scaffold and the battle-field stream alternately +with the blood of their victims. Let this agent but once +intrude upon your deliberations, and Freedom will take her flight +for heaven. The Declaration of Independence will become a philosophical +dream, and uncontrolled, despotic sovereignties will +trample with impunity, through a long career of after ages, at +interminable or exterminating war with one another, upon the +indefeasible and unalienable rights of man.</p> + +<p>The event of a conflict of arms, between the Union and one +of its members, whether terminating in victory or defeat, would +be but an alternative of calamity to all. In the holy records of +antiquity, we have two examples of a confederation ruptured by +the severance of its members; one of which resulted, after three +desperate battles, in the extermination of the seceding tribe. And +the victorious people, instead of exulting in shouts of triumph, +"came to the House of God, and abode there till even before +God; and lifted up their voices, and wept sore, and said,--O +Lord God of Israel, <i>why</i> is this come to pass in Israel, that there +should be to-day one tribe lacking in Israel?" The other was a +successful example of resistance against tyrannical taxation, and +severed forever the confederacy, the fragments forming separate +kingdoms; and from that day, their history presents an unbroken +series of disastrous alliances and exterminating wars--of assassinations, +conspiracies, revolts, and rebellions, until both parts of +the confederacy sunk in tributary servitude to the nations around +them; till the countrymen of David and Solomon hung their +harps upon the willows of Babylon, and were totally lost among +the multitudes of the Chaldean and Assyrian monarchies, "the +most despised portion of their slaves."</p> + +<p>In these mournful memorials of their fate, we may behold +the sure, too sure prognostication of our own, from the hour +when force shall be substituted for deliberation in the settlement +of our Constitutional questions. This is the deplorable alternative--the +extirpation of the seceding member, or the never-ceasing +struggle of two rival confederacies, ultimately bending the neck of +both under the yoke of foreign domination, or the despotic sovereignty +of a conqueror at home. May Heaven avert the omen! +The destinies of not only our posterity, but of the human race, +are at stake.</p> + +<p>Let no such melancholy forebodings intrude upon the festivities +of this anniversary. Serene skies and balmy breezes are not +congenial to the climate of freedom. Progressive improvement +in the condition of man is apparently the purpose of a superintending +Providence. That purpose will not be disappointed. In +no delusion of national vanity, but with a feeling of profound +gratitude to the God of our Fathers, let us indulge the cheering +hope and belief, that our country and her people have been +selected as instruments for preparing and maturing much of the +good yet in reserve for the welfare and happiness of the human +race. Much good has already been effected by the solemn proclamation +of our principles, much more by the illustration of our +example. The tempest which threatens desolation, may be destined +only to purify the atmosphere. It is not in tranquil ease +and enjoyment that the active energies of mankind are displayed. +Toils and dangers are the trials of the soul. Doomed to the +first by his sentence at the fall, man, by his submission, converts +them into pleasures. The last are since the fall the condition of +his existence. To see them in advance, to guard against them +by all the suggestions of prudence, to meet them with the composure +of unyielding resistance, and to abide with firm resignation +the final dispensation of Him who rules the ball,--these are +the dictates of philosophy--these are the precepts of religion--these +are the principles and consolations of patriotism; these remain +when all is lost--and of these is composed the spirit of +independence--the spirit embodied in that beautiful personification +of the poet, which may each of you, my countrymen, to the +last hour of his life, apply to himself:--</p> + +<blockquote> +"Thy spirit, Independence, let me share,<br> + Lord of the lion heart and eagle eye!<br> +Thy steps I follow, with my bosom bare,<br> + Nor heed the storm that howls along the sky."<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>In the course of nature, the voice which now addresses you +must soon cease to be heard upon earth. Life and all which it +inherits, lose of their value as it draws toward its close. But for +most of you, my friends and neighbors, long and many years of +futurity are yet in store. May they be years of freedom--years +of prosperity--years of happiness, ripening for immortality! But, +were the breath which now gives utterance to my feelings, the +last vital air I should draw, my expiring words to you and your +children should be, INDEPENDENCE AND UNION FOREVER!</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="SARAH_FLOWER_ADAMS"></a>SARAH FLOWER ADAMS</h2> +<h3>(1805--1848)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-t.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>his English poet, whose hymn, 'Nearer, my God, to Thee,' is +known wherever the English language is spoken, was born +at Great Harlow, Essex, England, in 1805. She was the +daughter of Benjamin Flower, who in 1799 was prosecuted for plain +speaking in his paper, the Cambridge Intelligencer. From the outcome +of his trial is to be dated the liberty of political discussion +in England. Her mother was Eliza Gould, who first met her future +husband in jail, whither she had gone on a visit to assure him of her +sympathy. She also had suffered for liberal opinions. From their +parents two daughters inherited a distinguished nobility and purity of +character. Eliza excelled in the composition of music for congregational +worship, and arranged a musical service for the Unitarian +South Place Chapel, London. Sarah contributed first to the Monthly +Repository, conducted by W.J. Fox, her Unitarian pastor, in whose +family she lived after her father's death. In 1834 she married William +Bridges Adams. Her delicate health gave way under the shock of +her sister's death in 1846, and she died of decline in 1848.</p> + +<p>Her poetic genius found expression both in the drama and in +hymns. Her play, 'Vivia Perpetua' (1841), tells of the author's rapt +aspiration after an ideal, symbolized in a pagan's conversion to +Christianity. She published also 'The Royal Progress,' a ballad (1845), on +the giving tip of the feudal privileges of the Isle of Wight to Edward +I.; and poems upon the humanitarian interests which the Anti-Corn-Law +League endeavored to further. Her hymns are the happiest +expressions of the religious trust, resignation, and sweetness of her +nature.</p> + +<p>'Nearer, my God, to Thee,' was written for the South Place +Chapel service. There are stories of its echoes having been heard +from a dilapidated log cabin in Arkansas, from a remote corner of +the north of England, and from the Heights of Benjamin in the Holy +Land. But even its devotion and humility have not escaped censure--arising, +perhaps, from denominational bias. The fault found with it +is the fault of Addison's 'How are thy servants blessed, O Lord,' +and the fault of the Psalmody begun by Sternhold and Hopkins, +which, published in Geneva in 1556, electrified the congregation of +six thousand souls in Elizabeth's reign,--it has no direct reference +to Jesus. Compilers of hymn-books have sought to rectify what they +deem a lapse in Christian spirit by the substitution of a verse begining +"Christ alone beareth me." But the quality of the interpolated +verse is so inferior to the lyric itself that it has not found general +acceptance. Others, again, with an excess of zeal, have endeavored +to substitute "the Cross" for "a cross" in the first stanza.</p> + +<p>An even share of its extraordinary vogue must in bare justice be +credited to the tune which Dr. Lowell Mason has made an inseparable +part of it; though this does not detract in the least from its +own high merit, or its capacity to satisfy the feelings of a devout +soul. A taking melody is the first condition of even the loveliest +song's obtaining popularity; and this hymn was sung for many years +to various tunes, including chants, with no general recognition of its +quality. It was Dr. Mason's tune, written about 1860, which sent it +at once into the hearts of the people.</p> +<br><br> + +<blockquote> +<a name="HESENDETHSUNHESENDETHSHOWER"></a>HE SENDETH SUN, HE SENDETH SHOWER +<br> +He sendeth sun, he sendeth shower,<br> +Alike they're needful to the flower;<br> +And joys and tears alike are sent<br> +To give the soul fit nourishment.<br> +As comes to me or cloud or sun,<br> +Father! thy will, not mine, be done.<br> +<br> +Can loving children e'er reprove<br> +With murmurs, whom they trust and love?<br> +Creator, I would ever be<br> +A trusting, loving child to thee:<br> +As comes to me or cloud or sun,<br> +Father! thy will, not mine, be done.<br> +<br> +Oh, ne'er will I at life repine,--<br> +Enough that thou hast made it mine.<br> +When falls the shadow cold of death,<br> +I yet will sing with parting breath,<br> +As comes to me or cloud or sun,<br> +Father! thy will, not mine, be done.<br> +</blockquote> +<br><br> + +<blockquote> +<center><a name="NEARERMYGODTOTHEE"></a>NEARER, MY GOD, TO THEE</center> +<br> +Nearer, my God, to thee,<br> + Nearer to thee!<br> +E'en though it be a cross<br> + That raiseth me;<br> +Still all my song shall be,--<br> +Nearer, my God, to thee,<br> + Nearer to thee!<br> +<br> +Though, like a wanderer,<br> + The sun gone down,<br> +Darkness be over me,<br> + My rest a stone;<br> +Yet in my dreams I'd be<br> +Nearer, my God, to thee,<br> + Nearer to thee!<br> +<br> +There let the way appear<br> + Steps unto heaven;<br> +All that thou sendest me<br> + In mercy given;<br> +Angels to beckon me<br> +Nearer, my God, to thee,<br> + Nearer to thee!<br> +<br> +Then with my waking thoughts<br> + Bright with thy praise,<br> +Out of my stony griefs<br> + Bethel I'll raise;<br> +So by my woes to be<br> +Nearer, my God, to thee,<br> + Nearer to thee!<br> +<br> +Or if on joyful wing,<br> + Cleaving the sky,<br> +Sun, moon, and stars forgot,<br> + Upward I fly;<br> +Still all my song shall be,--<br> +Nearer, my God, to thee,<br> + Nearer to thee!<br> +<br> +From 'Adoration, Aspiration, and Belief.'<br> +</blockquote> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="JOSEPH_ADDISON"></a>JOSEPH ADDISON</h2> +<h3>(1672-1719)</h3> + +<h3>BY HAMILTON WRIGHT MABIE</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-t.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>here are few figures in literary history more dignified and +attractive than Joseph Addison; few men more eminently +representative, not only of literature as a profession, but of +literature as an art. It has happened more than once that literary +gifts of a high order have been lodged in very frail moral tenements; +that taste, feeling, and felicity of expression have been divorced from +general intellectual power, from intimate acquaintance with the best +in thought and art, from grace of manner and dignity of life. There +have been writers of force and originality who failed to attain a +representative eminence, to identify themselves with their art in the +memory of the world. There have been other writers without claim +to the possession of gifts of the highest order, who have secured this +distinction by virtue of harmony of character and work, of breadth +of interest, and of that fine intelligence which instinctively allies +itself with the best in its time. Of this class Addison is an illustrious +example. His gifts are not of the highest order; there was none of +the spontaneity, abandon, or fertility of genius in him; his thought +made no lasting contribution to the highest intellectual life; he set no +pulses beating by his eloquence of style, and fired no imagination by +the insight and emotion of his verse; he was not a scholar in the +technical sense: and yet, in an age which was stirred and stung by +the immense satiric force of Swift, charmed by the wit and elegance +of Pope, moved by the tenderness of Steele, and enchanted by the +fresh realism of De Foe, Addison holds the most representative place. +He is, above all others, the Man of Letters of his time; his name +instantly evokes the literature of his period.</p> + +<br> +<a name="161.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><img src="images/161.jpg" width="45%" alt=""> +</p><br> + +<p>Born in the rectory at Milston, Wiltshire, on May Day, 1672, it was +Addison's fortune to take up the profession of Letters at the very +moment when it was becoming a recognized profession, with a field +of its own, and with emoluments sufficient in kind to make decency +of living possible, and so related to a man's work that their acceptance +involved loss neither of dignity nor of independence. He was +contemporary with the first English publisher, Jacob Tonson. He +was also contemporary with the notable reorganization of English +prose which freed it from exaggeration, complexity, and obscurity; +and he contributed not a little to the flexibility, charm, balance, and +ease which have since characterized its best examples. He saw the +rise of polite society in its modern sense; the development of the +social resources of the city; the enlargement of what is called "the +reading class" to embrace all classes in the community and all orders +in the nation. And he was one of the first, following the logic of +a free press, an organized business for the sale of books, and the +appearance of popular interest in literature, to undertake that work of +translating the best thought, feeling, sentiment, and knowledge of +his time, and of all times, into the language of the drawing-room, the +club, and the street, which has done so much to humanize and civilize +the modern world.</p> + +<p>To recognize these various opportunities, to feel intuitively the +drift of sentiment and conviction, and so to adjust the uses of art to +life as to exalt the one, and enrich and refine the other, involved +not only the possession of gifts of a high order, but that training +which puts a man in command of himself and of his materials. +Addison was fortunate in that incomparably important education +which assails a child through every sense, and above all through the +imagination--in the atmosphere of a home, frugal in its service to +the body, but prodigal in its ministry to the spirit. His father was +a man of generous culture: an Oxford scholar, who had stood frankly +for the Monarchy and Episcopacy in Puritan times; a voluminous and +agreeable writer; of whom Steele says that he bred his five children +"with all the care imaginable in a liberal and generous way." From +this most influential of schools Addison passed on to other masters: +from the Grammar School at Lichfield, to the well-known Charter +House; and thence to Oxford, where he first entered Queen's College, +and later, became a member of Magdalen, to the beauty of whose +architecture and natural situation the tradition of his walks and +personality adds no small charm. He was a close student, shy in manner, +given to late hours of work. His literary tastes and appetite +were early disclosed, and in his twenty-second year he was already +known in London, had written an 'Account of the Greatest English +Poets,' and had addressed some complimentary verses to Dryden, +then the recognized head of English Letters.</p> + +<p>While Addison was hesitating what profession to follow, the leaders +of the political parties were casting about for men of literary +power. A new force had appeared in English politics--the force of +public opinion; and in their experiments to control and direct this +novel force, politicians were eager to secure the aid of men of Letters. +The shifting of power to the House of Commons involved a +radical readjustment, not only of the mechanism of political action, +but of the attitude of public men to the nation. They felt the need +of trained and persuasive interpreters and advocates; of the resources +of wit, satire, and humor. It was this very practical service which +literature was in the way of rendering to political parties, rather than +any deep regard for literature itself, which brought about a brief but +brilliant alliance between groups of men who have not often worked +together to mutual advantage. It must be said, however, that there +was among the great Whig and Tory leaders of the time a certain +liberality of taste, and a care for those things which give public life +dignity and elegance, which were entirely absent from Robert Walpole +and the leaders of the two succeeding reigns, when literature +and politics were completely divorced, and the government knew +little and cared less for the welfare of the arts. Addison came on +the stage at the very moment when the government was not only +ready but eager to foster such talents as his. He was a Whig of +pronounced although modern type, and the Whigs were in power.</p> + +<p>Lord Somers and Charles Montagu, better known later as Lord +Halifax, were the heads of the ministry, and his personal friends as +well. They were men of culture, lovers of Letters, and not unappreciative +of the personal distinction which already stamped the +studious and dignified Magdalen scholar. A Latin poem on the Peace +of Ryswick, dedicated to Montagu, happily combined Virgilian elegance +and felicity with Whig sentiment and achievement. It confirmed +the judgment already formed of Addison's ability; and, setting +aside with friendly insistence the plan of putting that ability into the +service of the Church, Montagu secured a pension of £300 for the +purpose of enabling Addison to fit himself for public employment +abroad by thorough study of the French language, and of manners, +methods, and institutions on the Continent. With eight Latin poems, +published in the second volume of the 'Musae Anglicanae,' as an +introduction to foreign scholars, and armed with letters of introduction +from Montagu to many distinguished personages, Addison left Oxford +in the summer of 1699, and, after a prolonged stay at Blois for purposes +of study, visited many cities and interesting localities in France, +Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Germany, and Holland. The shy, reticent, +but observing young traveler was everywhere received with the +courtesy which early in the century had made so deep an impression +on the young Milton. He studied hard, saw much, and meditated +more. He was not only fitting himself for public service, but for +that delicate portraiture of manners which was later to become his +distinctive work. Clarendon had already drawn a series of lifelike +portraits of men of action in the stormy period of the Revolution: +Addison was to sketch the society of his time with a touch at once +delicate and firm; to exhibit its life in those aspects which emphasize +individual humor and personal quality, against a carefully wrought +background of habit, manners, usage, and social condition. The +habit of observation and the wide acquaintance with cultivated and +elegant social life which was a necessary part of the training for the +work which was later to appear in the pages of the Spectator, were +perhaps the richest educational results of these years of travel and +study; for Addison the official is a comparatively obscure figure, but +Addison the writer is one of the most admirable and attractive figures +in English history.</p> + +<p>Addison returned to England in 1703 with clouded prospects. The +accession of Queen Anne had been followed by the dismissal of the +Whigs from office; his pension was stopped, his opportunity of advancement +gone, and his father dead. The skies soon brightened, +however: the support of the Whigs became necessary to the Government; +the brilliant victory of Blenheim shed lustre not only on Marlborough, +but on the men with whom he was politically affiliated; and +there was great dearth of poetic ability in the Tory ranks at the very +moment when a notable achievement called for brave and splendid +verse. Lord Godolphin, that easy-going and eminently successful +politician of whom Charles the Second once shrewdly said that he +was "never in the way and never out of it," was directed to Addison +in this emergency; and the story goes that the Chancellor of the +Exchequer, afterward Lord Carleton, who was sent to express to the +needy scholar the wishes of the Government, found him lodged in a +garret over a small shop. The result of this memorable embassy +from politics to literature was 'The Campaign': an eminently successful +poem of the formal, "occasional" order, which celebrated the +victor of Blenheim with tact and taste, pleased the ministry, delighted +the public, and brought reputation and fortune to its unknown +writer. Its excellence is in skillful avoidance of fulsome adulation, in +the exclusion of the well-worn classical allusions, and in a straightforward +celebration of those really great qualities in Marlborough +which set his military career in brilliant contrast with his private life. +The poem closed with a simile which took the world by storm:--</p> + +<blockquote> +"So when an angel, by divine command,<br> +With rising tempests shakes a guilty land,<br> +(Such as of late o'er pale Britannia passed,)<br> +Calm and serene he drives the furious blast;<br> +And, pleased the Almighty's orders to perform,<br> +Rides in the whirlwind and directs the storm."<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>"Addison left off at a good moment," says Thackeray. "That +simile was pronounced to be the greatest ever produced in poetry. +That angel, that good angel, flew off with Mr. Addison, and landed +him in the place of Commissioner of Appeals--<i>vice</i> Mr. Locke, providentially +promoted. In the following year Mr. Addison went to +Hanover with Lord Halifax, and the year after was made Under-Secretary +of State. O angel visits! You come 'few and far between' +to literary gentlemen's lodgings! Your wings seldom quiver at the +second-floor windows now!"</p> + +<p>The prize poem was followed by a narrative of travel in Italy, +happily written, full of felicitous description, and touched by a humor +which, in quality and manner, was new to English readers. Then +came one of those indiscretions of the imagination which showed +that the dignified and somewhat sober young poet, the "parson in a +tye-wig," as he was called at a later day, was not lacking in gayety +of mood. The opera 'Rosamond' was not a popular success, mainly +because the music to which it was set fell so far below it in grace +and ease. It must be added, however, that Addison lacked the qualities +of a successful libretto writer. He was too serious, and despite +the lightness of his touch, there was a certain rigidity in him which +made him unapt at versification which required quickness, agility, +and variety. When he attempted to give his verse gayety of manner, +he did not get beyond awkward simulation of an ease which nature +had denied him:--</p> + +<blockquote> + "Since conjugal passion<br> + Is come into fashion,<br> +And marriage so blest on the throne is,<br> + Like a Venus I'll shine,<br> + Be fond and be fine,<br> +And Sir Trusty shall be my Adonis."<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>Meantime, in spite of occasional clouds, Addison's fortunes were +steadily advancing. The Earl of Wharton was appointed Lord Lieutenant +of Ireland, and Addison accepted the lucrative post of Secretary. +Spenser had found time and place, during a similar service in +the same country, to complete the 'Faery Queene'; although the fair +land in which the loveliest of English poems has its action was not +unvexed by the chronic turbulence of a mercurial and badly used +race. Irish residence was coincident in Addison's case, not only with +prosperous fortunes and with important friendships, but also with the +beginning of the work on which his fame securely rests. In Ireland +the acquaintance he had already made in London with Swift ripened +into a generous friendship, which for a time resisted political differences +when such differences were the constant occasion of personal +animosity and bitterness. The two men represented the age in an +uncommonly complete way. Swift had the greater genius: he was, +indeed, in respect of natural endowment, the foremost man of his +time; but his nature was undisciplined, his temper uncertain, and his +great powers quite as much at the service of his passions as of his +principles. He made himself respected, feared, and finally hated; +his lack of restraint and balance, his ferocity of spirit when opposed, +and the violence with which he assailed his enemies, neutralized +his splendid gifts, marred his fortune, and sent him into lonely exile +at Dublin, where he longed for the ampler world of London. Few +figures in literary history are more pathetic than that of the old +Dean of St. Patrick's, broken in spirit, failing in health, his noble +faculties gone into premature decay, forsaken, bitter, and remorseful. +At the time of Addison's stay in Ireland, the days of Swift's eclipse +were, however, far distant; both men were in their prime. That +Swift loved Addison is clear enough; and it is easy to understand +the qualities which made Addison one of the most deeply loved men +of his time. He was of an eminently social temper, although averse +to large companies and shy and silent in their presence. "There is +no such thing," he once said, "as real conversation but between two +persons." He was free from malice, meanness, or jealousy, Pope to +the contrary notwithstanding. He was absolutely loyal to his principles +and to his friends, in a time when many men changed both +with as little compunction as they changed wigs and swords. His +personality was singularly winning; his features regular, and full of +refinement and intelligence; his bearing dignified and graceful; his +temper kindly and in perfect control; his character without a stain; +his conversation enchanting, its charm confessed by persons so +diverse in taste as Pope, Swift, Steele, and Young. Lady Mary +Montagu declared that he was the best company she had ever known. +He had two faults of which the world has heard much: he loved the +company of men who flattered him, and at times he used wine +too freely. The first of these defects was venial, and did not blind +his judgment either of himself or his friends; the second defect was +so common among the men of his time that Addison's occasional +over-indulgence, in contrast with the excesses of others, seems like +temperance itself.</p> + +<p>The harmony and symmetry of this winning personality has, in a +sense, told against it; for men are prone to call the well-balanced +nature cold and the well-regulated life Pharisaic. Addison did not +escape charges of this kind from the wild livers of his own time, +who could not dissociate genius from profligacy nor generosity of +nature from prodigality. It was one of the great services of Addison +to his generation and to all generations, that in an age of violent +passions, he showed how a strong man could govern himself. In a +time of reckless living, he illustrated the power which flows from +subordination of pleasure to duty. In a day when wit was identified +with malice, he brought out its power to entertain, surprise, and +delight, without taking on the irreverent levity of Voltaire, the +bitterness of Swift, or the malice of Pope.</p> + +<p>It was during Addison's stay in Ireland that Richard Steele projected +the Tatler, and brought out the first number in 1709. His +friendship for Addison amounted almost to a passion; their intimacy +was cemented by harmony of tastes and diversity of character. +Steele was ardent, impulsive, warm-hearted, mercurial; full of aspiration +and beset by lamentable weaknesses,--preaching the highest +morality and constantly falling into the prevalent vices of his time; +a man so lovable of temper, so generous a spirit, and so frank a +nature, that his faults seem to humanize his character rather than +to weaken and stain it. Steele's gifts were many, and they were +always at the service of his feelings; he had an Irish warmth of +sympathy and an Irish readiness of humor, with great facility of +inventiveness, and an inexhaustible interest in all aspects of human +experience. There had been political journals in England since the +time of the Revolution, but Steele conceived the idea of a journal +which should comment on the events and characteristics of the time +in a bright and humorous way; using freedom with judgment and +taste, and attacking the vices and follies of the time with the light +equipment of wit rather than with the heavy armament of the formal +moralist. The time was ripe for such an enterprise. London was +full of men and women of brilliant parts, whose manners, tastes, +and talk presented rich material for humorous report and delineation +or for satiric comment. Society, in the modern sense, was fast taking +form, and the resources of social intercourse were being rapidly +developed. Men in public life were intimately allied with society +and sensitive to its opinion; and men of all interests--public, fashionable, +literary--gathered in groups at the different chocolate or coffee +houses, and formed a kind of organized community. It was distinctly +an aristocratic society: elegant in dress, punctilious in manner, exacting +in taste, ready to be amused, and not indifferent to criticism +when it took the form of sprightly badinage or of keen and trenchant +satire. The informal organization of society, which made it possible +to reach and affect the Town as a whole, is suggested by the +division of the Tatler:--</p> + +<p>"All accounts of Gallantry, Pleasure, and Entertainment, shall be +under the article of White's Chocolate-House; Poetry under that of +Will's Coffee-House; Learning under the title of Grecian; Foreign and +Domestic News you will have from St. James's Coffee-House; and +what else I have to offer on any other subject shall be dated from +my own apartment."</p> + +<p>So wrote Steele in his introduction to the readers of the new journal, +which was to appear three times a week, at the cost of a penny. +Of the coffee-houses enumerated, St. James's and White's were the +headquarters of men of fashion and of politics; the Grecian of men of +legal learning; Will's of men of Letters. The Tatler was successful +from the start. It was novel in form and in spirit; it was sprightly +without being frivolous, witty without being indecent, keen without +being libelous or malicious. In the general license and coarseness of +the time, so close to the Restoration and the powerful reaction against +Puritanism, the cleanness, courtesy, and good taste which characterized +the journal had all the charm of a new diversion. In paper No. 18, +Addison made his appearance as a contributor, and gave the world +the first of those inimitable essays which influenced their own time so +widely, and which have become the solace and delight of all times. +To Addison's influence may perhaps be traced the change which +came over the Tatler, and which is seen in the gradual disappearance +of the news element, and the steady drift of the paper away from +journalism and toward literature. Society soon felt the full force of +the extraordinary talent at the command of the new censor of contemporary +manners and morals. There was a well-directed and incessant +fire of wit against the prevailing taste of dramatic art; against +the vices of gambling and dueling; against extravagance and affectation +of dress and manner: and there was also criticism of a new +order.</p> + +<p>The Tatler was discontinued in January, 1711, and the first number +of the Spectator appeared in March. The new journal was issued +daily, but it made no pretensions to newspaper timeliness or interest; +it aimed to set a new standard in manners, morals, and taste, without +assuming the airs of a teacher. "It was said of Socrates," wrote +Addison, in a memorable chapter in the new journal, "that he +brought Philosophy down from heaven to inhabit among men; and I +shall be happy to have it said of me that I have brought Philosophy +out of closets and libraries, schools and colleges, to dwell in clubs +and assemblies, at tea-tables and in coffee-houses." For more than +two years the Spectator discharged with inimitable skill and success +the difficult function of chiding, reproving, and correcting, without +irritating, wounding, or causing strife. Swift found the paper too +gentle, but its influence was due in no small measure to its persuasiveness. +Addison studied his method of attack as carefully as Matthew +Arnold, who undertook a similar educational work in our own +time, studied his means of approach to a public indifferent or hostile +to his ideas. The two hundred and seventy-four papers furnished by +Addison to the columns of the Spectator may be said to mark the +full development of English prose as a free, flexible, clear, and elegant +medium of expressing the most varied and delicate shades of +thought. They mark also the perfection of the essay form in our +literature; revealing clear perception of its limitations and of its +resources; easy mastery of its possibilities of serious exposition and +of pervading charm; ability to employ its full capacity of conveying +serious thought in a manner at once easy and authoritative. They +mark also the beginning of a deeper and more intelligent criticism; +for their exposition of Milton may be said to point the way to a new +quality of literary judgment and a new order of literary comment. +These papers mark, finally, the beginnings of the English novel; for +they contain a series of character-studies full of insight, delicacy of +drawing, true feeling, and sureness of touch. Addison was not content +to satirize the follies, attack the vices, and picture the manners +of his times: he created a group of figures which stand out as distinctly +as those which were drawn more than a century later by +the hand of Thackeray, our greatest painter of manners. De Foe had +not yet published the first of the great modern novels of incident +and adventure in 'Robinson Crusoe,' and Richardson, Fielding, and +Smollett were unborn or unknown, when Addison was sketching Sir +Roger de Coverley and Will Honeycomb, and filling in the background +with charming studies of life in London and in the country. +The world has instinctively selected Sir Roger de Coverley as the +truest of all the creations of Addison's imagination; and it sheds clear +light on the fineness of Addison's nature that among the four characters +in fiction whom English readers have agreed to accept as typical +gentlemen,--Don Quixote, Sir Roger de Coverley, Henry Esmond, and +Colonel Newcombe,--the old English baronet holds a secure place.</p> + +<p>Finished in style, but genuinely human in feeling, betraying the +nicest choice of words and the most studied care for elegant and +effective arrangement, and yet penetrated by geniality, enlivened by +humor, elevated by high moral aims, often using the dangerous +weapons of irony and satire, and yet always well-mannered and +kindly,--these papers reveal the sensitive nature of Addison and the +delicate but thoroughly tempered art which he had at his command.</p> + +<p>Rarely has literature of so high an order had such instant success; +for the popularity of the Spectator has been rivaled in English +literature only by that of the Waverley novels or of the novels of +Dickens. Its influence was felt not only in the sentiment of the +day, and in the crowd of imitators which followed in its wake, but +also across the Channel. In Germany, especially, the genius and +methods of Addison made a deep and lasting impression.</p> + +<p>No man could reach such eminence in the first quarter of the +last century without being tempted to try his hand at play-writing; +and the friendly fortune which seemed to serve Addison at every +turn reached its climax in the applause which greeted the production +of 'Cato.' The motive of this tragedy, constructed on what were +then held to be classic lines, is found in the two lines of the +Prologue: it was an endeavor to portray</p> + +<blockquote> +"A brave man struggling in the storms of fate,<br> +And greatly falling with a falling State."<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>The play was full of striking lines which were instantly caught +up and applied to the existing political situation; the theatre was +crowded night after night, and the resources of Europe in the way +of translations, plaudits, and favorable criticisms were exhausted in +the endeavor to express the general approval. The judgment of a +later period has, however, assigned 'Cato' a secondary place, and it +is remembered mainly on account of its many felicitous passages. +It lacks real dramatic unity and vitality; the character of Cato is +essentially an abstraction; there is little dramatic necessity in the +situations and incidents. It is rhetorical rather than poetic, declamatory +rather than dramatic. Johnson aptly described it as "rather a +poem in dialogue than a drama, rather a succession of just sentiments +in elegant language than a representation of natural affections, +or of any state probable or possible in human life."</p> + +<p>Addison's popularity touched its highest point in the production +of 'Cato.' Even his conciliatory nature could not disarm the envy +which such brilliant success naturally aroused, nor wholly escape the +bitterness which the intense political feeling of the time constantly +bred between ambitious and able men. Political differences separated +him from Swift, and Steele's uncertain character and inconsistent +course blighted what was probably the most delightful intimacy of +his life. Pope doubtless believed that he had good ground for charging +Addison with jealousy and insincerity, and in 1715 an open +rupture took place between them. The story of the famous quarrel +was first told by Pope, and his version was long accepted in many +quarters as final; but later opinion inclines to hold Addison guiltless +of the grave accusations brought against him. Pope was morbidly +sensitive to slights, morbidly eager for praise, and extremely irritable. +To a man of such temper, trifles light as air became significant of +malice and hatred. Such trifles unhappily confirmed Pope's suspicions; +his self-love was wounded, sensitiveness became animosity, +and animosity became hate, which in the end inspired the most +stinging bit of satire in the language:--</p> + +<blockquote> +"Should such a one, resolved to reign alone,<br> +Bear, like the Turk, no brother near the throne,<br> +View him with jealous yet with scornful eyes,<br> +Hate him for arts that caused himself to rise,<br> +Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer,<br> +And, without sneering, teach the rest to sneer;<br> +Alike unused to blame or to commend,<br> +A timorous foe and a suspicious friend,<br> +Fearing e'en fools, by flatterers besieged,<br> +And so obliging that he ne'er obliged;<br> +Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike."<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>There was just enough semblance of truth in these inimitable +lines to give them lasting stinging power; but that they were grossly +unjust is now generally conceded. Addison was human, and therefore +not free from the frailties of men of his profession; but there +was no meanness in him.</p> + +<p>Addison's loyalty to the Whig party and his ability to serve it +kept him in intimate relations with its leaders and bound him to its +fortunes. He served the Whig cause in Parliament, and filled many +positions which required tact and judgment, attaining at last the +very dignified post of Secretary of State. A long attachment for +the Countess of Warwick culminated in marriage in 1716, and +Addison took up his residence in Holland House; a house famous +for its association with men of distinction in politics and letters. +The marriage was not happy, if report is to be trusted. The union +of the ill-adapted pair was, in any event, short-lived; for three years +later, in 1719, Addison died in his early prime, not yet having completed +his forty-eighth year. On his death-bed, Young tells us, he +called his stepson to his side and said, "See in what peace a Christian +can die." His body was laid in Westminster Abbey; his work +is one of the permanent possessions of the English-speaking race; +his character is one of its finest traditions. He was, as truly as Sir +Philip Sidney, a gentleman in the sweetness of his spirit, the courage +of his convictions, the refinement of his bearing, and the purity +of his life. He was unspoiled by fortune and applause; uncorrupted +by the tempting chances of his time; stainless in the use of gifts +which in the hands of a man less true would have caught the contagion +of Pope's malice or of Swift's corroding cynicism.</p> + +<p class="rgt"><img src="images/172.png" width="60%" alt=""></p> +<br><br><br><br> + +<h3><a name="SIR_ROGER_DE_COVERLEY_AT_THE_PLAY"></a>SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY AT THE PLAY</h3> + +<center>From the Spectator, No. 335</center> + +<p>My friend Sir Roger de Coverley, when we last met together +at the Club, told me, that he had a great mind to see the +new Tragedy with me, assuring me at the same time that +he had not been at a Play these twenty Years. The last I +saw, said Sir Roger, was the <i>Committee</i>, which I should not have +gone to neither, had not I been told beforehand that it was a +good Church-of-<i>England</i> Comedy. He then proceeded to enquire +of me who this Distrest Mother was; and upon hearing that she +was <i>Hector's</i> Widow, he told me that her Husband was a brave +Man, and that when he was a Schoolboy he had read his Life at +the end of the Dictionary. My friend asked me in the next +place, if there would not be some danger in coming home late, +in case the <i>Mohocks</i><a name="FNanchor1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1">[1]</a> should be Abroad. I assure you, says he, +I thought I had fallen into their Hands last Night; for I observed +two or three lusty black Men that follow'd me half way up <i>Fleet-street,</i> +and mended their pace behind me, in proportion as I put +on to get away from them. You must know, continu'd the +Knight with a Smile, I fancied they had a mind to <i>hunt</i> me; for +I remember an honest Gentleman in my Neighbourhood, who was +served such a trick in King <i>Charles</i> the Second's time; for which +reason he has not ventured himself in Town ever since. I might +have shown them very good Sport, had this been their Design; +for as I am an old Fox-hunter, I should have turned and dodg'd, +and have play'd them a thousand tricks they had never seen in +their Lives before. Sir Roger added, that if these gentlemen had +any such Intention, they did not succeed very well in it: for I +threw them out, says he, at the End of <i>Norfolk street</i>, where I +doubled the Corner, and got shelter in my Lodgings before they +could imagine what was become of me. However, says the +Knight, if Captain Sentry will make one with us to-morrow +night, and if you will both of you call upon me about four +a Clock, that we may be at the House before it is full, I will +have my own Coach in readiness to attend you, for <i>John</i> tells me +he has got the Fore-Wheels mended.</p> + +<blockquote> +<a name="Footnote_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor1">[1]</a> London "bucks" who disguised themselves as savages and roamed the +streets at night, committing outrages on persons and property. +</blockquote> + +<p>The Captain, who did not fail to meet me there at the +appointed Hour, bid Sir Roger fear nothing, for that he had put +on the same Sword which he made use of at the Battel of <i>Steenkirk.</i> +Sir Roger's Servants, and among the rest my old Friend +the Butler, had, I found, provided themselves with good Oaken +Plants, to attend their Master upon this occasion. When he had +placed him in his Coach, with my self at his Left-Hand, the +Captain before him, and his Butler at the Head of his Footmen +in the Rear, we convoy'd him in safety to the Play-house, where, +after having marched up the Entry in good order, the Captain +and I went in with him, and seated him betwixt us in the Pit. +As soon as the House was full, and the Candles lighted, my old +Friend stood up and looked about him with that Pleasure, which +a Mind seasoned with Humanity naturally feels in its self, at the +sight of a Multitude of People who seem pleased with one another, +and partake of the same common Entertainment. I could +not but fancy to myself, as the old Man stood up in the middle +of the Pit, that he made a very proper Center to a Tragick Audience. +Upon the entring of <i>Pyrrhus</i>, the Knight told me that +he did not believe the King of <i>France</i> himself had a better Strut. +I was indeed very attentive to my old Friend's Remarks, because +I looked upon them as a Piece of natural Criticism, and was well +pleased to hear him at the Conclusion of almost every Scene, +telling me that he could not imagine how the Play would end. +One while he appeared much concerned for <i>Andromache</i>; and a +little while after as much for <i>Hermione</i>: and was extremely puzzled +to think what would become of <i>Pyrrhus</i>.</p> + +<p>When Sir Roger saw <i>Andromache's</i> obstinate Refusal to her +Lover's importunities, he whisper'd me in the Ear, that he was +sure she would never have him; to which he added, with a more +than ordinary Vehemence, You can't imagine, Sir, what 'tis to +have to do with a Widow. Upon <i>Pyrrhus</i> his threatning afterwards +to leave her, the Knight shook his Head, and muttered to +himself, Ay, do if you can. This Part dwelt so much upon my +Friend's Imagination, that at the close of the Third Act, as I was +thinking of something else, he whispered in my Ear, These +Widows, Sir, are the most perverse Creatures in the World. +But pray, says he, you that are a Critick, is this Play according +to your Dramatick Rules, as you call them? Should your +People in Tragedy always talk to be understood? Why, there +is not a single Sentence in this Play that I do not know the +Meaning of.</p> + +<p>The Fourth Act very luckily begun before I had time to give +the old Gentleman an Answer: Well, says the Knight, sitting +down with great Satisfaction, I suppose we are now to see +<i>Hector's</i> Ghost. He then renewed his Attention, and, from time +to time, fell a praising the Widow. He made, indeed, a little +Mistake as to one of her Pages, whom at his first entering, he +took for <i>Astyanax</i>; but he quickly set himself right in that Particular, +though, at the same time, he owned he should have been +very glad to have seen the little Boy, who, says he, must needs +be a very fine Child by the Account that is given of him. Upon +<i>Hermione's</i> going off with a Menace to <i>Pyrrhus</i>, the Audience +gave a loud Clap; to which Sir Roger added, On my Word, a +notable young Baggage!</p> + +<p>As there was a very remarkable Silence and Stillness in the +Audience during the whole Action, it was natural for them to +take the Opportunity of these Intervals between the Acts, to +express their Opinion of the Players, and of their respective +Parts. Sir Roger hearing a Cluster of them praise <i>Orestes</i>, struck +in with them, and told them, that he thought his Friend <i>Pylades</i> +was a very sensible Man; as they were afterwards applauding +<i>Pyrrhus</i>, Sir Roger put in a second time; And let me tell you, +says he, though he speaks but little, I like the old Fellow in +Whiskers as well as any of them. Captain Sentry seeing two or +three Waggs who sat near us, lean with an attentive Ear towards +Sir Roger, and fearing lest they should Smoke the Knight, +pluck'd him by the Elbow, and whisper'd something in his Ear, +that lasted till the Opening of the Fifth Act. The Knight was +wonderfully attentive to the Account which <i>Orestes</i> gives of <i>Pyrrhus</i> +his Death, and at the Conclusion of it, told me it was such +a bloody Piece of Work, that he was glad it was not done upon +the Stage. Seeing afterwards <i>Orestes</i> in his raving Fit, he grew +more than ordinary serious, and took occasion to moralize (in his +way) upon an Evil Conscience, adding, that <i>Orestes, in his Madness, +looked as if he saw something</i>.</p> + +<p>As we were the first that came into the House, so we were +the last that went out of it; being resolved to have a clear Passage +for our old Friend, whom we did not care to venture among +the justling of the Crowd. Sir Roger went out fully satisfied +with his Entertainment, and we guarded him to his Lodgings in +the same manner that we brought him to the Playhouse; being +highly pleased, for my own part, not only with the Performance +of the excellent Piece which had been Presented, but with the +Satisfaction which it had given to the good old Man. L.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="A_VISIT_TO_SIR_ROGER_DE_COVERLEY"></a>A VISIT TO SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY</h3> + +<center>From the Spectator, No. 106</center> + +<p>Having often received an Invitation from my Friend Sir Roger +de Coverley to pass away a Month with him in the Country, +I last Week accompanied him thither, and am settled with +him for some time at his Country-house, where I intend to form +several of my ensuing Speculations. Sir Roger, who is very well +acquainted with my Humour, lets me rise and go to Bed when I +please, dine at his own Table or in my Chamber as I think fit, +sit still and say nothing without bidding me be merry. When +the Gentlemen of the Country come to see him, he only shews +me at a distance: As I have been walking in his Fields I have +observed them stealing a Sight of me over an Hedge, and have +heard the Knight desiring them not to let me see them, for that +I hated to be stared at.</p> + +<p>I am the more at Ease in Sir Roger's Family, because it consists +of sober and staid Persons: for as the Knight is the best +Master in the World, he seldom changes his Servants; and as he +is beloved by all about him, his Servants never care for leaving +him: by this means his Domesticks are all in years, and grown +old with their Master. You would take his Valet de Chambre +for his Brother, his Butler is grey-headed, his Groom is one of +the Gravest men that I have ever seen, and his Coachman has +the Looks of a Privy-Counsellor. You see the Goodness of the +Master even in the old House-dog, and in a grey Pad that is +kept in the Stable with great Care and Tenderness out of Regard +to his past Services, tho' he has been useless for several Years.</p> + +<p>I could not but observe with a great deal of pleasure the Joy +that appeared in the Countenances of these ancient Domesticks +upon my Friend's Arrival at his Country-Seat. Some of them +could not refrain from Tears at the Sight of their old Master; +every one of them press'd forward to do something for him, and +seemed discouraged if they were not employed. At the same +time the good old Knight, with a Mixture of the Father and the +Master of the Family, tempered the Enquiries after his own +Affairs with several kind Questions relating to themselves. This +Humanity and good Nature engages every Body to him, so that +when he is pleasant upon any of them, all his Family are in +good Humour, and none so much as the Person whom he diverts +himself with: On the contrary, if he coughs, or betrays any +Infirmity of old Age, it is easy for a Stander-by to observe a +secret Concern in the Looks of all his Servants.</p> + +<p>My worthy Friend has put me under the particular Care of +his Butler, who is a very prudent Man, and, as well as the rest +of his Fellow-Servants, wonderfully desirous of pleasing me, +because they have often heard their Master talk of me as of his +particular Friend.</p> + +<p>My chief Companion, when Sir Roger is diverting himself in +the Woods or the Fields, is a very venerable man who is ever +with Sir Roger, and has lived at his House in the Nature of a +Chaplain above thirty Years. This Gentleman is a Person of +good Sense and some Learning, of a very regular Life and +obliging Conversation: He heartily loves Sir Roger, and knows +that he is very much in the old Knight's Esteem, so that he lives +in the Family rather as a Relation than a Dependent.</p> + +<p>I have observed in several of my Papers, that my Friend Sir +Roger, amidst all his good Qualities, is something of an Humourist; +and that his Virtues, as well as Imperfections, are as it were +tinged by a certain Extravagance, which makes them particularly +<i>his</i>, and distinguishes them from those of other Men. This Cast +of Mind, as it is generally very innocent in it self, so it renders +his Conversation highly agreeable, and more delightful than the +same Degree of Sense and Virtue would appear in their common +and ordinary Colours. As I was walking with him last Night, +he asked me how I liked the good Man whom I have just now +mentioned? and without staying for my Answer told me, That he +was afraid of being insulted with Latin and Greek at his own +Table; for which Reason he desired a particular Friend of his at +the University to find him out a Clergyman rather of plain Sense +than much Learning, of a good Aspect, a clear Voice, a sociable +Temper, and, if possible, a Man that understood a little of Back-Gammon. +My Friend, says Sir Roger, found me out this Gentleman, +who, besides the Endowments required of him, is, they tell +me, a good Scholar, tho' he does not show it. I have given him +the Parsonage of the Parish; and because I know his Value have +settled upon him a good Annuity for Life. If he outlives me, he +shall find that he was higher in my Esteem than perhaps he +thinks he is. He has now been with me thirty Years; and tho' +he does not know I have taken Notice of it, has never in all that +time asked anything of me for himself, tho' he is every Day +soliciting me for something in behalf of one or other of my +Tenants his Parishioners. There has not been a Law-suit in the +Parish since he has liv'd among them: If any Dispute arises they +apply themselves to him for the Decision, if they do not acquiesce +in his Judgment, which I think never happened above once or +twice at most, they appeal to me. At his first settling with me, +I made him a Present of all the good Sermons which have been +printed in <i>English</i>, and only begg'd of him that every <i>Sunday</i> he +would pronounce one of them in the Pulpit. Accordingly, he has +digested them into such a Series, that they follow one another +naturally, and make a continued System of practical Divinity.</p> + +<p>As Sir Roger was going on in his Story, the Gentleman we +were talking of came up to us; and upon the Knight's asking +him who preached to morrow (for it was <i>Saturday</i> Night) told +us, the Bishop of St. <i>Asaph</i> in the Morning, and Dr. <i>South</i> in +the Afternoon. He then shewed us his List of Preachers for the +whole Year, where I saw with a great deal of Pleasure Archbishop +<i>Tillotson</i>, Bishop <i>Saunderson</i>, Doctor <i>Barrow</i>, Doctor +<i>Calamy</i>, with several living Authors who have published Discourses +of Practical Divinity. I no sooner saw this venerable +Man in the Pulpit, but I very much approved of my Friend's +insisting upon the Qualifications of a good Aspect and a clear +Voice; for I was so charmed with the Gracefulness of his Figure +and Delivery, as well as with the Discourses he pronounced, that +I think I never passed any Time more to my Satisfaction. A +Sermon repeated after this Manner, is like the Composition of a +Poet in the Mouth of a graceful Actor.</p> + +<p>I could heartily wish that more of our Country Clergy would +follow this Example; and in stead of wasting their Spirits in laborious +Compositions of their own, would endeavour after a handsome +Elocution, and all those other Talents that are proper to +enforce what has been penned by greater Masters. This would +not only be more easy to themselves, but more edifying to the +People.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="THE_VANITY_OF_HUMAN_LIFE"></a>THE VANITY OF HUMAN LIFE</h3> + +<center>'The Vision of Mirzah,' from the Spectator, No. 159</center> + +<p>When I was at <i>Grand Cairo</i>, I picked up several Oriental +Manuscripts, which I have still by me. Among others I +met with one entitled, <i>The Visions of Mirzah</i>, which I +have read over with great Pleasure. I intend to give it to the +Publick when I have no other entertainment for them; and shall +begin with the first Vision, which I have translated Word for +Word as follows.</p> + +<p>On the fifth Day of the Moon, which according to the Custom +of my Forefathers I always keep holy, after having washed +my self, and offered up my Morning Devotions, I ascended the +high hills of <i>Bagdat</i>, in order to pass the rest of the Day in +Meditation and Prayer. As I was here airing my self on the +Tops of the Mountains, I fell into a profound Contemplation on +the Vanity of human Life; and passing from one Thought to +another, Surely, said I, Man is but a Shadow and Life a Dream. +Whilst I was thus musing, I cast my eyes towards the Summit of +a Rock that was not far from me, where I discovered one in the +Habit of a Shepherd, with a little Musical Instrument in his +Hand. As I looked upon him he applied it to his Lips, and began +to play upon it. The sound of it was exceeding sweet, and +wrought into a Variety of Tunes that were inexpressibly melodious, +and altogether different from any thing I had ever heard. +They put me in mind of those heavenly Airs that are played to +the departed Souls of good Men upon their first Arrival in Paradise, +to wear out the Impressions of the last Agonies, and +qualify them for the Pleasures of that happy Place. My Heart +melted away in secret Raptures.</p> + +<p>I had been often told that the Rock before me was the +Haunt of a Genius; and that several had been entertained with +Musick who had passed by it, but never heard that the Musician +had before made himself visible. When he had raised my +Thoughts by those transporting Airs which he played, to taste +the Pleasures of his Conversation, as I looked upon him like one +astonished, he beckoned to me, and by the waving of his Hand +directed me to approach the Place where he sat. I drew near +with that Reverence which is due to a superior Nature; and as +my heart was entirely subdued by the captivating Strains I +heard, I fell down at his Feet and wept. The Genius smiled +upon me with a Look of Compassion and Affability that familiarized +him to my Imagination, and at once dispelled all the +Fears and Apprehensions with which I approached him. He +lifted me from the Ground, and taking me by the hand, <i>Mirzah,</i> +said he, I have heard thee in thy Soliloquies; follow me.</p> + +<p>He then led me to the highest Pinnacle of the Rock, and +placing me on the Top of it, Cast thy Eyes Eastward, said he, +and tell me what thou seest. I see, said I, a huge Valley, and a +prodigious Tide of Water rolling through it. The Valley that +thou seest, said he, is the Vale of Misery, and the Tide of +Water that thou seest is part of the great Tide of Eternity. +What is the Reason, said I, that the Tide I see rises out of a +thick Mist at one End, and again loses itself in a thick Mist at +the other? What thou seest, said he, is that Portion of Eternity +which is called Time, measured out by the Sun, and reaching +from the Beginning of the World to its Consummation. Examine +now, said he, this Sea that is bounded with darkness at both +Ends, and tell me what thou discoverest in it. I see a Bridge, +said I, standing in the Midst of the Tide. The Bridge thou +seest, said he, is human Life, consider it attentively. Upon a +more leisurely Survey of it, I found that it consisted of threescore +and ten entire Arches, with several broken Arches, which +added to those that were entire, made up the Number about an +hundred. As I was counting the Arches, the Genius told me +that this Bridge consisted at first of a thousand Arches; but that +a great Flood swept away the rest, and left the Bridge in the +ruinous Condition I now beheld it: But tell me further, said he, +what thou discoverest on it. I see Multitudes of People passing +over it, said I, and a black Cloud hanging on each End of it. +As I looked more attentively, I saw several of the Passengers +dropping thro' the Bridge, into the great Tide that flowed underneath +it; and upon farther Examination, perceived there were +innumerable Trap-doors that lay concealed in the Bridge, which +the Passengers no sooner trod upon, but they fell thro' them into +the Tide and immediately disappeared. These hidden Pit-falls +were set very thick at the Entrance of the Bridge, so that the +Throngs of People no sooner broke through the Cloud, but many +of them fell into them. They grew thinner towards the Middle, +but multiplied and lay closer together toward the End of the +Arches that were entire. There were indeed some Persons, but +their number was very small, that continued a kind of a hobbling +March on the broken Arches, but fell through one after another, +being quite tired and spent with so long a Walk.</p> + +<p>I passed some Time in the Contemplation of this wonderful +Structure, and the great Variety of Objects which it presented. +My heart was filled with a deep Melancholy to see several dropping +unexpectedly in the midst of Mirth and Jollity, and catching +at every thing that stood by them to save themselves. Some +were looking up towards the Heavens in a thoughtful Posture, +and in the midst of a Speculation stumbled and fell out of Sight. +Multitudes were very busy in the Pursuit of Bubbles that glittered +in their Eyes and danced before them; but often when they +thought themselves within the reach of them their Footing failed +and down they sunk. In this Confusion of Objects, I observed +some with Scymetars in their Hands, and others with Urinals, +who ran to and fro upon the Bridge, thrusting several Persons +on Trap-doors which did not seem to lie in their way, and which +they might have escaped had they not been forced upon them.</p> + +<p>The Genius seeing me indulge my self in this melancholy Prospect, +told me I had dwelt long enough upon it: Take thine Eyes +off the Bridge, said he, and tell me if thou yet seest any thing +thou dost not comprehend. Upon looking up, What mean, said I, +those great Flights of Birds that are perpetually hovering about +the Bridge, and settling upon it from time to time? I see Vultures, +Harpyes, Ravens, Cormorants, and among many other +feather'd Creatures several little winged Boys, that perch in great +Numbers upon the middle Arches. These, said the Genius, are +Envy, Avarice, Superstition, Despair, Love, with the like Cares +and Passions that infest human Life.</p> + +<p>I here fetched a deep Sigh, Alas, said I, Man was made in +vain! How is he given away to Misery and Mortality! tortured +in Life, and swallowed up in Death! The Genius being moved +with Compassion towards me, bid me quit so uncomfortable a +Prospect: Look no more, said he, on Man in the first Stage of his +Existence, in his setting out for Eternity; but cast thine Eye on +that thick Mist into which the Tide bears the several Generations +of Mortals that fall into it. I directed my Sight as I was ordered, +and (whether or no the good Genius strengthened it with any +supernatural Force, or dissipated Part of the Mist that was before +too thick for the Eye to penetrate) I saw the Valley opening at +the farther End, and spreading forth into an immense Ocean, +that had a huge Rock of Adamant running through the Midst +of it, and dividing it into two equal parts. The Clouds still +rested on one Half of it, insomuch that I could discover nothing +in it: But the other appeared to me a vast Ocean planted with +innumerable Islands, that were covered with Fruits and Flowers, +and interwoven with a thousand little shining Seas that ran +among them. I could see Persons dressed in glorious Habits +with Garlands upon their Heads, passing among the Trees, lying +down by the Side of Fountains, or resting on Beds of Flowers; +and could hear a confused Harmony of singing Birds, falling +Waters, human Voices, and musical Instruments. Gladness grew +in me upon the Discovery of so delightful a Scene. I wished for +the Wings of an Eagle, that I might fly away to those happy +Seats; but the Genius told me there was no Passage to them, +except through the Gates of Death that I saw opening every +Moment upon the Bridge. The Islands, said he, that lie so fresh +and green before thee, and with which the whole Face of the +Ocean appears spotted as far as thou canst see, are more in +number than the Sands on the Sea-shore; there are Myriads of +Islands behind those which thou here discoverest, reaching further +than thine Eye, or even thine Imagination can extend it self. +These are the Mansions of good Men after Death, who according +to the Degree and Kinds of Virtue in which they excelled, are +distributed among these several Islands, which abound with +Pleasures of different Kinds and Degrees, suitable to the Relishes +and Perfections of those who are settled in them; every Island is +a Paradise accommodated to its respective Inhabitants. Are not +these, O <i>Mirzah</i>, Habitations worth contending for? Does Life +appear miserable, that gives thee Opportunities of earning such a +Reward? Is Death to be feared, that will convey thee to so +happy an Existence? Think not Man was made in vain, who +has such an Eternity reserved for him. I gazed with inexpressible +Pleasure on these happy Islands. At length, said I, shew me +now, I beseech thee, the Secrets that lie hid under those dark +Clouds which cover the Ocean on the other side of the Rock of +Adamant. The Genius making me no Answer, I turned about to +address myself to him a second time, but I found that he had +left me; I then turned again to the Vision which I had been so +long contemplating; but Instead of the rolling Tide, the arched +Bridge, and the happy Islands, I saw nothing but the long hollow +Valley of <i>Bagdat</i>, with Oxen, Sheep, and Camels grazing upon +the Sides of it.</p><br> + + +<h3><a name="AN_ESSAY_ON_FANS"></a>AN ESSAY ON FANS</h3> + +<center>From the Spectator, No. 102</center> +<br> + +<p>I do not know whether to call the following Letter a Satyr upon +Coquets, or a Representation of their several fantastical Accomplishments, +or what other Title to give it; but as it is I shall +communicate it to the Publick. It will sufficiently explain its own +Intentions, so that I shall give it my Reader at Length, without +either Preface or Postscript.</p> +<br> + +<p><i>Mr. Spectator</i>:</p> +<br> + +<p>Women are armed with Fans as Men with Swords, and sometimes +do more Execution with them. To the end therefore that +Ladies may be entire Mistresses of the Weapon which they bear, +I have erected an Academy for the training up of young Women +in the <i>Exercise of the Fan</i>, according to the most fashionable Airs +and Motions that are now practis'd at Court. The Ladies who +<i>carry</i> Fans under me are drawn up twice a-day in my great +Hall, where they are instructed in the Use of their Arms, and +<i>exercised</i> by the following Words of Command,</p> + + +<blockquote> +Handle your Fans,<br> +Unfurl your Fans,<br> +Discharge your Fans,<br> +Ground your Fans,<br> +Recover your Fans,<br> +Flutter your Fans.<br> +</blockquote><br> + +<p>By the right Observation of these few plain Words of Command, +a Woman of a tolerable Genius, who will apply herself diligently +to her Exercise for the Space of but one half Year, shall be able +to give her Fan all the Graces that can possibly enter into that +little modish Machine.</p> + +<p>But to the end that my Readers may form to themselves a +right Notion of this <i>Exercise</i>, I beg leave to explain it to them +in all its Parts. When my Female Regiment is drawn up in +Array, with every one her Weapon in her Hand, upon my giving +the Word to <i>handle their Fans</i>, each of them shakes her Fan at +me with a Smile, then gives her Right-hand Woman a Tap upon +the Shoulder, then presses her Lips with the Extremity of her +Fan, then lets her Arms fall in an easy Motion, and stands in a +Readiness to receive the next Word of Command. All this is +done with a close Fan, and is generally learned in the first Week.</p> + +<p>The next Motion is that of <i>unfurling the Fan</i>, in which are +comprehended several little Flirts and Vibrations, as also gradual +and deliberate Openings, with many voluntary Fallings asunder in +the Fan itself, that are seldom learned under a Month's Practice. +This part of the <i>Exercise</i> pleases the Spectators more than any +other, as it discovers on a sudden an infinite Number of <i>Cupids,</i> +[Garlands,] Altars, Birds, Beasts, Rainbows, and the like agreeable +Figures, that display themselves to View, whilst every one in +the Regiment holds a Picture in her Hand.</p> + +<p>Upon my giving the Word to <i>discharge their Fans</i>, they give +one general Crack that may be heard at a considerable distance +when the Wind sits fair. This is one of the most difficult parts +of the <i>Exercise</i>; but I have several ladies with me who at their +first Entrance could not give a Pop loud enough to be heard at +the further end of a Room, who can now <i>discharge a Fan</i> in such +a manner that it shall make a Report like a Pocket-Pistol. I have +likewise taken care (in order to hinder young Women from letting +off their Fans in wrong Places or unsuitable Occasions) to shew +upon what Subject the Crack of a Fan may come in properly: I +have likewise invented a Fan, with which a Girl of Sixteen, by +the help of a little Wind which is inclosed about one of the largest +Sticks, can make as loud a Crack as a Woman of Fifty with an +ordinary Fan.</p> + +<p>When the Fans are thus <i>discharged</i>, the Word of Command in +course is to <i>ground their Fans</i>. This teaches a Lady to quit her +Fan gracefully, when she throws it aside in order to take up a +Pack of Cards, adjust a Curl of Hair, replace a falling Pin, or +apply her self to any other Matter of Importance. This Part of +the <i>Exercise</i>, as it only consists in tossing a Fan with an Air +upon a long Table (which stands by for that Purpose) may be +learned in two Days Time as well as in a Twelvemonth.</p> + +<p>When my Female Regiment is thus disarmed, I generally let +them walk about the Room for some Time; when on a sudden +(like Ladies that look upon their Watches after a long Visit) they +all of them hasten to their Arms, catch them up in a Hurry, and +place themselves in their proper Stations upon my calling out +<i>Recover your Fans</i>. This Part of the <i>Exercise</i> is not difficult, +provided a Woman applies her Thoughts to it.</p> + +<p>The <i>Fluttering of the Fan</i> is the last, and indeed the Masterpiece +of the whole <i>Exercise</i>; but if a Lady does not mis-spend her +Time, she may make herself Mistress of it in three Months. I +generally lay aside the Dog-days and the hot Time of the Summer +for the teaching this Part of the <i>Exercise</i>; for as soon as +ever I pronounce <i>Flutter your Fans</i>, the Place is fill'd with so +many Zephyrs and gentle Breezes as are very refreshing in that +Season of the Year, tho' they might be dangerous to Ladies of a +tender Constitution in any other.</p> + +<p>There is an infinite variety of Motions to be made use of in +the <i>Flutter of a Fan</i>. There is an Angry Flutter, the modest +Flutter, the timorous Flutter, the confused Flutter, the merry +Flutter, and the amorous Flutter. Not to be tedious, there is +scarce any Emotion in the Mind which does not produce a suitable +Agitation in the Fan; insomuch, that if I only see the Fan +of a disciplin'd Lady, I know very well whether she laughs, +frowns, or blushes. I have seen a Fan so very Angry, that it +would have been dangerous for the absent Lover who provoked +it to have come within the Wind of it; and at other times so +very languishing, that I have been glad for the Lady's sake the +Lover was at a sufficient Distance from it. I need not add, that a +Fan is either a Prude or Coquet according to the Nature of the +Person who bears it. To conclude my Letter, I must acquaint +you that I have from my own Observations compiled a little Treatise +for the use of my Scholars, entitled <i>The Passions of the Fan;</i> +which I will communicate to you, if you think it may be of use +to the Publick. I shall have a general Review on <i>Thursday</i> +next; to which you shall be very welcome if you will honour it +with your Presence.</p> + +<p><i>I am</i>, &c.</p> + +<p><i>P.S.</i> I teach young Gentlemen the whole Art of Gallanting +a Fan.</p> + +<p><i>N.B.</i> I have several little plain Fans made for this Use, to +avoid Expence.</p> + +<p>L.</p> +<br><br> + + +<h3><a name="HYMN"></a>HYMN</h3> +<blockquote> +<br><br> +From the Spectator, No. 465 +<br><br> +The Spacious Firmament on high<br> + With all the blue Etherial Sky,<br> + And Spangled Heav'ns, a Shining Frame,<br> +Their great Original proclaim:<br> +Th' unwearied Sun, from Day to Day,<br> +Does his Creator's Pow'r display,<br> +And publishes to every Land<br> +The Work of an Almighty Hand.<br> +<br> +Soon as the Evening Shades prevail,<br> +The Moon takes up the wondrous Tale,<br> +And nightly to the list'ning Earth,<br> +Repeats the Story of her Birth:<br> +While all the Stars that round her burn,<br> +And all the Planets in their Turn,<br> +Confirm the Tidings as they rowl,<br> +And spread the Truth from Pole to Pole.<br> +<br> +What though, in solemn Silence, all<br> +Move round the dark terrestrial Ball?<br> +What tho' nor real Voice nor Sound<br> +Amid their radiant Orbs be found?<br> +In Reason's Ear they all rejoice,<br> +And titter forth a glorious Voice,<br> +For ever singing, as they shine,<br> +"The Hand that made us is Divine."<br> +</blockquote> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="AELIANUS_CLAUDIUS"></a>AELIANUS CLAUDIUS</h2> + +<h3>(Second Century A.D.)</h3> +<br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-a.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>ccording to his 'Varia Historia,' Aelianus Claudius was a +native of Praeneste and a citizen of Rome, at the time of +the emperor Hadrian. He taught Greek rhetoric at Rome, +and hence was known as "the Sophist." He spoke and wrote Greek +with the fluency and ease of a native Athenian, and gained thereby +the epithet of "the honey-tongued". He lived to be sixty years of +age, and never married because he would not incur the responsibility +of children.</p> + +<p>The 'Varia Historia' is the most noteworthy of his works. It is +a curious and interesting collection of short narratives, anecdotes, +and other historical, biographical, and antiquarian matter, selected +from the Greek authors whom he said he loved to study. And it +is valuable because it preserves scraps of works now lost. The +extracts are either in the words of the original, or give the compiler's +version; for, as he says, he liked to have his own way and +to follow his own taste. They are grouped without method; but in +this very lack of order--which shows that "browsing" instinct which +Charles Lamb declared to be essential to a right feeling for literature--the +charm of the book lies. This habit of straying, and his +lack of style, prove Aelianus more of a vagabond in the domain of +letters than a rhetorician.</p> + +<p>His other important book, 'De Animalium Natura' (On the Nature +of Animals), is a medley of his own observations, both in Italy and +during his travels as far as Egypt. For several hundred years it +was a popular and standard book on zoölogy; and even as late as the +fourteenth century, Manuel Philes, a Byzantine poet, founded upon it +a poem on animals. Like the 'Varia Historia', it is scrappy and +gossiping. He leaps from subject to subject: from elephants to +dragons, from the liver of mice to the uses of oxen. There was, +however, method in this disorder; for as he says, he sought thereby +to give variety and hold his reader's attention. The book is interesting, +moreover, as giving us a personal glimpse of the man and of +his methods of work; for in a concluding chapter he states the general +principle on which he composed: that he has spent great labor, +thought, and care in writing it; that he has preferred the pursuit of +knowledge to the pursuit of wealth; that for his part, he found more +pleasure in observing the habits of the lion, the panther, and the +fox, in listening to the song of the nightingale, and in studying the +migrations of cranes, than in mere heaping up of riches and finding +himself numbered among the great; and that throughout his work +he has sought to adhere to the truth.</p> + +<p>Aelianus was more of a moralizer than an artist in words; his +style has no distinctive literary qualities, and in both of his chief +works is the evident intention to set forth religious and moral principles. +He wrote, moreover, some treatises expressly on religious +and philosophic subjects, and some letters on husbandry.</p> + +<p>The 'Varia Historia' has been twice translated into English: by +Abraham Fleming in 1576, and by Thomas Stanley, son of the poet +and philosopher Stanley, in 1665. Fleming was a poet and scholar +of the English Renaissance, who translated from the ancients, and +made a digest of Holinshed's 'Historie of England.' His version of +Aelianus loses nothing by its quaint wording, as will be seen from +the subjoined stories. The full title of the book is 'A Registre of +Hystories containing martiall Exploits of worthy Warriours, politique +Practices and civil Magistrates, wise Sentences of famous +Philosophers, and other Matters manifolde and memorable written in +Greek by Aelianus Claudius and delivered in English by Abraham +Fleming' (1576).</p> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<center>[All the selections following are from 'A Registre of Hystories']</center> + +<h3><a name="AELIANUS1"></a>OF CERTAIN NOTABLE MEN THAT MADE THEMSELVES PLAYFELLOWES +WITH CHILDREN</h3> +<br> + +<p>Hercules (as some say) assuaged the tediousness of his labors, +which he sustayned in open and common games, with playing. +This Hercules, I say, being an incomparable warriour, +and the sonne of Jupiter and Latona, made himselfe a playfellowe +with boys. Euripides the poet introduceth, and bringeth in, +the selfe same god speaking in his owne person, and saying, "I +play because choyce and chaunge of labors is delectable and +sweete unto me," whiche wordes he uttered holdinge a boy by +the hande. Socrates also was espied of Alcibiades upon a time, +playing with Lamprocles, who was in manner but a childe. +Agesilaus riding upon a rude, or cock-horse as they terme it, +played with his sonne beeing but a boy: and when a certayn man +passing by sawe him so doe and laughed there withall, Agesilaus +sayde thus, Now hold thy peace and say nothing; but when thou +art a father I doubt not thou wilt doe as fathers should doe with +their children. Architas Tarentinus being both in authoritie in +the commonwealth, that is to say a magestrat, and also a philosopher, +not of the obscurest sorte, but a precise lover of wisdom, +at that time he was a housband, a housekeeper, and maintained +many servauntes, he was greatly delighted with their younglinges, +used to play oftentimes with his servauntes' children, and was +wonte, when he was at dinner and supper, to rejoyce in the sight +and presence of them: yet was Tarentinus (as all men knowe) a +man of famous memorie and noble name.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="AELIANUS2"></a>OF A CERTAINE SICILIAN WHOSE EYSIGHT WAS WOONDERFULL +SHARPE AND QUICK</h3> + +<p>There was in Sicilia a certaine man indued with such sharpnesse, +quicknesse, and clearnesse of sight (if report may +challenge credite) that hee coulde see from Lilybaeus to +Carthage with such perfection and constancy that his eies coulde +not be deceived: and that he tooke true and just account of all +ships and vessels which went under sayle from Carthage, over-skipping +not so much as one in the universall number.</p> + +<p>Something straunge it is that is recorded of Argus, a man +that had no lesse than an hundred eyes, unto whose custody Juno +committed Io, the daughter of Inachus, being transformed into a +young heifer: while Argus (his luck being such) was slaine sleeping, +but the Goddess Juno so provided that all his eyes (whatsoever +became of his carkasse) should be placed on the pecock's +taile; wherupon (sithence it came to passe) the pecock is called +Avis Junonia, or Lady Juno Birde. This historic is notable, but +yet the former (in mine opinion) is more memorable.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="AELIANUS3"></a>THE LAWE OF THE LACEDAEMONIANS AGAINST COVETOUSNESS</h3> + +<p>A certain young man of Lacedaemonia having bought a plot +of land for a small and easy price (and, as they say, dogge +cheape) was arrested to appear before the magistrates, and +after the trial of his matter he was charged with a penalty. The +reason why hee was judged worthy this punishment was because +he being but a young man gaped so gredely after gain and +yawned after filthy covetousness. For yt was a most commendable +thing among the Lacedaemonians not only to fighte against +the enemie in battell manfully; but also to wrestle and struggle +with covetousness (that misschievous monster) valliauntly.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="AELIANUS4"></a>THAT SLEEP IS THE BROTHER OF DEATH, AND OF GORGIAS +DRAWING TO HIS END</h3> + +<p>Gorgias Leontinus looking towardes the end of his life and +beeing wasted with the weaknes and wearysomenesse of +drooping olde age, falling into sharp and sore sicknesse +upon a time slumbered and slept upon his soft pillowe a little season. +Unto whose chamber a familiar freend of his resorting to +visit him in his sicknes demaunded how he felt himself affected in +body. To whom Gorgias Leontinus made this pithy and plausible +answeer, "Now Sleep beginneth to deliver me up into the +jurisdiction of his brother-germane, Death."</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="AELIANUS5"></a>OF THE VOLUNTARY AND WILLING DEATH OF CALANUS</h3> + +<p>The ende of Calanus deserveth no lesse commendation than it +procureth admiration; it is no less praiseworthy than it was +worthy wonder. The manner, therefore, was thus. The +within-named Calanus, being a sophister of India, when he had +taken his long leave and last farewell of Alexander, King of +Macedonia, and of his life in lyke manner, being willing, desirous, +and earnest to set himselfe at lybertie from the cloggs, chaines, +barres, boults, and fetters of the prison of the body, pyled up a +bonnefire in the suburbs of Babylon of dry woodde and chosen +sticks provided of purpose to give a sweete savour and an +odoriferous smell in burning. The kindes of woodde which hee +used to serve his turne in this case were these: Cedre, Rosemary, +Cipres, Mirtle, and Laurell. These things duely ordered, +he buckled himselfe to his accustomed exercise, namely, running +and leaping into the middest of the wodstack he stoode bolte +upright, having about his head a garlande made of the greene +leaves of reedes, the sunne shining full in his face, as he stoode +in the pile of stycks, whose glorious majesty, glittering with +bright beams of amiable beuty, he adored and worshipped. Furthermore +he gave a token and signe to the Macedonians to kindle +the fire, which, when they had done accordingly, hee beeing compassed +round about with flickering flames, stoode stoutly and +valiauntly in one and the selfe same place, and dyd not shrincke +one foote, until hee gave up the ghost, whereat Alexander unvailyng, +as at a rare strange sight and worldes wonder, saide +(as the voice goes) these words:--"Calanus hath subdued, overcome, +and vanquished stronger enemies than I. For Alexander +made warre against Porus, Taxiles, and Darius. But Calanus did +denounce and did battell to labor and fought fearcely and manfully +with death."</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="AELIANUS6"></a>OF DELICATE DINNERS, SUMPTUOUS SUPPERS, AND PRODIGALL +BANQUETING</h3> + +<p>Timothy, the son of Conon, captain of the Athenians, leaving +his sumptuous fare and royall banqueting, beeing desired +and intertained of Plato to a feast philosophicall, seasoned +with contentation and musick, at his returning home from that +supper of Plato, he said unto his familiar freends:--"They whiche +suppe with Plato, this night, are not sick or out of temper the +next day following;" and presently upon the enunciation of that +speech, Timothy took occasion to finde fault with great dinners, +suppers, feasts, and banquets, furnished with excessive fare, immoderate +consuming of meats, delicates, dainties, toothsome junkets, +and such like, which abridge the next dayes joy, gladnes, +delight, mirth, and pleasantnes. Yea, that sentence is consonant +and agreeable to the former, and importeth the same sense notwithstanding +in words it hath a little difference. That the within +named Timothy meeting the next day after with Plato said to +him:--"You philosophers, freend Plato, sup better the day following +than the night present."</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="AELIANUS7"></a>OF BESTOWING TIME, AND HOW WALKING UP AND DOWNE +WAS NOT ALLOWABLE AMONG THE LACEDAEMONIANS</h3> + +<p>The Lacedaemonians were of this judgment, that measureable +spending of time was greatly to be esteemed, and therefore +did they conforme and apply themselves to any kinde of +laboure moste earnestly and painfully, not withdrawing their hands +from works of much bodyly mooving, not permitting any particular +person, beeing a citizen, to spend the time in idlenes, to waste +it in unthrifty gaming, to consume it in trifling, in vain toyes and +lewd loytering, all whiche are at variance and enmity with vertue. +Of this latter among many testimonyes, take this for one.</p> + +<p>When it was reported to the magistrates of the Lacedaemonians +called Ephori, in manner of complaint, that the inhabitants +of Deceleia used afternoone walkings, they sent unto them messengers +with their commandmente, saying:--"Go not up and +doune like loyterers, nor walke not abrode at your pleasure, pampering +the wantonnes of your natures rather than accustoming +yourself to exercises of activity. For it becometh the Lacedaemonians +to regarde their health and to maintaine their safety not +with walking to and fro, but with bodily labours."</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="AELIANUS8"></a>HOW SOCRATES SUPPRESSED THE PRYDE AND HAUTINESSE +OF ALCIBIADES</h3> + +<p>Socrates, seeing Alcibiades puft up with pryde and broyling in +ambitious behavioure (because possessor of such great wealth +and lorde of so large lands) brought him to a place where +a table did hang containing a discription of the worlde universall. +Then did Socrates will Alcibiades to seeke out the situation of +Athens, which when he found Socrates proceeded further and +willed him to point out that plot of ground where his lands and +lordships lay. Alcibiades, having sought a long time and yet +never the nearer, sayde to Socrates that his livings were not set +forth in that table, nor any discription of his possession therein +made evident. When Socrates, rebuked with this secret quip: +"And art thou so arrogant (sayeth he) and so hautie in heart for +that which is no parcell of the world?"</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="AELIANUS9"></a>OF CERTAINE WASTGOODES AND SPENDTHRIFTES</h3> + +<p>Prodigall lavishing of substance, unthrifty and wastifull spending, +voluptuousness of life and palpable sensuality brought +Pericles, Callias, the sonne of Hipponicus, and Nicias not +only to necessitie, but to povertie and beggerie. Who, after their +money waxed scant, and turned to a very lowe ebbe, they three +drinking a poysoned potion one to another (which was the last +cuppe that they kissed with their lippes) passed out of this life +(as it were from a banquet) to the powers infernall.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="AESCHINES"></a>AESCHINES</h2> + +<h3>(389-314 B.C.)</h3> +<br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-t.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>he life and oratory of Aeschines fall fittingly into that period +of Greek history when the free spirit of the people which +had created the arts of Pindar and Sophocles, Pericles, Phidias, +and Plato, was becoming the spirit of slaves and of savants, who +sought to forget the freedom of their fathers in learning, luxury, +and the formalism of deducers of rules. To this slavery Aeschines +himself contributed, both in action with Philip of Macedon and in +speech. Philip had entered upon a career of conquest; a policy +legitimate in itself and beneficial as judged by +its larger fruits, but ruinous to the advanced +civilization existing in the Greek City-States +below, whose high culture was practically confiscated +to spread out over a waste of semi-barbarism +and mix with alien cultures. Among +his Greek sympathizers, Aeschines was perhaps +his chief support in the conquest of the Greek +world that lay to the south within his reach.</p> + +<p class="lft"><img src="images/192.png" width="50%" alt=""></p> + +<p>Aeschines was born in 389 B.C., six years +before his lifelong rival Demosthenes. If we +may trust that rival's elaborate details of his +early life, his father taught a primary school +and his mother was overseer of certain initiatory +rites, to both of which occupations Aeschines gave his youthful +hand and assistance. He became in time a third-rate actor, and the +duties of clerk or scribe presently made him familiar with the executive +and legislative affairs of Athens. Both vocations served as an +apprenticeship to the public speaking toward which his ambition was +turning. We hear of his serving as a heavy-armed soldier in various +Athenian expeditions, and of his being privileged to carry to Athens, +in 349 B.C., the first news of the victory of Tamynae, in Euboea, in +reward for the bravery he had shown in the battle.</p> + +<p>Two years afterward he was sent as an envoy into the Peloponnesus, +with the object of forming a union of the Greeks against Philip +for the defense of their liberties. But his mission was unsuccessful. +Toward the end of the same year he served as one of the ten +ambassadors sent to Philip to discuss terms of peace. The harangues +of the Athenians at this meeting were followed in turn by a speech +of Philip, whose openness of manner, pertinent arguments, and pretended +desire for a settlement led to a second embassy, empowered +to receive from him the oath of allegiance and peace. It was during +this second embassy that Demothenes says he discovered the +philippizing spirit and foul play of Aeschines. Upon their return to +Athens, Aeschines rose before the assembly to assure the people that +Philip had come to Thermopylae as the friend and ally of Athens. +"We, your envoys, have satisfied him," said Aeschines. "You will +hear of benefits still more direct which we have determined Philip +to confer upon you, but which it would not be prudent as yet to +specify."</p> + +<p>But the alarm of the Athenians at the presence of Philip within +the gates was not allayed. The king, however, anxious to temporize +with them until he could receive his army supplies by sea, suborned +Aeschines, who assured his countrymen of Philip's peaceful intentions. +On another occasion, by an inflammatory speech at Delphi, he so +played upon the susceptibilities of the rude Amphictyones that they +rushed forth, uprooted their neighbors' harvest fields, and began a +devastating war of Greek against Greek. Internal dissensions promised +the shrewd Macedonian the conquest he sought. At length, in +August, 338, came Philip's victory at Chaeronea, and the complete +prostration of Greek power. Aeschines, who had hitherto disclaimed +all connection with Philip, now boasted of his intimacy with the +king. As Philip's friend, while yet an Athenian, he offered himself +as ambassador to entreat leniency from the victor toward the unhappy +citizens.</p> + +<p>The memorable defense of Demosthenes against the attack of +Aeschines was delivered in 330 B.C. Seven years before this, Ctesiphon +had proposed to the Senate that the patriotic devotion and +labors of Demosthenes should be acknowledged by the gift of a +golden crown--a recognition willingly accorded. But as this decision, +to be legal, must be confirmed by the Assembly, Aeschines gave +notice that he would proceed against Ctesiphon for proposing an +unconstitutional measure. He managed to postpone action on the +notice for six years. At last he seized a moment when the victories +of Philip's son and successor, Alexander, were swaying popular +feeling, to deliver a bitter harangue against the whole life and policy +of his political opponent. Demosthenes answered in that magnificent +oration called by the Latin writers 'De Corona' Aeschines was +not upheld by the people's vote. He retired to Asia, and, it is said, +opened a school of rhetoric at Rhodes. There is a legend that after +he had one day delivered in his school the masterpiece of his enemy, +his students broke into applause: "What," he exclaimed, "if you +had heard the wild beast thunder it out himself!"</p> + +<p>Aeschines was what we call nowadays a self-made man. The great +faults of his life, his philippizing policy and his confessed corruption, +arose, doubtless, from the results of youthful poverty: a covetousness +growing out of want, and a lack of principles of conduct which a +broader education would have instilled. As an orator he was second +only to Demosthenes; and while he may at times be compared to +his rival in intellectual force and persuasiveness, his moral defects--which +it must be remembered that he himself acknowledged--make +a comparison of character impossible.</p> + +<p>His chief works remaining to us are the speeches 'Against Timarchus,' +'On the Embassy,' 'Against Ctesiphon,' and letters, which are +included in the edition of G.E. Benseler (1855-60). In his 'History of +Greece,' Grote discusses at length--of course adversely--the influence +of Aeschines; especially controverting Mitford's favorable view and +his denunciation of Demosthenes and the patriotic party. The trend +of recent writing is toward Mitford's estimate of Philip's policy, +and therefore less blame for the Greek statesmen who supported it, +though without Mitford's virulence toward its opponents. Mahaffy +('Greek Life and Thought') holds the whole contest over the crown +to be mere academic threshing of old straw, the fundamental issues +being obsolete by the rise of a new world under Alexander.</p> + + +<br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br> +<h3><a name="A_DEFENSE_AND_AN_ATTACK"></a>A DEFENSE AND AN ATTACK</h3> + +<center>From the 'Oration against Ctesiphon'</center> +<br> + +<p>In regard to the calumnies with which I am attacked, I wish +to say a word or two before Demosthenes speaks. He will +allege, I am told, that the State has received distinguished +services from him, while from me it has suffered injury on +many occasions; and that the deeds of Philip and Alexander, +and the crimes to which they gave rise, are to be imputed to me. +Demosthenes is so clever in the art of speaking that he does not +bring accusation against me, against any point in my conduct of +affairs or any counsels I may have brought to our public meetings; +but he rather casts reflections upon my private life, and +charges me with a criminal silence.</p> + +<p>Moreover, in order that no circumstance may escape his calumny, +he attacks my habits of life when I was in school with my +young companions; and even in the introduction of his speech +he will say that I have begun this prosecution, not for the benefit +of the State, but because I want to make a show of myself to +Alexander and gratify Alexander's resentment against him. He +purposes, as I learn, to ask why I blame his administration as a +whole, and yet never hindered or indicted any one separate act; +why, after a considerable interval of attention to public affairs, +I now return to prosecute this action....</p> + +<p>But what I am now about to notice--a matter which I hear +Demosthenes will speak of--about this, by the Olympian deities, +I cannot but feel a righteous indignation. He will liken my +speech to the Sirens', it seems, and the legend anent their art is +that those who listen to them are not charmed, but destroyed; +wherefore the music of the Sirens is not in good repute. Even +so he will aver that knowledge of my words and myself is a +source of injury to those who listen to me. I, for my part, think +it becomes no one to urge such allegations against me; for it is +a shame if one who makes charges cannot point to facts as full +evidence. And if such charges must be made, the making surely +does not become Demosthenes, but rather some military man--some +man of action--who has done good work for the State, and +who, in his untried speech, vies with the skill of antagonists +because he is conscious that he can tell no one of his deeds, and +because he sees his accusers able to show his audience that he +had done what in fact he never had done. But when a man +made up entirely of words,--of sharp words and overwrought +sentences,--when he takes refuge in simplicity and plain facts, who +then can endure it?--whose tongue is like a flute, inasmuch as if +you take it away the rest is nothing....</p> + +<p>This man thinks himself worthy of a crown--that his honor +should be proclaimed. But should you not rather send into exile +this common pest of the Greeks? Or will you not seize upon him +as a thief, and avenge yourself upon him whose mouthings have +enabled him to bear full sail through our commonwealth? Remember +the season in which you cast your vote. In a few days +the Pythian Games will come round, and the convention of the +Hellenic States will hold its sessions. Our State has been concerned +on account of the measures of Demosthenes regarding +present crises. You will appear, if you crown him, accessory to +those who broke the general peace. But if, on the other hand, +you refuse the crown, you will free the State from blame. Do +not take counsel as if it were for an alien, but as if it concerned, +as it does, the private interest of your city; and do not dispense +your honors carelessly, but with judgment; and let your public +gifts be the distinctive possession of men most worthy. Not only +hear, but also look around you and consider who are the men +who support Demosthenes. Are they his fellow-hunters, or his +associates in old athletic sports? No, by Olympian Zeus, he was +never engaged in hunting the wild boar, nor in care for the +well-being of his body; but he was toiling at the art of those +who keep up possessions.</p> + +<p>Take into consideration also his art of juggling, when he says +that by his embassy he wrested Byzantium from the hands of +Philip, and that his eloquence led the Acarnanians to revolt, and +struck dumb the Thebans. He thinks, forsooth, that you have +fallen to such a degree of weakness that he can persuade you +that you have been entertaining Persuasion herself in your city, +and not a vile slanderer. And when at the conclusion of his +argument he calls upon his partners in bribe-taking, then fancy +that you see upon these steps, from which I now address you, +the benefactors of your State arrayed against the insolence of +those men. Solon, who adorned our commonwealth with most +noble laws, a man who loved wisdom, a worthy legislator, asking +you in dignified and sober manner, as became his character, +not to follow the pleading of Demosthenes rather than your +oaths and laws. Aristides, who assigned to the Greeks their +tributes, to whose daughters after he had died the people gave +portions--imagine Aristides complaining bitterly at the insult to +public justice, and asking if you are not ashamed that when your +fathers banished Arthurias the Zelian, who brought gold from +the Medes (although while he was sojourning in the city and a +guest of the people of Athens they were scarce restrained from +killing him, and by proclamation forbade him the city and any +dominion the Athenians had power over), nevertheless that you +are going to crown Demosthenes, who did not indeed bring gold +from the Medes, but who received bribes and has them still in +his possession. And Themistocles and those who died at Marathon +and at Plataea, and the very graves of your ancestors--will +they not cry out if you venture to grant a crown to one who +confesses that he united with the barbarians against the Greeks?</p> + +<p>And now, O earth and sun! virtue and intelligence! and thou, +O genius of the humanities, who teachest us to judge between +the noble and the ignoble, I have come to your succor and I +have done. If I have made my pleading with dignity and +worthily, as I looked to the flagrant wrong which called it forth, +I have spoken as I wished. If I have done ill, it was as I was +able. Do you weigh well my words and all that is left unsaid, +and vote in accordance with justice and the interests of the city!</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="AESCHYLUS"></a>AESCHYLUS</h2> + +<h3>(B.C. 525-456)</h3> + +<h3>BY JOHN WILLIAMS WHITE</h3> +<br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-t.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>he mightiest of Greek tragic poets was the son of Euphorion, +an Athenian noble, and was born B.C. 525. When he was a +lad of eleven, the tyrant Hipparchus fell in a public street +of Athens under the daggers of Harmodius and Aristogeiton. Later, +Aeschylus saw the family of tyrants, which for fifty years had ruled +Attica with varying fortunes, banished from the land. With a boy's +eager interest he followed the establishment of the Athenian democracy +by Cleisthenes. He grew to manhood in stirring times. The +new State was engaged in war with +the powerful neighboring island of +Aegina; on the eastern horizon was +gathering the cloud that was to burst +in storm at Marathon, Aeschylus was +trained in that early school of Athenian +greatness whose masters were +Miltiades, Aristides, and Themistocles.</p> + +<p class="rgt"><img src="images/197.png" width="50%" alt=""></p> + +<p>During the struggle with Persia, +fought out on Greek soil, the poet +was at the height of his physical +powers, and we may feel confidence +in the tradition that he fought not +only at Marathon, but also at Salamis. +Two of his extant tragedies +breathe the very spirit of war, and +show a soldier's experience; and the epitaph upon his tomb, which +was said to have been written by himself, recorded how he had been +one of those who met the barbarians in the first shock of the great +struggle and had helped to save his country.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">"How brave in battle was Euphorion's son,</p> +<p>The long-haired Mede can tell who fell at Marathon."</p> +</div></div> + +<p>Before Aeschylus, Attic tragedy had been essentially lyrical. It +arose from the dithyrambic chorus that was sung at the festivals of +Dionysus. Thespis had introduced the first actor, who, in the pauses +of the choral song, related in monologue the adventures of the god +or engaged in dialogue with the leader of the chorus. To Aeschylus +is due the invention of the second actor. This essentially changed the +character of the performance. The dialogue could now be carried on +by the two actors, who were thus able to enact a complete story. +The functions of the chorus became less important, and the lyrical +element was subordinated to the action. (The word "drama" signifies +action.) The number of actors was subsequently increased to +three, and Aeschylus in his later plays used this number. This restriction +imposed upon the Greek playwright does not mean that he +was limited to two or three characters in his play, but that only two, +or at the most three, of these might take part in the action at once. +The same actor might assume different parts. The introduction of +the second actor was so capital an innovation that it rightly entitles +Aeschylus to be regarded as the creator of the drama, for in his +hands tragedy first became essentially dramatic. This is his great +distinction, but his powerful genius wrought other changes. He perfected, +if he did not discover, the practice of introducing three plays +upon a connected theme (technically named a <i>trilogy</i>), with an after-piece +of lighter character. He invented the tragic dress and buskin, +and perfected the tragic mask. He improved the tragic dance, and +by his use of scenic decoration and stage machinery, secured effects +that were unknown before him. His chief claim to superior excellence, +however, lies after all in his poetry. Splendid in diction, vivid +in the portraiture of character, and powerful in the expression of +passion, he is regarded by many competent critics as the greatest +tragic poet of all time.</p> + +<p>The Greek lexicographer, Suidas, reports that Aeschylus wrote +ninety plays. The titles of seventy-two of these have been handed +down in an ancient register. He brought out the first of these at +the age of twenty-five, and as he died at the age of sixty-nine, he +wrote on an average two plays each year throughout his lifetime. +Such fertility would be incredible, were not similar facts authentically +recorded of the older tragic poets of Greece. The Greek +drama, moreover, made unusual demands on the creative powers of +the poet. It was lyrical, and the lyrics were accompanied by the +dance. All these elements--poetry, song, and dance--the poet contributed; +and we gain a new sense of the force of the word "poet" +(it means "creator"), when we contemplate his triple function. +Moreover, he often "staged" the play himself, and sometimes he +acted in it. Aeschylus was singularly successful in an age that produced +many great poets. He took the first prize at least thirteen +times; and as he brought out four plays at each contest, more than +half his plays were adjudged by his contemporaries to be of the +highest quality. After the poet's death, plays which he had written, +but which had not been acted in his lifetime, were brought out +by his sons and a nephew. It is on record that his son Euphorion +took the first prize four times with plays of his father; so the poet's +art lived after him and suffered no eclipse.</p> + +<p>Only seven complete plays of Aeschylus are still extant. The +best present source of the text of these is a manuscript preserved in +the Laurentian Library, at Florence in Italy, which was written in +the tenth or eleventh century after Christ. The number of plays +still extant is small, but fortunately, among them is the only complete +Greek trilogy that we possess, and luckily also the other four +serve to mark successive stages in the poet's artistic development. +The trilogy of the 'Oresteia' is certainly his masterpiece; in some of +the other plays he is clearly seen to be still bound by the limitations +which hampered the earlier writers of Greek tragedy. In the following +analysis the seven plays will be presented in their probable +chronological order.</p> + +<p>The Greeks signally defeated Xerxes in the great sea fight in the +bay of Salamis, B.C. 480. The poet made this victory the theme of +his 'Persians.' This is the only historical Greek tragedy which we +now possess: the subjects of all the rest are drawn from mythology. +But Aeschylus had a model for his historical play in the 'Phoenician +Women' of his predecessor Phrynichus, which dealt with the +same theme. Aeschylus, indeed, is said to have imitated it closely +in the 'Persians.' Plagiarism was thought to be a venial fault by +the ancients, just as in the Homeric times piracy was not considered +a disgrace. The scene of the play is not Athens, as one might +expect, but Susa. It opens without set prologue. The Chorus consists +of Persian elders, to whom the government of the country has +been committed in the absence of the King. These venerable men +gather in front of the royal palace, and their leader opens the play +with expressions of apprehension: no news has come from the host +absent in Greece. The Chorus at first express full confidence in the +resistless might of the great army; but remembering that the gods +are jealous of vast power and success in men, yield to gloomy forebodings. +These grow stronger when Atossa, the aged mother of +Xerxes, appears from the palace and relates the evil dreams which +she has had on the previous night, and the omen that followed. The +Chorus beseech her to make prayer to the gods, to offer libations to +the dead, and especially to invoke the spirit of Darius to avert the +evil which threatens his ancient kingdom. Too late! A messenger +arrives and announces that all is lost. By one fell stroke the might +of Persia has been laid low at Salamis. At Atossa's request, the messenger, +interrupted at first by the lamentations of the Chorus, recounts +what has befallen. His description of the battle in the straits is a +passage of signal power, and is justly celebrated. The Queen retires, +and the Chorus sing a song full of gloomy reflections. The Queen +reappears, and the ghost of Darius is invoked from the lower world. +He hears from Atossa what has happened, sees in this the fulfillment +of certain ancient prophecies, foretells disaster still to come, +and warns the Chorus against further attempts upon Greece. As he +departs to the underworld, the Chorus sing in praise of the wisdom +of his reign. Atossa has withdrawn. Xerxes now appears with +attendants, laments with the Chorus the disaster that has overtaken +him, and finally enters the palace.</p> + +<p>The economy of the play is simple: only two actors are required. +The first played the parts of Atossa and Xerxes, the second that of +the messenger and the ghost of Darius. The play well illustrates +the conditions under which Aeschylus at this period wrote. The +Chorus was still of first importance; the ratio of the choral parts in +the play to the dialogue is about one to two.</p> + +<p>The exact date of the 'Suppliants' cannot be determined; but the +simplicity of its plot, the lack of a prologue, the paucity of its +characters, and the prominence of the Chorus, show that it is an early +play. The scene is Argos. The Chorus consists of the daughters of +Danaüs, and there are only three characters,--Danaüs, a Herald, and +Pelasgus King of Argos.</p> + +<p>Danaüs and Aegyptus, brothers, and descendants of Io and Epaphus, +had settled near Canopus at the mouth of the Nile. Aegyptus +sought to unite his fifty sons in marriage with the fifty daughters of +the brother. The daughters fled with their father to Argos. Here +his play opens. The Chorus appeal for protection to the country, +once the home of Io, and to its gods and heroes. Pelasgus, with the +consent of the Argive people, grants them refuge, and at the end of +the play repels the attempt to seize them made by the Herald of the +sons of Aegyptus.</p> + +<p>A part of one of the choruses is of singular beauty, and it is +doubtless to them that the preservation of the play is due. The +play hardly seems to be a tragedy, for it ends without bloodshed. +Further, it lacks dramatic interest, for the action almost stands still. +It is a cantata rather than a tragedy. Both considerations, however, +are sufficiently explained by the fact that this was the first play of a +trilogy. The remaining plays must have furnished, in the death of +forty-nine of the sons of Aegyptus, both action and tragedy in sufficient +measure to satisfy the most exacting demands.</p> + +<p>The 'Seven Against Thebes' deals with the gloomy myth of the +house of Laïus. The tetralogy to which it belonged consisted of the +'Laïus,' 'Oedipus,' 'Seven Against Thebes,' and 'Sphinx.' The +themes of Greek tragedy were drawn from the national mythology, +but the myths were treated with a free hand. In his portrayal of +the fortunes of this doomed race, Aeschylus departed in important +particulars, with gain in dramatic effect, from the story as it is read +in Homer.</p> + +<p>Oedipus had pronounced an awful curse upon his sons, Eteocles +and Polynices, for their unfilial neglect,--"they should one day +divide their land by steel." They thereupon agreed to reign in +turn, each for a year; but Eteocles, the elder, refused at the end of +the first year to give up the throne. Polynices appealed to Adrastus +King of Argos for help, and seven chiefs appeared before the walls +of Thebes to enforce his claim, and beleaguered the town. Here +the play opens, with an appeal addressed by Eteocles to the citizens +of Thebes to prove themselves stout defenders of their State in its +hour of peril. A messenger enters, and describes the sacrifice and +oath of the seven chiefs. The Chorus of Theban maidens enter in +confusion and sing the first ode. The hostile army is hurrying from +its camp against the town; the Chorus hear their shouts and the +rattling din of their arms, and are overcome by terror. Eteocles +reproves them for their fears, and bids them sing a paean that shall +hearten the people. The messenger, in a noteworthy scene, describes +the appearance of each hostile chief. The seventh and last +is Polynices. Eteocles, although conscious of his father's curse, +nevertheless declares with gloomy resoluteness that he will meet his +brother in single combat, and, resisting the entreaties of the Chorus, +goes forth to his doom. The attack on the town is repelled, but +the brothers fall, each by the other's hand. Thus is the curse fulfilled. +Presently their bodies are wheeled in. Their sisters, Antigone +and Ismene, follow and sing a lament over the dead. A herald announces +that the Theban Senate forbid the burial of Polynices; his +body shall be cast forth as prey of dogs. Antigone declares her +resolution to brave their mandate, and perform the last sad rites for +her brother.</p> + +<blockquote> +"Dread tie, the common womb from which we sprang,--<br> +Of wretched mother born and hapless sire."<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>The Chorus divides. The first semi-chorus sides with Antigone; +the second declares its resolution to follow to its last resting-place +the body of Eteocles. And thus the play ends. The theme is here +sketched, just at the close of the play, in outline, that Sophocles +has developed with such pathetic effect in his 'Antigone.'</p> + +<p>The 'Prometheus' transports the reader to another world. The +characters are gods, the time is the remote past, the place a desolate +waste in Scythia, on the confines of the Northern Ocean. Prometheus +had sinned against the authority of Zeus. Zeus wished to +destroy the old race of mankind; but Prometheus gave them fire, +taught them arts and handicrafts, developed in them thought and +consciousness, and so assured both their existence and their happiness. +The play deals with his punishment. Prometheus is borne +upon the scene by Force and Strength, and is nailed to a lofty cliff +by Hephaestus. His appeal to Nature, when his tormentors depart +and he is left alone, is peculiarly pathetic. The daughters of Oceanus, +constituting the Chorus, who have heard the sound of the hammer +in their ocean cave, are now borne in aloft on a winged car, +and bewail the fate of the outraged god. Oceanus appears upon a +winged steed, and offers his mediation; but this is scornfully rejected. +The resolution of Prometheus to resist Zeus to the last is strengthened +by the coming of Io. She too, as it seems, is a victim of the +Ruler of the Universe; driven by the jealous wrath of Hera, she +roams from land to land. She tells the tale of her sad wandering, +and finally rushes from the scene in frenzy, crazed by the sting of +the gadfly that Hera has sent to torment her. Prometheus knows a +secret full of menace to Zeus. Relying on this, he prophesies his +overthrow, and defies him to do his worst. Hermes is sent to demand +with threats its revelation, but fails to accomplish his purpose. +Prometheus insults and taunts him. Hermes warns the Chorus to +leave, for Zeus is about to display his wrath. At first they refuse, +but then fly affrighted: the cliff is rending and sinking, the elements +are in wild tumult. As he sinks, about to be engulfed in the bowels +of the earth, Prometheus cries:--</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">"Earth is rocking in space!</p> +<p>And the thunders crash up with a roar upon roar,</p> +<p class="i1">And the eddying lightnings flash fire in my face,</p> +<p>And the whirlwinds are whirling the dust round and round,</p> +<p class="i1">And the blasts of the winds universal leap free</p> +<p>And blow each upon each with a passion of sound,</p> +<p class="i1">And aether goes mingling in storm with the sea."</p> +</div></div> + +<p>The play is Titanic. Its huge shapes, its weird effects, its mighty +passions, its wild display of the forces of earth and air,--these impress +us chiefly at first; but its ethical interest is far greater. Zeus +is apparently represented in it as relentless, cruel, and unjust,--a +lawless ruler, who knows only his own will,--whereas in all the +other plays of Aeschylus he is just and righteous, although sometimes +severe. Aeschylus, we know, was a religious man. It seems incredible +that he should have had two contradictory conceptions of the +character of Zeus. The solution of this problem is to be found in +the fact that this 'Prometheus' was the first play of the trilogy. In +the second play, the 'Prometheus Unbound,' of which we have only +fragments, these apparent contradictions must have been reconciled. +Long ages are supposed to elapse between the plays. Prometheus +yields. He reveals the secret and is freed from his bonds. What +before seemed to be relentless wanton cruelty is now seen to have +been only the harsh but necessary severity of a ruler newly established +on his throne. By the reconciliation of this stern ruler with +the wise Titan, the giver of good gifts to men, order is restored to +the universe. Prometheus acknowledges his guilt, and the course +of Zeus is vindicated; but the loss of the second play of the trilogy +leaves much in doubt, and an extraordinary number of solutions of +the problem has been proposed. The reader must not look for one +of these, however, in the 'Prometheus Unbound' of Shelley, who +deliberately rejected the supposition of a reconciliation.</p> + +<p>The three remaining plays are founded on the woful myth of the +house of Atreus, son of Pelops, a theme much treated by the Greek +tragic poets. They constitute the only existing Greek trilogy, and +are the last and greatest work of the poet. They were brought out +at Athens, B.C. 458, two years after the author's death. The 'Agamemnon' +sets forth the crime,--the murder, by his wife, of the +great King, on his return home from Troy; the 'Choëphori,' the vengeance +taken on the guilty wife by her own son; the 'Eumenides,' the +atonement made by that son in expiation of his mother's murder.</p> + +<p>Agamemnon on departing for Troy left behind him in his palace +a son and a daughter, Orestes and Electra. Orestes was exiled from +home by his mother Clytemnestra, who in Agamemnon's absence +lived in guilty union with Aegisthus, own cousin of the King, and +who could no longer endure to look upon the face of her son.</p> + +<p>The scene of the 'Agamemnon' is the royal palace in Argos. +The time is night. A watchman is discovered on the flat roof of +the palace. For a year he has kept weary vigil there, waiting for +the beacon-fire that, sped from mountain-top to mountain-top, shall +announce the fall of Troy. The signal comes at last, and joyously +he proclaims the welcome news. The sacrificial fires which have +been made ready in anticipation of the event are set alight throughout +the city. The play naturally falls into three divisions. The +first introduces the Chorus of Argive elders, Clytemnestra, and a +Herald who tells of the hardships of the siege and of the calamitous +return, and ends with the triumphal entrance of Agamemnon with +Cassandra, and his welcome by the Queen; the second comprehends +the prophecy of the frenzied Cassandra of the doom about to fall +upon the house and the murder of the King; the third the conflict +between the Chorus, still faithful to the murdered King, and Clytemnestra, +beside whom stands her paramour Aegisthus.</p> + +<p>Interest centres in Clytemnestra. Crafty, unscrupulous, resolute, +remorseless, she veils her deadly hatred for her lord, and welcomes +him home in tender speech:--</p> + +<blockquote> +"So now, dear lord, I bid thee welcome home--<br> +True as the faithful watchdog of the fold,<br> +Strong as the mainstay of the laboring bark,<br> +Stately as column, fond as only child,<br> +Dear as the land to shipwrecked mariner,<br> +Bright as fair sunshine after winter's storms,<br> +Sweet as fresh fount to thirsty wanderer--<br> +All this, and more, thou art, dear love, to me."<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>Agamemnon passes within the palace; she slays him in his bath, +enmeshed in a net, and then, reappearing, vaunts her bloody deed:</p> + +<blockquote> +"I smote him, and he bellowed; and again<br> +I smote, and with a groan his knees gave way;<br> +And as he fell before me, with a third<br> +And last libation from the deadly mace,<br> +I pledged the crowning draught to Hades due,<br> +That subterranean Saviour--of the dead!<br> +At which he spouted up the Ghost in such<br> +A flood of purple as, bespattered with,<br> +No less did I rejoice than the green ear<br> +Rejoices in the largesse of the skies<br> +That fleeting Iris follows as it flies."<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>Aeschylus departs from the Homeric account, which was followed +by other poets, in making the action of the next play, the 'Choëphori,' +follow closer upon that of the 'Agamemnon.' Orestes has +heard in Phocis of his father's murder, and returns in secret, with +his friend Pylades, to exact vengeance. The scene is still Argos, +but Agamemnon's tomb is now seen in front of the palace. The +Chorus consists of captive women, who aid and abet the attempt. +The play sets forth the recognition of Orestes by Electra; the plot +by which Orestes gains admission to the palace; the deceit of the +old Nurse, a homely but capital character, by whom Aegisthus is +induced to come to the palace without armed attendants; the death +of Aegisthus and Clytemnestra; the appearance of the avenging +Furies; and the flight of Orestes.</p> + +<p>The last play of the trilogy, the 'Eumenides,' has many singular +features. The Chorus of Furies seemed even to the ancients to be +a weird and terrible invention; the scene of the play shifts from +Delphi to Athens; the poet introduces into the play a trial scene; +and he had in it a distinct political purpose, whose development +occupies one-half of the drama.</p> + +<p>Orestes, pursued by the avenging Furies, "Gorgon-like, vested in +sable stoles, their locks entwined with clustering snakes," has fled to +Delphi to invoke the aid of Apollo. He clasps the navel-stone and +in his exhaustion falls asleep. Around him sleep the Furies. The +play opens with a prayer made by the Pythian priestess at an altar +in front of the temple. The interior of the sanctuary is then laid +bare. Orestes is awake, but the Furies sleep on. Apollo, standing +beside Orestes, promises to protect him, but bids him make all haste +to Athens, and there clasp, as a suppliant, the image of Athena. +Orestes flies. The ghost of Clytemnestra rises from the underworld, +and calls upon the Chorus to pursue. Overcome by their toil, they +moan in their sleep, but finally start to their feet. Apollo bids them +quit the temple.</p> + +<p>The scene changes to the ancient temple of Athena on the +Acropolis at Athens, where Orestes is seen clasping the image of the +goddess. The Chorus enter in pursuit of their victim, and sing an ode +descriptive of their powers.</p> + +<p>Athena appears, and learns from the Chorus and from Orestes the +reasons for their presence. She declares the issue to be too grave +even for her to decide, and determines to choose judges of the murder, +who shall become a solemn tribunal for all future time. These +are to be the best of the citizens of Athens. After an ode by the +Chorus, she returns, the court is established, and the trial proceeds +in due form. Apollo appears for the defense of Orestes. When the +arguments have been presented, Athena proclaims, before the vote +has been taken, the establishment of the court as a permanent tribunal +for the trial of cases of bloodshed. Its seat shall be the Areopagus. +The votes are cast and Orestes is acquitted. He departs for +Argos. The Furies break forth in anger and threaten woes to the +land, but are appeased by Athena, who establishes their worship forever +in Attica. Heretofore they have been the Erinnyes, or Furies; +henceforth they shall be the Eumenides, or Gracious Goddesses. +The Eumenides are escorted from the scene in solemn procession.</p> + +<p>Any analysis of the plays so brief as the preceding is necessarily +inadequate. The English reader is referred to the histories of Greek +Literature by K.O. Müller and by J.P. Mahaffy, to the striking +chapter on Aeschylus in J.A. Symonds's 'Greek Poets,' and, for the +trilogy, to Moulton's 'Ancient Classical Drama.' If he knows French, +he should add Croiset's 'Histoire de la Littérature Grecque,' and +should by all means read M. Patin's volume on Aeschylus in his +'Études sur les Tragique Grècs.' There are translations in English +of the poet's complete works by Potter, by Plumptre, by Blackie, +and by Miss Swanwick. Flaxman illustrated the plays. Ancient +illustrations are easily accessible in Baumeister's 'Denkmäler,' under +the names of the different characters in the plays. There is a translation +of the 'Prometheus' by Mrs. Browning, and of the 'Suppliants' +by Morshead, who has also translated the Atridean trilogy under +the title of 'The House of Atreus.' Goldwin Smith has translated +portions of six of the plays in his 'Specimens of Greek Tragedy.' +Many translations of the 'Agamemnon' have been made, among others +by Milman, by Symmons, by Lord Carnarvon, and by Fitzgerald. +Robert Browning also translated the play, with appalling literalness.</p> +<br><br><br> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="THE_COMPLAINT_OF_PROMETHEUS"></a>THE COMPLAINT OF PROMETHEUS</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">PROMETHEUS (alone)</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>O holy Aether, and swift-winged Winds,</p> +<p class="i2">And River-wells, and laughter innumerous</p> +<p class="i2">Of yon Sea-waves! Earth, mother of us all,</p> +<p>And all-viewing cyclic Sun, I cry on you,--</p> +<p>Behold me a god, what I endure from gods!</p> +<p class="i2">Behold, with throe on throe,</p> +<p class="i2">How, wasted by this woe,</p> +<p>I wrestle down the myriad years of Time!</p> +<p class="i2">Behold, how fast around me</p> +<p>The new King of the happy ones sublime</p> +<p>Has flung the chain he forged, has shamed and bound me!</p> +<p>Woe, woe! to-day's woe and the coming morrow's</p> +<p>I cover with one groan. And where is found me</p> +<p class="i2">A limit to these sorrows?</p> +<p>And yet what word do I say? I have foreknown</p> +<p>Clearly all things that should be; nothing done</p> +<p>Comes sudden to my soul--and I must bear</p> +<p>What is ordained with patience, being aware</p> +<p>Necessity doth front the universe</p> +<p>With an invincible gesture. Yet this curse</p> +<p>Which strikes me now, I find it hard to brave</p> +<p>In silence or in speech. Because I gave</p> +<p>Honor to mortals, I have yoked my soul</p> +<p>To this compelling fate. Because I stole</p> +<p>The secret fount of fire, whose bubbles went</p> +<p>Over the ferrule's brim, and manward sent</p> +<p>Art's mighty means and perfect rudiment,</p> +<p>That sin I expiate in this agony,</p> +<p>Hung here in fetters, 'neath the blanching sky.</p> +<p class="i2">Ah, ah me! what a sound,</p> +<p>What a fragrance sweeps up from a pinion unseen</p> +<p>Of a god, or a mortal, or nature between,</p> +<p>Sweeping up to this rock where the earth has her bound,</p> +<p>To have sight of my pangs, or some guerdon obtain--</p> +<p>Lo, a god in the anguish, a god in the chain!</p> +<p class="i2">The god Zeus hateth sore,</p> +<p class="i2">And his gods hate again,</p> +<p>As many as tread on his glorified floor,</p> +<p>Because I loved mortals too much evermore.</p> +<p>Alas me! what a murmur and motion I hear,</p> +<p class="i2">As of birds flying near!</p> +<p class="i2">And the air undersings</p> +<p class="i2">The light stroke of their wings--</p> +<p>And all life that approaches I wait for in fear.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">From E.B. Browning's Translation of 'Prometheus.'</p> +</div></div> +<br><br><br> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"><b><a name="A_PRAYER_TO_ARTEMIS"></a>A PRAYER TO ARTEMIS</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">STROPHE IV</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Though Zeus plan all things right,</p> +<p class="i2">Yet is his heart's desire full hard to trace;</p> +<p class="i3">Nathless in every place</p> +<p class="i1"> Brightly it gleameth, e'en in darkest night,</p> +<p>Fraught with black fate to man's speech-gifted race.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">ANTISTROPHE IV</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i1">Steadfast, ne'er thrown in fight,</p> +<p>The deed in brow of Zeus to ripeness brought;</p> +<p class="i2">For wrapt in shadowy night,</p> +<p class="i1">Tangled, unscanned by mortal sight,</p> +<p>Extend the pathways of his secret thought.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">STROPHE V</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>From towering hopes mortals he hurleth prone</p> +<p class="i2">To utter doom; but for their fall</p> +<p class="i2">No force arrayeth he; for all</p> +<p class="i1">That gods devise is without effort wrought.</p> +<p>A mindful Spirit aloft on holy throne</p> +<p class="i1">By inborn energy achieves his thought.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">ANTISTROPHE V</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>But let him mortal insolence behold:--</p> +<p class="i2">How with proud contumacy rife,</p> +<p class="i2">Wantons the stem in lusty life</p> +<p>My marriage craving;--frenzy over-bold,</p> +<p>Spur ever-pricking, goads them on to fate,</p> +<p>By ruin taught their folly all too late.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">STROPHE VI</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i1">Thus I complain, in piteous strain,</p> +<p class="i1">Grief-laden, tear-evoking, shrill;</p> +<p class="i2">Ah woe is me! woe! woe!</p> +<p class="i1">Dirge-like it sounds; mine own death-trill</p> +<p class="i1">I pour, yet breathing vital air.</p> +<p class="i1">Hear, hill-crowned Apia, hear my prayer!</p> +<p class="i3">Full well, O land,</p> +<p>My voice barbaric thou canst understand;</p> +<p class="i1">While oft with rendings I assail</p> +<p>My byssine vesture and Sidonian veil.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">ANTISTROPHE VI</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i1">My nuptial right in Heaven's pure sight</p> +<p class="i1">Pollution were, death-laden, rude;</p> +<p class="i2">Ah woe is me! woe! woe!</p> +<p class="i1">Alas for sorrow's murky brood!</p> +<p class="i1">Where will this billow hurl me? Where?</p> +<p class="i1">Hear, hill-crowned Apia, hear my prayer;</p> +<p class="i3">ull well, O land,</p> +<p>My voice barbaric thou canst understand,</p> +<p class="i1">While oft with rendings I assail</p> +<p>My byssine vesture and Sidonian veil.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">STROPHE VII</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i1">The oar indeed and home with sails</p> +<p class="i1">Flax-tissued, swelled with favoring gales,</p> +<p class="i1">Staunch to the wave, from spear-storm free,</p> +<p class="i1">Have to this shore escorted me,</p> +<p class="i1">Nor so far blame I destiny.</p> +<p class="i1">But may the all-seeing Father send</p> +<p class="i1">In fitting time propitious end;</p> +<p class="i1">So our dread Mother's mighty brood,</p> +<p class="i1">The lordly couch may 'scape, ah me,</p> +<p class="i2">Unwedded, unsubdued!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">ANTISTROPHE VII</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i1">Meeting my will with will divine,</p> +<p class="i1">Daughter of Zeus, who here dost hold</p> +<p class="i2">Steadfast thy sacred shrine,--</p> +<p class="i1">Me, Artemis unstained, behold,</p> +<p class="i1">Do thou, who sovereign might dost wield,</p> +<p class="i1">Virgin thyself, a virgin shield;</p> +<p class="i1">So our dread Mother's mighty brood</p> +<p class="i1">The lordly couch may 'scape, ah me,</p> +<p class="i2">Unwedded, unsubdued!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>From Miss Swanwick's Translation of 'The Suppliants.'</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<blockquote> +<b><a name="THE_DEFIANCE_OF_ETEOCLES"></a>THE DEFIANCE OF ETEOCLES</b> +<br><br> +MESSENGER<br> +<br> +Now at the Seventh Gate the seventh chief,<br> +Thy proper mother's son, I will announce,<br> +What fortune for this city, for himself,<br> +With curses he invoketh:--on the walls<br> +Ascending, heralded as king, to stand,<br> +With paeans for their capture; then with thee<br> +To fight, and either slaying near thee die,<br> +Or thee, who wronged him, chasing forth alive,<br> +Requite in kind his proper banishment.<br> +Such words he shouts, and calls upon the gods<br> +Who o'er his race preside and Fatherland,<br> +With gracious eye to look upon his prayers.<br> +A well-wrought buckler, newly forged, he bears,<br> +With twofold blazon riveted thereon,<br> +For there a woman leads, with sober mien,<br> +A mailèd warrior, enchased in gold;<br> +Justice her style, and thus the legend speaks:--<br> +"This man I will restore, and he shall hold<br> +The city and his father's palace homes."<br> +Such the devices of the hostile chiefs.<br> +'Tis for thyself to choose whom thou wilt send;<br> +But never shalt thou blame my herald-words.<br> +To guide the rudder of the State be thine!<br> +<br> +ETEOCLES<br> +<br> +O heaven-demented race of Oedipus,<br> +My race, tear-fraught, detested of the gods!<br> +Alas, our father's curses now bear fruit.<br> +But it beseems not to lament or weep,<br> +Lest lamentations sadder still be born.<br> +For him, too truly Polyneikes named,--<br> +What his device will work we soon shall know;<br> +Whether his braggart words, with madness fraught,<br> +Gold-blazoned on his shield, shall lead him back.<br> +Hath Justice communed with, or claimed him hers,<br> +Guided his deeds and thoughts, this might have been;<br> +But neither when he fled the darksome womb,<br> +Or in his childhood, or in youth's fair prime,<br> +Or when the hair thick gathered on his chin,<br> +Hath Justice communed with, or claimed him hers,<br> +Nor in this outrage on his Fatherland<br> +Deem I she now beside him deigns to stand.<br> +For Justice would in sooth belie her name,<br> +Did she with this all-daring man consort.<br> +In these regards confiding will I go,<br> +Myself will meet him. Who with better right?<br> +Brother to brother, chieftain against chief,<br> +Foeman to foe, I'll stand. Quick, bring my spear,<br> +My greaves, and armor, bulwark against stones.<br> +<br> +From Miss Swanwick's Translation of 'The Seven Against Thebes.' +</blockquote><br> +<br><br> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="THE_VISION_OF_CASSANDRA"></a>THE VISION OF CASSANDRA</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CASSANDRA</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Phoebus Apollo!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CHORUS</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Hark!</p> +<p>The lips at last unlocking.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CASSANDRA</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Phoebus! Phoebus!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CHORUS</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Well, what of Phoebus, maiden? though a name</p> +<p>'Tis but disparagement to call upon</p> +<p>In misery.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CASSANDRA</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Apollo! Apollo! Again!</p> +<p>Oh, the burning arrow through the brain!</p> +<p>Phoebus Apollo! Apollo!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CHORUS</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Seemingly</p> +<p>Possessed indeed--whether by--</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CASSANDRA</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Phoebus! Phoebus!</p> +<p>Through trampled ashes, blood, and fiery rain,</p> +<p>Over water seething, and behind the breathing</p> +<p>War-horse in the darkness--till you rose again,</p> +<p>Took the helm--took the rein--</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CHORUS</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>As one that half asleep at dawn recalls</p> +<p>A night of Horror!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CASSANDRA</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Hither, whither, Phoebus? And with whom,</p> +<p>Leading me, lighting me--</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CHORUS</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>I can answer that--</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CASSANDRA</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Down to what slaughter-house!</p> +<p>Foh! the smell of carnage through the door</p> +<p>Scares me from it--drags me toward it--</p> +<p> Phoebus Apollo! Apollo!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CHORUS</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>One of the dismal prophet-pack, it seems,</p> +<p>That hunt the trail of blood. But here at fault--</p> +<p>This is no den of slaughter, but the house</p> +<p>Of Agamemnon.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CASSANDRA</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Down upon the towers,</p> +<p>Phantoms of two mangled children hover--and a famished man,</p> +<p>At an empty table glaring, seizes and devours!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CHORUS</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Thyestes and his children! Strange enough</p> +<p>For any maiden from abroad to know,</p> +<p>Or, knowing--</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CASSANDRA</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>And look! in the chamber below</p> +<p>The terrible Woman, listening, watching,</p> +<p>Under a mask, preparing the blow</p> +<p>In the fold of her robe--</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CHORUS</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Nay, but again at fault:</p> +<p>For in the tragic story of this House--</p> +<p>Unless, indeed the fatal Helen--</p> +<p>No woman--</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CASSANDRA</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>No Woman--Tisiphone! Daughter</p> +<p>Of Tartarus--love-grinning Woman above,</p> +<p>Dragon-tailed under--honey-tongued, Harpy-clawed,</p> +<p>Into the glittering meshes of slaughter</p> +<p>She wheedles, entices him into the poisonous</p> +<p>Fold of the serpent--</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CHORUS</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Peace, mad woman, peace!</p> +<p>Whose stony lips once open vomit out</p> +<p>Such uncouth horrors.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">CASSANDRA</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>I tell you the lioness</p> +<p>Slaughters the Lion asleep; and lifting</p> +<p>Her blood-dripping fangs buried deep in his mane,</p> +<p>Glaring about her insatiable, bellowing,</p> +<p>Bounds hither--Phoebus Apollo, Apollo, Apollo!</p> +<p>Whither have you led me, under night alive with fire,</p> +<p>Through the trampled ashes of the city of my sire,</p> +<p>From my slaughtered kinsmen, fallen throne, insulted shrine,</p> +<p>Slave-like to be butchered, the daughter of a royal line!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>From Edward Fitzgerald's Version of the 'Agamemnon.'</p> +</div></div> +<br><br> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="THE_LAMENT_OF_THE_OLD_NURSE"></a>THE LAMENT OF THE OLD NURSE</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">NURSE</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +Our mistress bids me with all speed to call<br> +Aegisthus to the strangers, that he come<br> +And hear more clearly, as a man from man,<br> +This newly brought report. Before her slaves,<br> +Under set eyes of melancholy cast,<br> +She hid her inner chuckle at the events<br> +That have been brought to pass--too well for her,<br> +But for this house and hearth most miserably,--<br> +As in the tale the strangers clearly told.<br> +He, when he hears and learns the story's gist,<br> +Will joy, I trow, in heart. Ah, wretched me!<br> +How those old troubles, of all sorts made up,<br> +Most hard to bear, in Atreus's palace-halls<br> +Have made my heart full heavy in my breast!<br> +But never have I known a woe like this.<br> +For other ills I bore full patiently,<br> +But as for dear Orestes, my sweet charge,<br> +Whom from his mother I received and nursed . . .<br> +And then the shrill cries rousing me o' nights,<br> +And many and unprofitable toils<br> +For me who bore them. For one needs must rear<br> +The heedless infant like an animal,<br> +(How can it else be?) as his humor serve<br> +For while a child is yet in swaddling clothes,<br> +It speaketh not, if either hunger comes,<br> +Or passing thirst, or lower calls of need;<br> +And children's stomach works its own content.<br> +And I, though I foresaw this, call to mind,<br> +How I was cheated, washing swaddling clothes,<br> +And nurse and laundress did the selfsame work.<br> +I then with these my double handicrafts,<br> +Brought up Orestes for his father dear;<br> +And now, woe's me! I learn that he is dead,<br> +And go to fetch the man that mars this house;<br> +And gladly will he hear these words of mine.<br> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>From Plumptre's Translation of 'The Libation-Pourers.'</p> +</div></div> +<br><br> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="THE_DECREE_OF_ATHENA"></a>THE DECREE OF ATHENA</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +Hear ye my statute, men of Attica--<br> +Ye who of bloodshed judge this primal cause;<br> +Yea, and in future age shall Aegeus's host<br> +Revere this court of jurors. This the hill<br> +Of Ares, seat of Amazons, their tent,<br> +What time 'gainst Theseus, breathing hate, they came,<br> +Waging fierce battle, and their towers upreared,<br> +A counter-fortress to Acropolis;--<br> +To Ares they did sacrifice, and hence<br> +This rock is titled Areopagus.<br> +Here then shall sacred Awe, to Fear allied,<br> +By day and night my lieges hold from wrong,<br> +Save if themselves do innovate my laws,<br> +If thou with mud, or influx base, bedim<br> +The sparkling water, nought thou'lt find to drink.<br> +Nor Anarchy, nor Tyrant's lawless rule<br> +Commend I to my people's reverence;--<br> +Nor let them banish from their city Fear;<br> +For who 'mong men, uncurbed by fear, is just?<br> +Thus holding Awe in seemly reverence,<br> +A bulwark for your State shall ye possess,<br> +A safeguard to protect your city walls,<br> +Such as no mortals otherwhere can boast,<br> +Neither in Scythia, nor in Pelops's realm.<br> +Behold! This Court august, untouched by bribes,<br> +Sharp to avenge, wakeful for those who sleep,<br> +Establish I, a bulwark to this land.<br> +This charge, extending to all future time,<br> +I give my lieges. Meet it as ye rise,<br> +Assume the pebbles, and decide the cause,<br> +Your oath revering. All hath now been said.<br> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>From Miss Swanwick's Translation of 'The Eumenides.'</p> +</div></div> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="AESOP"></a>AESOP</h2> + +<h3>(Seventh Century B.C.)</h3> + +<h3>BY HARRY THURSTON PECK</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-l.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>ike Homer, the greatest of the world's epic poets, Aesop +(Aesopus), the most famous of the world's fabulists, has +been regarded by certain scholars as a wholly mythical +personage. The many improbable stories that are told about him +gain some credence for this theory, which is set forth in detail by +the Italian scholar Vico, who says:--"Aesop, regarded +philosophically, will be found not to have +been an actually existing man, but rather an +abstraction representing a class,"--in other words, +merely a convenient invention of the later Greeks, +who ascribed to him all the fables of which they +could find no certain author.</p> + +<p class="lft"><img src="images/214.png" width="45%" alt=""></p> + +<p>The only narrative upon which the ancient +writers are in the main agreed represents Aesop +as living in the seventh century before Christ. As +with Homer, so with Aesop, several cities of Asia +Minor claimed the honor of having been his birthplace. +Born a slave and hideously ugly, his keen +wit led his admiring master to set him free; after which he traveled, +visiting Athens, where he is said to have told his fable of +King Log and King Stork to the citizens who were complaining of +the rule of Pisistratus. Still later, having won the favor of King +Croesus of Lydia, he was sent by him to Delphi with a gift of +money for the citizens of that place; but in the course of a dispute +as to its distribution, he was slain by the Delphians, who threw him +over a precipice.</p> + +<p>The fables that bore his name seem not to have been committed +by him to writing, but for a long time were handed down from generation +to generation by oral tradition; so that the same fables are +sometimes found quoted in slightly different forms, and we hear of +men learning them in conversation rather than from books. They +were, however, universally popular. Socrates while in prison amused +himself by turning some of them into verse. Aristophanes cites +them in his plays; and he tells how certain suitors once tried to win +favor of a judge by repeating to him some of the amusing stories of +Aesop. The Athenians even erected a statue in his honor. At a +later period, the fables were gathered together and published by the +Athenian statesman and orator, Demetrius Phalereus, in B.C. 320, +and were versified by Babrius (of uncertain date), whose collection is +the only one in Greek of which any substantial portion still survives. +They were often translated by the Romans, and the Latin +version by Phaedrus, the freedman of Augustus Caesar, is still preserved +and still used as a school-book. Forty-two of them are likewise +found in a Latin work by one Avianus, dating from the fifth +century after Christ. During the Middle Ages, when much of the +classical literature had been lost or forgotten, Aesop, who was called +by the mediaevals "Isopet," was still read in various forms; and in +modern times he has served as a model for a great number of imitations, +of which the most successful are those in French by Lafontaine +and those in English by John Gay.</p> + +<p>Whether or not such a person as Aesop ever lived, and whether +or not he actually narrated the fables that are ascribed to him, it is +certain that he did not himself invent them, but merely gave them +currency in Greece; for they can be shown to have existed long +before his time, and in fact to antedate even the beginnings of Hellenic +civilization. With some changes of form they are found in the +oldest literature of the Chinese; similar stories are preserved on the +inscribed Babylonian bricks; and an Egyptian papyrus of about the +year 1200 B.C. gives the fable of 'The Lion and the Mouse' in its +finished form. Other Aesopic apologues are essentially identical with +the Jatakas or Buddhist stories of India, and occur also in the great +Sanskrit story-book, the 'Panchatantra,' which is the very oldest +monument of Hindu literature.</p> + +<p>The so-called Aesopic Fables are in fact only a part of the primitive +folk-lore, that springs up in prehistoric times, and passes from +country to country and from race to race by the process of popular +story-telling. They reached Greece, undoubtedly through Egypt and +Persia, and even in their present form they still retain certain Oriental, +or at any rate non-Hellenic elements, such as the introduction +of Eastern animals,--the panther, the peacock, and the ape. They +represent the beginnings of conscious literary effort, when man first +tried to enforce some maxim of practical wisdom and to teach some +useful truth through the fascinating medium of a story. The Fable +embodies a half-unconscious desire to give concrete form to an +abstract principle, and a childish love for the picturesque and striking, +which endows rocks and stones and trees with life, and gives +the power of speech to animals.</p> + +<p>That beasts with the attributes of human beings should figure in +these tales involves, from the standpoint of primeval man, only a +very slight divergence from probability. In nothing, perhaps, has +civilization so changed us as in our mental attitude toward animals. +It has fixed a great gulf between us and them--a gulf far greater +than that which divided them from our first ancestors. In the early +ages of the world, when men lived by the chase, and gnawed the +raw flesh of their prey, and slept in lairs amid the jungle, the purely +animal virtues were the only ones they knew and exercised. They +adored courage and strength, and swiftness and endurance. They +respected keenness of scent and vision, and admired cunning. The +possession of these qualities was the very condition of existence, and +they valued them accordingly; but in each one of them they found +their equals, and in fact their superiors, among the brutes. A lion +was stronger than the strongest man. The hare was swifter. The +eagle was more keen-sighted. The fox was more cunning. Hence, +so far from looking down upon the animals from the remotely superior +height that a hundred centuries of civilization have erected for +us, the primitive savage looked up to the beast, studied his ways, +copied him, and went to school to him. The man, then, was not in +those days the lord of creation, and the beast was not his servant; +but they were almost brothers in the subtle sympathy between them, +like that which united Mowgli, the wolf-nursed <i>shikarri</i>, and his hairy +brethren, in that most weirdly wonderful of all Mr. Kipling's +inventions--the one that carries us back, not as his other stories do, to +the India of the cities and the bazaars, of the supercilious tourist and +the sleek Babu, but to the older India of unbroken jungle, darkling +at noonday through its green mist of tangled leaves, and haunted by +memories of the world's long infancy when man and brute crouched +close together on the earthy breast of the great mother.</p> + +<p>The Aesopic Fables, then, are the oldest representative that we +have of the literary art of primitive man. The charm that they have +always possessed springs in part from their utter simplicity, their +naiveté, and their directness; and in part from the fact that their +teachings are the teachings of universal experience, and therefore +appeal irresistibly to the consciousness of every one who hears them, +whether he be savage or scholar, child or sage. They are the literary +antipodes of the last great effort of genius and art working upon +the same material, and found in Mr. Kipling's Jungle Books. The +Fables show only the first stirrings of the literary instinct, the Jungle +Stories bring to bear the full development of the fictive art,--creative +imagination, psychological insight, brilliantly picturesque description, +and the touch of one who is a daring master of vivid language; so +that no better theme can be given to a student of literary history +than the critical comparison of these two allied forms of composition, +representing as they do the two extremes of actual development.</p> + +<p>The best general account in English of the origin of the Greek +Fable is that of Rutherford in the introduction to his 'Babrius' +(London, 1883). An excellent special study of the history of the +Aesopic Fables is that by Joseph Jacobs in the first volume of his +'Aesop' (London, 1889). The various ancient accounts of Aesop's life +are collected by Simrock in 'Aesops Leben' (1864). The best scientific +edition of the two hundred and ten fables is that of Halm +(Leipzig, 1887). Good disquisitions on their history during the Middle +Ages are those of Du Méril in French (Paris, 1854) and Bruno +in German (Bamberg, 1892). See also the articles in the present +work under the titles 'Babrius,' 'Bidpai,' 'John Gay,' 'Lafontaine,' +'Lokman,' 'Panchatantra,' 'Phaedrus,' 'Reynard the Fox.'</p> + +<p class="rgt"><img src="images/217.png" width="50%" alt=""></p> +<br><br><br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_FOX_AND_THE_LION"></a>THE FOX AND THE LION</h3> + +<blockquote>The first time the Fox saw the Lion, he fell down at his feet, +and was ready to die of fear. The second time, he took +courage and could even bear to look upon him. The third +time, he had the impudence to come up to him, to salute him, +and to enter into familiar conversation with him. +</blockquote> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THEASSINTHELIONSSKIN"></a>THE ASS IN THE LION'S SKIN</h3> + +<blockquote>An Ass, finding the skin of a Lion, put it on; and, going into +the woods and pastures, threw all the flocks and herds into +a terrible consternation. At last, meeting his owner, he +would have frightened him also; but the good man, seeing his +long ears stick out, presently knew him, and with a good cudgel +made him sensible that, notwithstanding his being dressed in a +Lion's skin, he was really no more than an Ass. +</blockquote> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_ASS_EATING_THISTLES"></a>THE ASS EATING THISTLES</h3> + +<blockquote>An Ass was loaded with good provisions of several sorts, which, +in time of harvest, he was carrying into the field for his +master and the reapers to dine upon. On the way he +met with a fine large thistle, and being very hungry, began to +mumble it; which while he was doing, he entered into this +reflection:--"How many greedy epicures would think themselves +happy, amidst such a variety of delicate viands as I now carry! +But to me this bitter, prickly thistle is more savory and relishing +than the most exquisite and sumptuous banquet." +</blockquote> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_WOLF_IN_SHEEPS_CLOTHING"></a>THE WOLF IN SHEEP'S CLOTHING</h3> + +<blockquote>A Wolf, clothing himself in the skin of a sheep, and getting +in among the flock, by this means took the opportunity to +devour many of them. At last the shepherd discovered +him, and cunningly fastening a rope about his neck, tied him up +to a tree which stood hard by. Some other shepherds happening +to pass that way, and observing what he was about, drew near, +and expressed their admiration at it. "What!" says one of them, +"brother, do you make hanging of a sheep?" "No," replied the +other, "but I make hanging of a Wolf whenever I catch him, +though in the habit and garb of a sheep." Then he showed +them their mistake, and they applauded the justice of the execution. +</blockquote> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_COUNTRYMAN_AND_THE_SNAKE"></a>THE COUNTRYMAN AND THE SNAKE</h3> + +<blockquote>A Villager, in a frosty, snowy winter, found a Snake under a +hedge, almost dead with cold. He could not help having +a compassion for the poor creature, so brought it home, +and laid it upon the hearth, near the fire; but it had not lain +there long, before (being revived with the heat) it began to erect +itself, and fly at his wife and children, filling the whole cottage +with dreadful hissings. The Countryman heard an outcry, and +perceiving what the matter was, catched up a mattock and soon +dispatched him; upbraiding him at the same time in these +words:--"Is this, vile wretch, the reward you make to him that +saved your life? Die as you deserve; but a single death is too +good for you." +</blockquote> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_BELLY_AND_THE_MEMBERS"></a>THE BELLY AND THE MEMBERS</h3> + +<blockquote>In former days, when the Belly and the other parts of the body +enjoyed the faculty of speech, and had separate views and +designs of their own, each part, it seems, in particular for +himself, and in the name of the whole, took exception to the +conduct of the Belly, and were resolved to grant him supplies no +longer. They said they thought it very hard that he should lead +an idle, good-for-nothing life, spending and squandering away, +upon his own ungodly guts, all the fruits of their labor; and +that, in short, they were resolved, for the future, to strike off his +allowance, and let him shift for himself as well as he could. The +Hands protested they would not lift up a finger to keep him from +starving; and the Mouth wished he might never speak again if +he took in the least bit of nourishment for him as long as he +lived; and, said the Teeth, may we be rotten if ever we chew a +morsel for him for the future. This solemn league and covenant +was kept as long as anything of that kind can be kept, which +was until each of the rebel members pined away to skin and +bone, and could hold out no longer. Then they found there was +no doing without the Belly, and that, idle and insignificant as he +seemed, he contributed as much to the maintenance and welfare +of all the other parts as they did to his. +</blockquote> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_SATYR_AND_THE_TRAVELER"></a>THE SATYR AND THE TRAVELER</h3> + +<blockquote>A Satyr, as he was ranging the forest in an exceeding cold, +snowy season, met with a Traveler half-starved with the +extremity of the weather. He took compassion on him, +and kindly invited him home to a warm, comfortable cave he had +in the hollow of a rock. As soon as they had entered and sat +down, notwithstanding there was a good fire in the place, the +chilly Traveler could not forbear blowing his fingers' ends. Upon +the Satyr's asking why he did so, he answered, that he did it to +warm his hands. The honest sylvan having seen little of the +world, admired a man who was master of so valuable a quality as +that of blowing heat, and therefore was resolved to entertain him +in the best manner he could. He spread the table before him +with dried fruits of several sorts; and produced a remnant of +cold wine, which as the rigor of the season made very proper, he +mulled with some warm spices, infused over the fire, and presented +to his shivering guest. But this the Traveler thought fit +to blow likewise; and upon the Satyr's demanding a reason why +he blowed again, he replied, to cool his dish. This second answer +provoked the Satyr's indignation as much as the first had +kindled his surprise: so, taking the man by the shoulder, he +thrust him out of doors, saying he would have nothing to do +with a wretch who had so vile a quality as to blow hot and cold +with the same mouth. +</blockquote> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_LION_AND_THE_OTHER_BEASTS"></a>THE LION AND THE OTHER BEASTS</h3> + +<blockquote>The Lion and several other beasts entered into an alliance, +offensive and defensive, and were to live very sociably together +in the forest. One day, having made a sort of an +excursion by way of hunting, they took a very fine, large, fat +deer, which was divided into four parts; there happening to be +then present his Majesty the Lion, and only three others. After +the division was made, and the parts were set out, his Majesty, +advancing forward some steps and pointing to one of the shares, +was pleased to declare himself after the following manner:-- +"This I seize and take possession of as my right, which devolves +to me, as I am descended by a true, lineal, hereditary succession +from the royal family of Lion. That [pointing to the second] I +claim by, I think, no unreasonable demand; considering that all the +engagements you have with the enemy turn chiefly upon my +courage and conduct, and you very well know that wars are too +expensive to be carried on without proper supplies. Then [nodding +his head toward the third] that I shall take by virtue of my +prerogative; to which, I make no question but so dutiful and +loyal a people will pay all the deference and regard that I can +desire. Now, as for the remaining part, the necessity of our +present affairs is so very urgent, our stock so low, and our credit +so impaired and weakened, that I must insist upon your granting +that, without any hesitation or demur; and hereof fail not at +your peril."</blockquote> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_ASS_AND_THE_LITTLE_DOG"></a>THE ASS AND THE LITTLE DOG</h3> + +<blockquote>The Ass, observing how great a favorite the little Dog was +with his Master, how much caressed and fondled, and fed +with good bits at every meal; and for no other reason, as +he could perceive, but for skipping and frisking about, wagging +his tail, and leaping up into his Master's lap: he was resolved to +imitate the same, and see whether such a behavior would not +procure him the same favors. Accordingly, the Master was no +sooner come home from walking about his fields and gardens, +and was seated in his easy-chair, but the Ass, who observed him, +came gamboling and braying towards him, in a very awkward +manner. The Master could not help laughing aloud at the odd +sight. But his jest was soon turned into earnest, when he felt +the rough salute of the Ass's fore-feet, who, raising himself upon +his hinder legs, pawed against his breast with a most loving air, +and would fain have jumped into his lap. The good man, terrified +at this outrageous behavior, and unable to endure the weight +of so heavy a beast, cried out; upon which, one of his servants +running in with a good stick, and laying on heartily upon the +bones of the poor Ass, soon convinced him that every one who +desires it is not qualified to be a favorite. +</blockquote> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_COUNTRY_MOUSE_AND_THE_CITY_MOUSE"></a>THE COUNTRY MOUSE AND THE CITY MOUSE</h3> + +<blockquote>An honest, plain, sensible Country Mouse is said to have +entertained at his hole one day a fine Mouse of the Town. +Having formerly been playfellows together, they were old +acquaintances, which served as an apology for the visit. However, +as master of the house, he thought himself obliged to do +the honors of it in all respects, and to make as great a stranger +of his guest as he possibly could. In order to do this he set +before him a reserve of delicate gray pease and bacon, a dish of +fine oatmeal, some parings of new cheese, and, to crown all with +a dessert, a remnant of a charming mellow apple. In good manners, +he forbore to eat any himself, lest the stranger should not +have enough; but that he might seem to bear the other company, +sat and nibbled a piece of a wheaten straw very busily. At last, +says the spark of the town:--"Old crony, give me leave to be a +little free with you: how can you bear to live in this nasty, +dirty, melancholy hole here, with nothing but woods, and meadows, +and mountains, and rivulets about you? Do not you prefer +the conversation of the world to the chirping of birds, and +the splendor of a court to the rude aspect of an uncultivated +desert? Come, take my word for it, you will find it a change +for the better. Never stand considering, but away this moment. +Remember, we are not immortal, and therefore have no time to +lose. Make sure of to-day, and spend it as agreeably as you can: +you know not what may happen to-morrow." In short, these +and such like arguments prevailed, and his Country Acquaintance +was resolved to go to town that night. So they both set out +upon their journey together, proposing to sneak in after the close +of the evening. They did so; and about midnight made their +entry into a certain great house, where there had been an extraordinary +entertainment the day before, and several tit-bits, which +some of the servants had purloined, were hid under the seat of +a window. The Country Guest was immediately placed in the +midst of a rich Persian carpet: and now it was the Courtier's +turn to entertain; who indeed acquitted himself in that capacity +with the utmost readiness and address, changing the courses as +elegantly, and tasting everything first as judiciously, as any +clerk of the kitchen. The other sat and enjoyed himself like a +delighted epicure, tickled to the last degree with this new turn +of his affairs; when on a sudden, a noise of somebody opening +the door made them start from their seats, and scuttle in confusion +about the dining-room. Our Country Friend, in particular, +was ready to die with fear at the barking of a huge mastiff or +two, which opened their throats just about the same time, and +made the whole house echo. At last, recovering himself:--"Well," +says he, "if this be your town-life, much good may you +do with it: give me my poor, quiet hole again, with my homely +but comfortable gray pease." +</blockquote> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_DOG_AND_THE_WOLF"></a>THE DOG AND THE WOLF</h3> + +<blockquote>A lean, hungry, half-starved Wolf happened, one moonshiny +night, to meet with a jolly, plump, well-fed Mastiff; and +after the first compliments were passed, says the Wolf:--"You +look extremely well. I protest, I think I never saw a +more graceful, comely person; but how comes it about, I beseech +you, that you should live so much better than I? I may say, +without vanity, that I venture fifty times more than you do; +and yet I am almost ready to perish with hunger." The Dog +answered very bluntly, "Why, you may live as well, if you will +do the same for it that I do."--"Indeed? what is that?" says +he.--"Why," says the Dog, "only to guard the house a-nights, +and keep it from thieves."--"With all my heart," replies the +Wolf, "for at present I have but a sorry time of it; and I +think to change my hard lodging in the woods, where I endure +rain, frost, and snow, for a warm roof over my head, and a +bellyful of good victuals, will be no bad bargain."--"True," +says the Dog; "therefore you have nothing more to do but to +follow me." Now, as they were jogging on together, the Wolf +spied a crease in the Dog's neck, and having a strange curiosity, +could not forbear asking him what it meant. "Pooh! nothing," +says the Dog.--"Nay, but pray--" says the Wolf.--"Why," +says the Dog, "if you must know, I am tied up in the daytime, +because I am a little fierce, for fear I should bite people, and +am only let loose a-nights. But this is done with design to make +me sleep a-days, more than anything else, and that I may watch +the better in the night-time; for as soon as ever the twilight +appears, out I am turned, and may go where I please. Then +my master brings me plates of bones from the table with his +own hands, and whatever scraps are left by any of the family, +all fall to my share; for you must know I am a favorite with +everybody. So you see how you are to live. Come, come along: +what is the matter with you?"--"No," replied the Wolf, "I +beg your pardon: keep your happiness all to yourself. Liberty +is the word with me; and I would not be a king upon the terms +you mention."</blockquote> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="JEAN_LOUIS_RODOLPHE_AGASSIZ"></a>JEAN LOUIS RODOLPHE AGASSIZ</h2> + +<h3>(1807-1873)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-a.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>t first, when a mere boy, twelve years of age," writes the +great Swiss naturalist, "I did what most beginners do. I +picked up whatever I could lay my hands on, and tried, by +such books and authorities as I had at my command, to find the +names of these objects. My highest ambition at that time, was to +be able to designate the plants and animals of my native country +correctly by a Latin name, and to extend gradually a similar knowledge +in its application to the productions of other countries. This +seemed to me, in those days, the legitimate aim and proper work of +a naturalist. I still possess manuscript volumes in which I entered +the names of all the animals and plants with which I became acquainted, +and I well remember that I then ardently hoped to acquire +the same superficial familiarity with the whole creation. I did not +then know how much more important it is to the naturalist to understand +the structure of a few animals than to command the whole field +of scientific nomenclature. Since I have become a teacher, and have +watched the progress of students, I have seen that they all begin in +the same way. But how many have grown old in the pursuit, without +ever rising to any higher conception of the study of nature, +spending their life in the determination of species, and in extending +scientific terminology! Long before I went to the university, and +before I began to study natural history under the guidance of men +who were masters in the science during the early part of this century, +I perceived that though nomenclature and classification, as then +understood, formed an important part of the study, being, in fact, its +technical language, the study of living beings in their natural element +was of infinitely greater value. At that age--namely, about +fifteen--I spent most of the time I could spare from classical and +mathematical studies in hunting the neighboring woods and meadows +for birds, insects, and land and fresh-water shells. My room became +a little menagerie, while the stone basin under the fountain in our +yard was my reservoir for all the fishes I could catch. Indeed, collecting, +fishing, and raising caterpillars, from which I reared fresh, +beautiful butterflies, were then my chief pastimes. What I know +of the habits of the fresh-water fishes of Central Europe I mostly +learned at that time; and I may add, that when afterward I obtained +access to a large library and could consult the works of Bloch and +Lacépède, the only extensive works on fishes then in existence. I +wondered that they contained so little about their habits, natural +attitudes, and mode of action, with which I was so familiar."</p> + +<br> +<a name="225.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><img src="images/225.jpg" width="45%" alt=""> +</p><br> + +<p>It is this way of looking at things that gives to Agassiz's writings +their literary and popular interest. He was born in Mortier, Canton +Fribourg, May 28th, 1807, the son of a clergyman, who sent his gifted +son to the Universities of Zürich, Heidelberg, and Munich, where he +acquired reputation for his brilliant powers, and entered into the +enthusiastic, intellectual, and merry student-life, taking his place in +the formal duels, and becoming known as a champion fencer. Agassiz +was an influence in every centre that he touched; and in Munich, +his room and his laboratory, thick with clouds of smoke from the +long-stemmed German pipes, was a gathering-place for the young +scientific aspirants, who affectionately called it "The Little Academy." +At the age of twenty-two, he had published his 'Fishes of Brazil,' a +folio that brought him into immediate recognition. Cuvier, the greatest +ichthyologist of his time, to whom the first volume was dedicated, +received him as a pupil, and gave to him all the material that he +had been collecting during fifteen years for a contemplated work on +Fossil Fishes. In Paris Agassiz also won the friendship of Humboldt, +who, learning that he stood in need of money, presented him with so +generous a sum as to enable the ambitious young naturalist to work +with a free and buoyant spirit.</p> + +<p>His practical career began in 1832, when he was installed at Neufchâtel, +from which point he easily studied the Alps. Two years later, +after the 'Poissons fossiles' (Fossil Fishes) appeared, he visited England +to lecture. Then returning to his picturesque home, he applied +himself to original investigation, and through his lectures and +publications won honors and degrees. His daring opinions, however, +sometimes provoked ardent discussion and angry comment.</p> + +<p>Agassiz's passion for investigation frequently led him into dangers +that imperiled both life and limb. In the summer of 1841, for example, +he was lowered into a deep crevasse bristling with huge stalactites +of ice, to reach the heart of a glacier moving at the rate of +forty feet a day. While he was observing the blue bands on the +glittering ice, he suddenly touched a well of water, and only after +great difficulty made his companions understand his signal for rescue. +These Alpine experiences are well described by Mrs. Elizabeth Gary +Agassiz, and also by Edouard Desors in his 'Séjours dans les Glaciers' +(Sojourn among the Glaciers: Neufchâtel, 1844). Interesting +particulars of these glacial studies ('Études des Glaciers') were soon +issued, and Agassiz received many gifts from lovers of science, +among whom was numbered the King of Prussia. His zoölogical and +geological investigations were continued, and important works on +'Fossil Mollusks,' 'Tertiary Shells,' and 'Living and Fossil Echinoderms' +date from this period.</p> + +<p>He had long desired to visit America, when he realized this wish +in 1846 by an arrangement with the Lowell Institute of Boston, +where he gave a series of lectures, afterwards repeated in various +cities. So attractive did he find the fauna and flora of America, and +so vast a field did he perceive here for his individual studies and +instruction, that he returned the following year. In 1848 the Prussian +government, which had borne the expenses of his scientific mission,--a +cruise along our Atlantic coast to study its marine life,--released +him from further obligation that he might accept the chair of geology +in the Lawrence Scientific School of Harvard University. His +cruises, his explorations, and his methods, combined with his attractive +personality, gave him unique power as a teacher; and many of +his biographers think that of all his gifts, the ability to instruct was +the most conspicuous. He needed no text-books, for he went directly +to Nature, and did not believe in those technical, dry-as-dust terms +which lead to nothing and which are swept away by the next generation. +Many noted American men of science remember the awakening +influence of his laboratories in Charleston and Cambridge, his +museum at Harvard, and his summer school at Penikese Island in +Buzzard's Bay, Massachusetts, where natural history was studied +under ideal conditions. It was here that he said to his class:--"A +laboratory of natural history is a sanctuary where nothing profane +should be tolerated." Whittier has left a poem called "The Prayer +of Agassiz," describing</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">"The isle of Penikese</p> +<p>Ranged about by sapphire seas."</p> +</div></div> + +<p>Just as he was realizing two of his ambitions, the establishment +of a great museum and a practical school of zoölogy, he died, December +14th, 1873, at his home in Cambridge, and was buried at Mount +Auburn beneath pine-trees sent from Switzerland, while a bowlder +from the glacier of the Aar was selected to mark his resting-place.</p> + +<p>Agassiz was greatly beloved by his pupils and associates, and was +identified with the brilliant group--Emerson, Longfellow, Holmes, and +Lowell,--each of whom has written of him. Lowell considered his +'Elegy on Agassiz,' written in Florence in 1874, among his best +verses; Longfellow wrote a poem for 'The Fiftieth Birthday of +Agassiz,' and Holmes 'A Farewell to Agassiz' on his departure for +the Andes, whose affectionate and humorous strain thus closes:--</p> + +<blockquote>"Till their glorious raid is o'er,<br> +And they touch our ransomed shore!<br> +Then the welcome of a nation,<br> +With its shout of exultation,<br> +Shall awake the dumb creation,<br> +And the shapes of buried aeons<br> +Join the living creatures' paeans,<br> +While the mighty megalosaurus<br> +Leads the palaeozoic chorus,--<br> +God bless the great Professor,<br> +And the land its proud possessor,--<br> +Bless them now and evermore!"<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>Numerous biographies and monographs of Agassiz exist in many +languages, a complete list of which is given in the last published +'Life of Agassiz,' by Jules Marcou (New York and London, 1896), +and also in the 'Life of Agassiz,' by Charles F. Holder (New York, +1893). Complete lists of Agassiz's works are also given in these +biographies, and these titles show how versatile was his taste and how +deep and wide his research. His principal contributions to science +are in French and Latin, but his most popular books appeared in +English. These include 'The Structure of Animal Life,' 'Methods of +Study,' 'Geological Sketches,' and 'Journey in Brazil,' the latter +written with Mrs. Agassiz. His 'Contributions to the Natural History +of the United States,' planned to be in ten large books, only reached +four volumes.</p> + +<p>In his 'Researches concerning Fossil Fishes,' Agassiz expressed +the views that made him a lifelong opponent of the Darwinian +theories, although he was a warm friend of Darwin. Considering +the demands upon his time as teacher, lecturer, and investigator, +the excellence not less than the amount of the great naturalist's +work is remarkable, and won such admiration that he was made a +member of nearly every scientific society in the world. One of his +favorite pastimes was deep-sea dredging, which embraced the excitement +of finding strange specimens and studying their singular habits.</p> + +<p>Of his love and gift for instructing, Mrs. Agassiz says in her +'Life' (Boston, 1885):--</p> + +<blockquote>"Teaching was a passion with him, and his power over his pupils might +be measured by his own enthusiasm. He was, intellectually as well as socially, +a democrat in the best sense. He delighted to scatter broadcast the highest +results of thought and research, and to adapt them even to the youngest and +most uninformed minds. In his later American travels he would talk of glacial +phenomena to the driver of a country stage-coach among the mountains, +or to some workman splitting rock at the roadside, with as much earnestness +as if he had been discussing problems with a brother geologist; he would +take the common fisherman into his scientific confidence, telling him the intimate +secrets of fish-culture or fish-embryology, till the man in his turn grew +enthusiastic and began to pour out information from the stores of his own +rough and untaught habits of observation. Agassiz's general faith in the +susceptibility of the popular intelligence, however untaught, to the highest +truths of nature, was contagious, and he created or developed that in which +he believed." +</blockquote> + +<p>The following citations exhibit his powers of observation, and that +happy method of stating scientific facts which interests the specialist +and general reader alike.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="THE_SILURIAN_BEACH"></a>THE SILURIAN BEACH</h3> + +<center>From 'Geological Sketches'</center> + +<p>With what interest do we look upon any relic of early +human history! The monument that tells of a civilization +whose hieroglyphic records we cannot even decipher, +the slightest trace of a nation that vanished and left no sign of +its life except the rough tools and utensils buried in the old site +of its towns or villages, arouses our imagination and excites our +curiosity. Men gaze with awe at the inscription on an ancient +Egyptian or Assyrian stone; they hold with reverential touch the +yellow parchment-roll whose dim, defaced characters record the +meagre learning of a buried nationality; and the announcement +that for centuries the tropical forests of Central America have +hidden within their tangled growth the ruined homes and temples +of a past race, stirs the civilized world with a strange, deep +wonder.</p> + +<p>To me it seems, that to look on the first land that was ever +lifted above the wasted waters, to follow the shore where the +earliest animals and plants were created when the thought of God +first expressed itself in organic forms, to hold in one's hand a bit +of stone from an old sea-beach, hardened into rock thousands of +centuries ago, and studded with the beings that once crept upon +its surface or were stranded there by some retreating wave, is +even of deeper interest to men than the relics of their own race, +for these things tell more directly of the thoughts and creative +acts of God.</p> + +<p>The statement that different sets of animals and plants have +characterized the successive epochs is often understood as indicating +a difference of another kind than that which distinguishes +animals now living in different parts of the world. This is a mistake. +They are so-called representative types all over the globe, +united to each other by structural relations and separated by +specific differences of the same kind as those that unite and separate +animals of different geological periods. Take, for instance, +mud-flats or sandy shores in the same latitudes of Europe and +America: we find living on each, animals of the same structural +character and of the same general appearance, but with certain +specific differences, as of color, size, external appendages, etc. +They represent each other on the two continents. The American +wolves, foxes, bears, rabbits, are not the same as the European. +but those of one continent are as true to their respective types as +those of the other; under a somewhat different aspect they represent +the same groups of animals. In certain latitudes, or under +conditions of nearer proximity, these differences may be less +marked. It is well known that there is a great monotony of +type, not only among animals and plants but in the human races +also, throughout the Arctic regions; and some animals characteristic +of the high North reappear under such identical forms in +the neighborhood of the snow-fields in lofty mountains, that to +trace the difference between the ptarmigans, rabbits, and other +gnawing animals of the Alps, for instance, and those of the +Arctics, is among the most difficult problems of modern science.</p> + +<p>And so is it also with the animated world of past ages: in +similar deposits of sand, mud, or lime, in adjoining regions of +the same geological age, identical remains of animals and plants +may be found; while at greater distances, but under similar circumstances, +representative species may occur. In very remote +regions, however, whether the circumstances be similar or dissimilar, +the general aspect of the organic world differs greatly, +remoteness in space being thus in some measure an indication of +the degree of affinity between different faunae. In deposits of +different geological periods immediately following each other, we +sometimes find remains of animals and plants so closely allied to +those of earlier or later periods that at first sight the specific differences +are hardly discernible. The difficulty of solving these +questions, and of appreciating correctly the differences and similarities +between such closely allied organisms, explains the antagonistic +views of many naturalists respecting the range of existence +of animals, during longer or shorter geological periods; and the +superficial way in which discussions concerning the transition of +species are carried on, is mainly owing to an ignorance of the +conditions above alluded to. My own personal observation and +experience in these matters have led me to the conviction that +every geological period has had its own representatives, and that +no single species has been repeated in successive ages.</p> + +<p>The laws regulating the geographical distribution of animals, +and their combination into distinct zoölogical provinces called faunae, +with definite limits, are very imperfectly understood as yet; +but so closely are all things linked together from the beginning +till to-day, that I am convinced we shall never find the clew +to their meaning till we carry on our investigations in the +past and the present simultaneously. The same principle according +to which animal and vegetable life is distributed over the +surface of the earth now, prevailed in the earliest geological +periods. The geological deposits of all times have had their +characteristic faunae under various zones, their zoölogical provinces +presenting special combinations of animal and vegetable +life over certain regions, and their representative types reproducing +in different countries, but under similar latitudes, the +same groups with specific differences.</p> + +<p>Of course, the nearer we approach the beginning of organic +life, the less marked do we find the differences to be; and for a +very obvious reason. The inequalities of the earth's surface, her +mountain-barriers protecting whole continents from the Arctic +winds, her open plains exposing others to the full force of the +polar blasts, her snug valleys and her lofty heights, her tablelands +and rolling prairies, her river-systems and her dry deserts, +her cold ocean-currents pouring down from the high North on +some of her shores, while warm ones from tropical seas carry +their softer influence to others,--in short, all the contrasts in the +external configuration of the globe, with the physical conditions +attendant upon them, are naturally accompanied by a corresponding +variety in animal and vegetable life.</p> + +<p>But in the Silurian age, when there were no elevations higher +than the Canadian hills, when water covered the face of the +earth with the exception of a few isolated portions lifted above +the almost universal ocean, how monotonous must have been the +conditions of life! And what should we expect to find on those +first shores? If we are walking on a sea-beach to-day, we do not +look for animals that haunt the forests or roam over the open +plains, or for those that live in sheltered valleys or in inland +regions or on mountain-heights. We look for Shells, for Mussels +and Barnacles, for Crabs, for Shrimps, for Marine Worms, for +Star-Fishes and Sea-Urchins, and we may find here and there a +fish stranded on the sand or strangled in the sea-weed. Let us +remember, then, that in the Silurian period the world, so far as +it was raised above the ocean, was a beach; and let us seek +there for such creatures as God has made to live on seashores, +and not belittle the Creative work, or say that He first scattered +the seeds of life in meagre or stinted measure, because we do +not find air-breathing animals when there was no fitting atmosphere +to feed their lungs, insects with no terrestrial plants to +live upon, reptiles without marshes, birds without trees, cattle +without grass,--all things, in short, without the essential conditions +for their existence....</p> + +<p>I have spoken of the Silurian beach as if there were but one, +not only because I wished to limit my sketch, and to attempt +at least to give it the vividness of a special locality, but also +because a single such shore will give us as good an idea of the +characteristic fauna of the time as if we drew our material from +a wider range. There are, however, a great number of parallel +ridges belonging to the Silurian and Devonian periods, running +from east to west, not only through the State of New York, but +far beyond, through the States of Michigan and Wisconsin into +Minnesota; one may follow nine or ten such successive shores in +unbroken lines, from the neighborhood of Lake Champlain to the +Far West. They have all the irregularities of modern seashores, +running up to form little bays here, and jutting out in promontories +there....</p> + +<p>Although the early geological periods are more legible in +North America, because they are exposed over such extensive +tracts of land, yet they have been studied in many other parts +of the globe. In Norway, in Germany, in France, in Russia, in +Siberia, in Kamchatka, in parts of South America,--in short, +wherever the civilization of the white race has extended, Silurian +deposits have been observed, and everywhere they bear the same +testimony to a profuse and varied creation. The earth was +teeming then with life as now; and in whatever corner of its +surface the geologist finds the old strata, they hold a dead fauna +as numerous as that which lives and moves above it. Nor do we +find that there was any gradual increase or decrease of any +organic forms at the beginning and close of the successive +periods. On the contrary, the opening scenes of every chapter +in the world's history have been crowded with life, and its last +leaves as full and varied as its first.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="VOICES"></a>VOICES</h3> + +<center>From 'Methods of Study in Natural History'</center> +<br> + +<p>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 +<i>Canidae</i> 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 meow, from our +quiet fireside companion to the lions and tigers and panthers of +the forests 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 meow, +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.</p> + +<p>Again, all the horses and donkeys neigh; for the bray of a +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 yak of Asia, to the cattle feeding in our pastures.</p> + +<p>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, or 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.</p> + +<p>These affinities of the vocal systems among the 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 zoölogical 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 originated from common +centres and single pairs, and have been thence distributed +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, from investigations of this kind, with reference not only to +families among animals, but to nationalities among men also....</p> + +<p>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 <i>Pleurobrachia</i>, 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.</p> +<br><br> + + +<h3><a name="FORMATION_OF_CORAL_REEFS"></a>FORMATION OF CORAL REEFS</h3> + +<center>From 'Methods of Study in Natural History'</center> +<br> + +<p>For a long time it was supposed that the reef-builders inhabited +very deep waters; for they were sometimes brought up upon +sounding-lines from a depth of many hundreds or even +thousands of feet, and it was taken for granted that they must +have had their home where they were found: but the facts +recently ascertained respecting the subsidence of ocean-bottoms +have shown that the foundation of a coral-wall may have sunk +far below the place where it was laid. And it is now proved, +beyond a doubt, that no reef-building coral can thrive at a depth +of more than fifteen fathoms, though corals of other kinds occur +far lower, and that the dead reef-corals, sometimes brought to +the surface from much greater depths, are only broken fragments +of some reef that has subsided with the bottom on which it was +growing. But though fifteen fathoms is the maximum depth at +which any reef-builder can prosper, there are many which will +not sustain even that degree of pressure; and this fact has, as +we shall see, an important influence on the structure of the reef.</p> + +<p>Imagine now a sloping shore on some tropical coast descending +gradually below the surface of the sea. Upon that slope, at a +depth of from ten to twelve or fifteen fathoms, and two or three +or more miles from the mainland, according to the shelving of +the shore, we will suppose that one of those little coral animals, +to whom a home in such deep waters is congenial, has established +itself. How it happens that such a being, which we know is +immovably attached to the ground, and forms the foundation of +a solid wall, was ever able to swim freely about in the water till +it found a suitable resting-place, I shall explain hereafter, when +I say something of the mode of reproduction of these animals. +Accept, for the moment, my unsustained assertion, and plant our +little coral on this sloping shore, some twelve or fifteen fathoms +below the surface of the sea.</p> + +<p>The internal structure of such a coral corresponds to that of +the sea-anemone. The body is divided by vertical partitions from +top to bottom, leaving open chambers between; while in the +centre hangs the digestive cavity, connected by an opening in the +bottom with all these chambers. At the top is an aperture serving +as a mouth, surrounded by a wreath of hollow tentacles, each +one of which connects at its base with one of the chambers, so +that all parts of the animal communicate freely with each other. +But though the structure of the coral is identical in all its parts +with the sea-anemone, it nevertheless presents one important +difference. The body of the sea-anemone is soft, while that of +the coral is hard.</p> + +<p>It is well known that all animals and plants have the power +of appropriating to themselves and assimilating the materials they +need, each selecting from the surrounding elements whatever +contributes to its well-being. Now, corals possess in an extraordinary +degree, the power of assimilating to themselves the lime +contained in the salt water around them; and as soon as our little +coral is established on a firm foundation, a lime deposit begins to +form in all the walls of its body, so that its base, its partitions, +and its outer wall, which in the sea-anemone remain always soft, +become perfectly solid in the polyp coral, and form a frame as +hard as bone.</p> + +<p>It may naturally be asked where the lime comes from in the +sea which the corals absorb in such quantities. As far as the +living corals are concerned the answer is easy, for an immense +deal of lime is brought down to the ocean by rivers that wear +away the lime deposits through which they pass. The Mississippi, +whose course lies through extensive lime regions, brings down +yearly lime enough to supply all the animals living in the Gulf of +Mexico. But behind this lies a question, not so easily settled, as +to the origin of the extensive deposits of limestone found at the +very beginning of life upon earth. This problem brings us to the +threshold of astronomy; for the base of limestone is metallic in +character, susceptible therefore of fusion, and may have formed a +part of the materials of our earth, even in an incandescent state, +when the worlds were forming. But though this investigation as +to the origin of lime does not belong either to the naturalist or the +geologist, its suggestion reminds us that the time has come when +all the sciences and their results are so intimately connected that +no one can be carried on independently of the others. Since the +study of the rocks has revealed a crowded life whose records are +hoarded within them, the work of the geologist and the naturalist +has become one and the same; and at that border-land where the +first crust of the earth was condensed out of the igneous mass of +materials which formed its earliest condition, their investigation +mingles with that of the astronomer, and we cannot trace the +limestone in a little coral without going back to the creation of +our solar system, when the worlds that compose it were thrown +off from a central mass in a gaseous condition.</p> + +<p>When the coral has become in this way permeated with lime, +all parts of the body are rigid, with the exception of the upper +margin, the stomach, and the tentacles. The tentacles are soft +and waving, projected or drawn in at will; they retain their flexible +character through life, and decompose when the animal dies. +For this reason the dried specimens of corals preserved in +museums do not give us the least idea of the living corals, in +which every one of the millions of beings composing such a community +is crowned by a waving wreath of white or green or +rose-colored tentacles.</p> + +<p>As soon as the little coral is fairly established and solidly +attached to the ground, it begins to bud. This may take place +in a variety of ways, dividing at the top or budding from the +base or from the sides, till the primitive animal is surrounded by +a number of individuals like itself, of which it forms the nucleus, +and which now begin to bud in their turn, each one surrounding +itself with a numerous progeny, all remaining, however, attached +to the parent. Such a community increases till its individuals are +numbered by millions, and I have myself counted no less than +fourteen millions of individuals in a coral mass of Porites measuring +not more than twelve feet in diameter. The so-called coral +heads, which make the foundation of a coral wall, and seem by +their massive character and regular form especially adapted to +give a strong, solid base to the whole structure, are known in +our classification as the <i>Astraeans</i>, so named on account of the +little [star-shaped] pits crowded upon their surface, each one of +which marks the place of a single more or less isolated individual +in such a community.</p> + +<p>Selections used by permission of Houghton, Mifflin & Company, Publishers.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="AGATHIAS"></a>AGATHIAS</h2> + +<h3>(536-581)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-a.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>gathas tells us, in his 'Prooemium,' that he was born at +Myrina, Asia Minor, that his father's name was Memnonius, +and his own profession the law of the Romans and practice +in courts of justice. He was born about A.D. 536, and was educated +at Alexandria. In Constantinople he studied and practiced his profession, +and won his surname of "Scholasticus," a title then given to a +lawyer. He died, it is believed, at the age of forty-four or forty-five. +He was a Christian, as he testifies in his epigrams. In the sketch +of his life prefixed to his works, Niebuhr collates the friendships he +himself mentions, with his fellow-poet Paulus Silentiarius, with Theodorus +the decemvir, and Macedonius the ex-consul. To these men +he dedicated some of his writings.</p> + +<p>Of his works, he says in his 'Prooemium' that he wrote in his +youth the 'Daphniaca,' a volume of short poems in hexameters, set +off with love-tales. His 'Anthology,' or 'Cyclus,' was a collection of +poems of early writers, and also compositions of his friend Paulus +Silentiarius and others of his time. A number of his epigrams, preserved +because they were written before or after his publication of +the 'Cyclus,' have come down to us and are contained in the 'Anthologia +Graeca.' His principal work is his 'Historia,' which is an +account of the conquest of Italy by Narses, of the first war between +the Greeks and Franks, of the great earthquakes and plagues, of the +war between the Greeks and Persians, and the deeds of Belisarius in +his contest with the Huns,--of all that was happening in the world +Agathias knew between 553 and 558 A.D., while he was a young +man. He tells, for instance, of the rebuilding of the great Church of +St. Sophia by Justinian, and he adds:--"If any one who happens to +live in some place remote from the city wishes to get a clear notion +of every part, as though he were there, let him read what Paulus +[Silentiarius] has composed in hexameter verse."</p> + +<p>The history of Agathias is valuable as a chronicle. It shows that +the writer had little knowledge of geography, and was not enough of +a philosopher to look behind events and trace the causes from which +they proceeded. He is merely a simple and honest writer, and his +history is a business-like entry of facts. He dwells upon himself and +his wishes with a minuteness that might seem self-conscious, but is +really <i>naif</i>; and goes so far in his outspokenness as to say that if +for the sake of a livelihood he took up another profession, his taste +would have led him to devote himself to the Muses and Graces.</p> + +<p>He wrote in the Ionic dialect of his time. The best edition of his +'Historia' is that of Niebuhr (1828). Those of his epigrams preserved +in the Greek anthology have not infrequently been turned +into English; the happiest translation of all is that of Dryden, in his +'Life of Plutarch.'</p> +<br><br> + +<blockquote> +<a name="ON_PLUTARCH"></a><b>ON PLUTARCH</b> +<br> +Cheronean Plutarch, to thy deathless praise<br> +Does martial Rome this grateful statue raise;<br> +Because both Greece and she thy fame have shar'd<br> +(Their heroes written, and their lives compar'd);<br> +But thou thyself could'st never write thy own:<br> +Their lives have parallels, but thine has none.<br> +</blockquote> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="GRACE_AGUILAR"></a>GRACE AGUILAR</h2> + +<h3>(1816-1847)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-f.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>ifty years ago a Jewish writer of English fiction was a new +and interesting figure in English literature. Disraeli, indeed, +had flashed into the literary world with 'Coningsby,' that +eloquent vindication of the Jewish race. His grandiose 'Tancred' +had revealed to an astonished public the strange life of the Desert, +of the mysterious vastness whence swept forth the tribes who became +the Moors of Spain and the Jews of Palestine. Disraeli, however, +stood in no category, and established no precedent. But when Miss +Aguilar's stories began to appear, they were +eagerly welcomed by a public with whom +she had already won reputation and favor +as the defender and interpreter of her faith.</p> + +<p class="lft"><img src="images/240.png" width="50%" alt=""></p> + +<p>The youngest child of a rich and refined +household, Grace Aguilar was born in 1816 +at Hackney, near London, of that historic +strain of Spanish-Jewish blood which for +generations had produced not only beauty +and artistic sensibility, but intellect. Her +ancestors were refugees from persecution, +and in her burned that ardor of faith which +persecution kindles. Fragile and sensitive, +she was educated at home, by her cultivated +father and mother, under whose solicitous training she developed an +alarming precocity. At the age of twelve she had written a heroic +drama on her favorite hero, Gustavus Vasa. At fourteen she had +published a volume of poems. At twenty-four she accomplished her +chief work on the Jewish religion, 'The Spirit of Judaism,' a book +republished in America with preface and notes by a well-known +rabbi, Dr. Isaac Leeser of Philadelphia. Although the orthodox priest +found much in the book to criticize, he was forced to commend its +ability.--It insists on the importance of the spiritual and moral +aspects of the faith delivered to Abraham, and deprecates a superstitious +reverence for the mere letter of the law. It presents Judaism +as a religion of love, and the Old Testament as the inspiration of the +teachings of Jesus. Written more than half a century ago, the book +is widely read to-day by students of the Jewish religion.</p> + +<p>Four years later Miss Aguilar published 'The Jewish Faith: Its +Spiritual Consolation, Moral Guidance, and Immortal Hope,' and 'The +Women of Israel,' a series of essays on Biblical history, which was +followed by 'Essays and Miscellanies.' So great was the influence of +her writings that the Jewesses of London gave her a public testimonial, +and addressed her as "the first woman who had stood forth +as the public advocate of the faith of Israel." While on her way to +visit a brother then residing at Schwalbach, Germany, she was taken +ill at Frankfurt, and died there, at the early age of thirty-one.</p> + +<p>The earliest and the best known of Miss Aguilar's novels is +'Home Influence,' which rapidly passed through thirty editions, and +is still a favorite book with young girls. There is little incident in +the story, which is the history of the development of character in a +household of six or seven young persons of very different endowments +and tendencies. It was the fashion of the day to be didactic, +and Mrs. Hamilton, from whom the "home influence" radiates, seems +to the modern reader somewhat inclined to preach, in season and out +of season. But the story is interesting, and the characters are distinctly +individualized, while at least one episode is dramatically +treated.</p> + +<p>'The Mother's Recompense' is a sequel to 'Home Influence,' +wherein the further fortunes of the Hamilton family are so set forth +that the wordly-minded reader is driven to the inference that the +brilliant marriages of her children are a sensible part of Mrs. Hamilton's +"recompense." The story is vividly and agreeably told.</p> + +<p>Of a different order is 'The Days of Bruce,' a historic romance of +the late thirteenth century, which is less historic than romantic, and +in whose mirror the rugged chieftain would hardly recognize his +angularities.</p> + +<p>'The Vale of Cedars' is a historic tale of the persecution of the +Jews in Spain under the Inquisition. It is told with intense feeling, +with much imagination, and with a strong love of local color. It is +said that family traditions are woven into the story. This book, as +well as 'Home Influence,' had a wide popularity in a German version.</p> + +<p>In reading Grace Aguilar it is not easy to believe her the contemporary +of Currer Bell and George Eliot. Both her manner and her +method are earlier. Her lengthy and artificial periods, the rounded +and decorative sentences that she puts into the mouths of her characters +under the extremest pressure of emotion or suffering, the italics, +the sentimentalities, are of another age than the sinewy English and +hard sense of 'Jane Eyre' or 'Adam Bede.' Doubtless her peculiar, +sheltered training, her delicate health, and a luxuriant imagination +that had seldom been measured against the realities of life, account +for the old-fashioned air of her work. But however antiquated their +form may become, the substance of all her tales is sweet and sound, +their charm for young girls is abiding, their atmosphere is pure, and +the spirit that inspires them is touched only to fine issues.</p> + +<p>The citation from 'The Days of Bruce' illustrates her narrative +style; that from 'Woman's Friendship' her habit of disquisition; and +the passage from 'Home Influence' her rendering of conversation.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_GREATNESS_OF_FRIENDSHIP"></a>THE GREATNESS OF FRIENDSHIP</h3> + +<center>From 'Woman's Friendship'</center> +<br> + +<p>It is the fashion to deride woman's influence over woman, to +laugh at female friendship, to look with scorn on all those +who profess it; but perhaps the world at large little knows +the effect of this influence,--how often the unformed character of +a young, timid, and gentle girl may be influenced for good or evil +by the power of an intimate female friend. There is always to +me a doubt of the warmth, the strength, and purity of her feelings, +when a young girl merges into womanhood, passing over +the threshold of actual life, seeking only the admiration of the +other sex; watching, pining, for a husband, or lovers, perhaps, +and looking down on all female friendship as romance and folly. +No young spirit was ever yet satisfied with the love of nature.</p> + +<p>Friendship, or love, gratifies self-love; for it tacitly acknowledges +that we must possess some good qualities to attract beyond +the mere love of nature. Coleridge justly observes, "that it is +well ordered that the amiable and estimable should have a fainter +perception of their own qualities than their friends have, otherwise +they would love themselves." Now, friendship, or love, permits +their doing this unconsciously: mutual affection is a tacit +avowal and appreciation of mutual good qualities,--perhaps +friendship yet more than love, for the latter is far more an aspiration, +a passion, than the former, and influences the permanent +character much less. Under the magic of love a girl is generally +in a feverish state of excitement, often in a wrong position, +deeming herself the goddess, her lover the adorer; whereas it +is her will that must bend to his, herself be abnegated for him. +Friendship neither permits the former nor demands the latter. It +influences silently, often unconsciously; perhaps its power is never +known till years afterwards. A girl who stands alone, without +acting or feeling friendship, is generally a cold unamiable being, +so wrapt in self as to have no room for any person else, except +perhaps a lover, whom she only seeks and values as offering +his devotion to that same idol, self. Female friendship may be +abused, may be but a name for gossip, letter-writing, romance, +nay worse, for absolute evil: but that Shakespeare, the mighty +wizard of human hearts, thought highly and beautifully of female +friendship, we have his exquisite portraits of Rosalind and Celia, +Helen and the Countess, undeniably to prove; and if he, who +could portray every human passion, every subtle feeling of +humanity, from the whelming tempest of love to the fiendish +influences of envy and jealousy and hate; from the incomprehensible +mystery of Hamlet's wondrous spirit, to the simplicity +of the gentle Miranda, the dove-like innocence of Ophelia, who +could be crushed by her weight of love, but not reveal it;--if +Shakespeare scorned not to picture the sweet influences of female +friendship, shall women pass by it as a theme too tame, too idle +for their pens?</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_ORDER_OF_KNIGHTHOOD"></a>THE ORDER OF KNIGHTHOOD</h3> + +<center>From 'The Days of Bruce'</center> + +<p>A right noble and glorious scene did the great hall of the palace +present the morning which followed this eventful night. +The king, surrounded by his highest prelates and nobles, +mingling indiscriminately with the high-born dames and maidens +of his court, all splendidly attired, occupied the upper part of the +hall, the rest of which was crowded by both his military followers +and many of the good citizens of Scone, who flocked in +great numbers to behold the august ceremony of the day. Two +immense oaken doors at the south side of the hall were flung +open, and through them was discerned the large space forming +the palace yard, prepared as a tilting-ground, where the new-made +knights were to prove their skill. The storm had given +place to a soft, breezy morning, the cool freshness of which +appeared peculiarly grateful from the oppressiveness of the night; +light downy clouds sailed over the blue expanse of heaven, tempering +without clouding the brilliant rays of the sun. Every +face was clothed with smiles, and the loud shouts which hailed +the youthful candidates for knighthood, as they severally entered, +told well the feeling with which the patriots of Scotland were +regarded.</p> + +<p>Some twenty youths received the envied honor at the hand +of their sovereign this day; but our limits forbid a minute +scrutiny of the bearing of any, however well deserving, save of +the two whose vigils have already detained us so long. A yet +longer and louder shout proclaimed the appearance of the +youngest scion of the house of Bruce and his companion. The +daring patriotism of Isabella of Buchan had enshrined her in +every heart, and so disposed all men towards her children that +the name of their traitorous father was forgotten.</p> + +<p>Led by their godfathers, Nigel by his brother-in-law Sir +Christopher Seaton, and Alan by the Earl of Lennox, their +swords, which had been blessed by the abbot at the altar, slung +round their necks, they advanced up the hall. There was a +glow on the cheek of the young Alan, in which pride and +modesty were mingled; his step at first was unsteady and his +lip was seen to quiver from very bashfulness, as he first glanced +round the hall and felt that every eye was turned toward him; +but when that glance met his mother's fixed on him, and breathing +that might of love that filled her heart, all boyish tremors +fled, the calm, staid resolve of manhood took the place of the +varying glow upon his cheek, the quivering lip became compressed +and firm, and his step faltered not again.</p> + +<p>The cheek of Nigel Bruce was pale, but there was firmness +in the glance of his bright eye, and a smile unclouded in its +joyance on his lip. The frivolous lightness of the courtier, the +mad bravado of knight-errantry, which was not uncommon to +the times, indeed, were not there. It was the quiet courage of +the resolved warrior, the calm of a spirit at peace with itself, +shedding its own high feeling and poetic glory over all around +him.</p> + +<p>On reaching the foot of King Robert's throne, both youths +knelt and laid their sheathed swords at his feet. Their armor-bearers +then approached, and the ceremony of clothing the candidates +in steel commenced; the golden spur was fastened on the +left foot of each by his respective godfather, while Athol, Hay, +and other nobles advanced to do honor to the youths, by aiding +in the ceremony. Nor was it warriors alone.</p> + +<p>"Is this permitted, lady?" demanded the king, smiling, as +the Countess of Buchan approached the martial group, and, +aided by Lennox, fastened the polished cuirass on the form of +her son. "Is it permitted for a matron to arm a youthful +knight? Is there no maiden to do such inspiring office?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, when the knight is one like this, my liege," she +answered, in the same tone. "Let a matron arm him, good my +liege," she added, sadly: "let a mother's hand enwrap his boyish +limbs in steel, a mother's blessing mark him thine and Scotland's, +that those who watch his bearing in the battle-field may +know who sent him there, may thrill his heart with memories +of her who stands alone of her ancestral line, that though he +bears the name of Comyn, the blood of Fife flows reddest in his +veins!"</p> + +<p>"Arm him and welcome, noble lady," answered the king, and +a buzz of approbation ran through the hall; "and may thy noble +spirit and dauntless loyalty inspire him: we shall not need a +trusty follower while such as he are around us. Yet, in very +deed, my youthful knight must have a lady fair for whom he +tilts to-day. Come hither, Isoline, thou lookest verily inclined +to envy thy sweet friend her office, and nothing loth to have a +loyal knight thyself. Come, come, my pretty one, no blushing +now. Lennox, guide those tiny hands aright."</p> + +<p>Laughing and blushing, Isoline, the daughter of Lady Campbell, +a sister of the Bruce, a graceful child of some thirteen +summers, advanced nothing loth, to obey her royal uncle's summons; +and an arch smile of real enjoyment irresistibly stole over +the countenance of Alan, dispersing the emotion his mother's +words produced.</p> + +<p>"Nay, tremble not, sweet one," the king continued, in a +lower and yet kinder tone, as he turned from the one youth to +the other, and observed that Agnes, overpowered by emotion, +had scarcely power to perform her part, despite the whispered +words of encouraging affection Nigel murmured in her ear. One +by one the cuirass and shoulder-pieces, the greaves and gauntlets, +the gorget and brassards, the joints of which were so beautifully +burnished that they shone as mirrors, and so flexible that +every limb had its free use, enveloped those manly forms. Their +swords once again girt to their sides, and once more kneeling, +the king descended from his throne, alternately dubbing them +knight in the name of God, St. Michael, and St. George.</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_CULPRIT_AND_THE_JUDGE"></a>THE CULPRIT AND THE JUDGE</h3> + +<center>From 'Home Influence'</center> + +<p>Mrs. Hamilton was seated at one of the tables on the dais +nearest the oriel window, the light from which fell on her, +giving her figure--though she was seated naturally enough +in one of the large maroon-velvet oaken chairs--an unusual +effect of dignity and command, and impressing the terrified +beholder with such a sensation of awe that had her life depended +on it, she could not for that one minute have gone forward; and +even when desired to do so by the words "I desired your presence, +Ellen, because I wished to speak to you: come here without +any more delay,"--how she walked the whole length of that +interminable room, and stood facing her aunt, she never knew.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Hamilton for a full minute did not speak, but she fixed +that searching look, to which we have once before alluded, upon +Ellen's face; and then said, in a tone which, though very low +and calm, expressed as much as that earnest look:--</p> + +<p>"Ellen! is it necessary for me to tell you why you are here--necessary +to produce the proof that my words are right, and that +you <i>have</i> been influenced by the fearful effects of some unconfessed +and most heinous sin? Little did I dream its nature."</p> + +<p>For a moment Ellen stood as turned to stone, as white and +rigid--the next she had sunk down with a wild, bitter cry, at +Mrs. Hamilton's feet, and buried her face in her hands.</p> + +<p>"Is it true--can it be true--that you, offspring of my own +sister; dear to me, cherished by me as my own child--you have +been the guilty one to appropriate, and conceal the appropriation +of money, which has been a source of distress by its loss, and +the suspicion thence proceeding, for the last seven weeks?--that +you could listen to your uncle's words, absolving his whole +household as incapable of a deed which was actual theft, and +yet, by neither word nor sign, betray remorse or guilt?--could +behold the innocent suffering, the fearful misery of suspicion, +loss of character, without the power of clearing himself, and +stand calmly, heedlessly by--only proving by your hardened +and rebellious temper that all was not right within--Ellen, can +this be true?"</p> + +<p>"Yes!" was the reply, but with such a fearful effort that her +slight frame shook as with an ague: "thank God that it is known! +I dared not bring down the punishment on myself; but I can bear +it."</p> + +<p>"This is mere mockery, Ellen: how dare I believe even this +poor evidence of repentance, with the recollection of your past +conduct? What were the notes you found?"</p> + +<p>Ellen named them.</p> + +<p>"Where are they?--This is but one, and the smallest."</p> + +<p>Ellen's answer was scarcely audible.</p> + +<p>"Used them--and for what?"</p> + +<p>There was no answer; neither then nor when Mrs. Hamilton +sternly reiterated the question. She then demanded:--</p> + +<p>"How long have they been in your possession?"</p> + +<p>"Five or six weeks;" but the reply was so tremulous it carried +no conviction with it.</p> + +<p>"Since Robert told his story to your uncle, or before?"</p> + +<p>"Before."</p> + +<p>"Then your last answer was a falsehood, Ellen: it is full seven +weeks since my husband addressed the household on the subject. +You could not have so miscounted time, with such a deed to date +by. Where did you find them?"</p> + +<p>Ellen described the spot.</p> + +<p>"And what business had you there? You know that neither +you nor your cousins are ever allowed to go that way to Mrs. +Langford's cottage, and more especially alone. If you wanted to +see her, why did you not go the usual way? And when was +this?--you must remember the exact day. Your memory is not +in general so treacherous."</p> + +<p>Again Ellen was silent.</p> + +<p>"Have you forgotten it?"</p> + +<p>She crouched lower at her aunt's feet, but the answer was +audible--"No."</p> + +<p>"Then answer me, Ellen, this moment, and distinctly: for +what purpose were you seeking Mrs. Langford's cottage by that +forbidden path, and when?"</p> + +<p>"I wanted money, and I went to ask her to take my trinkets--my +watch, if it must be--and dispose of them as I had read of +others doing, as miserable as I was; and the wind blew the notes +to my very hand, and I used them. I was mad then; I have +been mad since, I believe: but I would have returned the whole +amount to Robert if I could have but parted with my trinkets +in time."</p> + +<p>To describe the tone of utter despair, the recklessness as to +the effect her words would produce, is impossible. Every word +increased Mrs. Hamilton's bewilderment and misery. To suppose +that Ellen did not feel was folly. It was the very depth of +wretchedness which was crushing her to earth, but every answered +and unanswered question but deepened the mystery, and rendered +her judge's task more difficult.</p> + +<p>"And when was this, Ellen? I will have no more evasion--tell +me the exact day."</p> + +<p>But she asked in vain. Ellen remained moveless and silent as +the dead.</p> + +<p>After several minutes Mrs. Hamilton removed her hands from +her face, and compelling her to lift up her head, gazed searchingly +on her death-like countenance for some moments in utter +silence, and then said, in a tone that Ellen never in her life +forgot:--</p> + +<p>"You cannot imagine, Ellen, that this half confession will +either satisfy me, or in the smallest degree redeem your sin. +One, and one only path is open to you; for all that you have +said and left unsaid but deepens your apparent guilt, and so +blackens your conduct, that I can scarcely believe I am addressing +the child I so loved--and could still so love, if but one real +sign be given of remorse and penitence--one hope of returning +truth. But that sign, that hope, can only be a full confession. +Terrible as is the guilt of appropriating so large a sum, granted +it came by the merest chance into your hand; dark as is the additional +sin of concealment when an innocent person was suffering--something +still darker, more terrible, must be concealed +behind it, or you would not, could not, continue thus obdurately +silent. I can believe that under some heavy pressure of misery, +some strong excitement, the sum might have been used without +thought, and that fear might have prevented the confession of +anything so dreadful; but what was this heavy necessity for +money, this strong excitement? What fearful and mysterious +difficulties have you been led into to call for either? Tell me +the truth, Ellen, the whole truth; let me have some hope of saving +you and myself the misery of publicly declaring you the +guilty one, and so proving Robert's innocence. Tell me what +difficulty, what misery so maddened you, as to demand the disposal +of your trinkets. If there be the least excuse, the smallest +possibility of your obtaining in time forgiveness, I will grant it. +I will not believe you so utterly fallen. I will do all I can to +remove error, and yet to prevent suffering; but to win this, I +must have a full confession--every question that I put to you +must be clearly and satisfactorily answered, and so bring back the +only comfort to yourself, and hope to me. Will you do this, +Ellen?"</p> + +<p>"Oh that I could!" was the reply in such bitter anguish, Mrs. +Hamilton actually shuddered. "But I cannot--must not--dare +not. Aunt Emmeline, hate me; condemn me to the severest, +sharpest suffering; I wish for it, pine for it: you cannot loathe +me more than I do myself, but do not--do not speak to me in +these kind tones--I cannot bear them. It was because I knew +what a wretch I am, that I have so shunned you. I was not +worthy to be with you; oh, sentence me at once! I dare not +answer as you wish."</p> + +<p>"Dare not!" repeated Mrs. Hamilton, more and more bewildered; +and to conceal the emotion Ellen's wild words and agonized +manner had produced, adopting a greater sternness.</p> + +<p>"You dare commit a sin, from which the lowest of my household +would shrink in horror, and yet tell me you dare not make +the only atonement, give me the only proof of real penitence I +demand. This is a weak and wicked subterfuge, Ellen, and will +not pass with me. There can be no reason for this fearful obduracy, +not even the consciousness of greater guilt, for I promise +forgiveness, if it be possible, on the sole condition of a full confession. +Once more, will you speak? Your hardihood will be utterly +useless, for you cannot hope to conquer me; and if you permit +me to leave you with your conduct still clothed in this impenetrable +mystery, you will compel me to adopt measures to subdue +that defying spirit, which will expose you and myself to intense +suffering, but which <i>must</i> force submission at last."</p> + +<p>"You cannot inflict more than I have endured the last seven +weeks," murmured Ellen, almost inarticulately. "I have borne +that; I can bear the rest."</p> + +<p>"Then you will not answer? You are resolved not to tell me +the day on which you found that money, the use to which it was +applied, the reason of your choosing that forbidden path, permitting +me to believe you guilty of heavier sins than may be the +case in reality. Listen to me, Ellen; it is more than time this +interview should cease; but I will give you one chance more. It +is now half-past seven,"--she took the watch from her neck, and +laid it on the table--"I will remain here one-half hour longer: +by that time this sinful temper may have passed away, and you +will consent to give me the confession I demand. I cannot +believe you so altered in two months as to choose obduracy and +misery, when pardon, and in time confidence and love, are +offered in their stead. Get up from that crouching posture; it +can be but mock humility, and so only aggravates your sin."</p> + +<p>Ellen rose slowly and painfully, and seating herself at the +table some distance from her aunt, leaned her arms upon it, and +buried her face within them. Never before and never after did +half an hour appear so interminable to either Mrs. Hamilton or +Ellen. It was well for the firmness of the former, perhaps, that +she could not read the heart of that young girl, even if the cause +of its anguish had been still concealed. Again and again did the +wild longing, turning her actually faint and sick with its agony, +come over her to reveal the whole, to ask but rest and mercy +for herself, pardon and security for Edward: but then, clear as if +held before her in letters of fire, she read every word of her +brother's desperate letter, particularly "Breathe it to my uncle or +aunt--for if she knows it he will--and you will never see me +more." Her mother, pallid as death, seemed to stand before +her, freezing confession on her heart and lips, looking at her +threateningly, as she had so often seen her, as if the very +thought were guilt. The rapidly advancing twilight, the large +and lonely room, all added to that fearful illusion; and if Ellen +did succeed in praying it was with desperate fervor for strength +not to betray her brother. If ever there were a martyr spirit, +it was enshrined in that young, frail form.</p> + +<p>"Aunt Emmeline, Aunt Emmeline, speak to me but one +word--only one word of kindness before you go. I do not +ask for mercy--there can be none for such a wretch as I am; +I will bear without one complaint, one murmur, all you may +inflict--you cannot be too severe. Nothing can be such agony as +the utter loss of your affection; I thought, the last two months, +that I feared you so much that it was all fear, no love: but now, +now that you know my sin, it has all, all come back to make me +still more wretched." And before Mrs. Hamilton could prevent, +or was in the least aware of her intention, Ellen had obtained +possession of one of her hands, and was covering it with kisses, +while her whole frame shook with those convulsed, but completely +tearless sobs.</p> + +<p>"Will you confess, Ellen, if I stay? Will you give me the +proof that it <i>is</i> such agony to lose my affection, that you <i>do</i> love +me as you profess, and that it is only one sin which has so +changed you? One word, and, tardy as it is, I will listen, and it +I can, forgive."</p> + +<p>Ellen made no answer, and Mrs. Hamilton's newly raised hopes +vanished; she waited full two or three minutes, then gently disengaged +her hand and dress from Ellen's still convulsive grasp; +the door closed, with a sullen, seemingly unwilling sound, and +Ellen was alone. She remained in the same posture, the same +spot, till a vague, cold terror so took possession of her, that the +room seemed filled with ghostly shapes, and all the articles of furniture +suddenly transformed to things of life; and springing up, +with the wild, fleet step of fear, she paused not till she found +herself in her own room, where, flinging herself on her bed, she +buried her face on her pillow, to shut out every object--oh, how +she longed to shut out thought!</p> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="WILLIAM_HARRISON_AINSWORTH"></a>WILLIAM HARRISON AINSWORTH</h2> + +<h3>(1805-1882)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-i.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>n the year 1881, at a commemorative dinner given to her +native novelist by the city of Manchester, it was announced +that the public library contained two hundred and fifty +volumes of his works, which passed through seven thousand six +hundred and sixty hands annually, so that his stories were read at +the rate of twenty volumes a day throughout the year. This exceptional +prophet, who was thus not without honor in his own country, +was the son of a prosperous attorney, and was himself destined to +the bar. But he detested the law and he loved letters, and before he +was twenty he had helped to edit a paper, had written essays, a story, +and a play,--none of which, fortunately for him, survive,--and had +gone to London, ostensibly to read in a lawyer's office, and really to +spin his web of fiction whenever opportunity offered. Chance connected +the fortunes of young Ainsworth with periodical literature, +where most of his early work appeared. His first important tale was +'Rookwood,' published in 1834. This describes the fortunes of a +family of Yorkshire gentry in the last century; but its real interest +lies in an episode which includes certain experiences of the notorious +highwayman, Dick Turpin, and his furious ride to outrun the +hue and cry. Sporting England was enraptured with the dash and +breathlessness of this adventure, and the novelist's fame was established.</p> + +<p class="lft"><img src="images/252.png" width="50%" alt=""></p> + +<p>His second romance, 'Crichton,' appeared in 1836. The hero +of this tale is the brilliant Scottish gentleman whose handsome +person, extraordinary scholarship, great +accomplishments, courage, eloquence, subtlety, +and achievement gained him the +sobriquet of "The Admirable." The chief +scenes are laid in Paris at the time of +Catherine de' Medici's rule and Henry +III.'s reign, when the air was full of intrigue +and conspiracy, and when religious +quarrels were not more bitter and dangerous +than political wrangles. The inscrutable +king, the devout Queen Louise of +Lorraine, the scheming queen-mother, and +Marguerite of Valois, half saint, half profligate, +a pearl of beauty and grace; Henry +of Navarre, ready to buy his Paris with +sword or mass; well-known great nobles, priests, astrologers, learned +doctors, foreign potentates, ambassadors, pilgrims, and poisoners,--pass +before the reader's eye. The pictures of student life, at a time +when all the world swarmed to the great schools of Paris, serve to +explain the hero and the period.</p> + +<p>When, in 1839, Dickens resigned the editorship of Bentley's Miscellany, +Ainsworth succeeded him. "The new whip," wrote the old +one afterward, "having mounted the box, drove straight to Newgate. +He there took in Jack Sheppard, and Cruikshank the artist; and +aided by that very vulgar but very wonderful draughtsman, he made +an effective story of the burglar's and housebreaker's life." Everybody +read the story, and most persons cried out against so ignoble a +hero, so mean a history, and so misdirected a literary energy. The +author himself seems not to have been proud of the success which +sold thousands of copies of an unworthy book, and placed a dramatic +version of its vulgar adventures on the stage of eight theatres at +once. He turned his back on this profitable field to produce, in rapid +succession, 'Guy Fawkes,' a tale of the famous Gunpowder Plot; +'The Tower of London,' a story of the Princess Elizabeth, the reign +of Queen Mary, and the melancholy episode of Lady Jane Grey's +brief glory; 'Old Saint Paul,' a story of the time of Charles II., +which contains the history of the Plague and of the Great Fire; +'The Miser's Daughter'; 'Windsor Castle,' whose chief characters +are Katharine of Aragon, Anne Boleyn, Cardinal Wolsey, and Henry +the Eighth; 'St. James,' a tale of the court of Queen Anne; 'The +Lancashire Witches'; 'The Star-Chamber,' a historical story of the +time of Charles I.; 'The Constable of the Tower'; 'The Lord Mayor +of London'; 'Cardinal Pole,' which deals with the court and times of +Philip and Mary; 'John Law,' a story of the great Mississippi Bubble; +'Tower Hill,' whose heroine is the luckless Catharine Howard; +'The Spanish Match,' a story of the romantic pilgrimage of Prince +Charles and "Steenie" Buckingham to Spain for the fruitless wooing +of the Spanish Princess; and at least ten other romances, many of +them in three volumes, all appearing between 1840 and 1873. Two +of these were published simultaneously, in serial form; and no year +passed without its book, to the end of the novelist's long life.</p> + +<p>Whatever the twentieth century may say to Ainsworth's historic +romances, many of them have found high favor in the past. Concerning +'Crichton,' so good a critic as "Father Prout" wrote:--"Indeed, +I scarcely know any of the so-called historical novels of this +frivolous generation which has altogether so graphically reproduced +the spirit and character of the time as this daring and dashing portraiture +of the young Scot and his contemporaries." The author of +'Waverley' praised more than one of the romances, saying that they +were written in his own vein. Even Maginn, the satirical, thought +that the novelist was doing excellent service to history in making +Englishmen understand how full of comedy and tragedy were the old +streets and the old buildings of London. And if Ainsworth the +writer received some buffetings, Ainsworth the man seems to have +been universally loved and approved. All the literary men of his +time were his cordial friends. Scott wrote for him 'The Bonnets +of Bonnie Dundee,' and objected to being paid. Dickens was eager +to serve him. Talfourd, Barham, Hood, Howitt, James, Jerrold, +delighted in his society. At dinner-parties and in country-houses he +was a favorite guest. Thus, easy in circumstances, surrounded by +affection, happy in the labor of his choice, passed the long life of +the upright and kindly English gentleman who spent fifty industrious +years in recording the annals of tragedy, wretchedness, and crime.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_STUDENTS_OF_PARIS"></a>THE STUDENTS OF PARIS</h3> + +<center>From 'Crichton'</center> + +<p>Toward the close of Wednesday, the 4th of February, 1579, a +vast assemblage of scholars was collected before the Gothic +gateway of the ancient College of Navarre. So numerous +was this concourse, that it not merely blocked up the area in +front of the renowned seminary in question, but extended far +down the Rue de la Montagne Sainte-Généviève, in which it is +situated. Never had such a disorderly rout been brought together +since the days of the uproar in 1557, when the predecessors of +these turbulent students took up arms, marched in a body to the +Pré-aux-Clercs, set fire to three houses in the vicinity, and slew +a sergeant of the guard, who vainly endeavored to restrain their +fury. Their last election of a rector, Messire Adrien d'Amboise,--<i>pater +eruditionum</i>, as he is described in his epitaph, when the +same body congregated within the cloisters of the Mathurins, and +thence proceeded, in tumultuous array, to the church of Saint +Louis, in the isle of the same name,--had been nothing to it. +Every scholastic hive sent forth its drones. Sorbonne, and Montaigu, +Cluny, Harcourt, the Four Nations, and a host of minor +establishments--in all, amounting to forty-two--each added its +swarms; and a pretty buzzing they created! The fair of Saint-Germain +had only commenced the day before; but though its +festivities were to continue until Palm Sunday, and though it was +the constant resort of the scholars, who committed, during their +days of carnival, ten thousand excesses, it was now absolutely +deserted.</p> + +<p>The Pomme-de-Pin, the Castel, the Magdaleine, and the Mule, +those "capital caverns," celebrated in Pantagruel's conference with +the Limosin student, which has conferred upon them an immortality +like that of our own hostel, the Mermaid, were wholly +neglected; the dice-box was laid aside for the nonce; and the +well-used cards were thrust into the doublets of these thirsty +tipplers of the schools.</p> + +<p>But not alone did the crowd consist of the brawler, the +gambler, the bully, and the debauchee, though these, it must be +confessed, predominated. It was a grand medley of all sects and +classes. The modest demeanor of the retiring, pale-browed student +was contrasted with the ferocious aspect and reckless bearing +of his immediate neighbor, whose appearance was little better +than that of a bravo. The grave theologian and embryo ecclesiastic +were placed in juxtaposition with the scoffing and licentious +acolyte; while the lawyer <i>in posse</i>, and the law-breaker <i>in esse</i>, +were numbered among a group whose pursuits were those of violence +and fraud.</p> + +<p>Various as were the characters that composed it, not less +diversified were the costumes of this heterogeneous assemblage. +Subject to no particular regulations as to dress, or rather openly +infracting them, if any such were attempted to be enforced--each +scholar, to whatever college he belonged, attired himself in +such garments as best suited his taste or his finances. Taking it +altogether, the mob was neither remarkable for the fashion, nor +the cleanliness of the apparel of its members.</p> + +<p>From Rabelais we learn that the passion of play was so +strongly implanted in the students of his day, that they would +frequently stake the points of their doublets at <i>tric-trac</i> +or <i>troumadame</i>; +and but little improvement had taken place in their +morals or manners some half-century afterward. The buckle at +their girdle--the mantle on their shoulders--the shirt to their +back--often stood the hazard of the die; and hence it not unfrequently +happened, that a rusty <i>pourpoint</i> and ragged <i>chaussés</i> +were all the covering which the luckless dicers could enumerate, +owing, no doubt, "to the extreme rarity and penury of money in +their pouches."</p> + +<p>Round or square caps, hoods and cloaks of black, gray, or +other sombre hue, were, however, the prevalent garb of the members +of the university; but here and there might be seen some +gayer specimen of the tribe, whose broad-brimmed, high-crowned +felt hat and flaunting feather; whose puffed-out sleeves and exaggerated +ruff--with starched plaits of such amplitude that they +had been not inappropriately named <i>plats de Saint Jean-Baptiste</i>, +from the resemblance which the wearer's head bore to that of the +saint, when deposited in the charger of the daughter of Herodias--were +intended to ape the leading mode of the elegant court of +their sovereign, Henri Trois.</p> + +<p>To such an extent had these insolent youngsters carried their +license of imitation that certain of their members, fresh from the +fair of Saint-Germain, and not wholly unacquainted with the +hippocras of the sutlers crowding its mart, wore around their +throats enormous collars of paper, cut in rivalry of the legitimate +plaits of muslin, and bore in their hands long hollow sticks from +which they discharged peas and other missiles, in imitation of the +<i>sarbacanes</i> or pea-shooters then in vogue with the monarch and +his favorites.</p> + +<p>Thus fantastically tricked out, on that same day--nay, only +a few hours before, and at the fair above mentioned--had these +facetious wights, with more merriment than discretion, ventured +to exhibit themselves before the cortege of Henri, and to exclaim +loud enough to reach the ears of royalty, "<i>à la fraise on connoit +le veau</i>!" a piece of pleasantry for which they subsequently paid +dear.</p> + +<p>Notwithstanding its shabby appearance in detail, the general +effect of this scholastic rabble was striking and picturesque. The +thick mustaches and pointed beards with which the lips and +chins of most of them were decorated, gave to their physiognomies +a manly and determined air, fully borne out by their unrestrained +carriage and deportment. To a man, almost all were +armed with a tough vine-wood bludgeon, called in their language +an <i>estoc volant</i>, tipped and shod with steel--a weapon fully +understood by them, and rendered, by their dexterity in the use +of it, formidable to their adversaries. Not a few carried at +their girdles the short rapier, so celebrated in their duels and +brawls, or concealed within their bosom a poniard or a two-edged +knife.</p> + +<p>The scholars of Paris have ever been a turbulent and ungovernable +race; and at the period of which this history treats, and +indeed long before, were little better than a licensed horde of +robbers, consisting of a pack of idle and wayward youths drafted +from all parts of Europe, as well as from the remoter provinces +of their own nation. There was little in common between the +mass of students and their brethren, excepting the fellowship +resulting from the universal license in which all indulged. Hence +their thousand combats among themselves--combats almost invariably +attended with fatal consequences--and which the heads of +the university found it impossible to check.</p> + +<p>Their own scanty resources, eked out by what little they could +derive from beggary or robbery, formed their chief subsistence; +for many of them were positive mendicants, and were so denominated: +and being possessed of a sanctuary within their own +quarters, to which they could at convenience retire, they submitted +to the constraint of no laws except those enforced within +the jurisdiction of the university, and hesitated at no means of +enriching themselves at the expense of their neighbors. Hence +the frequent warfare waged between them and the brethren of +Saint-Germain des Prés, whose monastic domains adjoined their +territories, and whose meadows were the constant battleground of +their skirmishes; according to Dulaure--"<i>presque toujours un +théâtre de tumulte, de galanterie, de combats, de duels, de débauches +et de sédition</i>." Hence their sanguinary conflicts with the good +citizens of Paris, to whom they were wholly obnoxious, and who +occasionally repaid their aggressions with interest. In 1407 two +of their number, convicted of assassination and robbery, were condemned +to the gibbet, and the sentence was carried into execution; +but so great was the uproar occasioned in the university by this +violation of its immunities that the Provost of Paris, Guillaume de +Tignonville, was compelled to take down their bodies from Montfaucon +and see them honorably and ceremoniously interred. This +recognition of their rights only served to make matters worse, and +for a series of years the nuisance continued unabated.</p> + +<p>It is not our purpose to record all the excesses of the university, +nor the means taken for their suppression. Vainly were +the civil authorities arrayed against them. Vainly were bulls +thundered from the Vatican. No amendment was effected. The +weed might be cut down, but was never entirely extirpated. +Their feuds were transmitted from generation to generation, and +their old bone of contention with the abbot of Saint-Germain (the +Pré-aux-Clercs) was, after an uninterrupted strife for thirty years, +submitted to the arbitration of the Pope, who very equitably +refused to pronounce judgment in favor of either party.</p> + +<p>Such were the scholars of Paris in the sixteenth century--such +the character of the clamorous crew who besieged the portals +of the College of Navarre.</p> + +<p>The object that summoned together this unruly multitude +was, it appears, a desire on the part of the scholars to be present +at a public controversy or learned disputation, then occurring +within the great hall of the college before which they were +congregated; and the disappointment caused by their finding the +gates closed, and all entrance denied to them, occasioned their +present disposition to riot.</p> + +<p>It was in vain they were assured by the halberdiers stationed +at the gates, and who, with crossed pikes, strove to resist the +onward pressure of the mob, that the hall and court were already +crammed to overflowing, that there was not room even for the +sole of a foot of a doctor of the faculties, and that their orders +were positive and imperative that none beneath the degree of a +bachelor or licentiate should be admitted, and that a troop of martinets +and new-comers could have no possible claim to admission.</p> + +<p>In vain they were told this was no ordinary disputation, no +common controversy, where all were alike entitled to license of +ingress; that the disputant was no undistinguished scholar, whose +renown did not extend beyond his own trifling sphere, and +whose opinions, therefore, few would care to hear and still +fewer to oppugn, but a foreigner of high rank, in high favor and +fashion, and not more remarkable for his extraordinary intellectual +endowments than for his brilliant personal accomplishments.</p> + +<p>In vain the trembling officials sought to clinch their arguments +by stating, that not alone did the conclave consist of the chief +members of the university, the senior doctors of theology, medicine, +and law, the professors of the humanities, rhetoric, and philosophy, +and all the various other dignitaries; but that the debate +was honored by the presence of Monsieur Christophe de Thou, +first president of Parliament; by that of the learned Jacques +Augustin, of the same name; by one of the secretaries of state +and Governor of Paris, M. René de Villequier; by the ambassadors +of Elizabeth, Queen of England, and of Philip the Second, +King of Spain, and several of their suite; by Abbé de Brantôme; +by M. Miron, the court physician; by Cosmo Ruggieri, the +Queen Mother's astrologer; by the renowned poets and masque +writers, Maîtres Ronsard, Baïf, and Philippe Desportes; by the +well-known advocate of Parliament, Messire Étienne Pasquier: +but also (and here came the gravamen of the objection to their +admission) by the two especial favorites of his Majesty and leaders +of affairs, the seigneurs of Joyeuse and D'Epernon.</p> + +<p>It was in vain the students were informed that for the preservation +of strict decorum, they had been commanded by the rector +to make fast the gates. No excuses would avail them. The +scholars were cogent reasoners, and a show of staves soon +brought their opponents to a nonplus. In this line of argument +they were perfectly aware of their ability to prove a major.</p> + +<p>"To the wall with them--to the wall!" cried a hundred infuriated +voices. "Down with the halberdiers--down with the gates--down +with the disputants--down with the rector himself!--Deny +our privileges! To the wall with old Adrien d'Amboise--exclude +the disciples of the university from their own halls!--curry +favor with the court minions!--hold a public controversy +in private!--down with him! We will issue a mandamus for a +new election on the spot!"</p> + +<p>Whereupon a deep groan resounded throughout the crowd. +It was succeeded by a volley of fresh execrations against the +rector, and an angry demonstration of bludgeons, accompanied by +a brisk shower of peas from the <i>sarbacanes</i>.</p> + +<p>The officials turned pale, and calculated the chance of a broken +neck in reversion, with that of a broken crown in immediate +possession. The former being at least contingent, appeared the +milder alternative, and they might have been inclined to adopt +it had not a further obstacle stood in their way. The gate was +barred withinside, and the vergers and bedels who had the custody +of the door, though alarmed at the tumult without, positively +refused to unfasten it.</p> + +<p>Again the threats of the scholars were renewed, and further +intimations of violence were exhibited. Again the peas rattled +upon the hands and faces of the halberdiers, till their ears tingled +with pain. "Prate to us of the king's favorites," cried one of the +foremost of the scholars, a youth decorated with a paper collar: +"they may rule within the precincts of the Louvre, but not +within the walls of the university. <i>Maugre-bleu!</i> We hold them +cheap enough. We heed not the idle bark of these full-fed court +lapdogs. What to us is the bearer of a cup and ball? By the +four Evangelists, we will have none of them here! Let the Gascon +cadet, D'Epernon, reflect on the fate of Quélus and Maugiron, +and let our gay Joyeuse beware of the dog's death of Saint-Mégrin. +Place for better men--place for the schools--away with +frills and <i>sarbacanes</i>."</p> + +<p>"What to us is a president of Parliament, or a governor of the +city?" shouted another of the same gentry. "We care nothing +for their ministration. We recognize them not, save in their own +courts. All their authority fell to the ground at the gate of the +Rue Saint Jacques, when they entered our dominions. We care +for no parties. We are trimmers, and steer a middle course. We +hold the Guisards as cheap as the Huguenots, and the brethren +of the League weigh as little with us as the followers of Calvin. +Our only sovereign is Gregory the Thirteenth, Pontiff of Rome. +Away with the Guise and the Béarnaise!"</p> + +<p>"Away with Henri of Navarre, if you please," cried a scholar +of Harcourt; "or Henri of Valois, if you list: but by all the +saints, not with Henri of Lorraine; he is the fast friend of the +true faith. No!--No!--live the Guise--live the Holy Union!"</p> + +<p>"Away with Elizabeth of England," cried a scholar of Cluny: +"what doth her representative here? Seeks he a spouse for her +among our schools? She will have no great bargain, I own, if +she bestows her royal hand upon our Duc d'Anjou."</p> + +<p>"If you value your buff jerkin, I counsel you to say nothing +slighting of the Queen of England in my hearing," returned a +bluff, broad-shouldered fellow, raising his bludgeon after a menacing +fashion. He was an Englishman belonging to the Four +Nations, and had a huge bull-dog at his heels.</p> + +<p>"Away with Philip of Spain and his ambassador," cried a +Bernardin.</p> + +<p>"By the eyes of my mistress!" cried a Spaniard belonging to +the College of Narbonne, with huge mustaches curled half-way +up his bronzed and insolent visage, and a slouched hat pulled +over his brow. "This may not pass muster. The representative +of the King of Spain must be respected even by the Academics +of Lutetia. Which of you shall gainsay me?--ha!"</p> + +<p>"What business has he here with his suite, on occasions like +to the present?" returned the Bernardin. "<i>Tête-Dieu!</i> this disputation +is one that little concerns the interest of your politic king; +and methinks Don Philip, or his representative, has regard for +little else than whatsoever advances his own interest. Your +ambassador hath, I doubt not, some latent motive for his present +attendance in our schools."</p> + +<p>"Perchance," returned the Spaniard. "We will discuss that +point anon."</p> + +<p>"And what doth the pander of the Sybarite within the dusty +halls of learning?" ejaculated a scholar of Lemoine. "What +doth the jealous-pated slayer of his wife and unborn child within +the reach of free-spoken voices, and mayhap of well-directed +blades? Methinks it were more prudent to tarry within the +bowers of his harem, than to hazard his perfumed person among +us."</p> + +<p>"Well said," rejoined the scholar of Cluny--"down with +René de Villequier, though he be Governor of Paris."</p> + +<p>"What title hath the Abbé de Brantôme to a seat among +us?" said the scion of Harcourt: "faith, he hath a reputation for +wit, and scholarship, and gallantry. But what is that to us? +His place might now be filled by worthier men."</p> + +<p>"And what, in the devil's name, brings Cosmo Ruggieri +hither?" asked the Bernardin. "What doth the wrinkled old +dealer in the black art hope to learn from us? We are not +given to alchemy, and the occult sciences; we practice no hidden +mysteries; we brew no philtres; we compound no slow poisons; +we vend no waxen images. What doth he here, I say! 'Tis a +scandal in the rector to permit his presence. And what if he +came under the safeguard, and by the authority of his mistress, +Catherine de' Medicis! Shall we regard her passport? Down +with the heathen abbé, his abominations have been endured too +long; they smell rank in our nostrils. Think how he ensnared +La Mole--think on his numberless victims. Who mixed the +infernal potion of Charles the Ninth? Let him answer that. +Down with the infidel--the Jew--the sorcerer! The stake were +too good for him. Down with Ruggieri, I say."</p> + +<p>"Aye, down with the accursed astrologer," echoed the whole +crew. "He has done abundant mischief in his time. A day of +reckoning has arrived. Hath he cast his own horoscope? Did +he foresee his own fate? Ha! ha!"</p> + +<p>"And then the poets," cried another member of the Four +Nations--"a plague on all three. Would they were elsewhere. +In what does this disputation concern them? Pierre Ronsard, +being an offshoot of this same College of Navarre, hath indubitably +a claim upon our consideration. But he is old, and I +marvel that his gout permitted him to hobble so far. Oh, the +mercenary old scribbler! His late verses halt like himself, yet +he lowereth not the price of his masques. Besides which, he is +grown moral, and unsays all his former good things. <i>Mort +Dieu!</i> your superannuated bards ever recant the indiscretions +of their nonage. Clément Marot took to psalm-writing in his +old age. As to Baïf, his name will scarce outlast the scenery +of his ballets, his plays are out of fashion since the Gelosi +arrived. He deserves no place among us. And Philip Desportes +owes all his present preferment to the Vicomte de Joyeuse. +However, he is not altogether devoid of merit--let him wear +his bays, so he trouble us not with his company. Room for the +sophisters of Narbonne, I say. To the dogs with poetry!"</p> + +<p>"<i>Morbleu!</i>" exclaimed another. "What are the sophisters +of Narbonne to the decretists of the Sorbonne, who will discuss +you a position of Cornelius à Lapide, or a sentence of Peter +Lombard, as readily as you would a flask of hippocras, or a slice +of botargo. Aye, and cry <i>transeat</i> to a thesis of Aristotle, +though it be against rule. What sayst thou, Capéte?" continued +he, addressing his neighbor, a scholar of Montaigu, whose +modest gray capuchin procured him this appellation: "are we the +men to be thus scurvily entreated?"</p> + +<p>"I see not that your merits are greater than ours," returned +he of the capuch, "though our boasting be less. The followers +of the lowly John Standoncht are as well able to maintain their +tenets in controversy as those of Robert of Sorbon; and I see no +reason why entrance should be denied us. The honor of the +university is at stake, and all its strength should be mustered to +assert it."</p> + +<p>"Rightly spoken," returned the Bernardin; "and it were a +lasting disgrace to our schools were this arrogant Scot to carry +off their laurels when so many who might have been found +to lower his crest are allowed no share in their defense. The +contest is one that concerns us all alike. We at least can arbitrate +in case of need."</p> + +<p>"I care not for the honors of the university," rejoined one +of the Écossais, or Scotch College, then existing in the Rue des +Amandiers, "but I care much for the glory of my countryman, +and I would gladly have witnessed the triumph of the disciples of +Rutherford and of the classic Buchanan. But if the arbitrament +to which you would resort is to be that of voices merely, I am +glad the rector in his wisdom has thought fit to keep you without, +even though I myself be personally inconvenienced by it."</p> + +<p>"Name o' God! what fine talking is this?" retorted the Spaniard. +"There is little chance of the triumph you predicate for +your countryman. Trust me, we shall have to greet his departure +from the debate with many hisses and few cheers; and if we +could penetrate through the plates of yon iron door, and gaze +into the court it conceals from our view, we should find that the +loftiness of his pretensions has been already humbled, and his +arguments graveled. <i>For la Litania de los Santos!</i> to think of +comparing an obscure student of the pitiful College of Saint +Andrew with the erudite doctors of the most erudite university +in the world, always excepting those of Valencia and Salamanca. +It needs all thy country's assurance to keep the blush of shame +from mantling in thy cheeks."</p> + +<p>"The seminary you revile," replied the Scot, haughtily, "has +been the nursery of our Scottish kings. Nay, the youthful James +Stuart pursued his studies under the same roof, beneath the same +wise instruction, and at the self-same time as our noble and gifted +James Crichton, whom you have falsely denominated an adventurer, +but whose lineage is not less distinguished than his learning. +His renown has preceded him hither, and he was not +unknown to your doctors when he affixed his programme to these +college walls. Hark!" continued the speaker, exultingly, "and +listen to yon evidence of his triumph."</p> + +<p>And as he spoke, a loud and continued clapping of hands proceeding +from within was distinctly heard above the roar of the +students.</p> + +<p>"That may be at his defeat," muttered the Spaniard, between +his teeth.</p> + +<p>"No such thing," replied the Scot. "I heard the name of +Crichton mingled with the plaudits."</p> + +<p>"And who may be this Phoenix--this Gargantua of intellect--who +is to vanquish us all, as Panurge did Thaumast, the +Englishman?" asked the Sorbonist of the Scot. "Who is he that +is more philosophic than Pythagoras?--ha!"</p> + +<p>"Who is more studious than Carneades!" said the Bernardin.</p> + +<p>"More versatile than Alcibiades!" said Montaigu.</p> + +<p>"More subtle than Averroës!" cried Harcourt.</p> + +<p>"More mystical than Plotinus!" said one of the Four Nations.</p> + +<p>"More visionary than Artemidorus!" said Cluny.</p> + +<p>"More infallible than the Pope!" added Lemoine.</p> + +<p>"And who pretends to dispute <i>de omni scibili</i>," shouted the +Spaniard.</p> + +<p>"<i>Et quolibet ente!</i>! added the Sorbonist.</p> + +<p>"Mine ears are stunned with your vociferations," replied the +Scot. "You ask me who James Crichton is, and yourselves give +the response. You have mockingly said he is a <i>rara avis</i>; a +prodigy of wit and learning: and you have unintentionally spoken +the truth. He is so. But I will tell you that of him of which +you are wholly ignorant, or which you have designedly overlooked. +His condition is that of a Scottish gentleman of high +rank. Like your Spanish grandee, he need not doff his cap to +kings. On either side hath he the best of blood in his veins. +His mother was a Stuart directly descended from that regal line. +His father, who owneth the fair domains of Eliock and Cluny, +was Lord Advocate to our bonny and luckless Mary (whom +Heaven assoilzie!) and still holds his high office. Methinks the +Lairds of Crichton might have been heard of here. Howbeit, +they are well known to me, who being an Ogilvy of +Balfour, have often heard tell of a certain contract or obligation, +whereby--"</p> + +<p>"<i>Basta!</i>" interrupted the Spaniard, "heed not thine own +affairs, worthy Scot. Tell us of this Crichton--ha!"</p> + +<p>"I have told you already more than I ought to have told," +replied Ogilvy, sullenly. "And if you lack further information +respecting James Crichton's favor at the Louvre, his feats of +arms, and the esteem in which he is held by all the dames of +honor in attendance upon your Queen Mother, Catherine de' +Medicis--and moreover," he added, with somewhat of sarcasm, +"with her fair daughter, Marguerite de Valois--you will do well +to address yourself to the king's buffoon, Maître Chicot, whom I +see not far off. Few there are, methinks, who could in such +short space have won so much favor, or acquired such bright +renown."</p> + +<p>"Humph!" muttered the Englishman, "your Scotsmen stick +by each other all the world over. This James Crichton may or +may not be the hero he is vaunted, but I shall mistrust his +praises from that quarter, till I find their truth confirmed."</p> + +<p>"He has, to be sure, acquired the character of a stout swords-man," +said the Bernardin, "to give the poor devil his due."</p> + +<p>"He has not met with his match at the <i>salle-d'armes</i>, though +he has crossed blades with the first in France," replied Ogilvy.</p> + +<p>"I have seen him at the Manége," said the Sorbonist, "go +through his course of equitation, and being a not altogether +unskillful horseman myself, I can report favorably of his performance."</p> + +<p>"There is none among your youth can sit a steed like him," +returned Ogilvy, "nor can any of the jousters carry off the ring +with more certainty at the lists. I would fain hold my tongue, +but you enforce me to speak in his praise."</p> + +<p>"Body of Bacchus!" exclaimed the Spaniard, half unsheathing +the lengthy weapon that hung by his side, "I will hold you a +wager of ten rose-nobles to as many silver reals of Spain, that +with this stanch Toledo I will overcome your vaunted Crichton +in close fight in any manner or practice of fence or digladiation +which he may appoint--sword and dagger, or sword only--stripped +to the girdle or armed to the teeth. By our Saint +Trinidad! I will have satisfaction for the contumelious affront +he hath put upon the very learned gymnasium to which I +belong; and it would gladden me to clip the wings of this loud-crowing +cock, or any of his dunghill crew," added he, with a +scornful gesture at the Scotsman.</p> + +<p>"If that be all you seek, you shall not need to go far in your +quest," returned Ogilvy. "Tarry till this controversy be ended, +and if I match not your Spanish blade with a Scottish broad-sword, +and approve you as recreant at heart as you are boastful +and injurious of speech, may Saint Andrew forever after withhold +from me his protection."</p> + +<p>"The Devil!" exclaimed the Spaniard. "Thy Scottish saint +will little avail thee, since thou hast incurred my indignation. +Betake thee, therefore, to thy paternosters, if thou has grace +withal to mutter them; for within the hour thou art assuredly +food for the kites of the Pré-aux-Clercs--sa-ha!"</p> + +<p>"Look to thyself, vile braggart!" rejoined Ogilvy, scornfully: +"I promise thee thou shalt need other intercession than thine +own to purchase safety at my hands."</p> + +<p>"Courage, Master Ogilvy," said the Englishman, "thou wilt +do well to slit the ears of this Spanish swashbuckler. I warrant +me he hides a craven spirit beneath that slashed <i>pourpoint</i>. +Thou art in the right, man, to make him eat his words. Be +this Crichton what he may, he is at least thy countryman, and +in part mine own."</p> + +<p>"And as such I will uphold him," said Ogilvy, "against any +odds."</p> + +<p>"Bravo! my valorous Don Diego Caravaja," said the Sorbonist, +slapping the Spaniard on the shoulder, and speaking in his +ear. "Shall these scurvy Scots carry all before them?--I warrant +me, no. We will make common cause against the whole +beggarly nation; and in the meanwhile we intrust thee with this +particular quarrel. See thou acquit thyself in it as beseemeth a +descendant of the Cid."</p> + +<p>"Account him already abased," returned Caravaja. "By Pelayo, +I would the other were at his back, that both might be +transfixed at a blow--ha!"</p> + +<p>"To return to the subject of difference," said the Sorbonist, +who was too much delighted with the prospect of a duel to allow +the quarrel a chance of subsiding, while it was in his power to +fan the flame; "to return to the difference," said he, aloud, +glancing at Ogilvy; "it must be conceded that as a wassailer this +Crichton is without a peer. None of us may presume to cope +with him in the matter of the flask and the flagon, though we +number among us some jolly topers. Friar John, with the +Priestess of Bacbuc, was a washy bibber compared with him."</p> + +<p>"He worships at the shrines of other priestesses besides hers +of Bacbuc, if I be not wrongly informed," added Montaigu, who +understood the drift of his companion.</p> + +<p>"Else, wherefore our rejoinder to his cartels?" returned the +Sorbonist. "Do you not call to mind that beneath his arrogant +defiance of our learned body, affixed to the walls of the Sorbonne, +it was written, 'That he who would behold this miracle +of learning must hie to the tavern or bordel?' Was it not so, +my hidalgo?"</p> + +<p>"I have myself seen him at the temulentive tavern of the +Falcon," returned Caravaja, "and at the lupanarian haunts in the +Champ Gaillard and the Val-d'Amour. You understand me--ha!"</p> + +<p>"Ha! ha! ha!" chorused the scholars. "James Crichton is +no stoic. He is a disciple of Epicurus. <i>Vel in puellam impingit, +vel in poculum</i>--ha! ha!"</p> + +<p>"'Tis said that he hath dealings with the Evil One," observed +the man of Harcourt, with a mysterious air; "and that, like +Jeanne d'Arc, he hath surrendered his soul for his temporal welfare. +Hence his wondrous lore; hence his supernatural beauty +and accomplishments; hence his power of fascinating the fair sex; +hence his constant run of luck with the dice; hence, also, his +invulnerableness to the sword."</p> + +<p>"'Tis said, also, that he has a familiar spirit, who attends him +in the semblance of a black dog," said Montaigu.</p> + +<p>"Or in that of a dwarf, like the sooty imp of Cosmo Ruggieri," +said Harcourt. "Is it not so?" he asked, turning to the +Scot.</p> + +<p>"He lies in his throat who says so," cried Ogilvy, losing all +patience. "To one and all of you I breathe defiance; and there +is not a brother in the college to which I belong who will not +maintain my quarrel."</p> + +<p>A loud laugh of derision followed this sally; and, ashamed of +having justly exposed himself to ridicule by his idle and unworthy +display of passion, the Scotsman held his peace and endeavored +to turn a deaf ear to their taunts.</p> + +<p>The gates of the College of Navarre were suddenly thrown +open, and a long-continued thunder of applause bursting from +within, announced the conclusion of the debate. That it had +terminated in favor of Crichton could no longer be doubted, as +his name formed the burden of all the plaudits with which the +courts were ringing. All was excitement: there was a general +movement. Ogilvy could no longer restrain himself. Pushing +forward by prodigious efforts, he secured himself a position at +the portal.</p> + +<p>The first person who presented himself to his inquiring eyes +was a gallant figure in a glittering steel corselet crossed by a +silken sash, who bore at his side a long sword with a magnificent +handle, and upon his shoulder a lance of some six feet in length, +headed with a long scarlet tassel, and brass half-moon pendant. +"Is not Crichton victorious?" asked Ogilvy of Captain Larchant, +for he it was.</p> + +<p>"He hath acquitted himself to admiration," replied the guardsman, +who, contrary to the custom of such gentry (for captains of +the guard have been fine gentlemen in all ages), did not appear +to be displeased at this appeal to his courtesy, "and the rector +hath adjudged him all the honors that can be bestowed by the +university."</p> + +<p>"Hurrah for old Scotland," shouted Ogilvy, throwing his +bonnet in the air; "I was sure it would be so; this is a day +worth living for. <i>Hoec olim meminisse juvabit</i>."</p> + +<p>"Thou at least shalt have reason to remember it," muttered +Caravaja, who, being opposite to him, heard the exclamation--"and +he too, perchance," he added, frowning gloomily, and drawing +his cloak over his shoulder.</p> + +<p>"If the noble Crichton be compatriot of yours, you are in +the right to be proud of him," replied Captain Larchant, "for +the memory of his deeds of this day will live as long as learning +shall be held in reverence. Never before hath such a marvelous +display of universal erudition been heard within these +schools. By my faith, I am absolutely wonder-stricken, and not +I alone, but all. In proof of which I need only tell you, that +coupling his matchless scholarship with his extraordinary accomplishments, +the professors in their address to him at the close +of the controversy have bestowed upon him the epithet of +'Admirable'--an appellation by which he will ever after be distinguished."</p> + +<p>"The Admirable Crichton!" echoed Ogilvy--"hear you that!--a +title adjudged to him by the whole conclave of the university--hurrah! +The Admirable Crichton! 'Tis a name will find +an echo in the heart of every true Scot. By Saint Andrew! this +is a proud day for us."</p> + +<p>"In the mean time," said Larchant, smiling at Ogilvy's exultations, +and describing a circle with the point of his lance, "I +must trouble you to stand back, Messieurs Scholars, and leave +free passage for the rector and his train--Archers advance, and +make clear the way, and let the companies of the Baron D'Epernon +and of the Vicomte de Joyeuse be summoned, as well as the +guard of his excellency, Seigneur René de Villequier. Patience, +messieurs, you will hear all particulars anon."</p> + +<p>So saying, he retired, and the men-at-arms, less complaisant +than their leaders, soon succeeded in forcing back the crowd.</p> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="MARK_AKENSIDE"></a>MARK AKENSIDE</h2> + +<h3>(1721-1770)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-m.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>ark Akenside is of less importance in genuine poetic rank +than in literary history. He was technically a real poet; +but he had not a great, a spontaneous, nor a fertile poetical +mind. Nevertheless, a writer who gave pleasure to a generation +cannot be set aside. The fact that the mid-eighteenth century ranked +him among its foremost poets is interesting +and still significant. It determines the +poetic standard and product of that age; +and the fact that, judged thus, Akenside +was fairly entitled to his fame.</p> + +<p class="lft"><img src="images/268.png" width="50%" alt=""></p> + +<p>He was the son of a butcher, born November +9th, 1721, in Newcastle-on-Tyne, +whence Eldon and Stowell also sprang. +He attracted great attention by an early +poem, 'The Virtuoso.' The citizens of that +commercial town have always appreciated +their great men and valued intellectual distinction, +and its Dissenters sent him at +their own expense to Edinburgh to study +for the Presbyterian ministry. A year later +he gave up theology for medicine--honorably repaying the money +advanced for his divinity studies, if obviously out of some one's else +pocket.</p> + +<p>After some struggle in provincial towns, his immense literary +reputation--for at twenty-four he was a star of the first magnitude +in Great Britain--and the generosity of a friend enabled him to acquire +a fashionable London practice. He wrote medical treatises +which at the time made him a leader in his profession, secured a +rich clientage, and prospered greatly. In 1759 he was made physician +to Christ's Hospital, where, however valued professionally, he is +charged with being brutal and offensive to the poor; with indulging +his fastidiousness, temper, and pomposity, and with forgetting that +he owed anything to mere duty or humanity.</p> + +<p>Unfortunately, too, Akenside availed himself of that mixture of +complaisance and arrogance by which almost alone a man of no birth +can rise in a society graded by birth. He concealed his origin and +was ashamed of his pedigree. But the blame for his flunkeyism +belongs, perhaps, less to him than to the insolent caste feeling of +society, which forced it on him as a measure of self-defense and of +advancement. He wanted money, loved place and selfish comfort, +and his nature did not balk at the means of getting them,--including +living on a friend when he did not need such help. To become +physician to the Queen, he turned his coat from Whig to Tory; but +no one familiar with the politics of the time will regard this as an +unusual offense. It must also be remembered that Akenside possessed +a delicate constitution, keen senses, and irritable nerves; and +that he was a parvenu, lacking the power of self-control even among +strangers. These traits explain, though they do not excuse, his bad +temper to the unclean and disagreeable patients of the hospital, and +they mitigate the fact that his industry was paralyzed by material +prosperity, and his self-culture interfered with by conceit. His early +and sweeping success injured him as many a greater man has been +thus injured.</p> + +<p>Moreover, his temper was probably soured by secret bitternesses. +His health, his nerves, an entire absence of the sense of humor, and +his lack of repartee, made him shun like Pope and Horace Walpole +the bibulous and gluttonous element of eighteenth-century British +society. For its brutal horseplay and uncivil practical joking which +passed for wit, Akenside had no tolerance, yet he felt unwilling to +go where he would be outshone by inferior men. His strutty arrogance +of manner, like excessive prudery in a woman, may have been +a fortification to a garrison too weak to fight in the open field. And +it must be admitted that, as so often happens, Akenside's outward +<i>ensemble</i> was eminently what the vulgar world terms "guyable." He +was not a little of a fop. He was plain-featured and yet assuming +in manner. He hobbled in walking from lameness of tell-tale origin,--a +cleaver falling on his foot in childhood, compelling him to wear +an artificial heel--and he was morbidly sensitive over it. His prim +formality of manner, his sword and stiff-curled wig, his small and +sickly face trying to maintain an expression impressively dignified, +made him a ludicrous figure, which his contemporaries never tired +of ridiculing and caricaturing. Henderson, the actor, said that "Akenside, +when he walked the streets, looked for all the world like one +of his own Alexandrines set upright." Smollett even used him as +a model for the pedantic doctor in 'Peregrine Pickle,' who gives a +dinner in the fashion of the ancients, and dresses each dish according +to humorous literary recipes.</p> + +<p>But there were those who seem to have known an inner and superior +personality beneath the brusqueness, conceit, and policy, beyond +the nerves and fears; and they valued it greatly, at least on the +intellectual side. A wealthy and amiable young Londoner, Jeremiah +Dyson, remained a friend so enduring and admiring as to give the +poet a house in Bloomsbury Square, with £300 a year and a chariot, +and personally to extend his medical practice. We cannot suppose +this to be a case of patron and parasite. Other men of judgment +showed like esteem. And in congenial society, Akenside was his best +and therefore truest self. He was an easy and even brilliant talker, +displaying learning and immense memory, taste, and philosophic reflection; +and as a volunteer critic he has the unique distinction of a +man who had what books he liked given him by the publishers for +the sake of his oral comments!</p> + +<p>The standard edition of Akenside's poems is that edited by Alexander +Dyce (London, 1835). Few of them require notice here. His +early effort, 'The Virtuoso,' was merely an acknowledged and servile +imitation of Spenser. The claim made by the poet's biographers +that he preceded Thomson in reintroducing the Spenserian stanza is +groundless. Pope preceded him, and Thomson renewed its popularity +by being the first to use it in a poem of real merit, 'The +Castle of Indolence.' Mr. Gosse calls the 'Hymn to the Naiads' +"beautiful,"--"of transcendent merit,"--"perhaps the most elegant +of his productions." The 'Epistle to Curio,' however, must be held +his best poem,--doubtless because it is the only one which came +from his heart; and even its merit is much more in rhetorical energy +than in art or beauty. As to its allusion and object, the real and +classic Curio of Roman social history was a protégé of Cicero's, a rich +young Senator, who began as a champion of liberty and then sold +himself to Caesar to pay his debts. In Akenside's poem, Curio represents +William Pulteney, Walpole's antagonist, the hope of that younger +generation who hated Walpole's system of parliamentary corruption +and official jobbing. This party had looked to Pulteney for a clean +and public-spirited administration. Their hero was carried to a brief +triumph on the wave of their enthusiasm. But Pulteney disappointed +them bitterly: he took a peerage, and sunk into utter and permanent +political damnation, with no choice but Walpole's methods and +tools, no policy save Walpole's to redeem the withdrawal of so much +lofty promise, and no aims but personal advancement. From Akenside's +address to him, the famous 'Epistle to Curio,' a citation is +made below. Akenside's fame, however, rests on the 'Pleasures of +the Imagination.' He began it at seventeen; though in the case of +works begun in childhood, it is safer to accept the date of finishing +as the year of the real composition. He published it six years later, +in 1744, on the advice and with the warm admiration of Pope, a man +never wasteful of encomiums on the poetry of his contemporaries. It +raised its author to immediate fame. It secures him a place among +the accepted English classics still. Yet neither its thought nor its +style makes the omission to read it any irreparable loss. It is cultivated +rhetoric rather than true poetry. Its chief merit and highest +usefulness are that it suggested two far superior poems, Campbell's +'Pleasures of Hope' and Rogers's 'Pleasures of Memory.' It is the +relationship to these that really keeps Akenside's alive.</p> + +<p>In scope, the poem consists of two thousand lines of blank verse. +It is distributed in three books. The first defines the sources, methods, +and results of imagination; the second its distinction from philosophy +and its enchantment by the passions; the third sets forth +the power of imagination to give pleasure, and illustrates its mental +operation. The author remodeled the poem in 1757, but it is generally +agreed that he injured it. Macaulay says he spoiled it, and +another critic delightfully observes that he "stuffed it with intellectual +horsehair."</p> + +<p>The year of Akenside's death (1770) gave birth to Wordsworth. +The freer and nobler natural school of poetry came to supplant the +artificial one, belonging to an epoch of wigs and false calves, and to +open toward the far greater one of the romanticism of Scott and +Byron.</p> +<br><br> + +<blockquote> +<h3><a name="FROM_THE_EPISTLE_TO_CURIO"></a>FROM THE EPISTLE TO CURIO</h3> + +[With this earlier and finer form of Akenside's address to the unstable +Pulteney (see biographical sketch above) must not be confused its later +embodiment among his odes; of which it is 'IX: to Curio.' Much of its +thought and diction were transferred to the Ode named; but the latter by no +means happily compares with the original 'Epistle.' Both versions, however, +are of the same year, 1744.]<br><br> + +Thrice has the spring beheld thy faded fame,<br> +And the fourth winter rises on thy shame,<br> +Since I exulting grasped the votive shell.<br> +In sounds of triumph all thy praise to tell;<br> +Blest could my skill through ages make thee shine,<br> +And proud to mix my memory with thine.<br> +But now the cause that waked my song before,<br> +With praise, with triumph, crowns the toil no more.<br> +If to the glorious man whose faithful cares,<br> +Nor quelled by malice, nor relaxed by years,<br> +Had awed Ambition's wild audacious hate,<br> +And dragged at length Corruption to her fate;<br> +If every tongue its large applauses owed,<br> +And well-earned laurels every muse bestowed;<br> +If public Justice urged the high reward,<br> +And Freedom smiled on the devoted bard:<br> +Say then,--to him whose levity or lust<br> +Laid all a people's generous hopes in dust,<br> +Who taught Ambition firmer heights of power<br> +And saved Corruption at her hopeless hour,<br> +Does not each tongue its execrations owe?<br> +Shall not each Muse a wreath of shame bestow?<br> +And public Justice sanctify the award?<br> +And Freedom's hand protect the impartial bard?<br> +<br> +There are who say they viewed without amaze<br> +The sad reverse of all thy former praise;<br> +That through the pageants of a patriot's name,<br> +They pierced the foulness of thy secret aim;<br> +Or deemed thy arm exalted but to throw<br> +The public thunder on a private foe.<br> +But I, whose soul consented to thy cause,<br> +Who felt thy genius stamp its own applause,<br> +Who saw the spirits of each glorious age<br> +Move in thy bosom, and direct thy rage,--<br> +I scorned the ungenerous gloss of slavish minds,<br> +The owl-eyed race, whom Virtue's lustre blinds.<br> +Spite of the learned in the ways of vice,<br> +And all who prove that each man has his price,<br> +I still believed thy end was just and free;<br> +And yet, even yet believe it--spite of thee.<br> +Even though thy mouth impure has dared disclaim,<br> +Urged by the wretched impotence of shame,<br> +Whatever filial cares thy zeal had paid<br> +To laws infirm, and liberty decayed;<br> +Has begged Ambition to forgive the show;<br> +Has told Corruption thou wert ne'er her foe;<br> +Has boasted in thy country's awful ear,<br> +Her gross delusion when she held thee dear;<br> +How tame she followed thy tempestuous call,<br> +And heard thy pompous tales, and trusted all--<br> +Rise from your sad abodes, ye curst of old<br> +For laws subverted, and for cities sold!<br> +Paint all the noblest trophies of your guilt,<br> +The oaths you perjured, and the blood you spilt;<br> +Yet must you one untempted vileness own,<br> +One dreadful palm reserved for him alone:<br> +With studied arts his country's praise to spurn,<br> +To beg the infamy he did not earn,<br> +To challenge hate when honor was his due,<br> +And plead his crimes where all his virtue knew.<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"><br> +When they who, loud for liberty and laws,<br> +In doubtful times had fought their country's cause,<br> +When now of conquest and dominion sure,<br> +They sought alone to hold their fruit secure;<br> +When taught by these, Oppression hid the face,<br> +To leave Corruption stronger in her place,<br> +By silent spells to work the public fate,<br> +And taint the vitals of the passive state,<br> +Till healing Wisdom should avail no more,<br> +And Freedom loath to tread the poisoned shore:<br> +Then, like some guardian god that flies to save<br> +The weary pilgrim from an instant grave,<br> +Whom, sleeping and secure, the guileful snake<br> +Steals near and nearer thro' the peaceful brake,--<br> +Then Curio rose to ward the public woe,<br> +To wake the heedless and incite the slow,<br> +Against Corruption Liberty to arm.<br> +And quell the enchantress by a mightier charm.<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"><br> +Lo! the deciding hour at last appears;<br> +The hour of every freeman's hopes and fears!<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"><br> +See Freedom mounting her eternal throne,<br> +The sword submitted, and the laws her own!<br> +See! public Power, chastised, beneath her stands,<br> +With eyes intent, and uncorrupted hands!<br> +See private life by wisest arts reclaimed!<br> +See ardent youth to noblest manners framed!<br> +See us acquire whate'er was sought by you,<br> +If Curio, only Curio will be true.<br> +<br> +'Twas then--O shame! O trust how ill repaid!<br> +O Latium, oft by faithless sons betrayed!--<br> +'Twas then--What frenzy on thy reason stole?<br> +What spells unsinewed thy determined soul?--<br> +Is this the man in Freedom's cause approved?<br> +The man so great, so honored, so beloved?<br> +This patient slave by tinsel chains allured?<br> +This wretched suitor for a boon abjured?<br> +This Curio, hated and despised by all?<br> +Who fell himself to work his country's fall?<br> +<br> +O lost, alike to action and repose!<br> +Unknown, unpitied in the worst of woes!<br> +With all that conscious, undissembled pride,<br> +Sold to the insults of a foe defied!<br> +With all that habit of familiar fame,<br> +Doomed to exhaust the dregs of life in shame!<br> +The sole sad refuge of thy baffled art<br> +To act a stateman's dull, exploded part,<br> +Renounce the praise no longer in thy power,<br> +Display thy virtue, though without a dower,<br> +Contemn the giddy crowd, the vulgar wind,<br> +And shut thy eyes that others may be blind.<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"><br> +O long revered, and late resigned to shame!<br> +If this uncourtly page thy notice claim<br> +When the loud cares of business are withdrawn,<br> +Nor well-drest beggars round thy footsteps fawn;<br> +In that still, thoughtful, solitary hour,<br> +When Truth exerts her unresisted power,<br> +Breaks the false optics tinged with fortune's glare,<br> +Unlocks the breast, and lays the passions bare:<br> +Then turn thy eyes on that important scene,<br> +And ask thyself--if all be well within.<br> +Where is the heart-felt worth and weight of soul,<br> +Which labor could not stop, nor fear control?<br> +Where the known dignity, the stamp of awe,<br> +Which, half abashed, the proud and venal saw?<br> +Where the calm triumphs of an honest cause?<br> +Where the delightful taste of just applause?<br> +Where the strong reason, the commanding tongue,<br> +On which the Senate fired or trembling hung!<br> +All vanished, all are sold--and in their room,<br> +Couched in thy bosom's deep, distracted gloom,<br> +See the pale form of barbarous Grandeur dwell,<br> +Like some grim idol in a sorcerer's cell!<br> +To her in chains thy dignity was led;<br> +At her polluted shrine thy honour bled;<br> +With blasted weeds thy awful brow she crowned,<br> +Thy powerful tongue with poisoned philters bound,<br> +That baffled Reason straight indignant flew,<br> +And fair Persuasion from her seat withdrew:<br> +For now no longer Truth supports thy cause;<br> +No longer Glory prompts thee to applause;<br> +No longer Virtue breathing in thy breast,<br> +With all her conscious majesty confest,<br> +Still bright and brighter wakes the almighty flame,<br> +To rouse the feeble, and the willful tame,<br> +And where she sees the catching glimpses roll,<br> +Spreads the strong blaze, and all involves the soul;<br> +But cold restraints thy conscious fancy chill,<br> +And formal passions mock thy struggling will;<br> +Or, if thy Genius e'er forget his chain,<br> +And reach impatient at a nobler strain,<br> +Soon the sad bodings of contemptuous mirth<br> +Shoot through thy breast, and stab the generous birth,<br> +Till, blind with smart, from truth to frenzy tost,<br> +And all the tenor of thy reason lost,<br> +Perhaps thy anguish drains a real tear;<br> +While some with pity, some with laughter hear.<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"><br> +Ye mighty foes of liberty and rest,<br> +Give way, do homage to a mightier guest!<br> +Ye daring spirits of the Roman race,<br> +See Curio's toil your proudest claims efface!--<br> +Awed at the name, fierce Appius rising bends,<br> +And hardy Cinna from his throne attends:<br> +"He comes," they cry, "to whom the fates assigned<br> +With surer arts to work what we designed,<br> +From year to year the stubborn herd to sway,<br> +Mouth all their wrongs, and all their rage obey;<br> +Till owned their guide and trusted with their power,<br> +He mocked their hopes in one decisive hour;<br> +Then, tired and yielding, led them to the chain,<br> +And quenched the spirit we provoked in vain."<br> +But thou, Supreme, by whose eternal hands<br> +Fair Liberty's heroic empire stands;<br> +Whose thunders the rebellious deep control,<br> +And quell the triumphs of the traitor's soul,<br> +O turn this dreadful omen far away!<br> +On Freedom's foes their own attempts repay;<br> +Relume her sacred fire so near suppressed,<br> +And fix her shrine in every Roman breast:<br> +Though bold corruption boast around the land,<br> +"Let virtue, if she can, my baits withstand!"<br> +Though bolder now she urge the accursed claim,<br> +Gay with her trophies raised on Curio's shame;<br> +Yet some there are who scorn her impious mirth,<br> +Who know what conscience and a heart are worth.<br> +</blockquote> +<br><br> + +<blockquote> +<b><a name="ASPIRATIONS_AFTER_THE_INFINITE"></a>ASPIRATIONS AFTER THE INFINITE</b> +<br><br> +From (Pleasures of the Imagination)<br> +<br> +Who that, from Alpine heights, his laboring eye<br> +Shoots round the wide horizon, to survey<br> +Nilus or Ganges rolling his bright wave<br> +Thro' mountains, plains, thro' empires black with shade,<br> +And continents of sand, will turn his gaze<br> +To mark the windings of a scanty rill<br> +That murmurs at his feet? The high-born soul<br> +Disdains to rest her heaven-aspiring wing<br> +Beneath its native quarry. Tired of earth<br> +And this diurnal scene, she springs aloft<br> +Through fields of air; pursues the flying storm;<br> +Rides on the volleyed lightning through the heavens;<br> +Or, yoked with whirlwinds and the northern blast,<br> +Sweeps the long tract of day. Then high she soars<br> +The blue profound, and, hovering round the sun,<br> +Beholds him pouring the redundant stream<br> +Of light; beholds his unrelenting sway<br> +Bend the reluctant planets to absolve<br> +The fated rounds of Time. Thence, far effused,<br> +She darts her swiftness up the long career<br> +Of devious comets; through its burning signs<br> +Exulting measures the perennial wheel<br> +Of Nature, and looks back on all the stars,<br> +Whose blended light, as with a milky zone,<br> +Invests the orient. Now, amazed she views<br> +The empyreal waste, where happy spirits hold<br> +Beyond this concave heaven, their calm abode;<br> +And fields of radiance, whose unfading light<br> +Has traveled the profound six thousand years,<br> +Nor yet arrived in sight of mortal things.<br> +Even on the barriers of the world, untired<br> +She meditates the eternal depth below;<br> +Till half-recoiling, down the headlong steep<br> +She plunges; soon o'erwhelmed and swallowed up<br> +In that immense of being. There her hopes<br> +Rest at the fated goal. For from the birth<br> +Of mortal man, the sovereign Maker said,<br> +That not in humble nor in brief delight,<br> +Nor in the fading echoes of Renown,<br> +Power's purple robes, nor Pleasure's flowery lap,<br> +The soul should find enjoyment: but from these<br> +Turning disdainful to an equal good,<br> +Through all the ascent of things enlarge her view,<br> +Till every bound at length should disappear,<br> +And infinite perfection close the scene.<br> +</blockquote> +<br><br> + +<blockquote> +<b><a name="ON_A_SERMON_AGAINST_GLORY"></a>ON A SERMON AGAINST GLORY</b><br> +<br> +Come then, tell me, sage divine,<br> +Is it an offense to own<br> +That our bosoms e'er incline<br> +Toward immortal Glory's throne?<br> +For with me nor pomp nor pleasure,<br> +Bourbon's might, Braganza's treasure,<br> + So can Fancy's dream rejoice,<br> + So conciliate Reason's choice,<br> +As one approving word of her impartial voice.<br> +<br> + If to spurn at noble praise<br> + Be the passport to thy heaven,<br> + Follow thou those gloomy ways:<br> + No such law to me was given,<br> + Nor, I trust, shall I deplore me<br> + Faring like my friends before me;<br> + Nor an holier place desire<br> + Than Timoleon's arms acquire,<br> +And Tully's curule chair, and Milton's golden lyre.<br> +<br> +</blockquote> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="PEDRO_ANTONIO_DE_ALARCON"></a>PEDRO ANTONIO DE ALARCÓN</h2> + +<h3>(1833-1891)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-t.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>his novelist, poet, and politician was born at Guadix, in Spain, +near Granada, March 10th, 1833, and received his early training +in the seminary of his native city. His family destined +him for the Church; but he was averse to that profession, subsequently +studied law and modern languages at the University of +Granada, and took pains to cultivate his natural love for literature +and poetry. In 1853 he established at Cadiz the literary review Eco +del Occidente (Echo of the West). Greatly interested in politics, he +joined a democratic club with headquarters at Madrid. During the +revolution of 1854 he published El Látigo (The Whip), a pamphlet in +which he satirized the government. The spirit of adventure being +always strong in him, he joined the African campaign under O'Donnell +in 1859.</p> + +<p>His next occupation was the editorship of the journals La Epoca +and La Politica. Condemned to a brief period of exile as one of the +signers of a protest of Unionist deputies, he passed this time in +Paris. Shortly after his return he became involved in the revolution +of 1868, but without incurring personal disaster. After Alfonso XII. +came to the throne in 1875, he was appointed Councilor of State.</p> + +<p>It was in the domain of letters, however, and more especially as a +novelist, that he won his most enduring laurels. In 1855 he produced +'EL Final de Norma' (The End of Norma), which was his first +romance of importance. Four years later he began to publish that +series of notable novels which brought him fame, both at home and +abroad. The list includes 'EL Sombrero de Tres Picos' (The Three-Cornered +Hat), a charming <i>genre</i> sketch famous for its pungent wit +and humor, and its clever portraiture of provincial life in Spain at +the beginning of this century; 'La Alpujarra'; 'EL Escándalo' (The +Scandal), a story which at once created a profound sensation because +of its ultramontane cast and opposition to prevalent scientific opinion; +'El Niño de la Bola' (The Child of the Ball), thought by many to be +his masterpiece; 'El Capitán Veneno' (Captain Veneno); 'Novelas +Cortas' (Short Stories), 3 vols.; and 'La Pródiga' (The Prodigal). +Alarcón is also favorably known as poet, dramatic critic, and an +incisive and effective writer of general prose.</p> + +<p>His other publications comprise:--'Diario de un Testigo de la +Guerra de Africa' (Journal of a Witness of the African War), a work +which is said to have netted the publishers a profit of three million +pesetas ($600,000); 'De Madrid à Nápoles' (from Madrid to Naples); +'Poesias Serias y Humorísticas' (Serious and Humorous Poems); +'Judicios Literários y Artísticos' (Literary and Artistic Critiques); +'Viages por España' (Travels through Spain); 'El Hijo Pródigo' +(The Prodigal Son), a drama for children; and 'Ultimos Escritos' +(Last Writings). Alarcón was elected a member of the Spanish +Academy December 15th, 1875. Many of his novels have been translated +into English and French. He died July 20th, 1891.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="A_WOMAN_VIEWED_FROM_WITHOUT"></a>A WOMAN VIEWED FROM WITHOUT</h3> +<center>From 'The Three-Cornered Hat'</center> + +<p>The last and perhaps the most powerful reason which the +quality of the city--clergy as well as laymen, beginning +with the bishop and the corregidor--had for visiting the +mill so often in the afternoon, was to admire there at leisure one +of the most beautiful, graceful, and admirable works that ever +left the hands of the Creator: called Seña [Mrs.] Frasquita. Let +us begin by assuring you that Seña Frasquita was the lawful +spouse of Uncle Luke, and an honest woman; of which fact all +the illustrious visitors of the mill were well aware. Indeed, none +of them ever seemed to gaze on her with sinful eyes or doubtful +purpose. They all admired her, indeed, and sometimes paid her +compliments,--the friars as well as the cavaliers, the prebendaries +as well as the magistrate,--as a prodigy of beauty, an +honor to her Creator, and as a coquettish and mischievous sprite, +who innocently enlivened the most melancholy of spirits. "She +is a handsome creature," the most virtuous prelate used to say. +"She looks like an ancient Greek statue," remarked a learned +advocate, who was an Academician and corresponding member on +history. "She is the very image of Eve," broke forth the prior +of the Franciscans. "She is a fine woman," exclaimed the colonel +of militia. "She is a serpent, a witch, a siren, an imp," added the +corregidor. "But she is a good woman, an angel, a lovely creature, +and as innocent as a child four years old," all agreed in +saying on leaving the mill, crammed with grapes or nuts, on their +way to their dull and methodical homes.</p> + +<p>This four-year-old child, that is to say, Frasquita, was nearly +thirty years old, and almost six feet high, strongly built in proportion, +and even a little stouter than exactly corresponded to her +majestic figure. She looked like a gigantic Niobe, though she +never had any children; she seemed like a female Hercules, or +like a Roman matron, the sort of whom there are still copies to +be seen in the Rioni Trastevere. But the most striking feature +was her mobility, her agility, her animation, and the grace of her +rather large person.</p> + +<p>For resemblance to a statue, to which the Academician compared +her, she lacked statuesque repose. She bent her body like +a reed, or spun around like a weather-vane, or danced like a top. +Her features possessed even greater mobility, and in consequence +were even less statuesque. They were lighted up beautifully by +five dimples: two on one cheek, one on the other, another very +small one near the left side of her roguish lips, and the last--and +a very big one--in the cleft of her rounded chin. Add to +these charms her sly or roguish glances, her pretty pouts, and the +various attitudes of her head, with which she emphasized her +talk, and you will have some idea of that face full of vivacity +and beauty, and always radiant with health and happiness.</p> + +<p>Neither Uncle Luke nor Seña Frasquita was Andalusian by +birth: she came from Navarre, and he from Murcia. He went +to the city of ---- when he was but fifteen years old, as half +page, half servant of the bishop, the predecessor of the present +incumbent of that diocese. He was brought up for the Church +by his patron, who, perhaps on that account, so that he might +not lack competent maintenance, bequeathed him the mill in his +will. But Uncle Luke, who had received only the lesser orders +when the bishop died, cast off his ecclesiastical garb at once and +enlisted as a soldier; for he felt more anxious to see the world +and to lead a life of adventure than to say mass or grind corn. +He went through the campaign of the Western Provinces in +1793, as the orderly of the brave General Ventura Caro; he was +present at the siege of the Castle of Piñon, and remained a long +time in the Northern Provinces, when he finally quitted the service. +In Estella he became acquainted with Seña Frasquita, who +was then simply called Frasquita; made love to her, married +her, and carried her to Andalusia to take possession of the mill, +where they were to live so peaceful and happy during the rest +of their pilgrimage through this vale of tears.</p> + +<p>When Frasquita was taken from Navarre to that lonely place +she had not yet acquired any Andalusian ways, and was very +different from the countrywomen in that vicinity. She dressed +with greater simplicity, greater freedom, grace, and elegance +than they did. She bathed herself oftener; and allowed the sun +and air to caress her bare arms and uncovered neck. To a certain +extent she wore the style of dress worn by the gentlewomen +of that period; like that of the women in Goya's pictures, and +somewhat of the fashion worn by Queen Maria Louisa: if not +exactly so scant, yet so short that it showed her small feet, and +the commencement of her superb limbs; her bodice was low, +and round in the neck, according to the style in Madrid, where +she spent two months with her Luke on their way from Navarre +to Andalusia. She dressed her hair high on the top of her head, +displaying thus both the graceful curve of her snowy neck and +the shape of her pretty head. She wore earrings in her small +ears, and the taper fingers of her rough but clean hands were +covered with rings. Lastly, Frasquita's voice was as sweet as a +flute, and her laugh was so merry and so silvery it seemed like +the ringing of bells on Saturday of Glory or Easter Eve.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="HOW_THE_ORPHAN_MANUEL_GAINED_HIS_SOBRIQUET"></a>HOW THE ORPHAN MANUEL GAINED HIS SOBRIQUET</h3> +<center>From 'The Child of the Ball'</center> + +<p>The unfortunate boy seemed to have turned to ice from the +cruel and unexpected blows of fate; he contracted a death-like +pallor, which he never again lost. No one paid any +attention to the unhappy child in the first moments of his +anguish, or noticed that he neither groaned, sighed, nor wept. +When at last they went to him they found him convulsed and +rigid, like a petrifaction of grief; although he walked about, +heard and saw, and covered his wounded and dying father with +kisses. But he shed not a single tear, either during the death +agony of that beloved being, when he kissed the cold face after +it was dead, or when he saw them carry the body away forever; +nor when he left the house in which he had been born, and +found himself sheltered by charity in the house of a stranger. +Some praised his courage, others criticized his callousness. +Mothers pitied him profoundly, instinctively divining the cruel +tragedy that was being enacted in the orphan's heart for want +of some tender and compassionate being to make him weep by +weeping with him.</p> + +<p>Nor did Manuel utter a single word from the moment he +saw his beloved father brought in dying. He made no answer +to the affectionate questions asked him by Don Trinidad after the +latter had taken him home; and the sound of his voice was never +heard during the first three years which he spent in the holy +company of the priest. Everybody thought by this time that +he would remain dumb forever, when one day, in the church of +which his protector was the priest, the sacristan observed him +standing before a beautiful image of the "Child of the Ball," +and heard him saying in melancholy accents:--</p> + +<p>"Child Jesus, why do you not speak either?"</p> + +<p>Manuel was saved. The drowning boy had raised his head +above the engulfing waters of his grief. His life was no longer +in danger. So at least it was believed in the parish.</p> + +<p>Toward strangers--from whom, whenever they came in contact +with him, he always received demonstrations of pity and +kindness--the orphan continued to maintain the same glacial +reserve as before, rebuffing them with the phrase, stereotyped on +his disdainful lips, "Let me alone, now;" having said which, in +tones of moving entreaty, he would go on his way, not without +awakening superstitious feelings in the minds of the persons +whom he thus shunned.</p> + +<p>Still less did he lay aside, at this saving crisis, the profound +sadness and precocious austerity of his character, or the obstinate +persistence with which he clung to certain habits. These were +limited, thus far, to accompanying the priest to the church; +gathering flowers or aromatic herbs to adorn the image of the +"Child of the Ball," before which he would spend hour after +hour, plunged in a species of ecstasy; and climbing the neighboring +mountain in search of those herbs and flowers, when, owing +to the severity of the heat or cold, they were not to be found in +the fields.</p> + +<p>This adoration, while in consonance with the religious principles +instilled into him from the cradle by his father, greatly +exceeded what is usual even in the most devout. It was a +fraternal and submissive love, like that which he had entertained +for his father; it was a confused mixture of familiarity, protection, +and idolatry, very similar to the feeling which the +mothers of men of genius entertain for their illustrious sons; it +was the respectful and protecting tenderness which the strong +warrior bestows on the youthful prince; it was an identification +of himself with the image; it was pride; it was elation as for a +personal good. It seemed as if this image symbolized for him +his tragic fate, his noble origin, his early orphanhood, his poverty, +his cares, the injustice of men, his solitary state in the world, +and perhaps too some presentiment of his future sufferings.</p> + +<p>Probably nothing of all this was clear at the time to the mind +of the hapless boy, but something resembling it must have been +the tumult of confused thoughts that palpitated in the depths of +that childlike, unwavering, absolute, and exclusive devotion. For +him there was neither God nor the Virgin, neither saints nor +angels; there was only the "Child of the Ball," not with relation +to any profound mystery, but in himself, in his present form, +with his artistic figure, his dress of gold tissue, his crown of +false stones, his blonde head, his charming countenance, and the +blue-painted globe which he held in his hand, and which was +surmounted by a little silver-gilt cross, in sign of the redemption +of the world.</p> + +<p>And this was the cause and reason why the acolytes of Santa +María de la Cabéza first, all the boys of the town afterward, and +finally the more respectable and sedate persons, bestowed on +Manuel the extraordinary name of "The Child of the Ball": we +know not whether by way of applause of such vehement idolatry, +and to commit him, as it were, to the protection of the Christ-Child +himself; or as a sarcastic antiphrasis,--seeing that this +appellation is sometimes used in the place as a term of comparison +for the happiness of the very fortunate; or as a prophecy +of the valor for which the son of Venegas was to be one day +celebrated, and the terror he was to inspire,--since the most +hyperbolical expression that can be employed in that district, to +extol the bravery and power of any one, is to say that "she does +not fear even the 'Child of the Ball.'"</p> + +<p>Selections used by permission of Cassell Publishing Company</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="ALCAEUS"></a>ALCAEUS</h2> + +<h3>(Sixth Century B.C.)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-a.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>lcaeus, a contemporary of the more famous poet whom he +addressed as "violet-crowned, pure, sweetly-smiling Sappho," +was a native of Mitylene in Lesbos. His period of work +fell probably between 610 and 580 B.C. At this time his native +town was disturbed by an unceasing contention for power between +the aristocracy and the people; and Alcaeus, +through the vehemence of his zeal +and his ambition, was among the leaders +of the warring faction. By the accidents +of birth and education he was an aristocrat, +and in politics he was what is now +called a High Tory. With his brothers, +Cicis and Antimenidas, two influential +young nobles as arrogant and haughty +as himself, he resented and opposed the +slightest concession to democracy. He +was a stout soldier, but he threw away +his arms at Ligetum when he saw that +his side was beaten, and afterward wrote +a poem on this performance, apparently not in the least mortified by +the recollection. Horace speaks of the matter, and laughingly confesses +his own like misadventure.</p> + +<p class="lft"><img src="images/284.png" width="50%" alt=""></p> + +<p>When the kindly Pittacus was chosen dictator, he was compelled +to banish the swashbuckling brothers for their abuse of him. But +when Alcaeus chanced to be taken prisoner, Pittacus set him free, +remarking that "forgiveness is better than revenge." The irreconcilable +poet spent his exile in Egypt, and there he may have seen +the Greek oligarch who lent his sword to Nebuchadnezzar, and whom +he greeted in a poem, a surviving fragment of which is thus paraphrased +by John Addington Symonds:--</p> + +<blockquote> +From the ends of the earth thou art come,<br> +Back to thy home;<br> +The ivory hilt of thy blade<br> +With gold is embossed and inlaid;<br> +Since for Babylon's host a great deed<br> +Thou didst work in their need,<br> +Slaying a warrior, an athlete of might,<br> +Royal, whose height<br> +Lacked of five cubits one span--<br> +A terrible man.<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>Alcaeus is reputed to have been in love with Sappho, the glorious, +but only a line or two survives to confirm the tale. Most of his +lyrics, like those of his fellow-poets, seem to have been drinking +songs, combined, says Symonds, with reflections upon life, and +appropriate descriptions of the different seasons. "No time was +amiss for drinking, to his mind: the heat of summer, the cold of +winter, the blazing dog-star and the driving tempest, twilight with +its cheerful gleam of lamps, mid-day with its sunshine--all suggest +reasons for indulging in the cup. Not that we are justified in +fancying Alcaeus a mere vulgar toper: he retained Aeolian sumptuousness +in his pleasures, and raised the art of drinking to an aesthetic +attitude."</p> + +<p>Alcaeus composed in the Aeolic dialect; for the reason, it is said, +that it was more familiar to his hearers. After his death his poems +were collected and divided into ten books. Bergk has included the +fragments--and one of his compositions has come down to us entire--his +'Poetae Lyrici Graeci.'</p> + +<p>His love of political strife and military glory led him to the +composition of a class of poems which the ancients called 'Stasiotica' +(Songs of Sedition). To this class belong his descriptions of the +furnishing of his palace, and many of the fragments preserved to us. +Besides those martial poems, he composed hymns to the gods, and +love and convivial songs.</p> + +<p>His verses are subjective and impassioned. They are outbursts of +the poet's own feeling, his own peculiar expression toward the world +in which he lived; and it is this quality that gave them their +strength and their celebrity. His metres were lively, and the care +which he expended upon his strophes has led to the naming of one +metre the 'Alcaic.' Horace testifies (Odes ii. 13, ii. 26, etc.), to the +power of his master.</p> + +<p>The first selection following is a fragment from his 'Stasiotica.' +It is a description of the splendor of his palace before "the work +of war began."</p> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="THE_PALACE"></a>THE PALACE</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>From roof to roof the spacious palace halls</p> +<p class="i4">Glitter with war's array;</p> +<p>With burnished metal clad, the lofty walls</p> +<p class="i4">Beam like the bright noonday.</p> +<p>There white-plumed helmets hang from many a nail,</p> +<p class="i4">Above, in threatening row;</p> +<p>Steel-garnished tunics and broad coats of mail</p> +<p class="i4">Spread o'er the space below.</p> +<p>Chalcidian blades enow, and belts are here,</p> +<p class="i4">Greaves and emblazoned shields;</p> +<p>Well-tried protectors from the hostile spear,</p> +<p class="i4">On other battlefields.</p> +<p>With these good helps our work of war's begun,</p> +<p class="i4">With these our victory must be won.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">Translation of Colonel Mure.<br> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="A_BANQUET_SONG"></a>A BANQUET SONG</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The rain of Zeus descends, and from high heaven</p> +<p class="i4">A storm is driven:</p> +<p>And on the running water-brooks the cold</p> +<p class="i4">Lays icy hold;</p> +<p>Then up: beat down the winter; make the fire</p> +<p class="i4">Blaze high and higher;</p> +<p>Mix wine as sweet as honey of the bee</p> +<p class="i4">Abundantly;</p> +<p>Then drink with comfortable wool around</p> +<p class="i4">Your temples bound.</p> +<p>We must not yield our hearts to woe, or wear</p> +<p class="i4">With wasting care;</p> +<p>For grief will profit us no whit, my friend,</p> +<p class="i4">Nor nothing mend;</p> +<p>But this is our best medicine, with wine fraught</p> +<p class="i4">To cast out thought.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">Translation of J. A. Symonds.</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="AN_INVITATION"></a>AN INVITATION</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Why wait we for the torches' lights?</p> +<p class="i2">Now let us drink while day invites.</p> +<p class="i2">In mighty flagons hither bring</p> +<p class="i1">The deep-red blood of many a vine,</p> +<p>That we may largely quaff, and sing</p> +<p class="i2">The praises of the god of wine,</p> +<p class="i2">The son of Jove and Semele,</p> +<p class="i2">Who gave the jocund grape to be</p> +<p>A sweet oblivion to our woes.</p> +<p class="i1">Fill, fill the goblet--one and two:</p> +<p>Let every brimmer, as it flows,</p> +<p class="i1">In sportive chase, the last pursue.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">Translation of Sir William Jones.</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="THE_STORM"></a>THE STORM</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Now here, now there, the wild waves sweep,</p> +<p class="i1">Whilst we, betwixt them o'er the deep,</p> +<p class="i1">In shatter'd tempest-beaten bark,</p> +<p>With laboring ropes are onward driven,</p> +<p class="i1">The billows dashing o'er our dark</p> +<p>Upheavèd deck--in tatters riven</p> +<p class="i1">Our sails--whose yawning rents between</p> +<p class="i1">The raging sea and sky are seen.</p> +<br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br> +<p>Loose from their hold our anchors burst,</p> +<p class="i1">And then the third, the fatal wave</p> +<p>Comes rolling onward like the first,</p> +<p class="i1">And doubles all our toil to save.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">Translation of Sir William Jones.</p> +</div></div> +<br> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="THE_POOR_FISHERMAN"></a>THE POOR FISHERMAN</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The fisher Diotimus had, at sea</p> +<p>And shore, the same abode of poverty--</p> +<p>His trusty boat;--and when his days were spent,</p> +<p>Therein self-rowed to ruthless Dis he went;</p> +<p>For that, which did through life his woes beguile,</p> +<p>Supplied the old man with a funeral pile.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">Translation of Sir William Jones.</p> +</div></div> +<br> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="THE_STATE"></a>THE STATE</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>What constitutes a State?</p> +<p class="i2">Not high-raised battlement, or labored mound,</p> +<p class="i4">Thick wall or moated gate;</p> +<p>Not cities fair, with spires and turrets crown'd;</p> +<p class="i4">No:--Men, high-minded men,</p> +<p>With powers as far above dull brutes endued</p> +<p class="i4">In forest, brake or den,</p> +<p>As beasts excel cold rocks and brambles rude:--</p> +<p class="i4">Men who their duties know,</p> +<p>But know their rights, and knowing, dare maintain;</p> +<p class="i4">Prevent the long-aimed blow,</p> +<p>And crush the tyrant, while they rend the chain.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">Translation of Sir William Jones.</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="POVERTY"></a>POVERTY</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The worst of ills, and hardest to endure,</p> +<p class="i4">Past hope, past cure,</p> +<p class="i2">Is Penury, who, with her sister-mate</p> +<p>Disorder, soon brings down the loftiest state,</p> +<p class="i4">And makes it desolate.</p> +<p class="i2">This truth the sage of Sparta told,</p> +<p class="i4">Aristodemus old,--</p> +<p class="i2">"Wealth makes the man." On him that's poor,</p> +<p>Proud worth looks down, and honor shuts the door.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">Translation of Sir William Jones.</p> +</div></div> +<br> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="BALTAZAR_DE_ALCAZAR"></a>BALTÁZAR DE ALCÁZAR</h2> + +<h3>(1530?-1606)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-a.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>lthough little may be realized now of Alcázar's shadowy personality, +there is no doubt that in his own century he was +widely read. Born of a very respectable family in Seville, +either in 1530 or 1531, he first appears as entering the Spanish navy, +and participating in several battles on the war galleys of the Marquis +of Santa Cruz. It is known that for about twenty years he +was alcalde or mayor at the Molares on the outskirts of Utrera,--an +important local functionary, a practical man interested in public +affairs.</p> + +<p>But, on the whole, his seems to have been a strongly artistic +nature; for he was a musician of repute, skillful too at painting, and +above all a poet. As master and model in metrical composition he +chose Martial, and in his epigrammatic turn he is akin to the great +Latin poet. He was fond of experimenting in Latin lyrical forms, +and wrote many madrigals and sonnets. They are full of vigorous +thought and bright satire, of playful malice and epicurean joy in life, +and have always won the admiration of his fellow-poets. As has +been said, they show a fine taste, quite in advance of the age. +Cervantes, his greater contemporary, acknowledged his power with +cordial praise in the Canto de Caliope.</p> + +<p>The "witty Andalusian" did not write voluminously. Some of his +poems still remain in manuscript only. Of the rest, comprised in one +small volume, perhaps the best known are 'The Jovial Supper,' +'The Echo,' and the 'Counsel to a Widow.'</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="SLEEP"></a>SLEEP</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Sleep is no servant of the will,</p> +<p class="i1">It has caprices of its own:</p> +<p> When most pursued,--'tis swiftly gone;</p> +<p>When courted least, it lingers still.</p> +<p>With its vagaries long perplext,</p> +<p class="i1">I turned and turned my restless sconce,</p> +<p class="i1">Till one bright night, I thought at once</p> +<p>I'd master it; so hear my text!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>When sleep will tarry, I begin</p> +<p class="i1">My long and my accustomed prayer;</p> +<p class="i1">And in a twinkling sleep is there,</p> +<p>Through my bed-curtains peeping in.</p> +<p>When sleep hangs heavy on my eyes,</p> +<p class="i1">I think of debts I fain would pay;</p> +<p class="i1">And then, as flies night's shade from day,</p> +<p>Sleep from my heavy eyelids flies.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>And thus controlled the winged one bends</p> +<p class="i1">Ev'n his fantastic will to me;</p> +<p class="i1">And, strange, yet true, both I and he</p> +<p>Are friends,--the very best of friends.</p> +<p>We are a happy wedded pair,</p> +<p class="i1">And I the lord and she the dame;</p> +<p class="i1">Our bed--our board--our hours the same,</p> +<p>And we're united everywhere.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>I'll tell you where I learnt to school</p> +<p class="i1">This wayward sleep:--a whispered word</p> +<p class="i1">From a church-going hag I heard,</p> +<p>And tried it--for I was no fool.</p> +<p>So from that very hour I knew</p> +<p class="i1">That having ready prayers to pray,</p> +<p class="i1">And having many debts to pay,</p> +<p>Will serve for sleep and waking too.</p> +</div></div><br> +<p>From Longfellow's 'Poets of Europe': by permission of Houghton, Mifflin +and Company.</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="THE_JOVIAL_SUPPER"></a>THE JOVIAL SUPPER</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +In Jaen, where I reside,<br> +Lives Don Lopez de Sosa;<br> +And I will tell thee, Isabel, a thing<br> +The most daring that thou hast heard of him.<br> +This gentleman had<br> +A Portuguese serving man . . .<br> +However, if it appears well to you, Isabel,<br> +Let us first take supper.<br> +We have the table ready laid,<br> +As we have to sup together;<br> +The wine-cups at their stations<br> +Are only wanting to begin the feast.<br> +Let us commence with new, light wine,<br> +And cast upon it benediction;<br> +I consider it a matter of devotion<br> +To sign with cross that which I drink.<br> +<br><hr style="width: 25%;"><br> +Be it or not a modern invention,<br> +By the living God I do not know;<br> +But most exquisite was<br> +The invention of the tavern.<br> +Because, I arrive thirsty there,<br> +I ask for new-made wine,<br> +They mix it, give it to me, I drink,<br> +I pay for it, and depart contented.<br> +That, Isabel, is praise of itself,<br> +It is not necessary to laud it.<br> +I have only one fault to find with it,<br> +That is--it is finished with too much haste.<br> +<br><hr style="width: 25%;"><br> +But say, dost thou not adore and prize<br> +The illustrious and rich black pudding?<br> +How the rogue tickles!<br> +It must contain spices.<br> +How it is stuffed with pine nuts!<br> +<br><hr style="width: 25%;"><br> +But listen to a subtle hint.<br> +You did not put a lamp there?<br> +How is it that I appear to see two?<br> +But these are foolish questions,<br> +Already know I what it must be:<br> +It is by this black draught<br> +That the number of lamps accumulates.<br> +</div></div><br> +<p>[The several courses are ended, and the jovial diner resolves to finish his +story.]</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<br><hr style="width: 25%;"><br> +And now, Isabel, as we have supped<br> +So well, and with so much enjoyment,<br> +It appears to be but right<br> +To return to the promised tale.<br> +But thou must know, Sister Isabel,<br> +That the Portuguese fell sick . . .<br> +Eleven o'clock strikes, I go to sleep.<br> +Wait for the morrow.<br> +</div></div><br> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="ALCIPHRON"></a>ALCIPHRON</h2> + +<h3>(Second Century A.D.)</h3> + +<h3>BY HARRY THURSTON PECK</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-i.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>n the history of Greek prose fiction the possibilities of the +epistolary form were first developed by the Athenian teacher +of rhetoric, Alciphron, of whose life and personality nothing +is known except that he lived in the second century A.D.,--a +contemporary of the great satirical genius Lucian. Of his writings +we now possess only a collection of imaginary letters, one hundred +and eighteen in number, arranged in three books. Their value +depends partly upon the curious and interesting pictures given in +them of the life of the post-Alexandrine period, especially of the +low life, and partly upon the fact that they are the first successful +attempts at character-drawing to be found in the history of Greek +prose fiction. They form a connecting link between the novel of +pure incident and adventure, and the more fully developed novel +which combines incident and adventure with the delineation of character +and the study of motive. The use of the epistolary form in +fictitious composition did not, to be sure, originate with Alciphron; +for we find earlier instances in the imaginary love-letters composed +in verse by the Roman poet, Ovid, under the names of famous +women of early legend, such as those of Oenone to Paris (which +suggested a beautiful poem of Tennyson's), Medea to Jason, and +many others. In these one finds keen insight into character, especially +feminine character, together with much that is exquisite in +fancy and tender in expression. But it is to Alciphron that we owe +the adaptation of this form of composition to prose fiction, and its +employment in a far wider range of psychological and social observation.</p> + +<p>The life whose details are given us by Alciphron is the life of +contemporary Athens in the persons of its easy-going population. +The writers whose letters we are supposed to read in reading +Alciphron are peasants, fishermen, parasites, men-about-town, and +courtesans. The language of the letters is neat, pointed, and appropriate +to the person who in each case is supposed to be the writer; +and the details are managed with considerable art. Alciphron effaces +all impression of his own personality, and is lost in the characters +who for the time being occupy his pages. One reads the letters as +he would read a genuine correspondence. The illusion is perfect, +and we feel that we are for the moment in the Athens of the third +century before Christ; that we are strolling in its streets, visiting its +shops, its courts, and its temples, and that we are getting a whiff of +the Aegean, mingled with the less savory odors of the markets and +of the wine-shops. We stroll about the city elbowing our way +through the throng of boatmen, merchants, and hucksters. Here a +barber stands outside his shop and solicits custom; there an old +usurer with pimply face sits bending over his accounts in a dingy +little office; at the corner of the street a crowd encircles some Cheap +Jack who is showing off his juggling tricks at a small three-legged +table, making sea-shells vanish out of sight and then taking them +from his mouth. Drunken soldiers pass and repass, talking boisterously +of their bouts and brawls, of their drills and punishments, +and the latest news of their barracks, and forming a striking contrast +to the philosopher, who, in coarse robes, moves with supercilious +look and an affectation of deep thought, in silence amid the crowd +that jostles him. The scene is vivid, striking, realistic.</p> + +<p>Many of the letters are from women; and in these, especially, +Alciphron reveals the daily life of the Athenians. We see the demimonde +at their toilet, with their mirrors, their powders, their +enamels and rouge-pots, their brushes and pincers, and all the +thousand and one accessories. Acquaintances come in to make a +morning call, and we hear their chatter,--Thaïs and Megara and +Bacchis, Hermione and Myrrha. They nibble cakes, drink sweet +wine, gossip about their respective lovers, hum the latest songs, +and enjoy themselves with perfect abandon. Again we see them +at their evening rendezvous, at the banquets where philosophers, +poets, sophists, painters, artists of every sort,--in fact, the whole +Bohemia of Athens,--gather round them. We get hints of all the +stages of the revel, from the sparkling wit and the jolly good-fellowship +of the early evening, to the sodden disgust that comes +with daybreak when the lamps are poisoning the fetid air and the +remnants of the feast are stale.</p> + +<p>We are not to look upon the letters of Alciphron as embodying a +literary unity. He did not attempt to write one single symmetrical +epistolary romance; but the individual letters are usually slight +sketches of character carelessly gathered together, and deriving +their greatest charm from their apparent spontaneity and artlessness. +Many of them are, to be sure, unpleasantly cynical, and depict the +baser side of human nature; others, in their realism, are essentially +commonplace; but some are very prettily expressed, and show a +brighter side to the picture of contemporary life. Those especially +which are supposed to pass between Menander, the famous comic +poet, and his mistress Glycera, form a pleasing contrast to the greed +and cynicism of much that one finds in the first book of the epistles; +they are true love-letters, and are untainted by the slightest suggestion +of the mercenary spirit or the veiled coarseness that makes +so many of the others unpleasant reading. One letter (i. 6) is +interesting as containing the first allusion found in literature to the +familiar story of Phryne before the judges, which is more fully told +in Athenaeus.</p> + +<p>The imaginary letter was destined to play an important part in +the subsequent history of literature. Alciphron was copied by +Aristaenetus, who lived in the fifth century of our era, and whose +letters have been often imitated in modern times, and by Theophylactus, +who lived in the seventh century. In modern English fiction +the epistolary form has been most successfully employed by Richardson, +Fanny Burney, and, in another <i>genre</i>, by Wilkie Collins.</p> + +<p>The standard editions of Alciphron are those of Seiler (Leipzig, +1856) and of Hercher (Paris, 1873), the latter containing the Greek +text with a parallel version in Latin. The letters have not yet been +translated into English. The reader may refer to the chapter on +Alciphron in the recently published work of Salverte, 'Le Roman +dans la Grèce Ancienne' (The Novel in Ancient Greece: Paris, +1893). The following selections are translated by the present writer.</p> + +<p class="rgt"><img src="images/293.png" width="50%" alt=""></p> +<br><br><br><br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="FROM_A_MERCENARY_GIRL"></a>FROM A MERCENARY GIRL</h3> + +<center>PETALA TO SIMALION</center> + +<p>Well, if a girl could live on tears, what a wealthy girl I +should be; for you are generous enough with <i>them</i>, any-how! +Unfortunately, however, that isn't quite enough +for me. I need money; I must have jewels, clothes, servants, +and all that sort of thing. Nobody has left me a fortune, I +should like you to know, or any mining stock; and so I am +obliged to depend on the little presents that gentlemen happen +to make me. Now that I've known you a year, how much better +off am I for it, I should like to ask? My head looks like a +fright because I haven't had anything to rig it out with, all that +time; and as to clothes,--why, the only dress I've got in the +world is in rags that make me ashamed to be seen with my +friends: and yet you imagine that I can go on in this way without +having any other means of living! Oh, yes, of course, you +cry; but you'll stop presently. I'm really surprised at the number +of your tears; but really, unless somebody gives me something +pretty soon I shall die of starvation. Of course, you +pretend you're just crazy for me, and that you can't live without +me. Well, then, isn't there any family silver in your house? +Hasn't your mother any jewelry that you can get hold of? +Hasn't your father any valuables? Other girls are luckier than +I am; for I have a mourner rather than a lover. He sends me +crowns, and he sends me garlands and roses, as if I were dead +and buried before my time, and he says that he cries all night. +Now, if you can manage to scrape up something for me, you can +come here without having to cry your eyes out; but if you can't, +why, keep your tears to yourself, and don't bother me!</p> + +<p>From the 'Epistolae,' i. 36.</p> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_PLEASURES_OF_ATHENS"></a>THE PLEASURES OF ATHENS</h3> + +<center>EUTHYDICUS TO EPIPHANIO</center> + +<p>By all the gods and demons, I beg you, dear mother, to leave +your rocks and fields in the country, and before you die, +discover what beautiful things there are in town. Just think +what you are losing,--the Haloan Festival and the Apaturian +Festival, and the Great Festival of Bacchus, and especially the +Thesmophorian Festival, which is now going on. If you would +only hurry up, and get here to-morrow morning before it is daylight, +you would be able to take part in the affair with the other +Athenian women. Do come, and don't put it off, if you have +any regard for my happiness and my brothers'; for it's an awful +thing to die without having any knowledge of the city. That's +the life of an ox; and one that is altogether unreasonable. Please +excuse me, mother, for speaking so freely for your own good. +After all, one ought to speak plainly with everybody, and especially +with those who are themselves plain speakers.</p> + +<p>From the 'Epistolae,' iii. 39.</p> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="FROM_AN_ANXIOUS_MOTHER"></a>FROM AN ANXIOUS MOTHER</h3> + +<center>PHYLLIS TO THRASONIDES</center> + +<p>If you only would put up with the country and be sensible, +and do as the rest of us do, my dear Thrasonides, you would +offer ivy and laurel and myrtle and flowers to the gods at +the proper time; and to us, your parents, you would give wheat +and wine and a milk-pail full of the new goat's-milk. But as +things are, you despise the country and farming, and are fond +only of the helmet-plumes and the shield, just as if you were an +Acarnanian or a Malian soldier. Don't keep on in this way, my +son; but come back to us and take up this peaceful life of ours +again (for farming is perfectly safe and free from any danger, +and doesn't require bands of soldiers and strategy and squadrons), +and be the stay of our old age, preferring a safe life to a +risky one.</p> + +<p>From the 'Epistolae,' iii. 16.</p> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="FROM_A_CURIOUS_YOUTH"></a>FROM A CURIOUS YOUTH</h3> + +<center>PHILOCOMUS TO THESTYLUS</center> + +<p>Since I have never yet been to town, and really don't know at +all what the thing is that they call a city, I am awfully anxious +to see this strange sight,--men living all in one place,--and +to learn about the other points in which a city differs from +the country. Consequently, if you have any reason for going to +town, do come and take me with you. As a matter of fact, I am +sure there are lots of things I ought to know, now that my beard +is beginning to sprout; and who is so able to show me the city +as yourself, who are all the time going back and forth to the +town?</p> + +<p>From the 'Epistolae' iii. 31.</p> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="FROM_A_PROFESSIONAL_DINER-OUT"></a>FROM A PROFESSIONAL DINER-OUT</h3> + +<center>CAPNOSPHRANTES TO ARISTOMACHUS</center> + +<p>I should like to ask my evil genius, who drew me by lot as his +own particular charge, why he is so malignant and so cruel +as to keep me in everlasting poverty; for if no one happens +to invite me to dinner I have to live on greens, and to eat acorns +and to fill my stomach with water from the hydrant. Now, as +long as my body was able to put up with this sort of thing, and +my time of life was such as made it proper for me to bear it, I +could get along with them fairly well; but now that my hair is +growing gray, and the only outlook I have is in the direction of +old age, what on earth am I going to do? I shall really have to +get a rope and hang myself unless my luck changes. However, +even if fortune remains as it is, I shan't string myself up before +I have at least one square meal; for before very long, the wedding +of Charitus and Leocritis, which is going to be a famous +affair, will come off, to which there isn't a doubt that I shall be +invited,--either to the wedding itself or to the banquet afterward. +It's lucky that weddings need the jokes of brisk fellows +like myself, and that without us they would be as dull as gatherings +of pigs rather than of human beings!</p> + +<p>From the 'Epistolae,' iii. 49.</p> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="UNLUCKY_LUCK"></a>UNLUCKY LUCK</h3> + +<center>CHYTROLICTES TO PATELLOCHARON</center> + +<p>Perhaps you would like to know why I am complaining so, +and how I got my head broken, and why I'm going around +with my clothes in tatters. The fact is I swept the board at +gambling: but I wish I hadn't; for what's the sense in a feeble +fellow like me running up against a lot of stout young men? +You see, after I scooped in all the money they put up, and they +hadn't a cent left, they all jumped on my neck, and some of +them punched me, and some of them stoned me, and some of +them tore my clothes off my back. All the same, I hung on to +the money as hard as I could, because I would rather die than +give up anything of theirs I had got hold of; and so I held out +bravely for quite a while, not giving in when they struck me, or +even when they bent my fingers back. In fact, I was like some +Spartan who lets himself be whipped as a test of his endurance: +but unfortunately it wasn't at Sparta that I was doing this thing, +but at Athens, and with the toughest sort of an Athenian gambling +crowd; and so at last, when actually fainting, I had to let +the ruffians rob me. They went through my pockets, and after +they had taken everything they could find, they skipped. After +all, I've come to the conclusion that it's better to live without +money than to die with a pocket full of it.</p> + +<p>From the 'Epistolae,' iii. 54.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="ALCMAN"></a>ALCMAN</h2> + +<h3>(Seventh Century B.C.)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-a.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>ccording to legend, this illustrious Grecian lyric poet was +born in Lydia, and taken to Sparta as a slave when very +young, but emancipated by his master on the discovery of +his poetic genius. He flourished probably between 670 and 630, during +the peace following the Second Messenian War. It was that +remarkable period in which the Spartans were gathering poets and +musicians from the outer world of liberal accomplishment to educate +their children; for the Dorians thought it beneath the dignity of a +Dorian citizen to practice these things themselves.</p> + +<p>His poetic remains indicate a social freedom at this period hardly +in keeping with the Spartan rigor alleged to have been practiced +without break from the ancient time of Lycurgus; perhaps this communal +asceticism was really a later growth, when the camp of militant +slave-holders saw their fibre weakening under the art and luxury +they had introduced. He boasts of his epicurean appetite; with +evident truthfulness, as a considerable number of his extant fragments +are descriptions of dishes. He would have echoed Sydney +Smith's--</p> + +<blockquote> +"Fate cannot harm me--I have dined to-day."<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>In a poem descriptive of spring, he laments that the season affords +but a scanty stock of his favorite viands.</p> + +<p>The Alexandrian grammarians put Alcman at the head of the +lyric canon; perhaps partly because they thought him the most +ancient, but he was certainly much esteemed in classic times. <i>Aelian</i> +says his songs were sung at the first performance of the gymnopaedia +at Sparta in 665 B.C., and often afterward. Much of his poetry was +erotic; but he wrote also hymns to the gods, and ethical and philosophic +pieces. His 'Parthenia,' which form a distinct division of +his writings, were songs sung at public festivals by, and in honor of, +the performing chorus of virgins. The subjects were either religious +or erotic. His proverbial wisdom, and the forms of verse which he +often chose, are reputed to have been like Pindar's. He said of himself +that he sang like the birds,--that is, was self-taught.</p> + +<p>He wrote in the broad Spartan dialect with a mixture of the +Aeolic, and in various metres. One form of hexameter which he +invented was called Alcmanic after him. His poems were comprehended +in six books. The scanty fragments which have survived are +included in Bergk's 'Poetae Lyrici Graeci' (1878). The longest was +found in 1855 by M. Mariette, in a tomb near the second pyramid. +It is a papyrus fragment of three pages, containing a part of his +hymn to the Dioscuri, much mutilated and difficult to decipher.</p> + +<p>His descriptive passages are believed to have been his best. The +best known and most admired of his fragments is his beautiful +description of night, which has been often imitated and paraphrased.</p> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="NIGHT"></a>NIGHT</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i1">Over the drowsy earth still night prevails;</p> +<p class="i2">Calm sleep the mountain tops and shady vales,</p> +<p class="i4">The rugged cliffs and hollow glens;</p> +<p class="i1">The cattle on the hill. Deep in the sea,</p> +<p class="i2">The countless finny race and monster brood</p> +<p class="i1">Tranquil repose. Even the busy bee</p> +<p class="i2">Forgets her daily toil. The silent wood</p> +<p class="i1">No more with noisy hum of insect rings;</p> +<p>And all the feathered tribes, by gentle sleep subdued,</p> +<p class="i1">Roost in the glade, and hang their drooping wings.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">Translation by Colonel Mure.</p> +</div></div> +<br> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="LOUISA_MAY_ALCOTT"></a>LOUISA MAY ALCOTT</h2> + +<h3>(1832-1888)</h3> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-l.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>ouisa May Alcott, daughter of Amos Bronson and Abigail +(May) Alcott, and the second of the four sisters whom she +was afterward to make famous in 'Little Women,' was +born in Germantown, Pennsylvania, November 29th, 1832, her father's +thirty-third birthday. On his side, she +was descended from good Connecticut +stock; and on her mother's, from the Mays +and Quincys of Massachusetts, and from +Judge Samuel Sewall, who has left in his +diary as graphic a picture of the New +England home-life of two hundred years +ago, as his granddaughter of the fifth +generation did of that of her own time.</p> + +<p class="lft"><img src="images/298.png" width="45%" alt=""></p> + +<p>At the time of Louisa Alcott's birth +her father had charge of a school in Germantown; +but within two years he moved +to Boston with his family, and put into +practice methods of teaching so far in +advance of his time that they were unsuccessful. From 1840, the +home of the Alcott family was in Concord, Massachusetts, with the +exception of a short time spent in a community on a farm in a +neighboring town, and the years from 1848 to 1857 in Boston. At +seventeen, Louisa's struggle with life began. She wrote a play, contributed +sensational stories to weekly papers, tried teaching, sewing,--even +going out to service,--and would have become an actress +but for an accident. What she wrote of her mother is as true of +herself, "She always did what came to her in the way of duty or +charity, and let pride, taste, and comfort suffer for love's sake." Her +first book, 'Flower Fables,' a collection of fairy tales which she had +written at sixteen for the children of Ralph Waldo Emerson, some +other little friends, and her younger sisters, was printed in 1855 and +was well received. From this time until 1863 she wrote many +stories, but few that she afterward thought worthy of being reprinted. +Her best work from 1860 to 1863 is in the Atlantic Monthly, +indexed under her name; and the most carefully finished of her few +poems, 'Thoreau's Flute,' appeared in that magazine in September, +1863. After six weeks' experience in the winter of 1862-63 as a +hospital nurse in Washington, she wrote for the Commonwealth, a +Boston weekly paper, a series of letters which soon appeared in book +form as 'Hospital Sketches,' Miss Alcott says of them, "The +'Sketches' never made much money, but showed me 'my style.'" +In 1864 she published a novel, 'Moods'; and in 1866, after a year +abroad as companion to an invalid, she became editor of Merry's +Museum, a magazine for children.</p> + +<p>Her 'Little Women,' founded on her own family life, was written +in 1867-68, in answer to a request from the publishing house of +Roberts Brothers for a story for girls, and its success was so great +that she soon finished a second part. The two volumes were translated +into French, German, and Dutch, and became favorite books in +England. While editing Merry's Museum, she had written the first +part of 'The Old-Fashioned Girl' as a serial for the magazine. After +the success of 'Little Women,' she carried the 'Old-Fashioned Girl' +and her friends forward several years, and ended the story with two +happy marriages. In 1870 she went abroad a second time, and from +her return the next year until her death in Boston from overwork on +March 6th, 1888, the day of her father's funeral, she published twenty +volumes, including two novels: one anonymous, 'A Modern Mephistopheles,' +in the 'No Name' series; the other, 'Work,' largely a record +of her own experience. She rewrote 'Moods,' and changed the sad +ending of the first version to a more cheerful one; followed the fortunes +of her 'Little Women' and their children in 'Little Men' and +'Jo's Boys,' and published ten volumes of short stories, many of +them reprinted pieces. She wrote also 'Eight Cousins,' its sequel +'Rose in Bloom,' 'Under the Lilacs,' and 'Jack and Jill,'</p> + +<p>The charm of her books lies in their freshness, naturalness, and +sympathy with the feelings and pursuits of boys and girls. She says +of herself, "I was born with a boy's spirit under my bib and tucker," +and she never lost it. Her style is often careless, never elegant, for +she wrote hurriedly, and never revised or even read over her manuscript; +yet her books are full of humor and pathos, and preach the +gospel of work and simple, wholesome living. She has been a help +and inspiration to many young girls, who have learned from her Jo +in 'Little Women,' or Polly in the 'Old-Fashioned Girl,' or Christie +in 'Work,' that a woman can support herself and her family without +losing caste or self-respect. Her stories of the comradeship of New +England boys and girls in school or play have made her a popular +author in countries where even brothers and sisters see little of each +other. The haste and lack of care in her books are the result of +writing under pressure for money to support the family, to whom +she gave the best years of her life. As a little girl once said of her +in a school essay, "I like all Miss Alcott's books; but what I like best +in them is the author herself."</p> + +<p>The reader is referred to 'Louisa May Alcott: Her Life, Letters, +and Journals,' edited by Ednah D. Cheney, published in 1889.</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_NIGHT_WARD"></a>THE NIGHT WARD</h3> + +<center>From 'Hospital Sketches'</center> + +<p>Being fond of the night side of nature, I was soon promoted +to the post of night nurse, with every facility for indulging +in my favorite pastime of "owling." My colleague, a +black-eyed widow, relieved me at dawn, we two taking care of +the ward between us, like regular nurses, turn and turn about. +I usually found my boys in the jolliest state of mind their condition +allowed; for it was a known fact that Nurse Periwinkle +objected to blue devils, and entertained a belief that he who +laughed most was surest of recovery. At the beginning of my +reign, dumps and dismals prevailed; the nurses looked anxious +and tired, the men gloomy or sad; and a general +"Hark-from-the-tombs-a-doleful-sound" style of conversation seemed to be +the fashion: a state of things which caused one coming from a +merry, social New England town, to feel as if she had got into +an exhausted receiver; and the instinct of self-preservation, to +say nothing of a philanthropic desire to serve the race, caused a +speedy change in Ward No. 1.</p> + +<p>More flattering than the most gracefully turned compliment, +more grateful than the most admiring glance, was the sight of +those rows of faces, all strange to me a little while ago, now +lighting up with smiles of welcome as I came among them, +enjoying that moment heartily, with a womanly pride in their +regard, a motherly affection for them all. The evenings were +spent in reading aloud, writing letters, waiting on and amusing +the men, going the rounds with Dr. P---- as he made his second +daily survey, dressing my dozen wounds afresh, giving last doses, +and making them cozy for the long hours to come, till the nine +o'clock bell rang, the gas was turned down, the day nurses went +off duty, the night watch came on, and my nocturnal adventures +began.</p> + +<p>My ward was now divided into three rooms; and under favor +of the matron, I had managed to sort out the patients in such a +way that I had what I called my "duty room," my "pleasure +room," and my "pathetic room," and worked for each in a +different way. One I visited armed with a dressing-tray full of +rollers, plasters, and pins; another, with books, flowers, games, +and gossip; a third, with teapots, lullabies, consolation, and sometimes +a shroud.</p> + +<p>Wherever the sickest or most helpless man chanced to be, +there I held my watch, often visiting the other rooms to see that +the general watchman of the ward did his duty by the fires and +the wounds, the latter needing constant wetting. Not only on +this account did I meander, but also to get fresher air than the +close rooms afforded; for owing to the stupidity of that mysterious +"somebody" who does all the damage in the world, the +windows had been carefully nailed down above, and the lower +sashes could only be raised in the mildest weather, for the men +lay just below. I had suggested a summary smashing of a few +panes here and there, when frequent appeals to headquarters had +proved unavailing and daily orders to lazy attendants had come +to nothing. No one seconded the motion, however, and the nails +were far beyond my reach; for though belonging to the sisterhood +of "ministering angels," I had no wings, and might as well +have asked for a suspension bridge as a pair of steps in that +charitable chaos.</p> + +<p>One of the harmless ghosts who bore me company during the +haunted hours was Dan, the watchman, whom I regarded with a +certain awe; for though so much together, I never fairly saw his +face, and but for his legs should never have recognized him, as +we seldom met by day. These legs were remarkable, as was his +whole figure: for his body was short, rotund, and done up in a +big jacket and muffler; his beard hid the lower part of his face, +his hat-brim the upper, and all I ever discovered was a pair of +sleepy eyes and a very mild voice. But the legs!--very long, +very thin, very crooked and feeble, looking like gray sausages in +their tight coverings, and finished off with a pair of expansive +green cloth shoes, very like Chinese junks with the sails down. +This figure, gliding noiselessly about the dimly lighted rooms, +was strongly suggestive of the spirit of a beer-barrel mounted on +corkscrews, haunting the old hotel in search of its lost mates, +emptied and staved in long ago.</p> + +<p>Another goblin who frequently appeared to me was the attendant +of "the pathetic room," who, being a faithful soul, was often +up to tend two or three men, weak and wandering as babies, +after the fever had gone. The amiable creature beguiled the +watches of the night by brewing jorums of a fearful beverage +which he called coffee, and insisted on sharing with me; coming +in with a great bowl of something like mud soup, scalding hot, +guiltless of cream, rich in an all-pervading flavor of molasses, +scorch, and tin pot.</p> + +<p>Even my constitutionals in the chilly halls possessed a certain +charm, for the house was never still. Sentinels tramped round +it all night long, their muskets glittering in the wintry moonlight +as they walked, or stood before the doors straight and +silent as figures of stone, causing one to conjure up romantic +visions of guarded forts, sudden surprises, and daring deeds; for +in these war times the humdrum life of Yankeedom has vanished, +and the most prosaic feel some thrill of that excitement which +stirs the Nation's heart, and makes its capital a camp of hospitals. +Wandering up and down these lower halls I often heard +cries from above, steps hurrying to and fro, saw surgeons passing +up, or men coming down carrying a stretcher, where lay a long +white figure whose face was shrouded, and whose fight was done. +Sometimes I stopped to watch the passers in the street, the +moonlight shining on the spire opposite, or the gleam of some +vessel floating, like a white-winged sea-gull, down the broad Potomac, +whose fullest flow can never wash away the red stain of +the land.</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="AMYS_VALLEY_OF_HUMILIATION"></a>AMY'S VALLEY OF HUMILIATION</h3> + +<center>From 'Little Women'</center> + +<p>"That boy is a perfect Cyclops, isn't he?" said Amy one day, +as Laurie clattered by on horseback, with a flourish of +his whip as he passed.</p> + +<p>"How dare you say so, when he's got both his eyes? and very +handsome ones they are, too," cried Jo, who resented any slighting +remarks about her friend.</p> + +<p>"I didn't say anything about his eyes; and I don't see why +you need fire up when I admire his riding."</p> + +<p>"Oh, my goodness! that little goose means a centaur, and she +called him a Cyclops," exclaimed Jo, with a burst of laughter.</p> + +<p>"You needn't be so rude; it's only a 'lapse of lingy,' as Mr. +Davis says," retorted Amy, finishing Jo with her Latin. "I just +wish I had a little of the money Laurie spends on that horse," +she added, as if to herself, yet hoping her sisters would hear.</p> + +<p>"Why?" asked Meg, kindly, for Jo had gone off in another +laugh at Amy's second blunder.</p> + +<p>"I need it so much: I'm dreadfully in debt, and it won't be +my turn to have the rag-money for a month."</p> + +<p>"In debt, Amy: what do you mean?" and Meg looked sober.</p> + +<p>"Why, I owe at least a dozen pickled limes; and I can't pay +them, you know, till I have money, for Marmee forbids my having +anything charged at the shop."</p> + +<p>"Tell me all about it. Are limes the fashion now? It used +to be pricking bits of rubber to make balls;" and Meg tried to +keep her countenance, Amy looked so grave and important.</p> + +<p>"Why, you see, the girls are always buying them, and unless +you want to be thought mean, you must do it too. It's nothing +but limes now, for every one is sucking them in their desks in +school-time, and trading them off for pencils, bead-rings, paper +dolls, or something else, at recess. If one girl likes another, she +gives her a lime; if she's mad with her, she eats one before her +face, and don't offer even a suck. They treat by turns; and +I've had ever so many, but haven't returned them, and I ought, +for they are debts of honor, you know."</p> + +<p>"How much will pay them off, and restore your credit?" +asked Meg, taking out her purse.</p> + +<p>"A quarter would more than do it, and leave a few cents +over for a treat for you. Don't you like limes?"</p> + +<p>"Not much; you may have my share. Here's the money: +make it last as long as you can, for it isn't very plenty, you +know."</p> + +<p>"Oh, thank you! it must be so nice to have pocket-money. +I'll have a grand feast, for I haven't tasted a lime this week. I +felt delicate about taking any, as I couldn't return them, and +I'm actually suffering for one."</p> + +<p>Next day Amy was rather late at school; but could not resist +the temptation of displaying, with pardonable pride, a moist +brown-paper parcel before she consigned it to the inmost recesses +of her desk. During the next few minutes the rumor that Amy +March had got twenty-four delicious limes (she ate one on the +way), and was going to treat, circulated through her "set" and +the attentions of her friends became quite overwhelming. Katy +Brown invited her to her next party on the spot; Mary Kingsley +insisted on lending her her watch till recess; and Jenny Snow, +a satirical young lady who had basely twitted Amy upon her +limeless state, promptly buried the hatchet, and offered to furnish +answers to certain appalling sums. But Amy had not forgotten +Miss Snow's cutting remarks about "some persons whose noses +were not too flat to smell other people's limes, and stuck-up +people who were not too proud to ask for them"; and she +instantly crushed "that Snow girl's" hopes by the withering telegram, +"You needn't be so polite all of a sudden, for you won't +get any."</p> + +<p>A distinguished personage happened to visit the school that +morning, and Amy's beautifully drawn maps received praise; +which honor to her foe rankled in the soul of Miss Snow, and +caused Miss March to assume the airs of a studious young +peacock. But, alas, alas! pride goes before a fall, and the +revengeful Snow turned the tables with disastrous success. No +sooner had the guest paid the usual stale compliments, and bowed +himself out, than Jenny, under pretence of asking an important +question, informed Mr. Davis, the teacher, that Amy March had +pickled limes in her desk.</p> + +<p>Now, Mr. Davis had declared limes a contraband article, and +solemnly vowed to publicly ferule the first person who was found +breaking the law. This much-enduring man had succeeded in +banishing gum after a long and stormy war, had made a bonfire +of the confiscated novels and newspapers, had suppressed a +private post-office, had forbidden distortions of the face, nicknames, +and caricatures, and done all that one man could do to +keep half a hundred rebellious girls in order. Boys are trying +enough to human patience, goodness knows! but girls are +infinitely more so, especially to nervous gentlemen with tyrannical +tempers, and no more talent for teaching than "Dr. Blimber." +Mr. Davis knew any quantity of Greek, Latin, algebra, +and ologies of all sorts, so he was called a fine teacher; and +manners, morals, feelings, and examples were not considered of +any particular importance. It was a most unfortunate moment +for denouncing Amy, and Jenny knew it. Mr. Davis had evidently +taken his coffee too strong that morning; there was an +east wind, which always affected his neuralgia, and his pupils +had not done him the credit which he felt he deserved; therefore, +to use the expressive if not elegant language of a school-girl, +"he was as nervous as a witch, and as cross as a bear." The +word "limes" was like fire to powder: his yellow face flushed, +and he rapped on his desk with an energy which made Jenny +skip to her seat with unusual rapidity.</p> + +<p>"Young ladies, attention, if you please!"</p> + +<p>At the stern order the buzz ceased, and fifty pairs of blue, +black, gray, and brown eyes were obediently fixed upon his +awful countenance.</p> + +<p>"Miss March, come to the desk."</p> + +<p>Amy rose to comply with outward composure; but a secret +fear oppressed her, for the limes weighed upon her conscience.</p> + +<p>"Bring with you the limes you have in your desk," was the +unexpected command which arrested her before she got out of +her seat.</p> + +<p>"Don't take all," whispered her neighbor, a young lady of +great presence of mind.</p> + +<p>Amy hastily shook out half a dozen, and laid the rest down +before Mr. Davis, feeling that any man possessing a human heart +would relent when that delicious perfume met his nose. Unfortunately, +Mr. Davis particularly detested the odor of the fashionable +pickle, and disgust added to his wrath.</p> + +<p>"Is that all?"</p> + +<p>"Not quite," stammered Amy.</p> + +<p>"Bring the rest, immediately."</p> + +<p>With a despairing glance at her set she obeyed.</p> + +<p>"You are sure there are no more?"</p> + +<p>"I never lie, sir."</p> + +<p>"So I see. Now take these disgusting things, two by two, +and throw them out of the window."</p> + +<p>There was a simultaneous sigh, which created quite a little +gust as the last hope fled, and the treat was ravished from their +longing lips. Scarlet with shame and anger, Amy went to and +fro twelve mortal times; and as each doomed couple, looking, oh, +so plump and juicy! fell from her reluctant hands, a shout from +the street completed the anguish of the girls, for it told them +that their feast was being exulted over by the little Irish children, +who were their sworn foes. This--this was too much; all +flashed indignant or appealing glances at the inexorable Davis, +and one passionate lime-lover burst into tears.</p> + +<p>As Amy returned from her last trip, Mr. Davis gave a portentous +"hem," and said, in his most impressive manner:--</p> + +<p>"Young ladies, you remember what I said to you a week +ago. I am sorry this has happened; but I never allow my rules +to be infringed, and I <i>never</i> break my word. Miss March, hold +out your hand."</p> + +<p>Amy started, and put both hands behind her, turning on him +an imploring look, which pleaded for her better than the words +she could not utter. She was rather a favorite with "old Davis," +as of course he was called, and it's my private belief that he +<i>would</i> have broken his word if the indignation of one irrepressible +young lady had not found vent in a hiss. That hiss, faint as it +was, irritated the irascible gentleman, and sealed the culprit's fate.</p> + +<p>"Your hand, Miss March!" was the only answer her mute +appeal received; and, too proud to cry or beseech, Amy set her +teeth, threw back her head defiantly, and bore without flinching +several tingling blows on her little palm. They were neither +many nor heavy, but that made no difference to her. For the +first time in her life she had been struck; and the disgrace, in +her eyes, was as deep as if he had knocked her down.</p> + +<p>"You will now stand on the platform till recess," said Mr. +Davis, resolved to do the thing thoroughly, since he had begun.</p> + +<p>That was dreadful. It would have been bad enough to go to +her seat and see the pitying faces of her friends, or the satisfied +ones of her few enemies; but to face the whole school with that +shame fresh upon her seemed impossible, and for a second she +felt as if she could only drop down where she stood, and break +her heart with crying. A bitter sense of wrong, and the thought +of Jenny Snow, helped her to bear it; and taking the ignominious +place, she fixed her eyes on the stove-funnel above what now +seemed a sea of faces, and stood there so motionless and white, +that the girls found it very hard to study, with that pathetic +little figure before them.</p> + +<p>During the fifteen minutes that followed, the proud and sensitive +little girl suffered a shame and pain which she never forgot. +To others it might seem a ludicrous or trivial affair, but to her +it was a hard experience; for during the twelve years of her life +she had been governed by love alone, and a blow of that sort +had never touched her before. The smart of her hand, and the +ache of her heart, were forgotten in the sting of the thought,--"I +shall have to tell at home, and they will be so disappointed +in me!"</p> + +<p>The fifteen minutes seemed an hour; but they came to an end +at last, and the word "Recess!" had never seemed so welcome to +her before.</p> + +<p>"You can go, Miss March," said Mr. Davis, looking, as he +felt, uncomfortable.</p> + +<p>He did not soon forget the reproachful look Amy gave him, as +she went, without a word to any one, straight into the ante-room, +snatched her things, and left the place "forever," as she passionately +declared to herself. She was in a sad state when she got +home; and when the older girls arrived, some time later, an indignation +meeting was held at once. Mrs. March did not say +much, but looked disturbed, and comforted her afflicted little +daughter in her tenderest manner. Meg bathed the insulted +hand with glycerine, and tears; Beth felt that even her beloved +kittens would fail as a balm for griefs like this, and Jo wrathfully +proposed that Mr. Davis be arrested without delay; while +Hannah shook her fist at the "villain," and pounded potatoes for +dinner as if she had him under her pestle.</p> + +<p>No notice was taken of Amy's flight, except by her mates; +but the sharp-eyed demoiselles discovered that Mr. Davis was +quite benignant in the afternoon, and also unusually nervous. +Just before school closed Jo appeared, wearing a grim expression +as she stalked up to the desk and delivered a letter from her +mother; then collected Amy's property and departed, carefully +scraping the mud from her boots on the door-mat, as if she +shook the dust of the place off her feet.</p> + +<p>"Yes, you can have a vacation from school, but I want you +to study a little every day with Beth," said Mrs. March that +evening. "I don't approve of corporal punishment, especially for +girls. I dislike Mr. Davis's manner of teaching, and don't think +the girls you associate with are doing you any good, so I shall +ask your father's advice before I send you anywhere else."</p> + +<p>"That's good! I wish all the girls would leave, and spoil his +old school. It's perfectly maddening to think of those lovely +limes," sighed Amy with the air of a martyr.</p> + +<p>"I am not sorry you lost them, for you broke the rules, and +deserved some punishment for disobedience," was the severe +reply, which rather disappointed the young lady, who expected +nothing but sympathy.</p> + +<p>"Do you mean you are glad I was disgraced before the whole +school?" cried Amy.</p> + +<p>"I should not have chosen that way of mending a fault," +replied her mother; "but I'm not sure that it won't do you more +good than a milder method. You are getting to be altogether +too conceited and important, my dear, and it is about time you +set about correcting it. You have a good many little gifts and +virtues, but there is no need of parading them, for conceit spoils +the finest genius. There is not much danger that real talent or +goodness will be overlooked long; even if it is, the consciousness +of possessing and using it well should satisfy one, and the great +charm of all power is modesty."</p> + +<p>"So it is," cried Laurie, who was playing chess in a corner +with Jo. "I knew a girl once who had a really remarkable +talent for music, and she didn't know it; never guessed what +sweet little things she composed when she was alone, and +wouldn't have believed it if any one had told her."</p> + +<p>"I wish I'd known that nice girl; maybe she would have +helped me, I'm so stupid," said Beth, who stood beside him +listening eagerly.</p> + +<p>"You do know her, and she helps you better than any one +else could," answered Laurie, looking at her with such mischievous +meaning in his merry eyes, that Beth suddenly turned +very red, and hid her face in the sofa-cushion, quite overcome by +such an unexpected discovery.</p> + +<p>Jo let Laurie win the game, to pay for that praise of her +Beth, who could not be prevailed upon to play for them after +her compliment. So Laurie did his best and sung delightfully, +being in a particularly lively humor, for to the Marches he +seldom showed the moody side of his character. When he was +gone, Amy, who had been pensive all the evening, said suddenly, +as if busy over some new idea:--</p> + +<p>"Is Laurie an accomplished boy?"</p> + +<p>"Yes; he has had an excellent education, and has much talent; +he will make a fine man, if not spoilt by petting," replied her +mother.</p> + +<p>"And he isn't conceited, is he?" asked Amy.</p> + +<p>"Not in the least; that is why he is so charming, and we all +like him so much."</p> + +<p>"I see: it's nice to have accomplishments, and be elegant, but +not to show off, or get perked up," said Amy thoughtfully.</p> + +<p>"These things are always seen and felt in a person's manner +and conversation, if modestly used; but it is not necessary to +display them," said Mrs. March.</p> + +<p>"Any more than it's proper to wear all your bonnets, and +gowns and ribbons, at once, that folks may know you've got +'em," added Jo; and the lecture ended in a laugh.</p> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="THOREAUS_FLUTE"></a>THOREAU'S FLUTE</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>From the Atlantic Monthly, September, 1863</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>We, sighing, said, "Our Pan is dead;</p> +<p class="i1">His pipe hangs mute beside the river;</p> +<p class="i1">Around it wistful sunbeams quiver,</p> +<p>But Music's airy voice is fled.</p> +<p>Spring mourns as for untimely frost;</p> +<p class="i1">The bluebird chants a requiem;</p> +<p class="i1">The willow-blossom waits for him;--</p> +<p>The Genius of the wood is lost."</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Then from the flute, untouched by hands,</p> +<p class="i1">There came a low, harmonious breath:</p> +<p class="i1">"For such as he there is no death;</p> +<p>His life the eternal life commands;</p> +<p>Above man's aims his nature rose:</p> +<p class="i1">The wisdom of a just content</p> +<p class="i1">Made one small spot a continent,</p> +<p>And turned to poetry Life's prose.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>"Haunting the hills, the stream, the wild,</p> +<p class="i1">Swallow and aster, lake and pine,</p> +<p class="i1">To him grew human or divine,--</p> +<p>Fit mates for this large-hearted child.</p> +<p>Such homage Nature ne'er forgets,</p> +<p class="i1">And yearly on the coverlid</p> +<p class="i1">'Neath which her darling lieth hid</p> +<p>Will write his name in violets.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>"To him no vain regrets belong,</p> +<p class="i1">Whose soul, that finer instrument,</p> +<p class="i1">Gave to the world no poor lament,</p> +<p>But wood-notes ever sweet and strong.</p> +<p>O lonely friend! he still will be</p> +<p class="i1">A potent presence, though unseen,--</p> +<p class="i1">Steadfast, sagacious, and serene:</p> +<p>Seek not for him,--he is with thee."</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="A_SONG_FROM_THE_SUDS"></a>A SONG FROM THE SUDS</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>From 'Little Women'</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Queen of my tub, I merrily sing,</p> +<p class="i2">While the white foam rises high;</p> +<p>And sturdily wash, and rinse, and wring,</p> +<p class="i2">And fasten the clothes to dry;</p> +<p>Then out in the free fresh air they swing,</p> +<p class="i2">Under the sunny sky.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>I wish we could wash from our hearts and souls</p> +<p class="i2">The stains of the week away,</p> +<p>And let water and air by their magic make</p> +<p class="i2">Ourselves as pure as they;</p> +<p>Then on the earth there would be indeed</p> +<p class="i2">A glorious washing-day!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Along the path of a useful life,</p> +<p class="i2">Will heart's-ease ever bloom;</p> +<p>The busy mind has no time to think</p> +<p class="i2">Of sorrow, or care, or gloom;</p> +<p>And anxious thoughts may be swept away,</p> +<p class="i2">As we busily wield a broom.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>I am glad a task to me is given,</p> +<p class="i2">To labor at day by day;</p> +<p>For it brings me health, and strength, and hope,</p> +<p class="i2">And I cheerfully learn to say,--</p> +<p>"Head you may think, Heart you may feel,</p> +<p class="i2">But Hand you shall work alway!"</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<p>Selections used by permission of Roberts Brothers, Publishers, and John +S.P. Alcott.</p> +<br> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="ALCUIN"></a>ALCUIN</h2> + +<h3>(735?-804)</h3> + +<h3>BY WILLIAM H. CARPENTER</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-a.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>lcuin, usually called Alcuin of York, came of a patrician +family of Northumberland. Neither the date nor the place +of his birth is known with definiteness, but he was born +about 735 at or near York. As a child he entered the cathedral +school recently founded by Egbert, Archbishop of York, and ultimately +became its most eminent pupil. He was subsequently assistant +master to Aelbert, its head; and when Aelbert succeeded to +the archbishopric, on the death of Egbert in 766, Alcuin became +<i>scholasticus</i> or master of the school. On the death of Aelbert in 780, +Alcuin was placed in charge of the cathedral library, the most +famous in Western Europe. In his longest poem, 'Versus de +Eboracensi Ecclesia' (Poem on the Saints of the Church at York), +he has left an important record of his connection with York. This +poem, written before he left England, is, like most of his verse, in +dactylic hexameters. To a certain extent it follows Virgil as a +model, and is partly based on the writings of Bede, partly on his +own personal experience. It is not only valuable for its historical +bearings, but for its disclosure of the manner and matter of instruction +in the schools of the time, and the contents of the great library. +As master of the cathedral school, Alcuin acquired name and fame +at home and abroad, and was soon the most celebrated teacher in +Britain. Before 766, in company with Aelbert, he made his first +journey to Germany, and may have visited Rome. Earlier than 780 +he was again abroad, and at Pavia came under the notice of +Charlemagne, who was on his way back from Italy. In 781 Eanbald, +the new Archbishop of York, sent Alcuin to Rome to bring back the +Archbishop's pallium. At Parma he again met Charlemagne, who +invited him to take up his abode at the Frankish court. With the +consent of his king and his archbishop he resigned his position at +York, and with a few pupils departed for the court at Aachen, in 782.</p> + +<p>Alcuin's arrival in Germany was the beginning of a new intellectual +epoch among the Franks. Learning was at this time in a +deplorable state. The older monastic and cathedral schools had +been broken up, and the monasteries themselves often unworthily +bestowed upon royal favorites. There had been a palace school for +rudimentary instruction, but it was wholly inefficient and unimportant.</p> + +<p>During the years immediately following his arrival, Alcuin zealously +labored at his projects of educational reform. First reorganizing +the palace school, he afterward undertook a reform of the monasteries +and their system of instruction, and the establishment of new schools +throughout the kingdom of Charlemagne. At the court school the +great king himself, as well as Liutgard the queen, became his +pupil. Gisela, Abbess of Chelles, the sister of Charlemagne, came +also to him for instruction, as did the Princes Charles, Pepin, and +Louis, and the Princesses Rotrud and Gisela. On himself and the +others, in accordance with the fashion of the time, Alcuin bestowed +fanciful names. He was Flaccus or Albinus, Charlemagne was +David, the queen was Ava, and Pepin was Julius. The subjects of +instruction in this school, the centre of culture of the kingdom, were +first of all, grammar; then arithmetic, astronomy, rhetoric, and +dialectic. The king himself studied poetry, astronomy, arithmetic, +the writings of the Fathers, and theology proper. It was under the +influence of Alcuin that Charlemagne issued in 787 the capitulary +that has been called "the first general charter of education for the +Middle Ages." It reproves the abbots for their illiteracy, and exhorts +them to the study of letters; and although its effect was less than +its purpose, it served, with subsequent decrees of the king, to stimulate +learning and literature throughout all Germany.</p> + +<p>Alcuin's system included, besides the palace school, and the +monastic and cathedral schools, which in some instances gave both +elementary and superior instruction, all the parish or village elementary +schools, whose head was the parish priest.</p> + +<p>In 790, seeing his plans well established, Alcuin returned to York +bearing letters of reconciliation to Offa, King of Mercia, between +whom and Charlemagne dissension had arisen. Having accomplished +his errand, he went back to the German court in 792. Here his first +act was to take a vigorous part in the furious controversy respecting +the doctrine of Adoptionism. Alcuin not only wrote against +the heresy, but brought about its condemnation by the Council of +Frankfort, in 794.</p> + +<p>Two years later, at his own request, he was made Abbot of the +Benedictine monastery of St. Martin, at Tours. Not contented with +reforming the lax monastic life, he resolved to make Tours a seat of +learning. Under his management, it presently became the most +renowned school in the kingdom. Especially in the copying of manuscripts +did the brethren excel. Alcuin kept up a vast correspondence +with Britain as well as with different parts of the Frankish +kingdom; and of the two hundred and thirty letters preserved, the +greater part belonged to this time. In 799, at Aachen, he held a +public disputation on Adoptionism with Felix, Bishop of Urgel, who +was wholly vanquished. When the king, in 800, was preparing for +that visit to the Papal court which was to end with his coronation as +Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, he invited Alcuin to accompany +him. But the old man, wearied with many burdens, could not make +the journey. By the beginning of 804 he had become much enfeebled. +It was his desire, often expressed, to die on the day of Pentecost. +His wish was fulfilled, for he died at dawn on the 19th of May. He +was buried in the Cloister Church of St. Martin, near the monastery.</p> + +<p>Alcuin's literary activity was exerted in various directions. Two-thirds +of all that he wrote was theological in character. These works +are exegetical, like the 'Commentary on the Gospel of St. John'; +dogmatic, like the 'Writings against Felix of Urgel and Elipandus +of Toledo,' his best work of this class; or liturgical and moral, like +the 'Lives of the Saints,' The other third is made up of the epistles, +already mentioned; of poems on a great variety of subjects, the +principal one being the 'Poem on the Saints of the Church at York'; +and of those didactic works which form his principal claim to attention +at the present day. His educational treatises are the following: +'On Grammar,' 'On Orthography,' 'On Rhetoric and the Virtues,' +'On Dialectics,' 'Disputation between the Royal and Most Noble +Youth Pepin, and Albinus the Scholastic,' and 'On the Calculation +of Easter,' The most important of all these writings is his 'Grammar,' +which consists of two parts: the first a dialogue between a +teacher and his pupils on philosophy and studies in general; the +other a dialogue between a teacher, a young Frank, and a young +Saxon, on grammar. These latter, in Alcuin's language, have "but +lately rushed upon the thorny thickets of grammatical density" +Grammar begins with the consideration of the letters, the vowels +and consonants, the former of which "are, as it were, the souls, and +the consonants the bodies of words." Grammar itself is defined +to be "the science of written sounds, the guardian of correct speaking +and writing. It is founded on nature, reason, authority, and +custom." He enumerates no less than twenty-six parts of grammar, +which he then defines. Many of his definitions and particularly his +etymologies, are remarkable. He tells us that feet in poetry are so +called "because the metres walk on them"; <i>littera</i> is derived from +<i>legitera</i>, "since the <i>littera</i> serve to prepare the way for readers" +(<i>legere, iter</i>). In his 'Orthography,' a pendant to the 'Grammar,' +<i>coelebs</i>, a bachelor, is "one who is on his way <i>ad coelum</i>" (to heaven). +Alcuin's 'Grammar' is based principally on Donatus. In this, as in +all his works, he compiles and adapts, but is only rarely original. +'On Rhetoric and the Virtues' is a dialogue between Charlemagne +and Albinus (Alcuin). The 'Disputation between Pepin and Albinus,' +the beginning of which is here given, shows both the manner +and the subject-matter of his instruction. Alcuin, with all the limitations +which his environment imposed upon him, stamped himself +indelibly upon his day and generation, and left behind him, in his +scholars, an enduring influence. Men like Rabanus, the famous +Bishop of Mayence, gloried in having been his pupils, and down to +the wars and devastations of the tenth century his influence upon +education was paramount throughout all Western Europe. There is +an excellent account of Alcuin in Professor West's 'Alcuin' ('Great +Educators' Series), published in 1893.</p> + +<p class="rgt"><img src="images/314.png" width="50%" alt=""></p> +<br><br><br> + +<blockquote> +<b><a name="ON_THE_SAINTS_OF_THE_CHURCH_AT_YORK"></a>ON THE SAINTS OF THE CHURCH AT YORK</b> +<br><br> +There the Eboric scholars felt the rule<br> +Of Master Aelbert, teaching in the school.<br> +Their thirsty hearts to gladden well he knew<br> +With doctrine's stream and learning's heavenly dew.<br> +<br> +To some he made the grammar understood,<br> +And poured on others rhetoric's copious flood.<br> +The rules of jurisprudence these rehearse,<br> +While those recite in high Eonian verse,<br> +Or play Castalia's flutes in cadence sweet<br> +And mount Parnassus on swift lyric feet.<br> +<br> +Anon the master turns their gaze on high<br> +To view the travailing sun and moon, the sky<br> +In order turning with its planets seven,<br> +And starry hosts that keep the law of heaven.<br> +<br> +The storms at sea, the earthquake's shock, the race<br> +Of men and beasts and flying fowl they trace;<br> +Or to the laws of numbers bend their mind,<br> +And search till Easter's annual day they find.<br> +<br> +Then, last and best, he opened up to view<br> +The depths of Holy Scripture, Old and New.<br> +Was any youth in studies well approved,<br> +Then him the master cherished, taught, and loved;<br> +And thus the double knowledge he conferred<br> +Of liberal studies and the Holy Word.<br> +</blockquote><br> +From West's 'Alcuin, and the Rise of the Christian Schools': by<br> +permission of Charles Scribner's Sons.<br> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<blockquote> +<h3><a name="DisputationBetweenPepinTheMostNobleandRoyal"></a>Disputation Between Pepin, The Most Noble and Royal +Youth, and Albinus the Scholastic</h3> + + <i>Pepin</i>--What is writing?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--The treasury of history.<br> +<br> + <i>Pepin</i>--What is language?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--The herald of the soul.<br> +<br> + <i>Pepin</i>--What generates language?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--The tongue.<br> +<br> + <i>Pepin</i>--What is the tongue?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--A whip of the air.<br> +<br> + <i>Pepin</i>--What is the air?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--A maintainer of life.<br> +<br> + <i>Pepin</i>--What is life?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--The joy of the happy; the torment of the suffering;<br> +a waiting for death.<br> +<br> + <i>Pepin</i>--What is death?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--An inevitable ending; a journey into uncertainty; a<br> +source of tears for the living; the probation of wills; a waylayer<br> +of men.<br> +<br> + <i>Pepin</i>--What is man?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--A booty of death; a passing traveler; a stranger on<br> +earth.<br> +<br> + <i>Pepin</i>--What is man like?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--The fruit of a tree.<br> +<br> + <i>Pepin</i>--What are the heavens?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--A rolling ball; an immeasurable vault.<br> +<br> + <i>Pepin</i>--What is light?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--The sight of all things.<br> +<br> + <i>Pepin</i>--What is day?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--The admonisher to labor.<br> +<br> + <i>Pepin</i>--What is the sun?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--The glory and splendor of the heavens; the attractive<br> +in nature; the measure of hours; the adornment of day.<br> +<br> + <i>Pepin</i>--What is the moon?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--The eye of night; the dispenser of dew; the presager<br> +of storms.<br> +<br> + <i>Pepin</i>--What are the stars?<br> +<br> + <i>Albinus</i>--A picture on the vault of heaven; the steersmen of<br> +ships; the ornament of night.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What is rain?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--The fertilizer of the earth; the producer of crops.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What is fog?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--Night in day; the annoyance of eyes.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What is wind?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--The mover of air; the agitation of water; the dryer<br> +of the earth.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What is the earth?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--The mother of growth; the nourisher of the living;<br> +the storehouse of life; the effacer of all.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What is the sea?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--The path of adventure; the bounds of the earth;<br> +the division of lands; the harbor of rivers; the source of rains;<br> +a refuge in danger; a pleasure in enjoyment.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What are rivers?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--A ceaseless motion; a refreshment to the sun; the<br> +waters of the earth.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What is water?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--The supporter of life; the cleanser of filth.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What is fire?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--An excessive heat; the nurse of growing things; the<br> +ripener of crops.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What is cold?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--The trembling of our members.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What is frost?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--An assailer of plants; the destruction of leaves; a<br> +fetter to the earth; a bridger of streams.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What is snow?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--Dry water.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What is winter?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--An exile of summer.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What is spring?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--A painter of the earth.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What is summer?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--That which brings to the earth a new garment, and<br> +ripens the fruit.<br> +<br> +<i>Pepin</i>--What is autumn?<br> +<br> +<i>Albinus</i>--The barn of the year.<br> +</blockquote><br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="A_LETTER_FROM_ALCUIN_TO_CHARLEMAGNE"></a>A LETTER FROM ALCUIN TO CHARLEMAGNE</h3> +<center>(Written in the year 796)</center> + +<p>I, your Flaccus, in accordance with your entreaty and your +gracious kindness, am busied under the shelter of St. Martin's, +in bestowing upon many of my pupils the honey of +the Holy Scriptures. I am eager that others should drink deep +of the old wine of ancient learning; I shall presently begin to +nourish still others with the fruits of grammatical ingenuity; and +some of them I am eager to enlighten with a knowledge of the +order of the stars, that seem painted, as it were, on the dome +of some mighty palace. I have become all things to all men +(1 Cor. i. 22) so that I may train up many to the profession of +God's Holy Church and to the glory of your imperial realm, lest +the grace of Almighty God in me should be fruitless (1 Cor. xv. +10) and your munificent bounty of no avail. But your servant +lacks the rarer books of scholastic learning, which in my own +country I used to have (thanks to the generous and most devoted +care of my teacher and to my own humble endeavors), and I +mention it to your Majesty so that, perchance, it may please you +who are eagerly concerned about the whole body of learning, to +have me dispatch some of our young men to procure for us certain +necessary works, and bring with them to France the flowers +of England; so that a graceful garden may not exist in York +alone, but so that at Tours as well there may be found the blossoming +of Paradise with its abundant fruits; that the south wind, +when it comes, may cause the gardens along the River Loire to +burst into bloom, and their perfumed airs to stream forth, and +finally, that which follows in the Canticle, whence I have drawn +this simile, may be brought to pass... (Canticle v. 1, 2). +Or even this exhortation of the prophet Isaiah, which urges us to +acquire wisdom:--"A11 ye who thirst, come to the waters; and +you who have not money, hasten, buy and eat: come, without +money and without price, and buy wine and milk" (Isaiah iv. 1.)</p> + +<p>And this is a thing which your gracious zeal will not overlook: +how upon every page of the Holy Scriptures we are urged +to the acquisition of wisdom; how nothing is more honorable for +insuring a happy life, nothing more pleasing in the observance, +nothing more efficient against sin, nothing more praiseworthy in +any lofty station, than that men live according to the teachings of +the philosophers. Moreover, nothing is more essential to the government +of the people, nothing better for the guidance of life +into the paths of honorable character, than the grace which wisdom +gives, and the glory of training and the power of learning. +Therefore it is that in its praise, Solomon, the wisest of all men, +exclaims, "Better is wisdom than all precious things, and more +to be desired" (Prov. viii. 11 <i>seq</i>). To secure this with every possible +effort and to get possession of it by daily endeavor, do you, +my lord King, exhort the young men who are in your Majesty's +palace, that they strive for this in the flower of their youth, so +that they may be deemed worthy to live through an old age of +honor, and that by its means they may be able to attain to everlasting +happiness. I, myself, according to my disposition, shall +not be slothful in sowing the seeds of wisdom among your servants +in this land, being mindful of the injunction, "Sow thy +seed in the morning, and at eventide let not thy hand cease; +since thou knowest not what will spring up, whether these or +those, and if both together, still better is it" (Eccles. xi. 6). In +the morning of my life and in the fruitful period of my studies I +sowed seed in Britain, and now that my blood has grown cool in +the evening of life, I still cease not; but sow the seed in France, +desiring that both may spring up by the grace of God. And now +that my body has grown weak, I find consolation in the saying of +St. Jerome, who declares in his letter to Nepotianus, "Almost all +the powers of the body are altered in old men, and wisdom alone +will increase while the rest decay." And a little further he says, +"The old age of those who have adorned their youth with noble +accomplishments and have meditated on the law of the Lord both +day and night becomes more and more deeply accomplished with +its years, more polished from experience, more wise by the lapse +of time; and it reaps the sweetest fruit of ancient learning." In +this letter in praise of wisdom, one who wishes can read many +things of the scientific pursuits of the ancients, and can understand +how eager were these ancients to abound in the grace of +wisdom. I have noted that your zeal, which is pleasing to God +and praiseworthy, is always advancing toward this wisdom and +takes pleasure in it, and that you are adorning the magnificence +of your worldly rule with still greater intellectual splendor. In +this may our Lord Jesus Christ, who is himself the supreme type +of divine wisdom, guard you and exalt you, and cause you to +attain to the glory of His own blessed and everlasting vision.</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="HENRY_M._ALDEN"></a>HENRY M. ALDEN</h2> + +<h3>(1836-)</h3> +<br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-h.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>enry Mills Alden, since 1864 the editor of Harper's Magazine, +was born in Mount Tabor, Vermont, November 11th, +1836, the eighth in descent from Captain John Alden, the +Pilgrim. He graduated at Williams College, and studied theology +at Andover Seminary, but was never ordained a minister, having +almost immediately turned his attention to literature. His first work +that attracted attention was an essay on the Eleusinian Mysteries, +published in the Atlantic Monthly. The scholarship and subtle +method revealed in this and similar works led to his engagement to +deliver a course of twelve Lowell Institute lectures at Boston, in +1863 and 1864, and he took for his subject 'The Structure of Paganism.' +Before this he had removed to New York, had engaged in +general editorial work, and formed his lasting connection with the +house of Harper and Brothers.</p> + +<p>As an editor Mr. Alden is the most practical of men, but he is in +reality a poet, and in another age he might have been a mystic. +He has the secret of preserving his life to himself, while paying the +keenest attention to his daily duties. In his office he is immersed in +affairs which require the exercise of vigilant common-sense, and +knowledge of life and literature. At his home he is a serene and +optimistic philosopher, contemplating the forces that make for our +civilization, and musing over the deep problems of man's occupation +of this earth. In 1893 appeared anonymously a volume entitled +'God in His World,' which attracted instantly wide attention in this +country and in England for its subtlety of thought, its boldness of +treatment, its winning sweetness of temper, and its exquisite style. +It was by Mr. Alden, and in 1895 it was followed by 'A Study of +Death,' continuing the great theme of the first,--the unity of creation, +the certainty that there is in no sense a war between the +Creator and his creation. In this view the Universe is not divided +into the Natural and the Supernatural: all is Natural. But we can +speak here only of their literary quality. The author is seen to be a +poet in his conceptions, but in form his writing is entirely within +the limits of prose; yet it is a prose most harmonious, most melodious, +and it exhibits the capacity of our English tongue in the hand of +a master. The thought is sometimes so subtle as to elude the careless +reader, but the charm of the melody never fails to entrance. +The study of life and civilization is profound, but the grace of treatment +seems to relieve the problems of half their difficulty.</p> + +<p>His wife did not live to read the exquisite dedication given below.</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<center>From 'A Study of Death,' 1895, by Harper and Brothers</center> + +<h3><a name="A_DEDICATION"></a>A DEDICATION</h3> + +<center>TO MY BELOVED WIFE</center> + +<p>My earliest written expression of intimate thought or cherished +fancy was for your eyes only; it was my first +approach to your maidenly heart, a mystical wooing, which +neglected no resource, near or remote, for the enhancement of +its charm, and so involved all other mystery in its own.</p> + +<p>In you, childhood has been inviolate, never losing its power +of leading me by an unspoken invocation to a green field, ever +kept fresh by a living fountain, where the Shepherd tends his +flock. Now, through a body racked with pain, and sadly broken, +still shines this unbroken childhood, teaching me Love's deepest +mystery.</p> + +<p>It is fitting, then, that I should dedicate to you this book +touching that mystery. It has been written in the shadow, but +illumined by the brightness of an angel's face seen in the darkness, +so that it has seemed easy and natural for me to find at +the thorn's heart a secret and everlasting sweetness far surpassing +that of the rose itself, which ceases in its own perfection.</p> + +<p>Whether that angel we have seen shall, for my need and +comfort, and for your own longing, hold back his greatest gift, +and leave you mine in the earthly ways we know and love, or +shall hasten to make the heavenly surprise, the issue in either +event will be a home-coming; if <i>here</i>, yet already the deeper +secret will have been in part disclosed; and if <i>beyond</i>, that +secret, fully known, will not betray the fondest hope of loving +hearts. Love never denied Death, and Death will not deny +Love.</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<center>From 'A Study of Death,' 1895, by Harper and Brothers</center> + +<h3><a name="THE_DOVE_AND_THE_SERPENT"></a>THE DOVE AND THE SERPENT</h3> + +<p>The Dove flies, and the Serpent creeps. Yet is the Dove +fond, while the Serpent is the emblem of wisdom. Both +were in Eden: the cooing, fluttering, wingèd spirit, loving +to descend, companion-like, brooding, following; and the creeping +thing which had glided into the sunshine of Paradise from +the cold bosoms of those nurses of an older world--Pain, and +Darkness, and Death--himself forgetting these in the warmth +and green life of the Garden. And our first parents knew +naught of these as yet unutterable mysteries, any more than +they knew that their roses bloomed over a tomb: so that when +all animate creatures came to Adam to be named, the meaning +of this living allegory which passed before him was in great +part hidden, and he saw no sharp line dividing the firmament +below from the firmament above; rather he leaned toward the +ground, as one does in a garden, seeing how quickly it was +fashioned into the climbing trees, into the clean flowers, and +into his own shapely frame. It was upon the ground he lay +when that deep sleep fell upon him from which he woke to find +his mate, lithe as the serpent, yet with the fluttering heart of +the dove.</p> + +<p>As the Dove, though winged for flight, ever descended, so the +Serpent, though unable wholly to leave the ground, tried ever to +lift himself therefrom, as if to escape some ancient bond. The +cool nights revived and nourished his memories of an older time, +wherein lay his subtile wisdom, but day by day his aspiring crest +grew brighter. The life of Eden became for him oblivion, the +light of the sun obscuring and confounding his reminiscence, even +as for Adam and Eve this life was Illusion, the visible disguising +the invisible, and pleasure veiling pain.</p> + +<p>In Adam the culture of the ground maintained humility. He +was held, moreover, in lowly content by the charm of the +woman, who was to him like the earth grown human; and since +she was the daughter of Sleep, her love seemed to him restful +as the night. Her raven locks were like the mantle of darkness, +and her voice had the laughter of streams that lapsed into +unseen depths.</p> + +<p>But Eve had something of the Serpent's unrest, as if she too +had come from the Under-world, which she would fain forget, +seeking liberation, urged by desire as deep as the abyss she had +left behind her, and nourished from roots unfathomably hidden--the +roots of the Tree of Life. She thus came to have conversation +with the Serpent.</p> + +<p>In the lengthening days of Eden's one Summer these two +were more and more completely enfolded in the Illusion of Light. +It was under this spell that, dwelling upon the enticement of +fruit good to look at, and pleasant to the taste, the Serpent +denied Death, and thought of Good as separate from Evil. "Ye +shall not surely die, but shall be as the gods, knowing good and +evil." So far, in his aspiring day-dream, had the Serpent fared +from his old familiar haunts--so far from his old-world wisdom!</p> + +<p>A surer omen would have come to Eve had she listened to +the plaintive notes of the bewildered Dove that in his downward +flutterings had begun to divine what the Serpent had come to +forget, and to confess what he had come to deny.</p> + +<p>For already was beginning to be felt "the season's difference," +and the grave mystery, without which Paradise itself could not +have been, was about to be unveiled,--the background of the +picture becoming its foreground. The fond hands plucking the +rose had found the thorn. Evil was known as something by +itself, apart from Good, and Eden was left behind, as one steps +out of infancy.</p> + +<p>From that hour have the eyes of the children of men been +turned from the accursed earth, looking into the blue above, +straining their vision for a glimpse of white-robed angels.</p> + +<p>Yet it was the Serpent that was lifted up in the wilderness; +and when He who "became sin for us" was being bruised in the +heel by the old enemy, the Dove descended upon Him at His +baptism. He united the wisdom of the Serpent with the harmlessness +of the Dove. Thus in Him were bound together and +reconciled the elements which in human thought had been put +asunder. In Him, Evil is overcome of Good, as, in Him, Death +is swallowed up of Life; and with His eyes we see that the robes +of angels are white, because they have been washed in blood.</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<center>From 'A Study of Death,' 1895, by Harper and Brothers</center> + +<h3><a name="Death_and_Sleep"></a>Death and Sleep</h3> + +<p>The Angel of Death is the invisible Angel of Life. While the +organism is alive as a human embodiment, death is present, +having the same human distinction as the life, from which +it is inseparable, being, indeed, the better half of living,--its +winged half, its rest and inspiration, its secret spring of elasticity, +and quickness. Life came upon the wings of Death, and so +departs.</p> + +<p>If we think of life apart from death our thought is partial, as +if we would give flight to the arrow without bending the bow. +No living movement either begins or is completed save through +death. If the shuttle return not there is no web; and the texture +of life is woven through this tropic movement.</p> + +<p>It is a commonly accepted scientific truth that the continuance +of life in any living thing depends upon death. But there +are two ways of expressing this truth: one, regarding merely +the outward fact, as when we say that animal or vegetable tissue +is renewed through decay; the other, regarding the action and +reaction proper to life itself, whereby it forever springs freshly +from its source. The latter form of expression is mystical, in +the true meaning of that term. We close our eyes to the outward +appearance, in order that we may directly confront a mystery +which is already past before there is any visible indication +thereof. Though the imagination engaged in this mystical apprehension +borrows its symbols or analogues from observation and +experience, yet these symbols are spiritually regarded by looking +at life on its living side, and abstracted as far as possible from +outward embodiment. We especially affect physiological analogues +because, being derived from our experience, we may the +more readily have the inward regard of them; and by passing +from one physiological analogue to another, and from all these to +those furnished by the processes of nature outside of our bodies, +we come to an apprehension of the action and reaction proper to +life itself as an idea independent of all its physical representations.</p> + +<p>Thus we trace the rhythmic beating of the pulse to the systole +and diastole of the heart, and we note a similar alternation in +the contraction and relaxation of all our muscles. Breathing is +alternately inspiration and expiration. Sensation itself is by beats, +and falls into rhythm. There is no uninterrupted strain of either +action or sensibility; a current or a contact is renewed, having +been broken. In psychical operation there is the same alternate +lapse and resurgence. Memory rises from the grave of oblivion. +No holding can be maintained save through alternate release. +Pulsation establishes circulation, and vital motions proceed through +cycles, each one of which, however minute, has its tropic of Cancer +and of Capricorn. Then there are the larger physiological +cycles, like that wherein sleep is the alternation of waking. Passing +from the field of our direct experience to that of observation, +we note similar alternations, as of day and night, summer and +winter, flood and ebb tide; and science discloses them at every +turn, especially in its recent consideration of the subtle forces of +Nature, leading us back of all visible motions to the pulsations +of the ether....</p> + +<p>In considering the action and reaction proper to life itself, we +here dismiss from view all measured cycles, whose beginning and +end are appreciably separate; our regard is confined to living +moments, so fleet that their beginning and ending meet as in one +point, which is seen to be at once the point of departure and of +return. Thus we may speak of a man's life as included between +his birth and his death, and with reference to this physiological +term, think of him as living, and then as dead; but we may also +consider him while living as yet every moment dying, and in this +view death is clearly seen to be the inseparable companion of +life,--the way of return, and so of continuance. This pulsation, +forever a vanishing and a resurgence, so incalculably swift as to +escape observation, is proper to life as life, does not begin with +what we call birth nor end with what we call death (considering +birth and death as terms applicable to an individual existence); it +is forever beginning and forever ending. Thus to all manifest +existence we apply the term Nature (<i>natura</i>), which means "forever +being born"; and on its vanishing side it is <i>moritura</i>, or +"forever dying." Resurrection is thus a natural and perpetual +miracle. The idea of life as transcending any individual embodiment +is as germane to science as it is to faith.</p> + +<p>Death, thus seen as essential, is lifted above its temporary +and visible accidents. It is no longer associated with corruption, +but rather with the sweet and wholesome freshness of life, being +the way of its renewal. Sweeter than the honey which Samson +found in the lion's carcass is this everlasting sweetness of Death; +and it is a mystery deeper than the strong man's riddle.</p> + +<p>So is Death pure and clean, as is the dew that comes with the +cool night when the sun has set; clean and white as the snowflakes +that betoken the absolution which Winter gives, shriving +the earth of all her Summer wantonness and excess, when only +the trees that yield balsam and aromatic fragrance remain green, +breaking the box of precious ointment for burial.</p> + +<p>In this view also is restored the kinship of Death with Sleep.</p> + +<p>The state of the infant seems to be one of chronic mysticism, +since during the greater part of its days its eyes are closed to +the outer world. Its larger familiarity is still with the invisible, +and it seems as if the Mothers of Darkness were still withholding +it as their nursling, accomplishing for it some mighty work +in their proper realm, some such fiery baptism of infants as is +frequently instanced in Greek mythology, tempering them for +earthly trials. The infant must needs sleep while this work is +being done for it; it has been sleeping since the work began, +from the foundation of the world, and the old habit still clings +about it and is not easily laid aside....</p> + +<p>That which we have been considering as the death that is in +every moment is a reaction proper to life itself, waking or sleeping, +whereby it is renewed, sharing at once Time and Eternity--time +as outward form, and eternity as its essential quality. Sleep +is a special relaxation, relieving a special strain. As daily we +build with effort and design an elaborate superstructure above +the living foundation, so must this edifice nightly be laid in +ruins. Sleep is thus a disembarrassment, the unloading of a +burden wherewith we have weighted ourselves. Here again we +are brought into a kind of repentance, and receive absolution. +Sleep is forgiveness.</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<center>From 'A Study of Death,' 1895, by Harper and Brothers</center> + +<h3><a name="THE_PARABLE_OF_THE_PRODIGAL"></a>THE PARABLE OF THE PRODIGAL</h3> + +<h3>I</h3> +<br> + +<p>Standing at the gate of Birth, it would seem as if it were the +vital destination of all things to fly from their source, as if +it were the dominant desire of life to enter into limitations. +We might mentally represent to ourselves an essence simple and +indivisible that denies itself in diversified manifold existence. To +us, this side the veil, nay, immeshed in innumerable veils that +hide from us the Father's face, this insistence appears to have +the stress of urgency, as if the effort of all being, its unceasing +travail, were like the beating of the infinite ocean upon the +shores of Time; and as if, within the continent of Time, all +existence were forever knocking at new gates, seeking, through +some as yet untried path of progression, greater complexity, a +deeper involvement. All the children seem to be beseeching the +Father to divide unto them His living, none willingly abiding in +that Father's house. But in reality their will is His will--they +fly, and they are driven, like fledglings from the mother-nest.</p> +<br> +<br> +<h3>II</h3> +<br> + +<p>The story of a solar system, or of any synthesis in time, +repeats the parable of the Prodigal Son, in its essential features. +It is a cosmic parable.</p> + +<p>The planet is a wanderer (<i>planes</i>), and the individual planetary +destiny can be accomplished only through flight from its +source. After all its prodigality it shall sicken and return.</p> + +<p>Attributing to the Earth, thus apparently separated from the +Sun, some macrocosmic sentience, what must have been her wondering +dream, finding herself at once thrust away and securely +held, poised between her flight and her bond, and so swinging +into a regular orbit about the Sun, while at the same time, in +her rotation, turning to him and away from him--into the light, +and into the darkness, forever denying and confessing her lord! +Her emotion must have been one of delight, however mingled +with a feeling of timorous awe, since her desire could not have +been other than one with her destination. Despite the distance +and the growing coolness she could feel the kinship still; her +pulse, though modulated, was still in rhythm with that of the +solar heart, and in her bosom were hidden consubstantial fires. +But it was the sense of otherness, of her own distinct individuation, +that was mainly being nourished, this sense, moreover, +being proper to her destiny; therefore, the signs of her likeness +to the Sun were more and more being buried from her view; +her fires were veiled by a hardening crust, and her opaqueness +stood out against his light. She had no regret for all she was +surrendering, thinking only of her gain, of being clothed upon +with a garment showing ever some new fold of surprising beauty +and wonder. If she had remained in the Father's house--like +the elder brother in the Parable--then would all that He +had have been hers, in nebulous simplicity. But now, holding +her revels apart, she seems to sing her own song, and to dream +her own beautiful dream, wandering, with a motion wholly her +own, among the gardens of cosmic order and loveliness. She +glories in her many veils, which, though they hide from her both +her source and her very self, are the media through which the +invisible light is broken into multiform illusions that enrich her +dream. She beholds the Sun as a far-off, insphered being existing +for her, her ministrant bridegroom; and when her face is turned +away from him into the night, she beholds innumerable suns, a +myriad of archangels, all witnesses of some infinitely remote and +central flame--the Spirit of all life. Yet, in the midst of these +visible images, she is absorbed in her individual dream, wherein +she appears to herself to be the mother of all living. It is proper +to her destiny that she should be thus enwrapped in her own +distinct action and passion, and refer to herself the appearances +of a universe. While all that is not she is what she really is,--necessary, +that is, to her full definition,--she, on the other hand, +from herself interprets all else. This is the inevitable terrestrial +idealism, peculiar to every individuation in time--the individual +thus balancing the universe.</p> +<br> +<br> +<h3>III</h3> +<br> +<p>In reality, the Earth has never left the Sun; apart from him +she has no life, any more than has the branch severed from the +vine. More truly it may be said that the Sun has never left the +Earth.</p> + +<p>No prodigal can really leave the Father's house, any more than +he can leave himself; coming to himself, he feels the Father's +arms about him--they have always been there--he is newly +appareled, and wears the signet ring of native prestige; he hears +the sound of familiar music and dancing, and it may be that the +young and beautiful forms mingling with him in this festival are +the riotous youths and maidens of his far-country revels, also +come to themselves and home, of whom also the Father saith: +These were dead and are alive again, they were lost and are +found. The starvation and sense of exile had been parts of a +troubled dream--a dream which had also had its ecstasy, but +had come into a consuming fever, with delirious imaginings of +fresh fountains, of shapes drawn from the memory of childhood, +and of the cool touch of kindred hands upon the brow. So near +is exile to home, misery to divine commiseration--so near are +pain and death, desolation and divestiture, to "a new creature," +and to the kinship involved in all creation and re-creation.</p> + +<p>Distance in the cosmic order is a standing-apart, which is only +another expression of the expansion and abundance of creative +life; but at every remove its reflex is nearness, a bond of attraction, +insphering and curving, making orb and orbit. While +in space this attraction is diminished--being inversely as the +square of the distance--and so there is maintained and emphasized +the appearance of suspension and isolation, yet in time it +gains preponderance, contracting sphere and orbit, aging planets +and suns, and accumulating destruction, which at the point of +annihilation becomes a new creation. This Grand Cycle, which is +but a pulsation or breath of the Eternal life, illustrates a truth +which is repeated in its least and most minutely divided moment--that +birth lies next to death, as water crystallizes at the +freezing-point, and the plant blossoms at points most remote from +the source of nutrition.</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="THOMAS_BAILEY_ALDRICH"></a>THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH</h2> + +<h3>(1836-)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-a.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p> poet in verse often becomes a poet in prose also, in composing +novels; although the novelist may not, and in general +does not, possess the faculty of writing poems. The +poet-novelist is apt to put into his prose a good deal of the same +charm and the same picturesque choice of phrase and image that +characterize his verse; while it does not follow that the novelist who +at times writes verse--like George Eliot, for example--succeeds in +giving a distinctly poetic quality to prose, or even wishes to do +so. Among authors who have displayed +peculiar power and won fame in the dual +capacity of poet and of prose romancer or +novelist, Sir Walter Scott and Victor Hugo +no doubt stand pre-eminent; and in American +literature, Edgar Allan Poe and Oliver +Wendell Holmes very strikingly combine +these two functions. Another American +author who has gained a distinguished +position both as a poet and as a writer of +prose fiction and essays is Thomas Bailey +Aldrich. +</p> +<p class="lft"><img src="images/328.png" width="45%" alt=""></p> + +<p>It is upon his work in the form of +verse, perhaps, that Aldrich's chief renown +is based; but some of his short stories in especial have contributed +much to his popularity, no less than to his repute as a delicate and +polished artificer in words. A New Englander, he has infused into +some of his poems the true atmosphere of New England, and has +given the same light and color of home to his prose, while imparting +to his productions in both kinds a delightful tinge of the foreign +and remote. In addition to his capacities as a poet and a romancer, +he is a wit and humorist of sparkling quality. In reading his books +one seems also to inhale the perfumes of Arabia and the farther +East, blended with the salt sea-breeze and the pine-scented air of +his native State, New Hampshire. +</p> + +<p>He was born in the old seaside town of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, +November 11th, 1836; but moved to New York City in 1854, at +the age of seventeen. There he remained until 1866; beginning his +work quite early; forming his literary character by reading and +observation, by the writing of poems, and by practice and experience +of writing prose sketches and articles for journals and periodicals. +During this period he entered into associations with the poets Stedman, +Stoddard, and Bayard Taylor, and was more or less in touch +with the group that included Walt Whitman, Fitz-James O'Brien, +and William Winter. Removing to Boston in January, 1866, he became +the editor of Every Saturday, and remained in that post until +1874, when he resigned. In 1875 he made a long tour in Europe, +plucking the first fruits of foreign travel, which were succeeded by +many rich and dainty gatherings from the same source in later +years. In the intervals of these wanderings he lived in Boston and +Cambridge; occupying for a time James Russell Lowell's historic +house of Elmwood, in the semi-rural university city; and then established +a pretty country house at Ponkapog, a few miles west of +Boston. This last suggested the title for a charming book of travel +papers, 'From Ponkapog to Pesth.' In 1881 he was appointed editor of +the Atlantic Monthly, and continued to direct that famous magazine +for nine years, frequently making short trips to Europe, extending +his tours as far as the heart of Russia, and gathering fresh materials, +for essay or song. Much of his time since giving up the Atlantic +editorship has been passed in voyaging, and in 1894-5 he made a +journey around the world. +</p> + +<p>From the beginning he struck with quiet certainty the vein that +was his by nature in poetry; and this has broadened almost continually, +yielding richer results, which have been worked out with an +increasing refinement of skill. His predilection is for the picturesque; +for romance combined with simplicity, purity, and tenderness of +feeling, touched by fancy and by occasional lights of humor so +reserved and dainty that they never disturb the pictorial harmony. +The capacity for unaffected utterance of feeling on matters common +to humanity reached a climax in the poem of 'Baby Bell,' which +by its sympathetic and delicate description of a child's advent and +death gave the author a claim to the affection^ of a wide circle; and +this remained for a long time probably the best known among his +poems. 'Friar Jerome's Beautiful Book' is another of the earlier +favorites. 'Spring in New England' has since come to hold high +rank both for its vivid and graceful description of the season, for its +tender fervor of patriotism, and for its sentiment of reconciliation +between North and South. The lines on 'Piscataqua River' remain +one of the best illustrations of boyhood memories, and have something +of Whittier's homely truth. In his longer narrative pieces, +'Judith' and 'Wyndham Towers,' cast in the mold of blank-verse +idyls, Mr. Aldrich does not seem so much himself as in many of his +briefer flights. An instinctive dramatic tendency finds outlet in +'Pauline Paulovna' and 'Mercedes'--the latter of which, a two-act +piece in prose, has found representation in the theatre; yet in these, +also, he is less eminently successful than in his lyrics and society +verse. +</p> + +<p>No American poet has wrought his stanzas with greater faithfulness +to an exacting standard of craftsmanship than Mr. Aldrich, or +has known better when to leave a line loosely cast, and when to reinforce +it with correction or with a syllable that might seem, to an ear +less true, redundant. This gives to his most carefully chiseled productions +an air of spontaneous ease, and has made him eminent as a +sonneteer. His sonnet on 'Sleep' is one of the finest in the language. +The conciseness and concentrated aptness of his expression +also--together with a faculty of bringing into conjunction subtly +contrasted thoughts, images, or feelings--has issued happily in short, +concentrated pieces like 'An Untimely Thought,' 'Destiny,' and +'Identity,' and in a number of pointed and effective quatrains. Without +overmastering purpose outside of art itself, his is the poetry of +luxury rather than of deep passion or conviction; yet, with the freshness +of bud and tint in springtime, it still always relates itself effectively +to human experience. The author's specially American quality, +also, though not dominant, comes out clearly in 'Unguarded Gates,' +and with a differing tone in the plaintive Indian legend of 'Miantowona.' +</p> + +<p>If we perceive in his verse a kinship with the dainty ideals of +Théophile Gautier and Alfred de Musset, this does not obscure his +originality or his individual charm; and the same thing may be said +with regard to his prose. The first of his short fictions that made a +decided mark was 'Marjorie Daw.' The fame which it gained, in +its separate field, was as swift and widespread as that of Hawthorne's +'The Gentle Boy' or Bret Harte's 'Luck of Roaring Camp.' It is a +bright and half-pathetic little parody on human life and affection; or +perhaps we should call it a parable symbolizing the power which +imagination wields over real life, even in supposedly unimaginative +people. The covert smile which it involves, at the importance of +human emotions, may be traced to a certain extent in some of Mr. +Aldrich's longer and more serious works of fiction: his three novels, +'Prudence Palfrey,' 'The Queen of Sheba,' and 'The Stillwater +Tragedy.' 'The Story of a Bad Boy,' frankly but quietly humorous +in its record of the pranks and vicissitudes of a healthy average lad +(with the scene of the story localized at old Portsmouth, under the +name of Rivermouth), a less ambitious work, still holds a secure +place in the affections of many mature as well as younger readers. +Besides these books, Mr. Aldrich has published a collection of short +descriptive, reminiscent, and half-historic papers on Portsmouth,--'An +Old Town by the Sea'; with a second volume of short stories +entitled 'Two Bites at a Cherry.' The character-drawing in his +fiction is clear-cut and effective, often sympathetic, and nearly always +suffused with an agreeable coloring of humor. There are notes of +pathos, too, in some of his tales; and it is the blending of these +qualities, through the medium of a lucid and delightful style, that +defines his pleasing quality in prose. +</p> +<br> +[The following selections are copyrighted, and are reprinted by +permission of the author, and Houghton, Mifflin & Co., publishers.]<br> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="DESTINY"></a>DESTINY</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Three roses, wan as moonlight, and weighed down</p> +<p>Each with its loveliness as with a crown,</p> +<p>Drooped in a florist's window in a town.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The first a lover bought. It lay at rest,</p> +<p>Like flower on flower, that night, on Beauty's breast.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The second rose, as virginal and fair,</p> +<p>Shrunk in the tangles of a harlot's hair.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The third, a widow, with new grief made wild,</p> +<p>Shut in the icy palm of her dead child.</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="IDENTITY"></a>IDENTITY</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Somewhere--in desolate wind-swept space--</p> +<p class="i1">In Twilight-land--in No-man's land--</p> +<p>Two hurrying Shapes met face to face,</p> +<p class="i2">And bade each other stand.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>"And who are you?" cried one, agape,</p> +<p class="i1">Shuddering in the gloaming light.</p> +<p>"I know not," said the second Shape,</p> +<p class="i2">"I only died last night!"</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="PRESCIENCE"></a>PRESCIENCE</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The new moon hung in the sky, the sun was low in the west,</p> +<p>And my betrothed and I in the churchyard paused to rest--</p> +<p class="i1">Happy maiden and lover, dreaming the old dream over:</p> +<p>The light winds wandered by, and robins chirped from the nest.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>And lo! in the meadow sweet was the grave of a little child,</p> +<p>With a crumbling stone at the feet and the ivy running wild--</p> +<p class="i1">Tangled ivy and clover folding it over and over:</p> +<p>Close to my sweetheart's feet was the little mound up-piled.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Stricken with nameless fears, she shrank and clung to me,</p> +<p>And her eyes were filled with tears for a sorrow I did not see:</p> +<p class="i1">Lightly the winds were blowing, softly her tears were flowing--</p> +<p>Tears for the unknown years and a sorrow that was to be!</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="ALEC_YEATONS_SON"></a>ALEC YEATON'S SON</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>GLOUCESTER, AUGUST, 1720</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The wind it wailed, the wind it moaned,</p> +<p class="i1">And the white caps flecked the sea;</p> +<p>"An' I would to God," the skipper groaned,</p> +<p class="i1">"I had not my boy with me!"</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Snug in the stern-sheets, little John</p> +<p class="i1">Laughed as the scud swept by;</p> +<p>But the skipper's sunburnt cheek grew wan</p> +<p class="i1">As he watched the wicked sky.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>"Would he were at his mother's side!"</p> +<p class="i1">And the skipper's eyes were dim.</p> +<p>"Good Lord in heaven, if ill betide,</p> +<p class="i1">What would become of him!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>"For me--my muscles are as steel,</p> +<p class="i1">For me let hap what may;</p> +<p>I might make shift upon the keel</p> +<p class="i1">Until the break o' day.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>"But he, he is so weak and small,</p> +<p class="i1">So young, scarce learned to stand--</p> +<p>O pitying Father of us all,</p> +<p class="i1">I trust him in thy hand!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>"For thou who markest from on high</p> +<p class="i1">A sparrow's fall--each one!--</p> +<p>Surely, O Lord, thou'lt have an eye</p> +<p class="i1">On Alec Yeaton's son!"</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Then, helm hard-port; right straight he sailed</p> +<p class="i1">Towards the headland light:</p> +<p>The wind it moaned, the wind it wailed,</p> +<p class="i1">And black, black fell the night.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Then burst a storm to make one quail,</p> +<p class="i1">Though housed from winds and waves--</p> +<p>They who could tell about that gale</p> +<p class="i1">Must rise from watery graves!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Sudden it came, as sudden went;</p> +<p class="i1">Ere half the night was sped,</p> +<p>The winds were hushed, the waves were spent,</p> +<p class="i1"> And the stars shone overhead.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Now, as the morning mist grew thin,</p> +<p class="i1">The folk on Gloucester shore</p> +<p>Saw a little figure floating in</p> +<p class="i1">Secure, on a broken oar!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Up rose the cry, "A wreck! a wreck!</p> +<p class="i1">Pull mates, and waste no breath!"--</p> +<p>They knew it, though 'twas but a speck</p> +<p class="i1">Upon the edge of death!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Long did they marvel in the town</p> +<p class="i1">At God his strange decree,</p> +<p>That let the stalwart skipper drown</p> +<p class="i1">And the little child go free!</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="MEMORY"></a>MEMORY</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>My mind lets go a thousand things,</p> +<p>Like dates of wars and deaths of kings,</p> +<p>And yet recalls the very hour--</p> +<p>'Twas noon by yonder village tower.</p> +<p>And on the last blue noon in May--</p> +<p>The wind came briskly up this way,</p> +<p>Crisping the brook beside the road;</p> +<p>Then, pausing here, set down its load</p> +<p>Of pine-scents, and shook listlessly</p> +<p>Two petals from that wild-rose tree.</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="TENNYSON1890"></a>TENNYSON (1890)</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4"><b>I</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Shakespeare and Milton--what third blazoned name</p> +<p class="i1">Shall lips of after ages link to these?</p> +<p class="i1">His who, beside the wild encircling seas,</p> +<p>Was England's voice, her voice with one acclaim,</p> +<p class="i1">For threescore years; whose word of praise was fame,</p> +<p>Whose scorn gave pause to man's iniquities.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4"><b>II</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>What strain was his in that Crimean war?</p> +<p class="i1">A bugle-call in battle; a low breath,</p> +<p class="i1">Plaintive and sweet, above the fields of death!</p> +<p>So year by year the music rolled afar,</p> +<p>From Euxine wastes to flowery Kandahar,</p> +<p class="i1">Bearing the laurel or the cypress wreath.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4"><b>III</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Others shall have their little space of time,</p> +<p class="i1">Their proper niche and bust, then fade away</p> +<p class="i1">Into the darkness, poets of a day;</p> +<p>But thou, O builder of enduring rhyme,</p> +<p>Thou shalt not pass! Thy fame in every clime</p> +<p class="i1">On earth shall live where Saxon speech has sway.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4"><b>IV</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Waft me this verse across the winter sea,</p> +<p class="i1">Through light and dark, through mist and blinding sleet,</p> +<p class="i1">O winter winds, and lay it at his feet;</p> +<p>Though the poor gift betray my poverty,</p> +<p>At his feet lay it; it may chance that he</p> +<p class="i1">Will find no gift, where reverence is, unmeet.</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br> +<a name="337.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><img src="images/337.jpg" width="50%" alt=""> +<br> +<b><i>POETRY</i>.<br> +Photogravure from a painting by C. Schweninger.</b></p><br> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="SWEETHEART_SIGH_NO_MORE"></a>SWEETHEART, SIGH NO MORE</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>It was with doubt and trembling</p> +<p class="i1">I whispered in her ear.</p> +<p class="i1">Go, take her answer, bird-on-bough,</p> +<p>That all the world may hear--</p> +<p class="i2"><i>Sweetheart, sigh no more</i>!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Sing it, sing it, tawny throat,</p> +<p class="i1">Upon the wayside tree,</p> +<p>How fair she is, how true she is,</p> +<p class="i1">How dear she is to me--</p> +<p class="i2"><i>Sweetheart, sigh no more</i>!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Sing it, sing it, and through the summer long</p> +<p class="i1">The winds among the clover-tops,</p> +<p>And brooks, for all their silvery stops,</p> +<p class="i1">Shall envy you the song--</p> +<p class="i2"><i>Sweetheart, sigh no more!</i></p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="BROKEN_MUSIC"></a>BROKEN MUSIC</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i6">"A note</p> +<p class="i2">All out of tune in this world's instrument."</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">AMY LEVY.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>I know not in what fashion she was made,</p> +<p class="i1">Nor what her voice was, when she used to speak,</p> +<p>Nor if the silken lashes threw a shade</p> +<p class="i4">On wan or rosy cheek.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>I picture her with sorrowful vague eyes,</p> +<p class="i1">Illumed with such strange gleams of inner light</p> +<p>As linger in the drift of London skies</p> +<p class="i4">Ere twilight turns to night.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>I know not; I conjecture. 'Twas a girl</p> +<p class="i1">That with her own most gentle desperate hand</p> +<p>From out God's mystic setting plucked life's pearl--</p> +<p class="i4">'Tis hard to understand.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>So precious life is! Even to the old</p> +<p class="i1">The hours are as a miser's coins, and she--</p> +<p>Within her hands lay youth's unminted gold</p> +<p class="i4">And all felicity.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The winged impetuous spirit, the white flame</p> +<p class="i1">That was her soul once, whither has it flown?</p> +<p>Above her brow gray lichens blot her name</p> +<p class="i4">Upon the carven stone.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>This is her Book of Verses--wren-like notes,</p> +<p class="i1">Shy franknesses, blind gropings, haunting fears;</p> +<p>At times across the chords abruptly floats</p> +<p class="i4">A mist of passionate tears.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>A fragile lyre too tensely keyed and strung,</p> +<p class="i1">A broken music, weirdly incomplete:</p> +<p>Here a proud mind, self-baffled and self-stung,</p> +<p class="i4">Lies coiled in dark defeat.</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<blockquote> +<a name="ELMWOOD"></a>ELMWOOD<br><br> +<i>In Memory of James Russell Lowell</i><br> +<br> +Here, in the twilight, at the well-known gate<br> +I linger, with no heart to enter more.<br> +Among the elm-tops the autumnal air<br> +Murmurs, and spectral in the fading light<br> +A solitary heron wings its way<br> +Southward--save this no sound or touch of life.<br> +Dark is the window where the scholar's lamp<br> +Was used to catch a pallor from the dawn.<br> +<br> + Yet I must needs a little linger here.<br> +Each shrub and tree is eloquent of him,<br> +For tongueless things and silence have their speech.<br> +This is the path familiar to his foot<br> +From infancy to manhood and old age;<br> +For in a chamber of that ancient house<br> +His eyes first opened on the mystery<br> +Of life, and all the splendor of the world.<br> +Here, as a child, in loving, curious way,<br> +He watched the bluebird's coming; learned the date<br> +Of hyacinth and goldenrod, and made<br> +Friends of those little redmen of the elms,<br> +And slyly added to their winter store<br> +Of hazel-nuts: no harmless thing that breathed,<br> +Footed or winged, but knew him for a friend.<br> +The gilded butterfly was not afraid<br> +To trust its gold to that so gentle hand,<br> +The bluebird fled not from the pendent spray.<br> +Ah, happy childhood, ringed with fortunate stars!<br> +What dreams were his in this enchanted sphere,<br> +What intuitions of high destiny!<br> +The honey-bees of Hybla touched his lips<br> +In that old New-World garden, unawares.<br> +<br> +So in her arms did Mother Nature fold<br> +Her poet, whispering what of wild and sweet<br> +Into his ear--the state-affairs of birds,<br> +The lore of dawn and sunset, what the wind<br> +Said in the tree-tops--fine, unfathomed things<br> +Henceforth to turn to music in his brain:<br> +A various music, now like notes of flutes,<br> +And now like blasts of trumpets blown in wars.<br> +Later he paced this leafy academe<br> +A student, drinking from Greek chalices<br> +The ripened vintage of the antique world.<br> +And here to him came love, and love's dear loss;<br> +Here honors came, the deep applause of men<br> +Touched to the heart by some swift-wingèd word<br> +That from his own full heart took eager flight--<br> +Some strain of piercing sweetness or rebuke,<br> +For underneath his gentle nature flamed<br> +A noble scorn for all ignoble deed,<br> +Himself a bondman till all men were free.<br> +<br> +Thus passed his manhood; then to other lands<br> +He strayed, a stainless figure among courts<br> +Beside the Manzanares and the Thames.<br> +Whence, after too long exile, he returned<br> +With fresher laurel, but sedater step<br> +And eye more serious, fain to breathe the air<br> +Where through the Cambridge marshes the blue Charles<br> +Uncoils its length and stretches to the sea:<br> +Stream dear to him, at every curve a shrine<br> +For pilgrim Memory. Again he watched<br> +His loved syringa whitening by the door,<br> +And knew the catbird's welcome; in his walks<br> +Smiled on his tawny kinsmen of the elms<br> +Stealing his nuts; and in the ruined year<br> +Sat at his widowed hearthside with bent brows<br> +Leonine, frosty with the breath of time,<br> +And listened to the crooning of the wind<br> +In the wide Elmwood chimneys, as of old.<br> +And then--and then....<br> +<br> +The after-glow has faded from the elms,<br> +And in the denser darkness of the boughs<br> +From time to time the firefly's tiny lamp<br> +Sparkles. How often in still summer dusks<br> +He paused to note that transient phantom spark<br> +Flash on the air--a light that outlasts him!<br> +<br> +The night grows chill, as if it felt a breath<br> +Blown from that frozen city where he lies.<br> +All things turn strange. The leaf that rustles here<br> +Has more than autumn's mournfulness. The place<br> +Is heavy with his absence. Like fixed eyes<br> +Whence the dear light of sense and thought has fled,<br> +The vacant windows stare across the lawn.<br> +The wise sweet spirit that informed it all<br> +Is otherwhere. The house itself is dead.<br> +<br> +O autumn wind among the sombre pines,<br> +Breathe you his dirge, but be it sweet and low.<br> +With deep refrains and murmurs of the sea,<br> +Like to his verse--the art is yours alone.<br> +His once--you taught him. Now no voice but yours!<br> +Tender and low, O wind among the pines.<br> +I would, were mine a lyre of richer strings,<br> +In soft Sicilian accents wrap his name.<br> +</blockquote> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<blockquote> +<a name="SEA_LONGINGS"></a>SEA LONGINGS<br> +<br> +The first world-sound that fell upon my ear<br> +Was that of the great winds along the coast<br> +Crushing the deep-sea beryl on the rocks--<br> +The distant breakers' sullen cannonade.<br> +Against the spires and gables of the town<br> +The white fog drifted, catching here and there<br> +At overleaning cornice or peaked roof,<br> +And hung--weird gonfalons. The garden walks<br> +Were choked with leaves, and on their ragged biers<br> +Lay dead the sweets of summer--damask rose,<br> +Clove-pink, old-fashioned, loved New England flowers<br> +Only keen salt-sea odors filled the air.<br> +Sea-sounds, sea-odors--these were all my world.<br> +Hence is it that life languishes with me<br> +Inland; the valleys stifle me with gloom<br> +And pent-up prospect; in their narrow bound<br> +Imagination flutters futile wings.<br> +Vainly I seek the sloping pearl-white sand<br> +And the mirage's phantom citadels<br> +Miraculous, a moment seen, then gone.<br> +Among the mountains I am ill at ease,<br> +Missing the stretched horizon's level line<br> +And the illimitable restless blue.<br> +The crag-torn sky is not the sky I love,<br> +But one unbroken sapphire spanning all;<br> +And nobler than the branches of a pine<br> +Aslant upon a precipice's edge<br> +Are the strained spars of some great battle-ship<br> +Plowing across the sunset. No bird's lilt<br> +So takes me as the whistling of the gale<br> +Among the shrouds. My cradle-song was this,<br> +Strange inarticulate sorrows of the sea,<br> +Blithe rhythms upgathered from the Sirens' caves.<br> +Perchance of earthly voices the last voice<br> +That shall an instant my freed spirit stay<br> +On this world's verge, will be some message blown<br> +Over the dim salt lands that fringe the coast<br> +At dusk, or when the trancèd midnight droops<br> +With weight of stars, or haply just as dawn,<br> +Illumining the sullen purple wave,<br> +Turns the gray pools and willow-stems to gold.<br> +</blockquote> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<blockquote> +<a name="A_SHADOW_OF_THE_NIGHT"></a>A SHADOW OF THE NIGHT<br> +<br> +Close on the edge of a midsummer dawn<br> +In troubled dreams I went from land to land,<br> +Each seven-colored like the rainbow's arc,<br> +Regions where never fancy's foot had trod<br> +Till then; yet all the strangeness seemed not strange,<br> +At which I wondered, reasoning in my dream<br> +With twofold sense, well knowing that I slept.<br> +At last I came to this our cloud-hung earth,<br> +And somewhere by the seashore was a grave,<br> +A woman's grave, new-made, and heaped with flowers;<br> +And near it stood an ancient holy man<br> +That fain would comfort me, who sorrowed not<br> +For this unknown dead woman at my feet.<br> +But I, because his sacred office held<br> +My reverence, listened; and 'twas thus he spake:--<br> +"When next thou comest thou shalt find her still<br> +In all the rare perfection that she was.<br> +Thou shalt have gentle greeting of thy love!<br> +Her eyelids will have turned to violets,<br> +Her bosom to white lilies, and her breath<br> +To roses. What is lovely never dies,<br> +But passes into other loveliness,<br> +Star-dust, or sea-foam, flower, or wingèd air.<br> +If this befalls our poor unworthy flesh,<br> +Think thee what destiny awaits the soul!<br> +What glorious vesture it shall wear at last!"<br> +While yet he spoke, seashore and grave and priest<br> +Vanished, and faintly from a neighboring spire<br> +Fell five slow solemn strokes upon my ear.<br> +Then I awoke with a keen pain at heart,<br> +A sense of swift unutterable loss,<br> +And through the darkness reached my hand to touch<br> +Her cheek, soft-pillowed on one restful palm--<br> +To be quite sure!<br> +</blockquote><br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="OUTWARD_BOUND"></a>OUTWARD BOUND</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>I leave behind me the elm-shadowed square</p> +<p class="i1">And carven portals of the silent street,</p> +<p class="i1">And wander on with listless, vagrant feet</p> +<p>Through seaward-leading alleys, till the air</p> +<p>Smells of the sea, and straightway then the care</p> +<p class="i1">Slips from my heart, and life once more is sweet.</p> +<p class="i1">At the lane's ending lie the white-winged fleet.</p> +<p>O restless Fancy, whither wouldst thou fare?</p> +<p>Here are brave pinions that shall take thee far--</p> +<p class="i1">Gaunt hulks of Norway; ships of red Ceylon;</p> +<p class="i2">Slim-masted lovers of the blue Azores!</p> +<p>'Tis but an instant hence to Zanzibar,</p> +<p class="i1">Or to the regions of the Midnight Sun:</p> +<p class="i2">Ionian isles are thine, and all the fairy shores!</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="REMINISCENCE"></a>REMINISCENCE</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Though I am native to this frozen zone</p> +<p class="i1">That half the twelvemonth torpid lies, or dead;</p> +<p class="i1">Though the cold azure arching overhead</p> +<p>And the Atlantic's never-ending moan</p> +<p>Are mine by heritage, I must have known</p> +<p class="i1">Life otherwhere in epochs long since fled;</p> +<p class="i1">For in my veins some Orient blood is red,</p> +<p>And through my thought are lotus blossoms blown.</p> +<p>I do remember ... it was just at dusk,</p> +<p class="i1">Near a walled garden at the river's turn,</p> +<p class="i2">(A thousand summers seem but yesterday!)</p> +<p>A Nubian girl, more sweet than Khoorja musk,</p> +<p class="i1">Came to the water-tank to fill her urn,</p> +<p class="i2">And with the urn she bore my heart away!</p> +</div></div> +<br> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="PERE_ANTOINES_DATE-PALM"></a>PÈRE ANTOINE'S DATE-PALM</h3> + +<p>Near the Levée, and not far from the old French Cathedral in +the Place d'Armes, at New Orleans, stands a fine date-palm, +thirty feet in height, spreading its broad leaves in +the alien air as hardily as if its sinuous roots were sucking +strength from their native earth.</p> + +<p>Sir Charles Lyell, in his 'Second Visit to the United States,' +mentions this exotic:--"The tree is seventy or eighty years old; +for Père Antoine, a Roman Catholic priest, who died about +twenty years ago, told Mr. Bringier that he planted it himself, +when he was young. In his will he provided that they who succeeded +to this lot of ground should forfeit it if they cut down +the palm."</p> + +<p>Wishing to learn something of Père Antoine's history, Sir +Charles Lyell made inquiries among the ancient Creole inhabitants +of the faubourg. That the old priest, in his last days, became +very much emaciated, that he walked about the streets like a +mummy, that he gradually dried up, and finally blew away, was +the meagre and unsatisfactory result of the tourist's investigations. +This is all that is generally told of Père Antoine.</p> + +<p>In the summer of 1861, while New Orleans was yet occupied +by the Confederate forces, I met at Alexandria, in Virginia, a +lady from Louisiana--Miss Blondeau by name--who gave me +the substance of the following legend touching Père Antoine and +his wonderful date-palm. If it should appear tame to the reader, +it will be because I am not habited in a black ribbed-silk dress, +with a strip of point-lace around my throat, like Miss Blondeau; +it will be because I lack her eyes and lips and Southern music +to tell it with.</p> + +<p>When Père Antoine was a very young man, he had a friend +whom he loved as he loved his life. Émile Jardin returned his +passion, and the two, on account of their friendship, became the +marvel of the city where they dwelt. One was never seen without +the other; for they studied, walked, ate, and slept together.</p> + +<p>Thus began Miss Blondeau, with the air of Fiammetta telling +her prettiest story to the Florentines in the garden of Boccaccio.</p> + +<p>Antoine and Émile were preparing to enter the Church; indeed, +they had taken the preliminary steps, when a circumstance +occurred which changed the color of their lives. A foreign +lady, from some nameless island in the Pacific, had a few +months before moved into their neighborhood. The lady died +suddenly, leaving a girl of sixteen or seventeen, entirely friendless +and unprovided for. The young men had been kind to the +woman during her illness, and at her death--melting with pity +at the forlorn situation of Anglice, the daughter--swore between +themselves to love and watch over her as if she were their sister.</p> + +<p>Now Anglice had a wild, strange beauty that made other +women seem tame beside her; and in the course of time the +young men found themselves regarding their ward not so much +like brothers as at first. In brief, they found themselves in +love with her.</p> + +<p>They struggled with their hopeless passion month after month, +neither betraying his secret to the other; for the austere orders +which they were about to assume precluded the idea of love and +marriage. Until then they had dwelt in the calm air of religious +meditations, unmoved except by that pious fervor which in other +ages taught men to brave the tortures of the rack and to smile +amid the flames. But a blonde girl, with great eyes and a voice +like the soft notes of a vesper hymn, had come in between them +and their ascetic dreams of heaven. The ties that had bound +the young men together snapped silently one by one. At last +each read in the pale face of the other the story of his own +despair.</p> + +<p>And she? If Anglice shared their trouble, her face told no +story. It was like the face of a saint on a cathedral window. +Once, however, as she came suddenly upon the two men and +overheard words that seemed to burn like fire on the lip of the +speaker, her eyes grew luminous for an instant. Then she passed +on, her face as immobile as before in its setting of wavy gold +hair.</p> + +<blockquote> +"Entre or et roux Dieu fit ses longs cheveux." +</blockquote> + +<p>One night Émile and Anglice were missing. They had flown--but +whither, nobody knew, and nobody save Antoine cared. +It was a heavy blow to Antoine--for he had himself half resolved +to confess his love to Anglice and urge her to fly with him.</p> + +<p>A strip of paper slipped from a volume on Antoine's <i>priedieu</i>, +and fluttered to his feet.</p> + +<p>"<i>Do not be angry</i>," said the bit of paper, piteously; <i>"forgive +us, for we love</i>." ("Pardonnez-nous, car nous aimons.")</p> + +<p>Three years went by wearily enough. Antoine had entered +the Church, and was already looked upon as a rising man; but +his face was pale and his heart leaden, for there was no sweetness +in life for him.</p> + +<p>Four years had elapsed, when a letter, covered with outlandish +postmarks, was brought to the young priest--a letter +from Anglice. She was dying;--would he forgive her? Émile, +the year previous, had fallen a victim to the fever that raged on +the island; and their child, Anglice, was likely to follow him. +In pitiful terms she begged Antoine to take charge of the child +until she was old enough to enter the convent of the Sacré-Coeur. +The epistle was finished hastily by another hand, informing +Antoine of Madame Jardin's death; it also told him that +Anglice had been placed on board a vessel shortly to leave the +island for some Western port.</p> + +<p>The letter, delayed by storm and shipwreck, was hardly read +and wept over when little Anglice arrived.</p> + +<p>On beholding her, Antoine uttered a cry of joy and surprise--she +was so like the woman he had worshiped.</p> + +<p>The passion that had been crowded down in his heart broke +out and lavished its richness on this child, who was to him +not only the Anglice of years ago, but his friend Émile Jardin +also.</p> + +<p>Anglice possessed the wild, strange beauty of her mother--the +bending, willowy form, the rich tint of skin, the large tropical +eyes, that had almost made Antoine's sacred robes a mockery +to him.</p> + +<p>For a month or two Anglice was wildly unhappy in her new +home. She talked continually of the bright country where she +was born, the fruits and flowers and blue skies, the tall, fan-like +trees, and the streams that went murmuring through them to +the sea. Antoine could not pacify her.</p> + +<p>By and by she ceased to weep, and went about the cottage in +a weary, disconsolate way that cut Antoine to the heart. A +long-tailed paroquet, which she had brought with her in the ship, +walked solemnly behind her from room to room, mutely pining, +it seemed, for those heavy orient airs that used to ruffle its brilliant +plumage.</p> + +<p>Before the year ended, he noticed that the ruddy tinge had +faded from her cheek, that her eyes had grown languid, and her +slight figure more willowy than ever.</p> + +<p>A physician was consulted. He could discover nothing wrong +with the child, except this fading and drooping. He failed to +account for that. It was some vague disease of the mind, he +said, beyond his skill.</p> + +<p>So Anglice faded day after day. She seldom left the room +now. At last Antoine could not shut out the fact that the child +was passing away. He had learned to love her so!</p> + +<p>"Dear heart," he said once, "What is't ails thee?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing, mon père," for so she called him.</p> + +<p>The winter passed, the balmy spring had come with its magnolia +blooms and orange blossoms, and Anglice seemed to revive. +In her small bamboo chair, on the porch, she swayed to and fro +in the fragrant breeze, with a peculiar undulating motion, like a +graceful tree.</p> + +<p>At times something seemed to weigh upon her mind. Antoine +observed it, and waited. Finally she spoke.</p> + +<p>"Near our house," said little Anglice--"near our house, on +the island, the palm-trees are waving under the blue sky. Oh, +how beautiful! I seem to lie beneath them all day long. I am +very, very happy. I yearned for them so much that I grew ill--don't +you think it was so, mon père?</p> + +<p>"Hélas, yes!" exclaimed Antoine, suddenly. "Let us hasten +to those pleasant islands where the palms are waving."</p> + +<p>Anglice smiled. "I am going there, mon père."</p> + +<p>A week from that evening the wax candles burned at her +feet and forehead, lighting her on the journey.</p> + +<p>All was over. Now was Antoine's heart empty. Death, like +another Émile, had stolen his new Anglice. He had nothing to +do but to lay the blighted flower away.</p> + +<p>Père Antoine made a shallow grave in his garden, and heaped +the fresh brown mold over his idol.</p> + +<p>In the tranquil spring evenings, the priest was seen sitting +by the mound, his finger closed in the unread breviary.</p> + +<p>The summer broke on that sunny land; and in the cool morning +twilight, and after nightfall, Antoine lingered by the grave. +He could never be with it enough.</p> + +<p>One morning he observed a delicate stem, with two curiously +shaped emerald leaves, springing up from the centre of the +mound. At first he merely noticed it casually; but presently +the plant grew so tall, and was so strangely unlike anything he +had ever seen before, that he examined it with care.</p> + +<p>How straight and graceful and exquisite it was! When it +swung to and fro with the summer wind, in the twilight, it +seemed to Antoine as if little Anglice were standing there in the +garden.</p> + +<p>The days stole by, and Antoine tended the fragile shoot, +wondering what manner of blossom it would unfold, white, or +scarlet, or golden. One Sunday, a stranger, with a bronzed, +weather-beaten face like a sailor's, leaned over the garden rail, and +said to him, "What a fine young date-palm you have there, sir!"</p> + +<p>"Mon Dieu!" cried Père Antoine starting, "and is it a palm?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, indeed," returned the man. "I didn't reckon the tree +would flourish in this latitude."</p> + +<p>"Ah, mon Dieu!" was all the priest could say aloud; but he +murmured to himself, "Bon Dieu, vous m'avez donné cela!"</p> + +<p>If Père Antoine loved the tree before, he worshiped it now. +He watered it, and nurtured it, and could have clasped it in his +arms. Here were Émile and Anglice and the child, all in one!</p> + +<p>The years glided away, and the date-palm and the priest +grew together--only one became vigorous and the other feeble. +Père Antoine had long passed the meridian of life. The tree +was in its youth. It no longer stood in an isolated garden; for +pretentious brick and stucco houses had clustered about Antoine's +cottage. They looked down scowling on the humble thatched +roof. The city was edging up, trying to crowd him off his land. +But he clung to it like lichen and refused to sell.</p> + +<p>Speculators piled gold on his doorsteps, and he laughed at +them. Sometimes he was hungry, and cold, and thinly clad; but +he laughed none the less.</p> + +<p>"Get thee behind me, Satan!" said the old priest's smile.</p> + +<p>Père Antoine was very old now, scarcely able to walk; but +he could sit under the pliant, caressing leaves of his palm, loving +it like an Arab; and there he sat till the grimmest of speculators +came to him. But even in death Père Antoine was +faithful to his trust: the owner of that land loses it if he harm +the date-tree.</p> + +<p>And there it stands in the narrow, dingy street, a beautiful, +dreamy stranger, an exquisite foreign lady whose grace is a joy +to the eye, the incense of whose breath makes the air enamored. +May the hand wither that touches her ungently!</p> + +<p>"<i>Because it grew from the heart of little Anglice</i>," said Miss +Blondeau tenderly.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="MISS_MEHETABELS_SON"></a>MISS MEHETABEL'S SON</h3> +<br> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<center>THE OLD TAVERN AT BAYLEY'S FOUR-CORNERS</center> + +<p>You will not find Greenton, or Bayley's Four-Corners as it is +more usually designated, on any map of New England that +I know of. It is not a town; it is not even a village: it is +merely an absurd hotel. The almost indescribable place called +Greenton is at the intersection of four roads, in the heart of New +Hampshire, twenty miles from the nearest settlement of note, and +ten miles from any railway station. A good location for a hotel, +you will say. Precisely; but there has always been a hotel +there, and for the last dozen years it has been pretty well +patronized--by one boarder. Not to trifle with an intelligent +public, I will state at once that, in the early part of this century, +Greenton was a point at which the mail-coach on the Great +Northern Route stopped to change horses and allow the passengers +to dine. People in the county, wishing to take the early +mail Portsmouth-ward, put up over night at the old tavern, +famous for its irreproachable larder and soft feather-beds. The +tavern at that time was kept by Jonathan Bayley, who rivaled +his wallet in growing corpulent, and in due time passed away. +At his death the establishment, which included a farm, fell into +the hands of a son-in-law. Now, though Bayley left his son-in-law +a hotel--which sounds handsome--he left him no guests; +for at about the period of the old man's death the old stage-coach +died also. Apoplexy carried off one, and steam the other. +Thus, by a sudden swerve in the tide of progress, the tavern at +the Corners found itself high and dry, like a wreck on a sand-bank. +Shortly after this event, or maybe contemporaneously, +there was some attempt to build a town at Greenton; but it +apparently failed, if eleven cellars choked up with <i>débris</i> and +overgrown with burdocks are any indication of failure. The +farm, however, was a good farm, as things go in New Hampshire, +and Tobias Sewell, the son-in-law, could afford to snap +his fingers at the traveling public if they came near enough--which +they never did.</p> + +<p>The hotel remains to-day pretty much the same as when +Jonathan Bayley handed in his accounts in 1840, except that +Sewell has from time to time sold the furniture of some of the +upper chambers to bridal couples in the neighborhood. The bar +is still open, and the parlor door says PARLOUR in tall black +letters. Now and then a passing drover looks in at that lonely +bar-room, where a high-shouldered bottle of Santa Cruz rum +ogles with a peculiarly knowing air a shriveled lemon on a +shelf; now and then a farmer rides across country to talk crops +and stock and take a friendly glass with Tobias; and now and +then a circus caravan with speckled ponies, or a menagerie with +a soggy elephant, halts under the swinging sign, on which there +is a dim mail-coach with four phantomish horses driven by a +portly gentleman whose head has been washed off by the rain. +Other customers there are none, except that one regular boarder +whom I have mentioned.</p> + +<p>If misery makes a man acquainted with strange bed-fellows, +it is equally certain that the profession of surveyor and civil +engineer often takes one into undreamed-of localities. I had +never heard of Greenton until my duties sent me there, and kept +me there two weeks in the dreariest season of the year. I do +not think I would, of my own volition, have selected Greenton +for a fortnight's sojourn at any time; but now the business is +over, I shall never regret the circumstances that made me the +guest of Tobias Sewell, and brought me into intimate relations +with Miss Mehetabel's Son.</p> + +<p>It was a black October night in the year of grace 1872, that +discovered me standing in front of the old tavern at the Corners. +Though the ten miles' ride from K---- had been depressing, +especially the last five miles, on account of the cold autumnal +rain that had set in, I felt a pang of regret on hearing the +rickety open wagon turn round in the road and roll off in the +darkness. There were no lights visible anywhere, and only for +the big, shapeless mass of something in front of me, which the +driver had said was the hotel, I should have fancied that I had +been set down by the roadside. I was wet to the skin and in +no amiable humor; and not being able to find bell-pull or +knocker, or even a door, I belabored the side of the house with +my heavy walking-stick. In a minute or two I saw a light +flickering somewhere aloft, then I heard the sound of a window +opening, followed by an exclamation of disgust as a blast of +wind extinguished the candle which had given me an instantaneous +picture <i>en silhouette</i> of a man leaning out of a casement.</p> + +<p>"I say, what do you want, down there?" inquired an unprepossessing +voice.</p> + +<p>"I want to come in; I want a supper, and a bed, and numberless +things."</p> + +<p>"This isn't no time of night to go rousing honest folks out +of their sleep. Who are you, anyway?"</p> + +<p>The question, superficially considered, was a very simple one, +and I, of all people in the world, ought to have been able to +answer it off-hand; but it staggered me. Strangely enough, there +came drifting across my memory the lettering on the back of a +metaphysical work which I had seen years before on a shelf in +the Astor Library. Owing to an unpremeditatedly funny collocation +of title and author, the lettering read as follows:--"Who +am I? Jones." Evidently it had puzzled Jones to know who +he was, or he wouldn't have written a book about it, and come +to so lame and impotent a conclusion. It certainly puzzled me +at that instant to define my identity. "Thirty years ago," I +reflected, "I was nothing; fifty years hence I shall be nothing +again, humanly speaking. In the mean time, who am I, sure +enough?" It had never before occurred to me what an indefinite +article I was. I wish it had not occurred to me then. Standing +there in the rain and darkness, I wrestled vainly with the problem, +and was constrained to fall back upon a Yankee expedient.</p> + +<p>"Isn't this a hotel?" I asked finally.</p> + +<p>"Well, it is a sort of hotel," said the voice, doubtfully. My +hesitation and prevarication had apparently not inspired my interlocutor +with confidence in me.</p> + +<p>"Then let me in. I have just driven over from K---- in +this infernal rain. I am wet through and through."</p> + +<p>"But what do you want here, at the Corners? What's your +business? People don't come here, leastways in the middle of +the night."</p> + +<p>"It isn't in the middle of the night," I returned, incensed. +"I come on business connected with the new road. I'm the +superintendent of the works."</p> + +<p>"Oh!"</p> + +<p>"And if you don't open the door at once, I'll raise the whole +neighborhood--and then go to the other hotel."</p> + +<p>When I said that, I supposed Greenton was a village with a +population of at least three or four thousand, and was wondering +vaguely at the absence of lights and other signs of human +habitation. Surely, I thought, all the people cannot be abed and +asleep at half past ten o'clock: perhaps I am in the business +section of the town, among the shops.</p> + +<p>"You jest wait," said the voice above.</p> + +<p>This request was not devoid of a certain accent of menace, +and I braced myself for a sortie on the part of the besieged, if +he had any such hostile intent. Presently a door opened at the +very place where I least expected a door, at the farther end of +the building, in fact, and a man in his shirt-sleeves, shielding a +candle with his left hand, appeared on the threshold. I passed +quickly into the house, with Mr. Tobias Sewell (for this was +Mr. Sewell) at my heels, and found myself in a long, low-studded +bar-room.</p> + +<p>There were two chairs drawn up before the hearth, on which +a huge hemlock back-log was still smoldering, and on the unpainted +deal counter contiguous stood two cloudy glasses with +bits of lemon-peel in the bottom, hinting at recent libations. +Against the discolored wall over the bar hung a yellowed hand-bill, +in a warped frame, announcing that "the Next Annual +N.H. Agricultural Fair" would take place on the 10th of September, +1841. There was no other furniture or decoration in +this dismal apartment, except the cobwebs which festooned the +ceiling, hanging down here and there like stalactites.</p> + +<p>Mr. Sewell set the candlestick on the mantel-shelf, and threw +some pine-knots on the fire, which immediately broke into a +blaze, and showed him to be a lank, narrow-chested man, past +sixty, with sparse, steel-gray hair, and small, deep-set eyes, perfectly +round, like a fish's, and of no particular color. His chief +personal characteristics seemed to be too much feet and not +enough teeth. His sharply cut, but rather simple face, as he +turned it towards me, wore a look of interrogation. I replied to +his mute inquiry by taking out my pocket-book and handing him +my business-card, which he held up to the candle and perused +with great deliberation.</p> + +<p>"You're a civil engineer, are you?" he said, displaying his +gums, which gave his countenance an expression of almost infantile +innocence. He made no further audible remark, but mumbled +between his thin lips something which an imaginative person +might have construed into, "If you're a civil engineer, I'll be +blessed if I wouldn't like to see an uncivil one!"</p> + +<p>Mr. Sewell's growl, however, was worse than his bite,--owing +to his lack of teeth, probably--for he very good-naturedly set +himself to work preparing supper for me. After a slice of cold +ham, and a warm punch, to which my chilled condition gave a +grateful flavor, I went to bed in a distant chamber in a most +amiable mood, feeling satisfied that Jones was a donkey to +bother himself about his identity.</p> + +<p>When I awoke, the sun was several hours high. My bed +faced a window, and by raising myself on one elbow I could +look out on what I expected would be the main street. To my +astonishment I beheld a lonely country road winding up a sterile +hill and disappearing over the ridge. In a cornfield at the right +of the road was a small private graveyard, inclosed by a crumbling +stone wall with a red gate. The only thing suggestive of +life was this little corner lot occupied by death. I got out of +bed and went to the other window. There I had an uninterrupted +view of twelve miles of open landscape, with Mount +Agamenticus in the purple distance. Not a house or a spire in +sight. "Well," I exclaimed, "Greenton doesn't appear to be a +very closely packed metropolis!" That rival hotel with which I +had threatened Mr. Sewell overnight was not a deadly weapon, +looking at it by daylight. "By Jove!" I reflected, "maybe I'm +in the wrong place." But there, tacked against a panel of the +bedroom door, was a faded time-table dated Greenton, August +1st, 1839.</p> + +<p>I smiled all the time I was dressing, and went smiling downstairs, +where I found Mr. Sewell, assisted by one of the fair sex +in the first bloom of her eightieth year, serving breakfast for +me on a small table--in the bar-room!</p> + +<p>"I overslept myself this morning," I remarked apologetically, +"and I see that I am putting you to some trouble. In future, +if you will have me called, I will take my meals at the usual +<i>table d'hôte.</i>"</p> + +<p>"At the what?" said Mr. Sewell.</p> + +<p>"I mean with the other boarders."</p> + +<p>Mr. Sewell paused in the act of lifting a chop from the fire, +and, resting the point of his fork against the woodwork of the +mantel-piece, grinned from ear to ear.</p> + +<p>"Bless you! there isn't any other boarders. There hasn't +been anybody put up here sence--let me see--sence father-in-law +died, and that was in the fall of '40. To be sure, there's +Silas; <i>he's</i> a regular boarder; but I don't count him."</p> + +<p>Mr. Sewell then explained how the tavern had lost its custom +when the old stage line was broken up by the railroad. The +introduction of steam was, in Mr. Sewell's estimation, a fatal +error. "Jest killed local business. Carried it off, I'm darned if +I know where. The whole country has been sort o' retrograding +ever sence steam was invented."</p> + +<p>"You spoke of having one boarder," I said.</p> + +<p>"Silas? Yes; he come here the summer 'Tilda died--she +that was 'Tilda Bayley--and he's here yet, going on thirteen +year. He couldn't live any longer with the old man. Between +you and I, old Clem Jaffrey, Silas's father, was a hard nut. +Yes," said Mr. Sewell, crooking his elbow in inimitable pantomime, +"altogether too often. Found dead in the road hugging +a three-gallon demijohn. <i>Habeas corpus</i> in the barn," added Mr. +Sewell, intending, I presume, to intimate that a <i>post-mortem</i> +examination had been deemed necessary. "Silas," he resumed, +in that respectful tone which one should always adopt when speaking +of capital, "is a man of considerable property; lives on his +interest, and keeps a hoss and shay. He's a great scholar, too, +Silas: takes all the pe-ri-odicals and the Police Gazette regular."</p> + +<p>Mr. Sewell was turning over a third chop, when the door +opened and a stoutish, middle-aged little gentleman, clad in deep +black, stepped into the room.</p> + +<p>"Silas Jaffrey," said Mr. Sewell, with a comprehensive sweep +of his arm, picking up me and the new-comer on one fork, so to +speak. "Be acquainted!"</p> + +<p>Mr. Jaffrey advanced briskly, and gave me his hand with +unlooked-for cordiality. He was a dapper little man, with a +head as round and nearly as bald as an orange, and not unlike +an orange in complexion, either; he had twinkling gray eyes and +a pronounced Roman nose, the numerous freckles upon which +were deepened by his funereal dress-coat and trousers. He +reminded me of Alfred de Musset's blackbird, which, with its +yellow beak and sombre plumage, looked like an undertaker +eating an omelet.</p> + +<p>"Silas will take care of you," said Mr. Sewell, taking down +his hat from a peg behind the door. "I've got the cattle to look +after. Tell him if you want anything."</p> + +<p>While I ate my breakfast, Mr. Jaffrey hopped up and down +the narrow bar-room and chirped away as blithely as a bird on a +cherry-bough, occasionally ruffling with his fingers a slight fringe +of auburn hair which stood up pertly round his head and seemed +to possess a luminous quality of its own.</p> + +<p>"Don't I find it a little slow up here at the Corners? Not at +all, my dear sir. I am in the thick of life up here. So many +interesting things going on all over the world--inventions, discoveries, +spirits, railroad disasters, mysterious homicides. Poets, +murderers, musicians, statesmen, distinguished travelers, prodigies +of all kinds turning up everywhere. Very few events or +persons escape me. I take six daily city papers, thirteen weekly +journals, all the monthly magazines, and two quarterlies. I +could not get along with less. I couldn't if you asked me. I +never feel lonely. How can I, being on intimate terms, as it +were, with thousands and thousands of people? There's that +young woman out West. What an entertaining creature <i>she</i> +is!--now in Missouri, now in Indiana, and now in Minnesota, +always on the go, and all the time shedding needles from various +parts of her body as if she really enjoyed it! Then there's +that versatile patriarch who walks hundreds of miles and saws +thousands of feet of wood, before breakfast, and shows no signs +of giving out. Then there's that remarkable, one may say that +historical colored woman who knew Benjamin Franklin, and +fought at the battle of Bunk--no, it is the old negro man who +fought at Bunker Hill, a mere infant, of course, at that period. +Really, now, it is quite curious to observe how that venerable +female slave--formerly an African princess--is repeatedly dying +in her hundred and eleventh year, and coming to life again +punctually every six months in the small-type paragraphs. Are +you aware, sir, that within the last twelve years no fewer than +two hundred and eighty-seven of General Washington's colored +coachmen have died?"</p> + +<p>For the soul of me I could not tell whether this quaint little +gentleman was chaffing me or not. I laid down my knife and +fork, and stared at him.</p> + +<p>"Then there are the mathematicians!" he cried vivaciously, +without waiting for a reply. "I take great interest in them. +Hear this!" and Mr. Jaffrey drew a newspaper from a pocket in +the tail of his coat, and read as follows:--"<i>It has been estimated +that if all the candles manufactured by this eminent firm</i> (<i>Stearine +& Co.</i>)<i> were placed end to end, they would reach 2 and 7-8 +times around the globe</i>. Of course," continued Mr. Jaffrey, folding +up the journal reflectively, "abstruse calculations of this +kind are not, perhaps, of vital importance, but they indicate +the intellectual activity of the age. Seriously, now," he said, +halting in front of the table, "what with books and papers and +drives about the country, I do not find the days too long, +though I seldom see any one, except when I go over to +K---- for my mail. Existence may be very full to a man who +stands a little aside from the tumult and watches it with philosophic +eye. Possibly he may see more of the battle than those +who are in the midst of the action. Once I was struggling with +the crowd, as eager and undaunted as the best; perhaps I should +have been struggling still. Indeed, I know my life would have +been very different now if I had married Mehetabel--if I had +married Mehetabel."</p> + +<p>His vivacity was gone, a sudden cloud had come over his +bright face, his figure seemed to have collapsed, the light +seemed to have faded out of his hair. With a shuffling step, +the very antithesis of his brisk, elastic tread, he turned to the +door and passed into the road.</p> + +<p>"Well," I said to myself, "if Greenton had forty thousand +inhabitants, it couldn't turn out a more astonishing old party +than that!"</p> +<br> + +<h3>II</h3> + +<center>THE CASE OF SILAS JAFFREY</center> +<br> + +<p>A man with a passion for <i>bric-a-brac</i> is always stumbling over +antique bronzes, intaglios, mosaics, and daggers of the time of +Benvenuto Cellini; the bibliophile finds creamy vellum folios +and rare Alduses and Elzevirs waiting for him at unsuspected +bookstalls; the numismatist has but to stretch forth his palm +to have priceless coins drop into it. My own weakness is odd +people, and I am constantly encountering them. It was plain +that I had unearthed a couple of very queer specimens at +Bayley's Four-Corners. I saw that a fortnight afforded me too +brief an opportunity to develop the richness of both, and I +resolved to devote my spare time to Mr. Jaffrey alone, instinctively +recognizing in him an unfamiliar species. My professional +work in the vicinity of Greenton left my evenings and occasionally +an afternoon unoccupied; these intervals I purposed to +employ in studying and classifying my fellow-boarder. It was +necessary, as a preliminary step, to learn something of his +previous history, and to this end I addressed myself to Mr. +Sewell that same night,</p> + +<p>"I do not want to seem inquisitive," I said to the landlord, +as he was fastening up the bar, which, by the way, was the +<i>salle à manger</i> and general sitting-room--"I do not want to +seem inquisitive, but your friend Mr. Jaffrey dropped a remark +this morning at breakfast which--which was not altogether +clear to me."</p> + +<p>"About Mehetabel?" asked Mr. Sewell, uneasily.</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Well, I wish he wouldn't!"</p> + +<p>"He was friendly enough in the course of conversation to +hint to me that he had not married the young woman, and +seemed to regret it."</p> + +<p>"No, he didn't marry Mehetabel."</p> + +<p>"May I inquire <i>why</i> he didn't marry Mehetabel?"</p> + +<p>"Never asked her. Might have married the girl forty times. +Old Elkins's daughter, over at K----. She'd have had him +quick enough. Seven years, off and on, he kept company with +Mehetabel, and then she died."</p> + +<p>"And he never asked her?"</p> + +<p>"He shilly-shallied. Perhaps he didn't think of it. When +she was dead and gone, then Silas was struck all of a heap--and +that's all about it."</p> + +<p>Obviously Mr. Sewell did not intend to tell me anything +more, and obviously there was more to tell. The topic was +plainly disagreeable to him for some reason or other, and that +unknown reason of course piqued my curiosity.</p> + +<p>As I was absent from dinner and supper that day, I did not +meet Mr. Jaffrey again until the following morning at breakfast. +He had recovered his bird-like manner, and was full of +a mysterious assassination that had just taken place in New +York, all the thrilling details of which were at his fingers' ends. +It was at once comical and sad to see this harmless old gentleman, +with his naïve, benevolent countenance, and his thin +hair flaming up in a semicircle, like the footlights at a theatre, +reveling in the intricacies of the unmentionable deed.</p> + +<p>"You come up to my room to-night," he cried, with horrid +glee, "and I'll give you my theory of the murder. I'll make it +as clear as day to you that it was the detective himself who +fired the three pistol-shots."</p> + +<p>It was not so much the desire to have this point elucidated +as to make a closer study of Mr. Jaffrey that led me to accept +his invitation. Mr. Jaffrey's bedroom was in an L of the +building, and was in no way noticeable except for the numerous +files of newspapers neatly arranged against the blank +spaces of the walls, and a huge pile of old magazines which +stood in one corner, reaching nearly up to the ceiling, and +threatening to topple over each instant, like the Leaning Tower +at Pisa. There were green paper shades at the windows, some +faded chintz valances about the bed, and two or three easy-chairs +covered with chintz. On a black-walnut shelf between +the windows lay a choice collection of meerschaum and brier-wood +pipes.</p> + +<p>Filling one of the chocolate-colored bowls for me and another +for himself, Mr. Jaffrey began prattling; but not about +the murder, which appeared to have flown out of his mind. In +fact, I do not remember that the topic was even touched upon, +either then or afterwards.</p> + +<p>"Cozy nest this," said Mr. Jaffrey, glancing complacently over +the apartment. "What is more cheerful, now, in the fall +of the year, than an open wood-fire? Do you hear those little +chirps and twitters coming out of that piece of apple-wood? +Those are the ghosts of the robins and bluebirds that sang +upon the bough when it was in blossom last spring. In summer +whole flocks of them come fluttering about the fruit-trees +under the window: so I have singing birds all the year round. +I take it very easy here, I can tell you, summer and winter. +Not much society. Tobias is not, perhaps, what one would +term a great intellectual force, but he means well. He's a +realist--believes in coming down to what he calls (the hardpan); +but his heart is in the right place, and he's very kind to me. +The wisest thing I ever did in my life was to sell out my grain +business over at K----, thirteen years ago, and settle down at +the Corners. When a man has made a competency, what does +he want more? Besides, at that time an event occurred which +destroyed any ambition I may have had. Mehetabel died."</p> + +<p>"The lady you were engaged to?"</p> + +<p>"No, not precisely engaged. I think it was quite understood +between us, though nothing had been said on the subject. +Typhoid," added Mr. Jaffrey, in a low voice.</p> + +<p>For several minutes he smoked in silence, a vague, troubled +look playing over his countenance. Presently this passed away, +and he fixed his gray eyes speculatively upon my face.</p> + +<p>"If I had married Mehetabel," said Mr. Jaffrey, slowly, and +then he hesitated. I blew a ring of smoke into the air, and, +resting my pipe on my knee, dropped into an attitude of +attention. "If I had married Mehetabel, you know, we should +have had--ahem!--a family."</p> + +<p>"Very likely," I assented, vastly amused at this unexpected +turn.</p> + +<p>"A Boy!" exclaimed Mr. Jaffrey, explosively.</p> + +<p>"By all means, certainly, a son."</p> + +<p>"Great trouble about naming the boy. Mehetabel's family +want him named Elkanah Elkins, after her grandfather; I want +him named Andrew Jackson. We compromise by christening +him Elkanah Elkins Andrew Jackson Jaffrey. Rather a long +name for such a short little fellow," said Mr. Jaffrey, musingly.</p> + +<p>"Andy isn't a bad nickname," I suggested.</p> + +<p>"Not at all. We call him Andy, in the family. Somewhat +fractious at first--colic and things. I suppose it is right, or it +wouldn't be so; but the usefulness of measles, mumps, croup, +whooping-cough, scarlatina, and fits is not clear to the parental +eye. I wish Andy would be a model infant, and dodge the +whole lot."</p> + +<p>This suppositions child, born within the last few minutes, +was plainly assuming the proportions of a reality to Mr. Jaffrey. +I began to feel a little uncomfortable. I am, as I have said, a +civil engineer, and it is not strictly in my line to assist at the +births of infants, imaginary or otherwise. I pulled away vigorously +at the pipe, and said nothing.</p> + +<p>"What large blue eyes he has," resumed Mr. Jaffrey, after +a pause; "just like Hetty's; and the fair hair, too, like hers. +How oddly certain distinctive features are handed down in +families! Sometimes a mouth, sometimes a turn of the eye-brow. +Wicked little boys over at K---- have now and then +derisively advised me to follow my nose. It would be an interesting +thing to do. I should find my nose flying about the +world, turning up unexpectedly here and there, dodging this +branch of the family and reappearing in that, now jumping +over one great-grandchild to fasten itself upon another, and +never losing its individuality. Look at Andy. There's Elkanah +Elkins's chin to the life. Andy's chin is probably older than +the Pyramids. Poor little thing," he cried, with sudden indescribable +tenderness, "to lose his mother so early!" And Mr. +Jaffrey's head sunk upon his breast, and his shoulders slanted +forward, as if he were actually bending over the cradle of the +child. The whole gesture and attitude was so natural that it +startled me. The pipe slipped from my fingers and fell to the +floor.</p> + +<p>"Hush!" whispered Mr. Jaffrey, with a deprecating motion +of his hand. "Andy's asleep!"</p> + +<p>He rose softly from the chair, and walking across the room +on tiptoe, drew down the shade at the window through which +the moonlight was streaming. Then he returned to his seat, +and remained gazing with half-closed eyes into the dropping +embers.</p> + +<p>I refilled my pipe and smoked in profound silence, wondering +what would come next. But nothing came next. Mr. +Jaffrey had fallen into so brown a study that, a quarter of an +hour afterwards, when I wished him good-night and withdrew, +I do not think he noticed my departure.</p> + +<p>I am not what is called a man of imagination; it is my +habit to exclude most things not capable of mathematical +demonstration: but I am not without a certain psychological +insight, and I think I understood Mr. Jaffrey's case. I could +easily understand how a man with an unhealthy, sensitive +nature, overwhelmed by sudden calamity, might take refuge in +some forlorn place like this old tavern, and dream his life +away. To such a man--brooding forever on what might have +been, and dwelling wholly in the realm of his fancies--the +actual world might indeed become as a dream, and nothing +seem real but his illusions. I dare say that thirteen years of +Bayley's Four-Corners would have its effect upon me; though +instead of conjuring up golden-haired children of the Madonna, +I should probably see gnomes and kobolds, and goblins engaged +in hoisting false signals and misplacing switches for midnight +express trains.</p> + +<p>"No doubt," I said to myself that night, as I lay in bed, +thinking over the matter, "this once possible but now impossible +child is a great comfort to the old gentleman,--a greater +comfort, perhaps, than a real son would be. Maybe Andy will +vanish with the shades and mists of night, he's such an unsubstantial +infant; but if he doesn't, and Mr. Jaffrey finds pleasure +in talking to me about his son, I shall humor the old fellow. +It wouldn't be a Christian act to knock over his harmless fancy."</p> + +<p>I was very impatient to see if Mr. Jaffrey's illusion would +stand the test of daylight. It did. Elkanah Elkins Andrew +Jackson Jaffrey was, so to speak, alive and kicking the next +morning. On taking his seat at the breakfast-table, Mr. Jaffrey +whispered to me that Andy had had a comfortable night.</p> + +<p>"Silas!" said Mr. Sewell, sharply, "what are you whispering +about?"</p> + +<p>Mr. Sewell was in an ill humor; perhaps he was jealous +because I had passed the evening in Mr. Jaffrey's room; but +surely Mr. Sewell could not expect his boarders to go to bed at +eight o'clock every night, as he did. From time to time during +the meal Mr. Sewell regarded me unkindly out of the corner of +his eye, and in helping me to the parsnips he poniarded them +with quite a suggestive air. All this, however, did not prevent +me from repairing to the door of Mr. Jaffrey's snuggery when +night came.</p> + +<p>"Well, Mr. Jaffrey, how's Andy this evening?"</p> + +<p>"Got a tooth!" cried Mr. Jaffrey, vivaciously.</p> + +<p>"No!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, he has! Just through. Give the nurse a silver dollar. +Standing reward for first tooth."</p> + +<p>It was on the tip of my tongue to express surprise that an +infant a day old should cut a tooth, when I suddenly recollected +that Richard III. was born with teeth. Feeling myself to be on +unfamiliar ground, I suppressed my criticism. It was well I +did so, for in the next breath I was advised that half a year +had elapsed since the previous evening.</p> + +<p>"Andy's had a hard six months of it," said Mr. Jaffrey, with +the well-known narrative air of fathers. "We've brought him +up by hand. His grandfather, by the way, was brought up by +the bottle--" and brought down by it, too, I added mentally, +recalling Mr. Sewell's account of the old gentleman's tragic +end.</p> + +<p>Mr. Jaffrey then went on to give me a history of Andy's +first six months, omitting no detail however insignificant or +irrelevant. This history I would in turn inflict upon the reader, +if I were only certain that he is one of those dreadful parents +who, under the aegis of friendship, bore you at a street-corner +with that remarkable thing which Freddy said the other day, +and insist on singing to you, at an evening party, the Iliad of +Tommy's woes.</p> + +<p>But to inflict this <i>enfantillage</i> upon the unmarried reader +would be an act of wanton cruelty. So I pass over that part +of Andy's biography, and for the same reason make no record +of the next four or five interviews I had with Mr. Jaffrey. It +will be sufficient to state that Andy glided from extreme +infancy to early youth with astonishing celerity--at the rate +of one year per night, if I remember correctly; and--must I +confess it?--before the week came to an end, this invisible +hobgoblin of a boy was only little less of a reality to me than +to Mr. Jaffrey.</p> + +<p>At first I had lent myself to the old dreamer's whim with a +keen perception of the humor of the thing; but by and by I +found that I was talking and thinking of Miss Mehetabel's son +as though he were a veritable personage. Mr. Jaffrey spoke of +the child with such an air of conviction!--as if Andy were +playing among his toys in the next room, or making mud-pies +down in the yard. In these conversations, it should be +observed, the child was never supposed to be present, except +on that single occasion when Mr. Jaffrey leaned over the +cradle. After one of our <i>séances</i> I would lie awake until the +small hours, thinking of the boy, and then fall asleep only to +have indigestible dreams about him. Through the day, and +sometimes in the midst of complicated calculations, I would +catch myself wondering what Andy was up to now! There was +no shaking him off; he became an inseparable nightmare to me; +and I felt that if I remained much longer at Bayley's Four-Corners +I should turn into just such another bald-headed, mild-eyed +visionary as Silas Jaffrey.</p> + +<p>Then the tavern was a grewsome old shell any way, full of +unaccountable noises after dark--rustlings of garments along +unfrequented passages, and stealthy footfalls in unoccupied +chambers overhead. I never knew of an old house without +these mysterious noises. Next to my bedroom was a musty, +dismantled apartment, in one corner of which, leaning against +the wainscot, was a crippled mangle, with its iron crank tilted +in the air like the elbow of the late Mr. Clem Jaffrey. Sometimes,</p> + +<blockquote>"In the dead vast and middle of the night,"</blockquote> + +<p>I used to hear sounds as if some one were turning that rusty +crank on the sly. This occurred only on particularly cold +nights, and I conceived the uncomfortable idea that it was the +thin family ghosts, from the neglected graveyard in the cornfield, +keeping themselves warm by running each other through +the mangle. There was a haunted air about the whole place +that made it easy for me to believe in the existence of a phantasm +like Miss Mehetabel's son, who, after all, was less unearthly +than Mr. Jaffrey himself, and seemed more properly an +inhabitant of this globe than the toothless ogre who kept the +inn, not to mention the silent Witch of Endor that cooked our +meals for us over the bar-room fire.</p> + +<p>In spite of the scowls and winks bestowed upon me by Mr. +Sewell, who let slip no opportunity to testify his disapprobation +of the intimacy, Mr. Jaffrey and I spent all our evenings together--those +long autumnal evenings, through the length of +which he talked about the boy, laying out his path in life and +hedging the path with roses. He should be sent to the High +School at Portsmouth, and then to college; he should be educated +like a gentleman, Andy.</p> + +<p>"When the old man dies," remarked Mr. Jaffrey one night, +rubbing his hands gleefully, as if it were a great joke, "Andy +will find that the old man has left him a pretty plum."</p> + +<p>"What do you think of having Andy enter West Point, when +he's old enough?" said Mr. Jaffrey on another occasion. "He +needn't necessarily go into the army when he graduates; he can +become a civil engineer."</p> + +<p>This was a stroke of flattery so delicate and indirect that +I could accept it without immodesty.</p> + +<p>There had lately sprung up on the corner of Mr. Jaffrey's +bureau a small tin house, Gothic in architecture and pink in +color, with a slit in the roof, and the word BANK painted on +one façade. Several times in the course of an evening Mr. +Jaffrey would rise from his chair without interrupting the conversation, +and gravely drop a nickel into the scuttle of the +bank. It was pleasant to observe the solemnity of his countenance +as he approached the edifice, and the air of triumph with +which he resumed his seat by the fireplace. One night I missed +the tin bank. It had disappeared, deposits and all, like a real +bank. Evidently there had been a defalcation on rather a large +scale. I strongly suspected that Mr. Sewell was at the bottom +of it, but my suspicion was not shared by Mr. Jaffrey, who, +remarking my glance at the bureau, became suddenly depressed.</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid," he said, "that I have failed to instill into Andrew +those principles of integrity which--which--" and the old gentleman +quite broke down.</p> + +<p>Andy was now eight or nine years old, and for some time +past, if the truth must be told, had given Mr. Jaffrey no inconsiderable +trouble; what with his impishness and his illnesses, the +boy led the pair of us a lively dance. I shall not soon forget +the anxiety of Mr. Jaffrey the night Andy had the scarlet-fever--an +anxiety which so infected me that I actually returned to +the tavern the following afternoon earlier than usual, dreading +to hear that the little spectre was dead, and greatly relieved on +meeting Mr. Jaffrey at the door-step with his face wreathed in +smiles. When I spoke to him of Andy, I was made aware that +I was inquiring into a case of scarlet-fever that had occurred +the year before!</p> + +<p>It was at this time, towards the end of my second week at +Greenton, that I noticed what was probably not a new trait--Mr. +Jaffrey's curious sensitiveness to atmospherical changes. He +was as sensitive as a barometer. The approach of a storm +sent his mercury down instantly. When the weather was fair +he was hopeful and sunny, and Andy's prospects were brilliant. +When the weather was overcast and threatening he grew restless +and despondent, and was afraid that the boy was not going +to turn out well.</p> + +<p>On the Saturday previous to my departure, which had been +fixed for Monday, it rained heavily all the afternoon, and that +night Mr. Jaffrey was in an unusually excitable and unhappy +frame of mind. His mercury was very low indeed.</p> + +<p>"That boy is going to the dogs just as fast as he can go," +said Mr. Jaffrey, with a woeful face. "I can't do anything with +him."</p> + +<p>"He'll come out all right, Mr. Jaffrey. Boys will be boys. +I would not give a snap for a lad without animal spirits."</p> + +<p>"But animal spirits," said Mr. Jaffrey sententiously, "shouldn't +saw off the legs of the piano in Tobias's best parlor. I don't +know what Tobias will say when he finds it out."</p> + +<p>"What! has Andy sawed off the legs of the old spinet?" I +returned, laughing.</p> + +<p>"Worse than that."</p> + +<p>"Played upon it, then!"</p> + +<p>"No, sir. He has lied to me!"</p> + +<p>"I can't believe that of Andy."</p> + +<p>"Lied to me, sir," repeated Mr. Jaffrey, severely. "He +pledged me his word of honor that he would give over his +climbing. The way that boy climbs sends a chill down my +spine. This morning, notwithstanding his solemn promise, he +shinned up the lightning-rod attached to the extension, and sat +astride the ridge-pole. I saw him, and he denied it! When a +boy you have caressed and indulged and lavished pocket-money +on lies to you and <i>will</i> climb, then there's nothing more to be +said. He's a lost child."</p> + +<p>"You take too dark a view of it, Mr. Jaffrey. Training and +education are bound to tell in the end, and he has been well +brought up."</p> + +<p>"But I didn't bring him up on a lightning-rod, did I? If +he is ever going to know how to behave, he ought to know +now. To-morrow he will be eleven years old."</p> + +<p>The reflection came to me that if Andy had not been +brought up by the rod, he had certainly been brought up by +the lightning. He was eleven years old in two weeks!</p> + +<p>I essayed, with that perspicacious wisdom which seems to be +the peculiar property of bachelors and elderly maiden ladies, to +tranquillize Mr. Jaffrey's mind, and to give him some practical +hints on the management of youth.</p> + +<p>"Spank him," I suggested at last.</p> + +<p>"I will!" said the old gentleman.</p> + +<p>"And you'd better do it at once!" I added, as it flashed +upon me that in six months Andy would be a hundred and +forty-three years old!--an age at which parental discipline +would have to be relaxed.</p> + +<p>The next morning, Sunday, the rain came down as if determined +to drive the quicksilver entirely out of my poor friend. +Mr. Jaffrey sat bolt upright at the breakfast-table, looking as +woe-begone as a bust of Dante, and retired to his chamber the +moment the meal was finished. As the day advanced, the wind +veered round to the northeast, and settled itself down to work. +It was not pleasant to think, and I tried not to think, what +Mr. Jaffrey's condition would be if the weather did not mend +its manners by noon; but so far from clearing off at noon, the +storm increased in violence, and as night set in, the wind +whistled in a spiteful falsetto key, and the rain lashed the old +tavern as if it were a balky horse that refused to move on. +The windows rattled in the worm-eaten frames, and the doors +of remote rooms, where nobody ever went, slammed to in the +maddest way. Now and then the tornado, sweeping down the +side of Mount Agamenticus, bowled across the open country, and +struck the ancient hostelry point-blank.</p> + +<p>Mr. Jaffrey did not appear at supper. I knew that he was +expecting me to come to his room as usual, and I turned over +in my mind a dozen plans to evade seeing him that night. The +landlord sat at the opposite side of the chimney-place, with his +eye upon me. I fancy he was aware of the effect of this storm +on his other boarder; for at intervals, as the wind hurled itself +against the exposed gable, threatening to burst in the windows, +Mr. Sewell tipped me an atrocious wink, and displayed his +gums in a way he had not done since the morning after my +arrival at Greenton. I wondered if he suspected anything about +Andy. There had been odd times during the past week when +I felt convinced that the existence of Miss Mehetabel's son was +no secret to Mr. Sewell.</p> + +<p>In deference to the gale, the landlord sat up half an hour +later than was his custom. At half-past eight he went to +bed, remarking that he thought the old pile would stand till +morning.</p> + +<p>He had been absent only a few minutes when I heard a +rustling at the door. I looked up, and beheld Mr. Jaffrey +standing on the threshold, with his dress in disorder, his scant +hair flying, and the wildest expression on his face.</p> + +<p>"He's gone!" cried Mr. Jaffrey.</p> + +<p>"Who? Sewell? Yes, he just went to bed."</p> + +<p>"No, not Tobias--the boy!"</p> + +<p>"What, run away?"</p> + +<p>"No--he is dead! He has fallen from a step-ladder in the +red chamber and broken his neck!"</p> + +<p>Mr. Jaffrey threw up his hands with a gesture of despair, +and disappeared. I followed him through the hall, saw him go +into his own apartment, and heard the bolt of the door drawn +to. Then I returned to the bar-room, and sat for an hour or +two in the ruddy glow of the fire, brooding over the strange +experience of the last fortnight.</p> + +<p>On my way to bed I paused at Mr. Jaffrey's door, and in +a lull of the storm, the measured respiration within told me +that the old gentleman was sleeping peacefully.</p> + +<p>Slumber was coy with me that night. I lay listening to the +soughing of the wind, and thinking of Mr. Jaffrey's illusion. +It had amused me at first with its grotesqueness; but now the +poor little phantom was dead, I was conscious that there had +been something pathetic in it all along. Shortly after midnight +the wind sunk down, coming and going fainter and +fainter, floating around the eaves of the tavern with an undulating, +murmurous sound, as if it were turning itself into soft +wings to bear away the spirit of a little child.</p> + +<p>Perhaps nothing that happened during my stay at Bayley's +Four-Corners took me so completely by surprise as Mr. Jaffrey's +radiant countenance the next morning. The morning itself was +not fresher or sunnier. His round face literally shone with +geniality and happiness. His eyes twinkled like diamonds, and +the magnetic light of his hair was turned on full. He came +into my room while I was packing my valise. He chirped, and +prattled, and caroled, and was sorry I was going away--but +never a word about Andy. However, the boy had probably +been dead several years then!</p> + +<p>The open wagon that was to carry me to the station stood at +the door; Mr. Sewell was placing my case of instruments under +the seat, and Mr. Jaffrey had gone up to his room to get me a +certain newspaper containing an account of a remarkable shipwreck +on the Auckland Islands. I took the opportunity to +thank Mr. Sewell for his courtesies to me, and to express my +regret at leaving him and Mr. Jaffrey.</p> + +<p>"I have become very much attached to Mr. Jaffrey," I said; +"he is a most interesting person; but that hypothetical boy of +his, that son of Miss Mehetabel's--"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I know!" interrupted Mr. Sewell, testily. "Fell off a +step-ladder and broke his dratted neck. Eleven year old, wasn't +he? Always does, jest at that point. Next week Silas will +begin the whole thing over again, if he can get anybody to +listen to him."</p> + +<p>"I see. Our amiable friend is a little queer on that subject."</p> + +<p>Mr. Sewell glanced cautiously over his shoulder, and tapping +himself significantly on the forehead, said in a low voice,--</p> + +<p>"Room To Let--Unfurnished!"</p> + +<blockquote>The foregoing selections are copyrighted, and are reprinted by +permission of the author, and Houghton, Mifflin & Co., publishers. +</blockquote> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="ALEARDO_ALEARDI"></a>ALEARDO ALEARDI</h2> + +<h3>(1812-1878)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-t.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>he Italian patriot and poet, Aleardo Aleardi, was born in the +village of San Giorgio, near Verona, on November 4th, 1812. +He passed his boyhood on his father's farm, amid the +grand scenery of the valley of the Adige, which deeply impressed +itself on his youthful imagination and left its traces in all his verse. +He went to school at Verona, where for his dullness he was nick-named +the "mole," and afterwards he passed on to the University of +Padua to study law, apparently to please his father, for in the +charming autobiography prefixed to his collected poems he quotes +his father as saying:--"My son, be not enamored of this coquette, +Poesy; for with all her airs of a great lady, she will play thee some +trick of a faithless grisette. Choose a good companion, as one might +say, for instance the law: and thou wilt found a family; wilt partake +of God's bounties; wilt be content in life, and die quietly and +happily." In addition to satisfying his father, the young poet also +wrote at Padua his first political poems. And this brought him +into slight conflict with the authorities. He practiced law for a +short time at Verona, and wrote his first long poem, 'Arnaldo,' published +in 1842, which was very favorably received. When six years +later the new Venetian republic came into being, Aleardi was sent +to represent its interests at Paris. The speedy overthrow of the new +State brought the young ambassador home again, and for the next +ten years he worked for Italian unity and freedom. He was twice +imprisoned, at Mantua in 1852, and again in 1859 at Verona, where +he died April 17th, 1878.</p> + +<p>Like most of the Italian poets of this century, Aleardi found his +chief inspiration in the exciting events that marked the struggle of +Italy for independence, and his best work antedated the peace of +Villafranca. His first serious effort was 'Le Prime Storie' (The Primal +Histories), written in 1845. In this he traces the story of the +human race from the creation through the Scriptural, classical, and +feudal periods down to the present century, and closes with foreshadowings +of a peaceful and happy future. It is picturesque, full of +lofty imagery and brilliant descriptive passages.</p> + +<p>'Una Ora della mia Giovinezza' (An Hour of My Youth: 1858) +recounts many of his youthful trials and disappointments as a patriot. +Like the 'Primal Histories,' this poem is largely contemplative and +philosophical, and shines by the same splendid diction and luxurious +imagery; but it is less wide-reaching in its interests and more +specific in its appeal to his own countrymen. And from this time +onward the patriotic qualities in Aleardi's poetry predominate, and +his themes become more and more exclusively Italian. The 'Monte +Circello' sings the glories and events of the Italian land and history, +and successfully presents many facts of science in poetic form, while +the singer passionately laments the present condition of Italy. In +'Le Citta Italiane Marinore e Commercianti' (The Marine and Commercial +Cities of Italy) the story of the rise, flourishing, and fall of +Venice, Florence, Pisa, and Genoa is recounted. His other noteworthy +poems are 'Rafaello e la Fornarina,' 'Le Tre Fiume' (The +Three Rivers), 'Le Tre Fanciulle' (The Three Maidens: 1858), 'I Sette +Soldati' (The Seven Soldiers: 1859), and 'Canto Politico' (Political +Songs: 1862).</p> + +<p>A slender volume of five hundred pages contains all that Aleardi +has written. Yet he is one of the chief minor Italian poets of this +century, because of his loftiness of purpose and felicity of expression, +his tenderness of feeling, and his deep sympathies with his struggling +country.</p> + +<p>"He has," observes Howells in his 'Modern Italian Poets,' "in +greater degree than any other Italian poet of this, or perhaps of any +age, those merits which our English taste of this time demands,--quickness +of feeling and brilliancy of expression. He lacks simplicity +of idea, and his style is an opal which takes all lights and hues, +rather than the crystal which lets the daylight colorlessly through. +He is distinguished no less by the themes he selects than by the +expression he gives them. In his poetry there is passion, but his +subjects are usually those to which love is accessory rather than +essential; and he cares better to sing of universal and national destinies +as they concern individuals, than the raptures and anguishes +of youthful individuals as they concern mankind." He was original +in his way; his attitude toward both the classic and the romantic +schools is shown in the following passage from his autobiography, +which at the same time brings out his patriotism. He says:--</p> + +<blockquote>"It seemed to me strange, on the one hand, that people who, in their +serious moments and in the recesses of their hearts, invoked Christ, should +in the recesses of their minds, in the deep excitement of poetry, persist in +invoking Apollo and Pallas Minerva. It seemed to me strange, on the other +hand, that people born in Italy, with this sun, with these nights, with so +many glories, so many griefs, so many hopes at home, should have the mania +of singing the mists of Scandinavia, and the Sabbaths of witches, and +should go mad for a gloomy and dead feudalism, which had come from the +North, the highway of our misfortunes. It seemed to me, moreover, that +every Art of Poetry was marvelously useless, and that certain rules were +mummies embalmed by the hand of pedants. In fine, it seemed to me that +there were two kinds of Art: the one, serene with an Olympic serenity, the +Art of all ages that belongs to no country; the other, more impassioned, that +has its roots in one's native soil.... The first that of Homer, of Phidias, +of Virgil, of Tasso; the other that of the Prophets, of Dante, of Shakespeare, +of Byron. And I have tried to cling to this last, because I was pleased to +see how these great men take the clay of their own land and their own time, +and model from it a living statue, which resembles their contemporaries." +</blockquote> + +<p>In another interesting passage he explains that his old drawing-master +had in vain pleaded with the father to make his son a painter, +and he continues:--</p> + +<blockquote>"Not being allowed to use the pencil, I have used the pen. And precisely +on this account my pen resembles too much a pencil; precisely on this +account I am often too much of a naturalist, and am too fond of losing +myself in minute details. I am as one who in walking goes leisurely along, +and stops every minute to observe the dash of light that breaks through the +trees of the woods, the insect that alights on his hand, the leaf that falls on +his head, a cloud, a wave, a streak of smoke; in fine, the thousand accidents +that make creation so rich, so various, so poetical, and beyond which we evermore +catch glimpses of that grand mysterious something, eternal, immense, +benignant, and never inhuman nor cruel, as some would have us believe, +which is called God." +</blockquote> + +<p>The selections are from Howells's 'Modern Italian Poets,' +1887, by Harper and Brothers.</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="COWARDS"></a>COWARDS</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>In the deep circle of Siddim hast thou seen,</p> +<p>Under the shining skies of Palestine,</p> +<p>The sinister glitter of the Lake of Asphalt?</p> +<p>Those coasts, strewn thick with ashes of damnation,</p> +<p>Forever foe to every living thing,</p> +<p>Where rings the cry of the lost wandering bird</p> +<p>That on the shore of the perfidious sea</p> +<p>Athirsting dies,--that watery sepulchre</p> +<p>Of the five cities of iniquity,</p> +<p>Where even the tempest, when its clouds hang low,</p> +<p>Passes in silence, and the lightning dies,--</p> +<p>If thou hast seen them, bitterly hath been</p> +<p>Thy heart wrung with the misery and despair</p> +<p>Of that dread vision!</p> +<p class="i7">Yet there is on earth</p> +<p>A woe more desperate and miserable,--</p> +<p>A spectacle wherein the wrath of God</p> +<p>Avenges Him more terribly. It is</p> +<p>A vain, weak people of faint-heart old men,</p> +<p>That, for three hundred years of dull repose,</p> +<p>Has lain perpetual dreamer, folded in</p> +<p>The ragged purple of its ancestors,</p> +<p>Stretching its limbs wide in its country's sun,</p> +<p>To warm them; drinking the soft airs of autumn</p> +<p>Forgetful, on the fields where its forefathers</p> +<p>Like lions fought! From overflowing hands,</p> +<p>Strew we with hellebore and poppies thick</p> +<p>The way.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">From 'The Primal Histories.'</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<blockquote> +<b><a name="THE_HARVESTERS"></a>THE HARVESTERS</b><br><br> + +What time in summer, sad with so much light,<br> +The sun beats ceaselessly upon the fields;<br> +The harvesters, as famine urges them,<br> +Draw hitherward in thousands, and they wear<br> +The look of those that dolorously go<br> +In exile, and already their brown eyes<br> +Are heavy with the poison of the air.<br> +Here never note of amorous bird consoles<br> +Their drooping hearts; here never the gay songs<br> +Of their Abruzzi sound to gladden these<br> +Pathetic hands. But taciturn they toil,<br> +Reaping the harvests for their unknowrn lords;<br> +And when the weary labor is performed,<br> +Taciturn they retire; and not till then<br> +Their bagpipes crown the joys of the return,<br> +Swelling the heart with their familiar strain.<br> +Alas! not all return, for there is one<br> +That dying in the furrow sits, and seeks<br> +With his last look some faithful kinsman out,<br> +To give his life's wage, that he carry it<br> +Unto his trembling mother, with the last<br> +Words of her son that comes no more. And dying,<br> +Deserted and alone, far off he hears<br> +His comrades going, with their pipes in time,<br> +Joyfully measuring their homeward steps.<br> +And when in after years an orphan comes<br> +To reap the harvest here, and feels his blade<br> +Go quivering through the swaths of falling grain,<br> +He weeps and thinks--haply these heavy stalks<br> +Ripened on his unburied father's bones.<br> +<br> +From 'Monte Circello.'<br> +</blockquote> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<blockquote> +<b><a name="THE_DEATH_OF_THE_YEAR"></a>THE DEATH OF THE YEAR</b><br><br> + +Ere yet upon the unhappy Arctic lands,<br> +In dying autumn, Erebus descends<br> +With the night's thousand hours, along the verge<br> +Of the horizon, like a fugitive,<br> +Through the long days wanders the weary sun;<br> +And when at last under the wave is quenched<br> +The last gleam of its golden countenance,<br> +Interminable twilight land and sea<br> +Discolors, and the north wind covers deep<br> +All things in snow, as in their sepulchres<br> +The dead are buried. In the distances<br> +The shock of warring Cyclades of ice<br> +Makes music as of wild and strange lament;<br> +And up in heaven now tardily are lit<br> +The solitary polar star and seven<br> +Lamps of the bear. And now the warlike race<br> +Of swans gather their hosts upon the breast<br> +Of some far gulf, and, bidding their farewell<br> +To the white cliffs and slender junipers,<br> +And sea-weed bridal-beds, intone the song<br> +Of parting, and a sad metallic clang<br> +Send through the mists. Upon their southward way<br> +They greet the beryl-tinted icebergs; greet<br> +Flamy volcanoes and the seething founts<br> +Of geysers, and the melancholy yellow<br> +Of the Icelandic fields; and, wearying<br> +Their lily wings amid the boreal lights,<br> +Journey away unto the joyous shores<br> +Of morning.<br> +<br> +From 'An Hour of My Youth.'<br> +</blockquote> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="JEAN_LE_ROND_DALEMBERT"></a>JEAN LE ROND D'ALEMBERT</h2> + +<h3>(1717-1783)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-j.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>ean Le Rond D'Alembert, one of the most noted of the +"Encyclopedists," a mathematician of the first order, and +an eminent man of letters, was born at Paris in 1717. The +unacknowleged son of the Chevalier Destouches and of Mme. de Tencin, +he had been exposed on the steps of the chapel St. Jean-le-Rond, +near Notre-Dame. He was named after the place where he was +found; the surname of D'Alembert being added by himself in later +years. He was given into the care of the wife of a glazier, who +brought him up tenderly and whom he +never ceased to venerate as his true +mother. His anonymous father, however, +partly supported him by an annual income +of twelve hundred francs. He was +educated at the college Mazarin, and surprised +his Jansenist teachers by his brilliance +and precocity. They believed him +to be a second Pascal; and, doubtless to +complete the analogy, drew his attention +away from his theological studies to geometry. +But they calculated without their +host; for the young student suddenly +found out his genius, and mathematics +and the exact sciences henceforth became +his absorbing interests. He studied successively law and medicine, +but finding no satisfaction in either of these professions, with the +true instincts of the scholar he chose poverty with liberty to pursue +the studies he loved. He astonished the scientific world by his +first published works, 'Memoir on the Integral Calculus' (1739) and +'On the Refraction of Solid Bodies' (1741); and while not yet twenty-four +years old, the brilliant young mathematician was made a member +of the French Academy of Sciences. In 1754 he entered the Académie +Française, and eighteen years later became its perpetual secretary.</p> + +<p class="lft"><img src="images/374.png" width="50%" alt=""></p> + +<p>D'Alembert wrote many and important works on physics and +mathematics. One of these, 'Memoir on the General Cause of +Winds,' carried away a prize from the Academy of Sciences of +Berlin, in 1746, and its dedication to Frederick II. of Prussia won him +the friendship of that monarch. But his claims to a place in French +literature, leaving aside his eulogies on members of the French +Academy deceased between 1700 and 1772, are based chiefly on his +writings in connection with the 'Encyclopédie.' Associated with +Diderot in this vast enterprise, he was at first, because of his +eminent position in the scientific world, its director and official head. +He contributed a large number of scientific and philosophic articles, +and took entire charge of the revising of the mathematical division. +His most noteworthy contribution, however, is the 'Preliminary Discourse' +prefixed as a general introduction and explanation of the +work. In this he traced with wonderful clearness and logical precision +the successive steps of the human mind in its search after +knowledge, and basing his conclusion on the historical evolution of the +race, he sketched in broad outlines the development of the sciences +and arts. In 1758 he withdrew from the active direction of the +'Encyclopédie,' that he might free himself from the annoyance of +governmental interference, to which the work was constantly subjected +because of the skeptical tendencies it evinced. But he continued to +contribute mathematical articles, with a few on other topics. One of +these, on 'Geneva,' involved him in his celebrated dispute with Rousseau +and other radicals in regard to Calvinism and the suppression +of theatrical performances in the stronghold of Swiss orthodoxy.</p> + +<p>His fame was spreading over Europe. Frederick the Great of +Prussia repeatedly offered him the presidency of the Academy of +Sciences of Berlin. But he refused, as he also declined the magnificent +offer of Catherine of Russia to become tutor to her son, at a +yearly salary of a hundred thousand francs. Pope Benedict XIV. +honored him by recommending him to the membership of the Institute +of Bologne; and the high esteem in which he was held in England +is shown by the legacy of £200 left him by David Hume.</p> + +<p>All these honors and distinctions did not affect the simplicity of +his life, for during thirty years he continued to reside in the poor +and incommodious quarters of his foster-mother, whom he partly +supported out of his small income. Ill health at last drove him to +seek better accommodations. He had formed a romantic attachment +for Mademoiselle de l'Espinasse, and lived with her in the same +house for years unscandaled. Her death in 1776 plunged him into +profound grief. He died nine years later, on the 9th of October, 1783.</p> + +<p>His manner was plain and at times almost rude; he had great +independence of character, but also much simplicity and benevolence. +With the other French deists, D'Alembert has been attacked for his +religious opinions, but with injustice. He was prudent in the public +expression of them, as the time necessitated; but he makes the freest +statement of them in his correspondence with Voltaire. His literary +and philosopic works were edited by Bassange (Paris, 1891). Condorcet, +in his 'Eulogy,' gives the best account of his life and writings.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="MONTESQUIEU"></a>MONTESQUIEU</h3> + +<center>From the Eulogy published in the 'Encyclopédie'</center> +<br> + +<p>The interest which good citizens are pleased to take in the +'Encyclopédie,' and the great number of men of letters +who consecrate their labors to it, authorize us to regard +this work as the most proper monument to preserve the grateful +sentiments of our country, and that respect which is due to the +memory of those celebrated men who have done it honor. Persuaded, +however, that M. de Montesquieu had a title to expect +other panegyrics, and that the public grief deserved to be described +by more eloquent pens, we should have paid his great +memory the homage of silence, had not gratitude compelled us +to speak. A benefactor to mankind by his writings, he was not +less a benefactor to this work, and at least we may place a few +lines at the base of his statue, as it were.</p> + +<p>Charles de Secondat, baron of La Brède and of Montesquieu, +late life-President of the Parliament of Bordeaux, member of the +French Academy of Sciences, of the Royal Academy and Belles-Lettres +of Prussia, and of the Royal Society of London, was +born at the castle of La Brède, near Bordeaux, the 18th of +January, 1689, of a noble family of Guyenne. His great-great-grandfather, +John de Secondat, steward of the household to +Henry the Second, King of Navarre, and afterward to Jane, +daughter of that king, who married Antony of Bourbon, purchased +the estate of Montesquieu for the sum of ten thousand +livres, which this princess gave him by an authentic deed, as a +reward for his probity and services.</p> + +<p>Henry the Third, King of Navarre, afterward Henry the +Fourth, King of France, erected the lands of Montesquieu into a +barony, in favor of Jacob de Secondat, son of John, first a gentleman +in ordinary of the bedchamber to this prince, and afterward +colonel of the regiment of Chatillon. John Gaston de +Secondat, his second son, having married a daughter of the first +president of the Parliament of Bordeaux, purchased the office of +perpetual president in this society. He had several children, one +of whom entered the service, distinguished himself, and quitted +it very early in life. This was the father of Charles de Secondat, +author of the 'Spirit of Laws.' These particulars may seem +superfluous in the eulogy of a philosopher who stands so little in +need of ancestors; but at least we may adorn their memory with +that lustre which his name reflects upon it.</p> + +<p>The early promise of his genius was fulfilled in Charles de +Secondat. He discovered very soon what he desired to be, and +his father cultivated this rising genius, the object of his hope +and of his tenderness. At the age of twenty, young Montesquieu +had already prepared materials for the 'Spirit of Laws,' by a +well-digested extract from the immense body of the civil law; as +Newton had laid in early youth the foundation of his immortal +works. The study of jurisprudence, however, though less dry to +M. de Montesquieu than to most who attempt it, because he +studied it as a philosopher, did not content him. He inquired +deeply into the subjects which pertain to religion, and considered +them with that wisdom, decency, and equity, which characterize +his work.</p> + +<p>A brother of his father, perpetual president of the Parliament +of Bordeaux, an able judge and virtuous citizen, the oracle of his +own society and of his province, having lost an only son, left his +fortune and his office to M. de Montesquieu.</p> + +<p>Some years after, in 1722, during the king's minority, his +society employed him to present remonstrances upon occasion of +a new impost. Placed between the throne and the people, like a +respectful subject and courageous magistrate he brought the cry +of the wretched to the ears of the sovereign--a cry which, being +heard, obtained justice. Unfortunately, this success was momentary. +Scarce was the popular voice silenced before the suppressed tax +was replaced by another; but the good citizen had done his duty.</p> + +<p>He was received the 3d of April, 1716, into the new academy +of Bordeaux. A taste for music and entertainment had at first +assembled its members. M. de Montesquieu believed that the +talents of his friends might be better employed in physical subjects. +He was persuaded that nature, worthy of being beheld +everywhere, could find everywhere eyes worthy to behold her; +while it was impossible to gather together, at a distance from +the metropolis, distinguished writers on works of taste. He +looked upon our provincial societies for belles-lettres as a shadow +of literature which obscures the reality. The Duke de la Force, +by a prize which he founded at Bordeaux, seconded these rational +views. It was decided that a good physical experiment would be +better than a weak discourse or a bad poem; and Bordeaux got +an Academy of Sciences.</p> + +<p>M. de Montesquieu, careless of reputation, wrote little. It +was not till 1721, that is to say, at thirty-two years of age, that +he published the 'Persian Letters.' The description of Oriental +manners, real or supposed, is the least important thing in these +letters. It serves merely as a pretense for a delicate satire upon +our own customs and for the concealment of a serious intention. +In this moving picture, Usbec chiefly exposes, with as much ease +as energy, whatever among us most struck his penetrating eyes: +our way of treating the silliest things seriously, and of laughing +at the most important; our way of talking which is at once so +blustering and so frivolous; our impatience even in the midst of +pleasure itself; our prejudices and our actions that perpetually +contradict our understandings; our great love of glory and respect +for the idol of court favor, our little real pride; our courtiers so +mean and vain; our exterior politeness to, and our real contempt +of strangers; our fantastical tastes, than which there is nothing +lower but the eagerness of all Europe to adopt them; our barbarous +disdain for the two most respectable occupations of a +citizen--commerce and magistracy; our literary disputes, so keen +and so useless; our rage for writing before we think, and for +judging before we understand. To this picture he opposes, in +the apologue of the Troglodytes, the description of a virtuous +people, become wise by misfortunes--a piece worthy of the portico. +In another place, he represents philosophy, long silenced, +suddenly reappearing, regaining rapidly the time which she had +lost; penetrating even among the Russians at the voice of a +genius which invites her; while among other people of Europe, +superstition, like a thick atmosphere, prevents the all-surrounding +light from reaching them. Finally, by his review of ancient and +modern government, he presents us with the bud of those bright +ideas since fully developed in his great work.</p> + +<p>These different subjects, no longer novel, as when the 'Persian +Letters' first appeared, will forever remain original--a merit the +more real that it proceeds alone from the genius of the writer; +for Usbec acquired, during his abode in France, so perfect a +knowledge of our morals, and so strong a tincture of our manners, +that his style makes us forget his country. This small +solecism was perhaps not unintentional. While exposing our follies +and vices, he meant, no doubt, to do justice to our merits. +Avoiding the insipidity of a direct panegyric, he has more delicately +praised us by assuming our own air in professed satire.</p> + +<p>Notwithstanding the success of his work, M. de Montesquieu +did not acknowledge it. Perhaps he wished to escape criticism. +Perhaps he wished to avoid a contrast of the frivolity of the +'Persian Letters' with the gravity of his office; a sort of reproach +which critics never fail to make, because it requires no sort of +effort. But his secret was discovered, and the public suggested +his name for the Academy. The event justified M. de Montesquieu's +silence. Usbec expresses himself freely, not concerning +the fundamentals of Christianity, but about matters which people +affect to confound with Christianity itself: about the spirit of +persecution which has animated so many Christians; about the +temporal usurpation of ecclesiastical power; about the excessive +multiplication of monasteries, which deprive the State of subjects +without giving worshipers to God; about some opinions which +would fain be established as principles; about our religious disputes, +always violent and often fatal. If he appears anywhere to +touch upon questions more vital to Christianity itself, his reflections +are in fact favorable to revelation, because he shows how +little human reason, left to itself, knows.</p> + +<p>Among the genuine letters of M. de Montesquieu the foreign +printer had inserted some by another hand. Before the author +was condemned, these should have been thrown out. Regardless +of these considerations, hatred masquerading as zeal, and zeal +without understanding, rose and united themselves against the +'Persian Letters.' Informers, a species of men dangerous and +base, alarmed the piety of the ministry. M. de Montesquieu, +urged by his friends, supported by the public voice, having +offered himself for the vacant place of M. de Sacy in the French +Academy, the minister wrote "The Forty" that his Majesty would +never accept the election of the author of the "Persian Letters" +that he had not, indeed, read the book, but that persons in whom +he placed confidence had informed him of its poisonous tendency. +M. de Montesquieu saw what a blow such an accusation might +prove to his person, his family, and his tranquillity. He neither +sought literary honors nor affected to disdain them when they +came in his way, nor did he regard the lack of them as a misfortune: +but a perpetual exclusion, and the motives of that exclusion, +appeared to him to be an injury. He saw the minister, and +explained that though he did not acknowledge the 'Persian Letters,' +he would not disown a work for which he had no reason to +blush; and that he ought to be judged upon its contents, and not +upon mere hearsay. At last the minister read the book, loved +the author, and learned wisdom as to his advisers. The French +Academy obtained one of its greatest ornaments, and France had +the happiness to keep a subject whom superstition or calumny +had nearly deprived her of; for M. de Montesquieu had declared +to the government that, after the affront they proposed, he would +go among foreigners in quest of that safety, that repose, and perhaps +those rewards which he might reasonably have expected in +his own country. The nation would really have deplored his loss, +while yet the disgrace of it must have fallen upon her.</p> + +<p>M. de Montesquieu was received the 24th of January, 1728. +His oration is one of the best ever pronounced here. Among +many admirable passages which shine out in its pages is the deep-thinking +writer's characterization of Cardinal Richelieu, "who +taught France the secret of its strength, and Spain that of its +weakness; who freed Germany from her chains and gave her new +ones."</p> + +<p>The new Academician was the worthier of this title, that he +had renounced all other employments to give himself entirely up +to his genius and his taste. However important was his place, he +perceived that a different work must employ his talents; that the +citizen is accountable to his country and to mankind for all the +good he may do; and that he could be more useful by his writings +than by settling obscure legal disputes. He was no longer +a magistrate, but only a man of letters.</p> + +<p>But that his works should serve other nations, it was necessary +that he should travel, his aim being to examine the natural +and moral world, to study the laws and constitution of every +country; to visit scholars, writers, artists, and everywhere to seek +for those rare men whose conversation sometimes supplies the +place of years of observation. M. de Montesquieu might have +said, like Democritus, "I have forgot nothing to instruct myself; +I have quitted my country and traveled over the universe, the +better to know truth; I have seen all the illustrious personages of +my time." But there was this difference between the French +Democritus and him of Abdera, that the first traveled to instruct +men, and the second to laugh at them.</p> + +<p>He went first to Vienna, where he often saw the celebrated +Prince Eugene. This hero, so fatal to France (to which he +might have been so useful), after having checked the advance of +Louis XIV. and humbled the Ottoman pride, lived without pomp, +loving and cultivating letters in a court where they are little +honored, and showing his masters how to protect them.</p> + +<p>Leaving Vienna, the traveler visited Hungary, an opulent and +fertile country, inhabited by a haughty and generous nation, the +scourge of its tyrants and the support of its sovereigns. As few +persons know this country well, he has written with care this +part of his travels.</p> + +<p>From Germany he went to Italy. At Venice he met the +famous Mr. Law, of whose former grandeur nothing remained +but projects fortunately destined to die away unorganized, and a +diamond which he pawned to play at games of hazard. One day +the conversation turned on the famous system which Law had +invented; the source of so many calamities, so many colossal fortunes, +and so remarkable a corruption in our morals. As the Parliament +of Paris had made some resistance to the Scotch minister +on this occasion, M. de Montesquieu asked him why he had never +tried to overcome this resistance by a method almost always +infallible in England, by the grand mover of human actions--in +a word, by money. "These are not," answered Law, "geniuses so +ardent and so generous as my countrymen; but they are much +more incorruptible." It is certainly true that a society which is +free for a limited time ought to resist corruption more than one +which is always free: the first, when it sells its liberty, loses it; +the second, so to speak, only lends it, and exercises it even when +it is thus parting with it. Thus the circumstances and nature of +government give rise to the vices and virtues of nations.</p> + +<p>Another person, no less famous, whom M. de Montesquieu saw +still oftener at Venice, was Count de Bonneval. This man, so +well known for his adventures, which were not yet at an end, +delighted to converse with so good a judge and so excellent a +hearer, often related to him the military actions in which he had +been engaged, and the remarkable circumstances of his life, and +drew the characters of generals and ministers whom he had +known.</p> + +<p>He went from Venice to Rome. In this ancient capital of +the world he studied the works of Raphael, of Titian, and of +Michael Angelo. Accustomed to study nature, he knew her when +she was translated, as a faithful portrait appeals to all who are +familiar with the original.</p> + +<p>After having traveled over Italy, M. de Montesquieu came to +Switzerland and studied those vast countries which are watered +by the Rhine. There was the less for him to see in Germany +that Frederick did not yet reign. In the United Provinces he +beheld an admirable monument of what human industry animated +by a love of liberty can do. In England he stayed three years. +Welcomed by the greatest men, he had nothing to regret save +that he had not made his journey sooner. Newton and Locke +were dead. But he had often the honor of paying his respects to +their patroness, the celebrated Queen of England, who cultivated +philosophy upon a throne, and who properly esteemed and valued +M. de Montesquieu. Nor was he less well received by the +nation. At London he formed intimate friendships with the +great thinkers. With them he studied the nature of the government, +attaining profound knowledge of it.</p> + +<p>As he had set out neither as an enthusiast nor a cynic, he +brought back neither a disdain for foreigners nor a contempt for +his own country. It was the result of his observations that Germany +was made to travel in, Italy to sojourn in, England to think +in, and France to live in.</p> + +<p>After returning to his own country, M. de Montesquieu retired +for two years to his estate of La Brède, enjoying that solitude +which a life in the tumult and hurry of the world but makes the +more agreeable. He lived with himself, after having so long +lived with others; and finished his work 'On the Cause of the +Grandeur and Decline of the Romans,' which appeared in 1734.</p> + +<p>Empires, like men, must increase, decay, and be extinguished. +But this necessary revolution may have hidden causes which the +veil of time conceals from us.</p> + +<p>Nothing in this respect more resembles modern history than +ancient history. That of the Romans must, however, be excepted. +It presents us with a rational policy, a connected system of +aggrandizement, which will not permit us to attribute the great fortune +of this people to obscure and inferior sources. The causes of +the Roman grandeur may then be found in history, and it is the +business of the philosopher to discover them. Besides, there are +no systems in this study, as in that of physics, which are easily +overthrown, because one new and unforeseen experiment can +upset them in an instant. On the contrary, when we carefully +collect the facts, if we do not always gather together all the +desired materials, we may at least hope one day to obtain more. +A great historian combines in the most perfect manner these +defective materials. His merit is like that of an architect, who, +from a few remains, traces the plan of an ancient edifice; supplying, +by genius and happy conjectures, what was wanting in fact.</p> + +<p>It is from this point of view that we ought to consider the +work of M. de Montesquieu. He finds the causes of the grandeur +of the Romans in that love of liberty, of labor, and of country, +which was instilled into them during their infancy; in those +intestine divisions which gave an activity to their genius, and +which ceased immediately upon the appearance of an enemy; in +that constancy after misfortunes, which never despaired of the +republic; in that principle they adhered to of never making peace +but after victories; in the honor of a triumph, which was a subject +of emulation among the generals; in that protection which +they granted to those peoples who rebelled against their kings; +in the excellent policy of permitting the conquered to preserve +their religion and customs; and the equally excellent determination +never to have two enemies upon their hands at once, but to +bear everything from the one till they had destroyed the other. +He finds the causes of their declension in the aggrandizement of +the State itself: in those distant wars, which, obliging the citizens +to be too long absent, made them insensibly lose their republican +spirit; in the too easily granted privilege of being citizens of +Rome, which made the Roman people at last become a sort of +many-headed monster; in the corruption introduced by the luxury +of Asia; in the proscriptions of Sylla, which debased the genius +of the nation, and prepared it for slavery; in the necessity of +having a master while their liberty was become burdensome to +them; in the necessity of changing their maxims when they +changed their government; in that series of monsters who +reigned, almost without interruption, from Tiberius to Nerva, +and from Commodus to Constantine; lastly, in the translation +and division of the empire, which perished first in the West +by the power of barbarians, and after having languished in the +East, under weak or cruel emperors, insensibly died away, like +those rivers which disappear in the sands.</p> + +<p>In a very small volume M. de Montesquieu explained and +unfolded his picture. Avoiding detail, and seizing only essentials, +he has included in a very small space a vast number of objects +distinctly perceived, and rapidly presented, without fatiguing the +reader. While he points out much, he leaves us still more to +reflect upon; and he might have entitled his book, 'A Roman +History for the Use of Statesmen and Philosophers.'</p> + +<p>Whatever reputation M. de Montesquieu had thus far acquired, +he had but cleared the way for a far grander undertaking--for +that which ought to immortalize his name, and commend it to +the admiration of future ages. He had meditated for twenty +years upon its execution; or, to speak more exactly, his whole +life had been a perpetual meditation upon it. He had made +himself in some sort a stranger in his own country, the better to +understand it. He had studied profoundly the different peoples +of Europe. The famous island, which so glories in her laws, and +which makes so bad a use of them, proved to him what Crete +had been to Lycurgus--a school where he learned much without +approving everything. Thus he attained by degrees to the noblest +title a wise man can deserve, that of legislator of nations.</p> + +<p>If he was animated by the importance of his subject, he was +at the same time terrified by its extent. He abandoned it, and +returned to it again and again. More than once, as he himself +owns, he felt his paternal hands fail him. At last, encouraged +by his friends, he resolved to publish the 'Spirit of Laws.'</p> + +<p>In this important work M. de Montesquieu, without insisting, +like his predecessors, upon metaphysical discussions, without confining +himself, like them, to consider certain people in certain +particular relations or circumstances, takes a view of the actual +inhabitants of the world in all their conceivable relations to each +other. Most other writers in this way are either simple moralists, +or simple lawyers, or even sometimes simple theologists. As +for him, a citizen of all nations, he cares less what duty requires +of us than what means may constrain us to do it; about the +metaphysical perfection of laws, than about what man is capable +of; about laws which have been made, than about those which +ought to have been made; about the laws of a particular people, +than about those of all peoples. Thus, when comparing himself +to those who have run before him in this noble and grand +career, he might say, with Correggio, when he had seen the +works of his rivals, "And I, too, am a Painter."</p> + +<p>Filled with his subject, the author of the 'Spirit of Laws' +comprehends so many materials, and treats them with such brevity +and depth, that assiduous reading alone discloses its merit. +This study will make that pretended want of method, of which +some readers have accused M. de Montesquieu, disappear. Real +want of order should be distinguished from what is apparent +only. Real disorder confuses the analogy and connection of ideas; +or sets up conclusions as principles, so that the reader, after +innumerable windings, finds himself at the point whence he set +out. Apparent disorder is when the author, putting his ideas +in their true place, leaves it to the readers to supply intermediate +ones. M. de Montesquieu's book is designed for men who +think, for men capable of supplying voluntary and reasonable +omissions.</p> + +<p>The order perceivable in the grand divisions of the 'Spirit +of Laws' pervades the smaller details also. By his method of +arrangement we easily perceive the influence of the different parts +upon each other; as, in a system of human knowledge well understood, +we may perceive the mutual relation of sciences and arts. +There must always remain something arbitrary in every comprehensive +scheme, and all that can be required of an author is, that +he follow strictly his own system.</p> + +<p>For an allowable obscurity the same defense exists. What +may be obscure to the ignorant is not so for those whom the +author had in mind. Besides, voluntary obscurity is not properly +obscurity. Obliged to present truths of great importance, the +direct avowal of which might have shocked without doing good, +M. de Montesquieu has had the prudence to conceal them from +those whom they might have hurt without hiding them from the +wise.</p> + +<p>He has especially profited from the two most thoughtful historians, +Tacitus and Plutarch; but, though a philosopher familiar +with these authors might have dispensed with many others, he +neglected nothing that could be of use. The reading necessary +for the 'Spirit of Laws' is immense; and the author's ingenuity +is the more wonderful because he was almost blind, and obliged +to depend on other men's eyes. This prodigious reading contributes +not only to the utility, but to the agreeableness of the work. +Without sacrificing dignity, M. de Montesquieu entertains the +reader by unfamiliar facts, or by delicate allusions, or by those +strong and brilliant touches which paint, by one stroke, nations +and men.</p> + +<p>In a word, M. de Montesquieu stands for the study of laws, as +Descartes stood for that of philosophy. He often instructs us, and +is sometimes mistaken; and even when he mistakes, he instructs +those who know how to read him. The last edition of his works +demonstrates, by its many corrections and additions, that when he +has made a slip, he has been able to rise again.</p> + +<p>But what is within the reach of all the world is the spirit of +the 'Spirit of Laws,' which ought to endear the author to all +nations, to cover far greater faults than are his. The love of the +public good, a desire to see men happy, reveals itself everywhere; +and had it no other merit, it would be worthy, on this account +alone, to be read by nations and kings. Already we may perceive +that the fruits of this work are ripe. Though M. de Montesquieu +scarcely survived the publication of the 'Spirit of Laws,' he had +the satisfaction to foresee its effects among us; the natural love of +Frenchmen for their country turned toward its true object; that +taste for commerce, for agriculture, and for useful arts, which +insensibly spreads itself in our nation; that general knowledge of +the principles of government, which renders people more attached +to that which they ought to love. Even the men who have +indecently attacked this work perhaps owe more to it than they +imagine. Ingratitude, besides, is their least fault. It is not without +regret and mortification that we expose them; but this history +is of too much consequence to M. de Montesquieu and to philosophy +to be passed over in silence. May that reproach, which at +last covers his enemies, profit them!</p> + +<p>The 'Spirit of Laws' was at once eagerly sought after on +account of the reputation of its author; but though M. de Montesquieu +had written for thinkers, he had the vulgar for his judge. +The brilliant passages scattered up and down the work, admitted +only because they illustrated the subject, made the ignorant +believe that it was written for them. Looking for an entertaining +book, they found a useful one, whose scheme and details they +could not comprehend without attention. The 'Spirit of Laws' +was treated with a deal of cheap wit; even the title of it was +made a subject of pleasantry. In a word, one of the finest literary +monuments which our nation ever produced was received almost +with scurrility. It was requisite that competent judges should +have time to read it, that they might correct the errors of the +fickle multitude. That small public which teaches, dictated to +that large public which listens to hear, how it ought to think and +speak; and the suffrages of men of abilities formed only one +voice over all Europe.</p> + +<p>The open and secret enemies of letters and philosophy now +united their darts against this work. Hence that multitude of +pamphlets discharged against the author, weapons which we shall +not draw from oblivion. If those authors were not forgotten, it +might be believed that the 'Spirit of Laws' was written amid a +nation of barbarians.</p> + +<p>M. de Montesquieu despised the obscure criticisms of the +curious. He ranked them with those weekly newspapers whose +encomiums have no authority, and their darts no effect; which +indolent readers run over without believing, and in which sovereigns +are insulted without knowing it. But he was not equally +indifferent about those principles of irreligion which they accused +him of having propagated. By ignoring such reproaches he +would have seemed to deserve them, and the importance of the +object made him shut his eyes to the meanness of his adversaries. +The ultra-zealous, afraid of that light which letters diffuse, not to the +prejudice of religion, but to their own disadvantage, took +different ways of attacking him; some, by a trick as puerile as +cowardly, wrote fictitious letters to themselves; others, attacking +him anonymously, had afterwards fallen by the ears among themselves. +M. de Montesquieu contented himself with making an +example of the most extravagant. This was the author of an +anonymous periodical paper, who accused M. de Montesquieu of +Spinozism and deism (two imputations which are incompatible); +of having followed the system of Pope (of which there is not a +word in his works); of having quoted Plutarch, who is not a +Christian author; of not having spoken of original sin and of +grace. In a word, he pretended that the 'Spirit of Laws' was a +production of the constitution <i>Unigenitus</i>; a preposterous idea. +Those who understand M. de Montesquieu and Clement XI. may +judge, by this accusation, of the rest.</p> + +<p>This enemy procured the philosopher an addition of glory as +a man of letters: the 'Defense of the Spirit of Laws' appeared. +This work, for its moderation, truth, delicacy of ridicule, is a +model. M. de Montesquieu might easily have made his adversary +odious; he did better--he made him ridiculous. We owe the +aggressor eternal thanks for having procured us this masterpiece. +For here, without intending it, the author has drawn a picture of +himself; those who knew him think they hear him; and posterity, +when reading his 'Defense,' will decide that his conversation +equaled his writings--an encomium which few great men have +deserved.</p> + +<p>Another circumstance gave him the advantage. The critic +loudly accused the clergy of France, and especially the faculty of +theology, of indifference to the cause of God, because they did +not proscribe the 'Spirit of Laws.' The faculty resolved to +examine the 'Spirit of Laws.' Though several years have passed, +it has not yet pronounced a decision. It knows the grounds of +reason and of faith; it knows that the work of a man of letters +ought not to be examined like that of a theologian; that a bad +interpretation does not condemn a proposition, and that it may +injure the weak to see an ill-timed suspicion of heresy thrown +upon geniuses of the first rank. In spite of this unjust accusation, +M. de Montesquieu was always esteemed, visited, and well +received by the greatest and most respectable dignitaries of the +Church. Would he have preserved this esteem among men of +worth, if they had regarded him as a dangerous writer?</p> + +<p>M. de Montesquieu's death was not unworthy of his life. +Suffering greatly, far from a family that was dear to him, surrounded +by a few friends and a great crowd of spectators, he +preserved to the last his calmness and serenity of soul. After +performing with decency every duty, full of confidence in the +Eternal Being, he died with the tranquillity of a man of worth, +who had ever consecrated his talents to virtue and humanity. +France and Europe lost him February 10th, 1755, aged sixty-six.</p> + +<p>All the newspapers published this event as a misfortune. We +may apply to M. de Montesquieu what was formerly said of an +illustrious Roman: that nobody, when told of his death, showed +any joy or forgot him when he was no more. Foreigners were +eager to demonstrate their regrets: my Lord Chesterfield, whom +it is enough to name, wrote an article to his honor--an article +worthy of both. It is the portrait of Anaxagoras drawn by +Pericles. The Royal Academy of Sciences and Belles-Lettres of +Prussia, though it is not its custom to pronounce a eulogy on +foreign members, paid him an honor which only the illustrious +John Bernoulli had hitherto received. M. de Maupertuis, though +ill, performed himself this last duty to his friend, and would not +permit so sacred an office to fall to the share of any other. To +these honorable suffrages were added those praises given him, +in presence of one of us, by that very monarch to whom this +celebrated Academy owes its lustre; a prince who feels the losses +which Philosophy sustains, and at the same time comforts her.</p> + +<p>The 17th of February the French Academy, according to +custom, performed a solemn service for him, at which all the +learned men of this body assisted. They ought to have placed +the 'Spirit of Laws' upon his coffin, as heretofore they exposed, +opposite to that of Raphael, his Transfiguration. This simple and +affecting decoration would have been a fit funeral oration.</p> + +<p>M. de Montesquieu had, in company, an unvarying sweetness +and gayety of temper. His conversation was spirited, agreeable, +and instructive, because he had known so many great men. It +was, like his style, concise, full of wit and sallies, without gall, +and without satire. Nobody told a story more brilliantly, more +readily, more gracefully, or with less affectation.</p> + +<p>His frequent absence of mind only made him the more amusing. +He always roused himself to reanimate the conversation. +The fire of his genius, his prodigality of ideas, gave rise to +flashes of speech; but he never interrupted an interesting conversation; +and he was attentive without affectation and without constraint. +His conversation not only resembled his character and +his genius, but had the method which he observed in his study. +Though capable of long-continued meditation, he never exhausted +his strength; he always left off application before he felt the +least symptom of fatigue.</p> + +<p>He was sensible to glory, but wished only to deserve it, and +never tried to augment his own fame by underhand practices.</p> + +<p>Worthy of all distinctions, he asked none, and he was not +surprised that he was forgot; but he has protected at court men +of letters who were persecuted, celebrated, and unfortunate, and +has obtained favors for them.</p> + +<p>Though he lived with the great, their company was not +necessary to his happiness. He retired whenever he could to the +country; there again with joy to welcome his philosophy, his +books, and his repose. After having studied man in the commerce +of the world, and in the history of nations, he studied him +also among those simple people whom nature alone has instructed. +From them he could learn something; he endeavored, +like Socrates, to find out their genius; he appeared as happy +thus as in the most brilliant assemblies, especially when he made +up their differences, and comforted them by his beneficence.</p> + +<p>Nothing does greater honor to his memory than the economy +with which he lived, and which has been blamed as excessive in +a proud and avaricious age. He would not encroach on the provision +for his family, even by his generosity to the unfortunate, +or by those expenses which his travels, the weakness of his sight, +and the printing of his works made necessary. He transmitted +to his children, without diminution or augmentation, the estate +which he received from his ancestors, adding nothing to it but +the glory of his name and the example of his life. He had +married, in 1715, dame Jane de Lartigue, daughter of Peter de +Lartigue, lieutenant-colonel of the regiment of Molevrier, and +had by her two daughters and one son.</p> + +<p>Those who love truth and their country will not be displeased +to find some of his maxims here. He thought: That every part +of the State ought to be equally subject to the laws, but that the +privileges of every part of the State ought to be respected when +they do not oppose the natural right which obliges every citizen +equally to contribute to the public good; that ancient possession +was in this kind the first of titles, and the most inviolable of +rights, which it was always unjust and sometimes dangerous to +shake; that magistrates, in all circumstances, and notwithstanding +their own advantage, ought to be magistrates without partiality +and without passion, like the laws which absolve and +punish without love or hatred. He said upon occasion of those +ecclesiastical disputes which so much employed the Greek emperors +and Christians, that theological disputes, when they are not +confined to the schools, infallibly dishonor a nation in the eyes +of its neighbors: in fact, the contempt in which wise men hold +those quarrels does not vindicate the character of their country; +because, sages making everywhere the least noise, and being the +smallest number, it is never from them that the nation is judged.</p> + +<p>We look upon that special interest which M. de Montesquieu +took in the (Encyclopedic) as one of the most honorable rewards +of our labor. Perhaps the opposition which the work has met +with, reminding him of his own experience, interested him the +more in our favor. Perhaps he was sensible, without perceiving +it, of that justice which we dared to do him in the first volume +of the 'Encyclopedic,' when nobody as yet had ventured to say a +word in his defense. He prepared for us an article upon 'Taste,' +which has been found unfinished among his papers. We shall +give it to the public in that condition, and treat it with the same +respect that antiquity formerly showed to the last words of +Seneca. Death prevented his giving us any further marks of his +approval; and joining our own griefs with those of all Europe, +we might write on his tomb:--</p> + +<blockquote>"<i>Finis vita ejus nobis luctuosus, patriae tristis, extraneis etiam<br> +ignotisque non sine cura fuit</i>."<br></blockquote> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="VITTORIO_ALFIERI"></a>VITTORIO ALFIERI</h2> + +<h3>(1749-1803)</h3> + +<h3>BY L. OSCAR KUHNS</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-i.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>talian literature during the eighteenth century, although it +could boast of no names in any way comparable with those +of Dante, Petrarch, Ariosto, and Tasso, showed still a vast +improvement on the degradation of the preceding century. Among +the most famous writers of the times--Goldoni, Parini, Metastasio--none +is so great or so famous as Vittorio Alfieri, the founder of Italian +tragedy. The story of his life and of his literary activity, as +told by himself in his memoirs, is one of extreme interest. Born at +Asti, on January 17th, 1749, of a wealthy and noble family, he grew +up to manhood singularly deficient in knowledge and culture, and +without the slightest interest in literature. He was "uneducated," +to use his own phrase, in the Academy of Turin. It was only after a +long tour in Italy, France, Holland, and England, that, recognizing +his own ignorance, he went to Florence to begin serious work.</p> + +<p>At the age of twenty-seven a sudden revelation of his dramatic +power came to him, and with passionate energy he spent the rest of +his life in laborious study and in efforts to make himself worthy of +a place among the poets of his native land. Practically he had to +learn everything; for he himself tells us that he had "an almost +total ignorance of the rules of dramatic composition, and an unskillfulness +almost total in the divine and most necessary art of writing +well and handling his own language."</p> + +<p>His private life was eventful, chiefly through his many sentimental +attachments, its deepest experience being his profound love +and friendship for the Countess of Albany,--Louise Stolberg, mistress +and afterward wife of the "Young Pretender," who passed under the +title of Count of Albany, and from whom she was finally divorced. +The production of Alfieri's tragedies began with the sketch called +'Cleopatra,' in 1775, and lasted till 1789, when a complete edition, by +Didot, appeared in Paris. His only important prose work is his +'Auto-biography' begun in 1790 and ended in the year of his death, 1803. +Although he wrote several comedies and a number of sonnets and +satires,--which do not often rise above mediocrity,--it is as a tragic +poet that he is known to fame. Before him--though Goldoni had +successfully imitated Molière in comedy, and Metastasio had become +enormously popular as the poet of love and the opera--no tragedies +had been written in Italy which deserved to be compared with the +great dramas of France, Spain, and England. Indeed, it had been +said that tragedy was not adapted to the Italian tongue or character. +It remained for Alfieri to prove the falsity of this theory.</p> + +<p>Always sensitive to the charge of plagiarism, Alfieri declared that +whether his tragedies were good or bad, they were at least his own. +This is true to a certain extent. And yet he was influenced more +than he was willing to acknowledge by the French dramatists of the +seventeenth century. In common with Corneille and Racine, he observed +strictly the three unities of time, place, and action. But the +courtliness of language, the grace and poetry of the French dramas, +and especially the tender love of Racine, are altogether lacking with +him.</p> + +<p>Alfieri had a certain definite theory of tragedy which he followed +with unswerving fidelity. He aimed at the simplicity and directness +of the Greek drama. He sought to give one clear, definite action, +which should advance in a straight line from beginning to end, without +deviation, and carry along the characters--who are, for the most +part, helplessly entangled in the toils of a relentless fate--to an +inevitable destruction. For this reason the well-known <i>confidantes</i> of +the French stage were discarded, no secondary action or episodes +were admitted, and the whole play was shortened to a little more +than two-thirds of the average French classic drama. Whatever +originality Alfieri possessed did not show itself in the choice of +subjects, which are nearly all well known and had often been used +before. From Racine he took 'Polynice,' 'Merope' had been treated +by Maffei and Voltaire, and Shakespeare had immortalized the story +of Brutus. The situations and events are often conventional; the +passions are those familiar to the stage,--jealousy, revenge, hatred, +and unhappy love. And yet Alfieri has treated these subjects in a +way which differs from all others, and which stamps them, in a certain +sense, as his own. With him all is sombre and melancholy; the +scene is utterly unrelieved by humor, by the flowers of poetry, or by +that deep-hearted sympathy--the pity of it all--which softens the +tragic effect of Shakespeare's plays.</p> + +<p>Alfieri seemed to be attracted toward the most horrible phases of +human life, and the most terrible events of history and tradition. +The passions he describes are those of unnatural love, of jealousy +between father and son, of fratricidal hatred, or those in which a +sense of duty and love for liberty triumphs over the ties of filial +and parental love. In treating the story of the second Brutus, it +was not enough for his purpose to have Caesar murdered by his +friend; but, availing himself of an unproven tradition, he makes Brutus +the son of Caesar, and thus a parricide.</p> + +<br> +<a name="393.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><img src="images/393.jpg" width="40%" alt=""> +</p><br> + +<p>It is interesting to notice his vocabulary; to see how constantly +he uses such words as "atrocious," "horror," "terrible," "incest," +"rivers," "streams," "lakes," and "seas" of blood. The exclamation, +"Oh, rage" occurs on almost every page. Death, murder, +suicide, is the outcome of every tragedy.</p> + +<p>The actors are few,--in many plays only four,--and each represents +a certain passion. They never change, but remain true to +their characters from beginning to end. The villains are monsters +of cruelty and vice, and the innocent and virtuous are invariably +their victims, and succumb at last.</p> + +<p>Alfieri's purpose in producing these plays was not to amuse an +idle public, but to promulgate throughout his native land--then +under Spanish domination--the great and lofty principle of liberty +which inspired his whole life. A deep, uncompromising hatred of +kings is seen in every drama, where invariably a tyrant figures as +the villain. There is a constant declamation against tyranny and +slavery. Liberty is portrayed as something dearer than life itself. +The struggle for freedom forms the subjects of five of his +plays,--'Virginia,' 'The Conspiracy of the Pazzi,' 'Timoleon,' the +'First Brutus,' and the 'Second Brutus.' One of these is dedicated to +George Washington--'Liberator dell' America.' The warmth of +feeling with which, in the 'Conspiracy of the Pazzi,' the degradation +and slavery of Florence under the Medici is depicted, betrays +clearly Alfieri's sense of the political state of Italy in his own day. +And the poet undoubtedly has gained the gratitude of his countrymen +for his voicing of that love for liberty which has always existed +in their hearts.</p> + +<p>Just as Alfieri sought to condense the action of his plays, so he +strove for brevity and condensation in language. His method of +composing was peculiar. He first sketched his play in prose, then +worked it over in poetry, often spending years in the process of +rewriting and polishing. In his indomitable energy, his persistence +in labor, and his determination to acquire a fitting style, he reminds +us of Balzac. His brevity of language--which shows itself most +strikingly in the omission of articles, and in the number of broken +exclamations--gives his pages a certain sententiousness, almost like +proverbs. He purposely renounced all attempts at the graces and +flowers of poetry.</p> + +<p>It is hard for the lover of Shakespearean tragedy to be just to +the merits of Alfieri. There is a uniformity, or even a monotony, +in these nineteen plays, whose characters are more or less alike, +whose method of procedure is the same, whose sentiments are +analogous, and in which an activity devoid of incident hurries the +reader to an inevitable conclusion, foreseen from the first act.</p> + +<p>And yet the student cannot fail to detect great tragic power, +sombre and often unnatural, but never producing that sense of the +ridiculous which sometimes mars the effect of Victor Hugo's dramas. +The plots are never obscure, the language is never trivial, and the +play ends with a climax which leaves a profound impression.</p> + +<p>The very nature of Alfieri's tragedies makes it difficult to represent +him without giving a complete play. The following extracts, +however, illustrate admirably the horror and power of his climaxes.</p> + +<p class="rgt"><img src="images/396.png" width="50%" alt=""></p> +<br><br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="AGAMEMNON"></a>AGAMEMNON</h3> +<br> + +<p>[During the absence of Agamemnon at the siege of Troy, Aegisthus, son of +Thyestes and the relentless enemy of the House of Atreus, wins the love +of Clytemnestra, and with devilish ingenuity persuades her that the only +way to save her life and his is to slay her husband.]</p> + + +<blockquote> +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<b>ACT IV--SCENE I</b> +<br><br> +AEGISTHUS--CLYTEMNESTRA +<br><br> +Aegisthus--To be a banished man, ... to fly, ... to die:<br> +... These are the only means that I have left.<br> +Thou, far from me, deprived of every hope<br> +Of seeing me again, wilt from thy heart<br> +Have quickly chased my image: great Atrides<br> +Will wake a far superior passion there;<br> +Thou, in his presence, many happy days<br> +Wilt thou enjoy--These auspices may Heaven<br> +Confirm--I cannot now evince to thee<br> +A surer proof of love than by my flight; ...<br> +A dreadful, hard, irrevocable proof.<br> +<br> +<i>Clytemnestra</i>--If there be need of death, we both will die!--<br> +But is there nothing left to try ere this?<br> +<br> +<i>Aegis</i>.--Another plan, perchance, e'en now remains; ...<br> +But little worthy ...<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--And it is--<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--Too cruel.<br> +<br> +<i>Cly</i>.--But certain?<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>. Certain, ah, too much so!<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--How<br> +Canst thou hide it from me?<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--How canst thou<br> +Of me demand it?<br> +<br> + <i>Cly.</i>--What then may it be? ...<br> +I know not ... Speak: I am too far advanced;<br> +I cannot now retract: perchance already<br> +I am suspected by Atrides; maybe<br> +He has the right already to despise me:<br> +Hence do I feel constrained, e'en now, to hate him;<br> +I cannot longer in his presence live;<br> +I neither will, nor dare.--Do thou, Aegisthus,<br> +Teach me a means, whatever it may be,<br> +A means by which I may withdraw myself<br> +From him forever.<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--Thou withdraw thyself<br> +From him? I have already said to thee<br> +That now 'tis utterly impossible.<br> +<br> + <i>Cly.</i>--What other step remains for me to take? ...<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--None.<br> +<br> + <i>Cly.</i>--Now I understand thee.--What a flash.<br> +Oh, what a deadly, instantaneous flash<br> +Of criminal conviction rushes through<br> +My obtuse mind! What throbbing turbulence<br> +In ev'ry vein I feel!--I understand thee:<br> +The cruel remedy ... the only one ...<br> +Is Agamemnon's life-blood.<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--I am silent ...<br> +<br> + <i>Cly.</i>--Yet, by thy silence, thou dost ask that blood.<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--Nay, rather I forbid it.--To our love<br> +And to thy life (of mine I do not speak)<br> +His living is the only obstacle;<br> +But yet, thou knowest that his life is sacred:<br> +To love, respect, defend it, thou art bound;<br> +And I to tremble at it.--Let us cease:<br> +The hour advances now; my long discourse<br> +Might give occasion to suspicious thoughts.--<br> +At length receive ... Aegisthus's last farewell.<br> +<br> + <i>Cly.</i>--Ah! hear me ... Agamemnon to our love ...<br> +And to thy life? ... Ah, yes; there are, besides him,<br> +No other obstacles: too certainly<br> +His life is death to us!<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--Ah! do not heed<br> +My words: they spring from too much love.<br> +<br> + <i>Cly.</i>--And love<br> +Revealed to me their meaning.<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--Hast thou not<br> +Thy mind o'erwhelmed with horror?<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--Horror? ... yes; ...<br> +But then to part from thee! ...<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--Wouldst have the courage? ...<br> +<br> +<i>Cly</i>.--So vast my love, it puts an end to fear.<br> +<br> +<i>Aegis</i>.--But the king lives surrounded by his friends:<br> +What sword would find a passage to his heart?<br> +<br> +<i>Cly</i>.--What sword?<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--Here open violence were vain.<br> +<br> +<i>Cly</i>.--Yet, ... treachery! ...<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--'Tis true, he merits not<br> +To be betrayed, Atrides: he who loves<br> +His wife so well; he who, enchained from Troy,<br> +In semblance of a slave in fetters, brought<br> +Cassandra, whom he loves, to whom he is<br> +Himself a slave ...<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--What do I hear!<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--Meanwhile<br> +Expect that when of thee his love is wearied,<br> +He will divide with her his throne and bed;<br> +Expect that, to thy many other wrongs,<br> +Shame will be added: and do thou alone<br> +Not be exasperated at a deed<br> +That rouses every Argive.<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--What said'st thou? ...<br> +Cassandra chosen as my rival? ...<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--So<br> +Atrides wills.<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--Then let Atrides perish.<br> +<br> +<i>Aegis</i>.--How? By what hand?<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--By mine, this very night,<br> +Within that bed which he expects to share<br> +With this abhorred slave.<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--O Heavens! but think ...<br> +<br> +<i>Cly</i>.--I am resolved ...<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--Shouldst thou repent? ...<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--I do<br> +That I so long delayed.<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--And yet ...<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--I'll do it;<br> +<br> +I, e'en if thou wilt not. Shall I let thee,<br> +Who only dost deserve my love, be dragged<br> +To cruel death? And shall I let him live<br> +Who cares not for my love? I swear to thee,<br> +To-morrow thou shalt be the king in Argos.<br> +Nor shall my hand, nor shall my bosom tremble ...<br> +But who approaches?<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--'Tis Electra ...<br> +<br> + <i>Cly.</i>--Heavens!<br> +Let us avoid her. Do thou trust in me.<br> +<br> +<b>SCENE II</b><br> +<br> +ELECTRA<br> +<br> + <i>Electra</i>--Aegisthus flies from me, and he does well;<br> +But I behold that likewise from my sight<br> +My mother seeks to fly. Infatuated<br> +And wretched mother! She could not resist<br> +The guilty eagerness for the last time<br> +To see Aegisthus.--They have here, at length,<br> +Conferred together ... But Aegisthus seems<br> +Too much elated, and too confident,<br> +For one condemned to exile ... She appeared<br> +Like one disturbed in thought, but more possessed<br> +With anger and resentment than with grief ...<br> +O Heavens! who knows to what that miscreant base,<br> +With his infernal arts, may have impelled her!<br> +To what extremities have wrought her up!...<br> +Now, now, indeed, I tremble: what misdeeds,<br> +How black in kind, how manifold in number,<br> +Do I behold! ... Yet, if I speak, I kill<br> +My mother: ... If I'm silent--? ...<br> +<br> +<b>ACT V--SCENE II</b><br> +<br> +AEGISTHUS--CLYTEMNESTRA<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--Hast thou performed the deed?<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--Aegisthus ...<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--What do I behold? O woman,<br> +What dost thou here, dissolved in useless tears?<br> +Tears are unprofitable, late, and vain;<br> +And they may cost us dear.<br> +<br> + <i>Cly.</i>--Thou here? ... but how? ...<br> +Wretch that I am! what have I promised thee?<br> +What impious counsel? ...<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--Was not thine the counsel?<br> +Love gave it thee, and fear recants it.--Now,<br> +Since thou'rt repentant, I am satisfied;<br> +Soothed by reflecting that thou art not guilty,<br> +I shall at least expire. To thee I said<br> +How difficult the enterprise would be;<br> +But thou, depending more than it became thee<br> +On that which is not in thee, virile courage,<br> +Daredst thyself thy own unwarlike hand<br> +For such a blow select. May Heaven permit<br> +That the mere project of a deed like this<br> +May not be fatal to thee! I by stealth,<br> +Protected by the darkness, hither came,<br> +And unobserved, I hope. I was constrained<br> +To bring the news myself, that now my life<br> +Is irrecoverably forfeited<br> +To the king's vengeance...<br> +<br> + <i>Cly.</i>--What is this I hear?<br> +<br> +Whence didst thou learn it?<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--More than he would wish<br> +<br> +Atrides hath discovered of our love;<br> +And I already from him have received<br> +A strict command not to depart from Argos.<br> +And further, I am summoned to his presence<br> +Soon as to-morrow dawns: thou seest well<br> +That such a conference to me is death.<br> +But fear not; for I will all means employ<br> +To bear myself the undivided blame.<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--What do I hear? Atrides knows it all?<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--He knows too much: I have but one choice left:<br> +<br> +It will be best for me to 'scape by death,<br> +By self-inflicted death, this dangerous inquest.<br> +I save my honor thus; and free myself<br> +From an opprobrious end. I hither came<br> +To give thee my last warning: and to take<br> +My last farewell... Oh, live; and may thy fame<br> +Live with thee, unimpeached! All thoughts of pity<br> +For me now lay aside; if I'm allowed<br> +By my own hand, for thy sake, to expire,<br> +I am supremely blest.<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--Alas!... Aegisthus...<br> +<br> +What a tumultuous passion rages now<br> +Within my bosom, when I hear thee speak!...<br> +And is it true?... Thy death...<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--Is more than certain....<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--And I'm thy murderer!...<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--I seek thy safety.<br> + + <i>Cly</i>.--What wicked fury from Avernus' shore,<br> +<br> +Aegisthus, guides thy steps? Oh, I had died<br> +Of grief, if I had never seen thee more;<br> +But guiltless I had died: spite of myself,<br> +Now, by thy presence, I already am<br> +Again impelled to this tremendous crime...<br> +An anguish, an unutterable anguish,<br> +Invades my bones, invades my every fibre...<br> +And can it be that this alone can save thee?...<br> +But who revealed our love?<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--To speak of thee,<br> +Who but Electra to her father dare?<br> +Who to the monarch breathe thy name but she?<br> +Thy impious daughter in thy bosom thrusts<br> +The fatal sword; and ere she takes thy life,<br> +Would rob thee of thy honor.<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--And ought I<br> +<br> +This to believe?... Alas!...<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--Believe it, then,<br> +<br> +On the authority of this my sword,<br> +If thou believ'st it not on mine. At least<br> +I'll die in time...<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--O Heavens! what wouldst thou do?<br> +<br> +Sheathe, I command thee, sheathe that fatal sword.--Oh,<br> +night of horrors!... hear me... Perhaps Atrides<br> +Has not resolved...<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--What boots this hesitation?...<br> +<br> +Atrides injured, and Atrides king,<br> +Meditates nothing in his haughty mind<br> +But blood and vengeance. Certain is my death,<br> +Thine is uncertain: but reflect, O queen,<br> +To what thou'rt destined, if he spare thy life.<br> +And were I seen to enter here alone,<br> +And at so late an hour... Alas, what fears<br> +Harrow my bosom when I think of thee!<br> +Soon will the dawn of day deliver thee<br> +From racking doubt; that dawn I ne'er shall see:<br> +I am resolved to die:...--Farewell... forever!<br> +<br> + <i>Cly</i>.--Stay, stay... Thou shalt not die.<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--By no man's hand<br> +<br> +Assuredly, except my own:--or thine,<br> +If so thou wilt. Ah, perpetrate the deed;<br> +Kill me; and drag me, palpitating yet,<br> +Before thy judge austere: my blood will be<br> +A proud acquittance for thee.<br> + +<i>Cly.</i>--Madd'ning thought!...<br> +Wretch that I am!... Shall I be thy assassin?...<br> +<br> +<i>Aegis.</i>--Shame on thy hand, that cannot either kill<br> +Who most adores thee, or who most detests thee!<br> +Mine then must serve....<br> +<br> +<i>Cly.</i>--Ah!... no....<br> +<br> +<i>Aegis.</i>--Dost thou desire<br> +Me, or Atrides, dead?<br> +<br> +<i>Cly.</i>--Ah! what a choice!...<br> +<br> +<i>Aegis.</i>--Thou art compelled to choose.<br> +<br> +<i>Cly.</i>--I death inflict ...<br> +<br> +<i>Aegis.</i>--Or death receive; when thou hast witnessed mine.<br> +<br> +<i>Cly.</i>--Ah, then the crime is too inevitable!<br> +<br> +<i>Aegis.</i>--The time now presses.<br> +<br> +<i>Cly.</i>--But ... the courage ... strength? ...<br> +<br> +<i>Aegis.</i>--Strength, courage, all, will love impart to thee.<br> +<br> +<i>Cly.</i>--Must I then with this trembling hand of mine<br> +Plunge ... in my husband's heart ... the sword? ...<br> +<br> +<i>Aegis</i>.--The blows<br> +Thou wilt redouble with a steady hand<br> +In the hard heart of him who slew thy daughter.<br> +<br> +<i>Cly.</i>--Far from my hand I hurled the sword in anguish.<br> +<br> +<i>Aegis</i>.--Behold a steel, and of another temper:<br> +The clotted blood-drops of Thyestes's sons<br> +Still stiffen on its frame: do not delay<br> +To furbish it once more in the vile blood<br> +Of Atreus; go, be quick: there now remain<br> +But a few moments; go. If awkwardly<br> +The blow thou aimest, or if thou shouldst be<br> +Again repentant, lady, ere 'tis struck,<br> +Do not thou any more tow'rd these apartments<br> +Thy footsteps turn: by my own hands destroyed,<br> +Here wouldst thou find me in a sea of blood<br> +Immersed. Now go, and tremble not; be bold.<br> +Enter and save us by his death.--<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<b>SCENE III</b><br> +<br> +<br> +AEGISTHUS<br> +<br> +<br> +<i>Aegis.</i> Come forth,<br> +Thyestes, from profound Avernus; come,<br> +Now is the time; within this palace now<br> +Display thy dreadful shade. A copious banquet<br> +Of blood is now prepared for thee, enjoy it;<br> +<br> +Already o'er the heart of thy foe's son<br> +Hangs the suspended sword; now, now, he feels it:<br> +An impious consort grasps it; it was fitting<br> +That she, not I, did this: so much more sweet<br> +To thee will be the vengeance, as the crime<br> +Is more atrocious.... An attentive ear<br> +Lend to the dire catastrophe with me;<br> +Doubt not she will accomplish it: disdain,<br> +Love, terror, to the necessary crime<br> +Compel the impious woman.--<br> +<br> +AGAMEMNON (within)<br> +<br> + <i>Aga</i>.--Treason! Ah! ...<br> +My wife?.. O Heavens!.. I die... O traitorous deed!<br> +<br> +<i>Aegis.</i>--Die, thou--yes, die! And thou redouble, woman.<br> +The blows redouble; all the weapon hide<br> +Within his heart; shed, to the latest drop,<br> +The blood of that fell miscreant: in our blood<br> +He would have bathed his hands.<br> +<br> +<b>SCENE IV</b><br> +<br> +CLYTEMNESTRA--AESGISTHUS<br> +<br> + <i>Cly.</i>--What have I done?<br> +Where am I?...<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis</i>.--Thou hast slain the tyrant: now<br> +At length thou'rt worthy of me.<br> +<br> + <i>Cly.</i>--See, with blood<br> +The dagger drips;... my hands, my face, my garments,<br> +All, all are blood... Oh, for a deed like this,<br> +What vengeance will be wreaked!... I see already<br> +Already to my breast that very steel<br> +I see hurled back, and by what hand! I freeze,<br> +I faint, I shudder, I dissolve with horror.<br> +My strength, my utterance, fail me. Where am I?<br> +What have I done?... Alas!...<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--Tremendous cries<br> +Resound on every side throughout the palace:<br> +'Tis time to show the Argives what I am,<br> +And reap the harvest of my long endurance.<br> + + + +<br><br> +<b>SCENE V</b> +<br><br> +ELECTRA--AEGISTHUS +<br><br> +<i>Elec.</i>--It still remains for thee to murder me,<br> +Thou impious, vile assassin of my father ...<br> +But what do I behold? O Heavens! ... my mother? ...<br> +Flagitious woman, dost thou grasp the sword?<br> +Didst thou commit the murder?<br> +<br> + <i>Aegis.</i>--Hold thy peace.<br> +Stop not my path thus; quickly I return;<br> +Tremble: for now that I am king of Argos,<br> +Far more important is it that I kill<br> +Orestes than Electra.<br> +<br><br> +<b>SCENE VI</b> +<br><br> +CLYTEMNESTRA--ELECTRA +<br><br> + <i>Cly.</i>--Heavens! ... Orestes? ...<br> +Aegisthus, now I know thee....<br> +<br> + <i>Elec.</i>--Give it me:<br> +Give me that steel.<br> +<br> + <i>Cly.</i>--Aegisthus! ... Stop! ... Wilt thou<br> +Murder my son? Thou first shalt murder me.<br> +<br> +<b>SCENE VII</b> +<br><br> +ELECTRA +<br><br> +<i>Elec.</i>--O night! ... O father! ... Ah, it was your deed,<br> +Ye gods, this thought of mine to place Orestes<br> +In safety first.--Thou wilt not find him, traitor.--<br> +Ah live, Orestes, live: and I will keep<br> +This impious steel for thy adult right hand.<br> +The day, I hope, will come, when I in Argos<br> +Shall see thee the avenger of thy father.<br> +<br> +Translation of Edgar Alfred Bowring, Bohn's Library.<br> +</blockquote> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="ALFONSO_THE_WISE"></a>ALFONSO THE WISE</h2> + +<h3>(1221-1284)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-k.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>ing Alfonso," records the Jesuit historian, Mariana, "was a +man of great sense, but more fit to be a scholar than a +king; for whilst he studied the heavens and the stars, he +lost the earth and his kingdom." Certainly it is for his services to +letters, and not for political or military successes, that the meditative +son of the valorous Ferdinand the Saint and the beautiful Beatrice +of Swabia will be remembered. The father conquered Seville, and +displaced the enterprising and infidel Moors with orthodox and indolent +Christians. The son could not keep what his sire had grasped. +Born in 1226, the fortunate young prince, at the age of twenty-five, +was proclaimed king of the newly conquered and united Castile and +Leon. He was very young: he was everywhere admired and honored +for skill in war, for learning, and for piety; he was everywhere loved +for his heritage of a great name and his kindly and gracious manners.</p> + +<p>In the first year of his reign, however, he began debasing the +coinage,--a favorite device of needy monarchs in his day,--and his +people never forgave the injury. He coveted, naturally enough, the +throne of the Empire, for which he was long a favorite candidate; +and for twenty years he wasted time, money, and purpose, heart and +hope, in pursuit of the vain bauble. His kingdom fell into confusion, +his eldest son died, his second son Sancho rebelled against him +and finally deposed him. Courageous and determined to the last, +defying the league of Church and State against him, he appealed to +the king of Morocco for men and money to reinstate his fortunes.</p> + +<p>In Ticknor's 'History of Spanish Literature' may be found his +touching letter to De Guzman at the Moorish court. He is, like +Lear, poor and discrowned, but not like him, weak. His prelates have +stirred up strife, his nobles have betrayed him. If Heaven wills, he +is ready to pay generously for help. If not, says the royal philosopher, +still, generosity and loyalty exalt the soul that cherishes them.</p> + +<blockquote> +"Therefore, my cousin, Alonzo Perez de Guzman, so treat with your +master and my friend [the king of Morocco] that he may lend me, on my +richest crown and on the jewels in it, as much as shall seem good to him: +and if you should be able to obtain his help for me, do not deprive me of it, +which I think you will not do; rather I hold that all the good offices which +my master may do me, by your hand they will come, and may the hand of +God be with you.<br> +<br> +"Given in my only loyal city of Seville, the thirtieth year of my reign +and the first of my misfortunes.<br> +<br> +"THE KING."<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>In his "only loyal city" the broken man remained, until the Pope +excommunicated Sancho, and till neighboring towns began to capitulate. +But he had been wounded past healing. There was no medicine +for a mind diseased, no charm to raze out the written troubles +of the brain. "He fell ill in Seville, so that he drew nigh unto +death.... And when the sickness had run its course, he said +before them all: that he pardoned the Infante Don Sancho, his heir, +all that out of malice he had done against him, and to his subjects +the wrong they had wrought towards him, ordering that letters confirming +the same should be written--sealed with his golden seal, so +that all his subjects should be certain that he had put away his +quarrel with them, and desired that no blame whatever should rest +upon them. And when he had said this, he received the body of +God with great devotion, and in a little while gave up his soul to +God."</p> + +<p>This was in 1284, when he was fifty-eight years old. At this age, +had a private lot been his,--that of a statesman, jurist, man of science, +annalist, philosopher, troubadour, mathematician, historian, +poet,--he would but have entered his golden prime, rich in promise, +fruitful in performance. Yet Alfonso, uniting in himself all these +vocations, seemed at his death to have left behind him a wide waste +of opportunities, a dreary dearth of accomplishment. Looking back, +however, it is seen that the balance swings even. While his kingdom +was slipping away, he was conquering a wider domain. He was +creating Spanish Law, protecting the followers of learning, cherishing +the universities, restricting privilege, breaking up time-honored +abuses. He prohibited the use of Latin in public acts. He adopted +the native tongue in all his own works, and thus gave to Spanish an +honorable eminence, while French and German struggled long for a +learning from scholars, and English was to wait a hundred years for +the advent of Dan Chaucer.</p> + +<p>Greatest achievement of all, he codified the common law of Spain +in 'Las Siete Partidas' (The Seven Parts). Still accepted as a legal +authority in the kingdom, the work is much more valuable as a compendium +of general knowledge than as an exposition of law. The +studious king with astonishing catholicity examined alike both Christian +and Arabic traditions, customs, and codes, paying a scholarly +respect to the greatness of a hostile language and literature. This +meditative monarch recognized that public office is a public trust, +and wrote:--</p> + +<blockquote> +"Vicars of God are the kings, each one in his kingdom, placed over the +people to maintain them in justice and in truth. They have been called the +heart and soul of the people. For as the soul lies in the heart of men, and +by it the body lives and is maintained, so in the king lies justice, which is +the life and maintenance of the people of his lordship....<br><br> + +"And let the king guard the thoughts of his heart in three manners: +firstly let him not desire nor greatly care to have superfluous and worthless +honors. Superfluous and worthless honors the king <i>ought</i> not to desire. For +that which is beyond necessity cannot last, and being lost, and come short +of, turns to dishonor. Moreover, the wise men have said that it is no less a +virtue for a man to keep that which he has than to gain that which he has +not; because keeping comes of judgment, but gain of good fortune. And the +king who keeps his honor in such a manner that every day and by all means +it is increased, lacking nothing, and does not lose that which he has for that +which he desires to have,--he is held for a man of right judgment, who +loves his own people, and desires to lead them to all good. And God will +keep him in this world from the dishonoring of men, and in the next from +the dishonor of the wicked in hell."<br> +</blockquote> + +<p>Besides the 'Siete Partidas,' the royal philosopher was the author, +or compiler, of a 'Book of Hunting'; a treatise on Chess; a system +of law, the 'Fuero Castellano' (Spanish Code),--an attempt to +check the monstrous irregularities of municipal privilege; 'La Gran +Conquista d'Ultramar (The Great Conquest Beyond the Sea), an +account of the wars of the Crusades, which is the earliest known +specimen of Castilian prose; and several smaller works, now collected +under the general title of 'Opuscules Legales' (Minor Legal +Writings). It was long supposed that he wrote the 'Tesoro' (Thesaurus), +a curious medley of ignorance and superstition, much of it +silly, and all of it curiously inconsistent with the acknowledged character +of the enlightened King. Modern scholarship, however, discards +this petty treatise from the list of his productions.</p> + +<p>His 'Tablas Alfonsinas' (Alfonsine Tables), to which Chaucer +refers in the 'Frankeleine's Tale,' though curiously mystical, yet were +really scientific, and rank among the most famous of mediaeval books. +Alfonso had the courage and the wisdom to recall to Toledo the +heirs and successors of the great Arabian philosophers and the +learned Rabbis, who had been banished by religious fanaticism, and +there to establish a permanent council--a mediaeval Academy of +Sciences--which devoted itself to the study of the heavens and the +making of astronomical calculations. "This was the first time," says +the Spanish historian, "that in barbarous times the Republic of +Letters was invited to contemplate a great school of learning,--men +occupied through many years in rectifying the old planetary observations, +in disputing about the most abstruse details of this science, in +constructing new instruments, and observing, by means of them, the +courses of the stars, their declensions, their ascensions, eclipses, +longitudes, and latitudes." It was the vision of Roger Bacon fulfilled.</p> + +<p>At his own expense, for years together, the King entertained in +his palace at Burgos, that their knowledge might enrich the nation, +not only certain free-thinking followers of Averroës and Avicebron, +but infidel disciples of the Koran, and learned Rabbis who denied the +true faith. That creed must not interfere with deed, was an astonishing +mental attitude for the thirteenth century, and invited a general +suspicion of the King's orthodoxy. His religious sense was +really strong, however, and appears most impressively in the 'Cantigas +à la Vergen Maria' (Songs to the Virgin), which were sung +over his grave by priests and acolytes for hundreds of years. They +are sometimes melancholy and sometimes joyous, always simple and +genuine, and, written in Galician, reflect the trustful piety and happiness +of his youth in remote hill provinces where the thought of +empire had not penetrated. It was his keen intelligence that expressed +itself in the saying popularly attributed to him, "Had I been +present at the creation, I might have offered some useful suggestions." +It was his reverent spirit that made mention in his will of +the sacred songs as the testimony to his faith. So lived and died +Alfonso the Tenth, the father of Spanish literature, and the reviver +of Spanish learning.</p> +<br><br> + +<h3>"<a name="WHAT_MEANETH_A_TYRANT"></a>WHAT MEANETH A TYRANT, AND HOW HE USETH HIS POWER +IN A KINGDOM WHEN HE HATH OBTAINED IT"</h3> + +<p>"A tyrant," says this law, "doth signify a cruel lord, who, +by force or by craft, or by treachery, hath obtained +power over any realm or country; and such men be of +such nature, that when once they have grown strong in the +land, they love rather to work their own profit, though it be in +harm of the land, than the common profit of all, for they always +live in an ill fear of losing it. And that they may be able to +fulfill this their purpose unincumbered, the wise of old have said +that they use their power against the people in three manners. +The first is, that they strive that those under their mastery be +ever ignorant and timorous, because, when they be such, they +may not be bold to rise against them, nor to resist their wills; +and the second is, that they be not kindly and united among +themselves, in such wise that they trust not one another, for +while they live in disagreement, they shall not dare to make any +discourse against their lord, for fear faith and secrecy should not +be kept among themselves; and the third way is, that they strive +to make them poor, and to put them upon great undertakings, +which they never can finish, whereby they may have so much +harm that it may never come into their hearts to devise anything +against their ruler. And above all this, have tyrants ever +striven to make spoil of the strong and to destroy the wise; and +have forbidden fellowship and assemblies of men in their land, +and striven always to know what men said or did; and do trust +their counsel and the guard of their person rather to foreigners, +who will serve at their will, than to them of the land, who +serve from oppression. And moreover, we say that though any +man may have gained mastery of a kingdom by any of the lawful +means whereof we have spoken in the laws going before this, +yet, if he use his power ill, in the ways whereof we speak in +this law, him may the people still call tyrant; for he turneth his +mastery which was rightful into wrongful, as Aristotle hath said +in the book which treateth of the rule and government of kingdoms."</p> + +<p>From 'Las Siete Partidas,' quoted in Ticknor's 'Spanish Literature.'</p> +<br><br> + +<h3><a name="ON_THE_TURKS"></a>ON THE TURKS, AND WHY THEY ARE SO CALLED</h3> + +<p>The ancient histories which describe the early inhabitants of +the East and their various languages show the origin of +each tribe or nation, or whence they came, and for what +reason they waged war, and how they were enabled to conquer +the former lords of the land. Now in these histories it is told +that the Turks, and also the allied race called Turcomans, were +all of one land originally, and that these names were taken from +two rivers which flow through the territory whence these people +came, which lies in the direction of the rising of the sun, a little +toward the north; and that one of these rivers bore the name +of Turco, and the other Mani: and finally that for this reason +the two tribes which dwelt on the banks of these two rivers came +to be commonly known as Turcomanos or Turcomans. On the +other hand, there are those who assert that because a portion of +the Turks lived among the Comanos (Comans) they accordingly, +in course of time, received the name of Turcomanos; but the +majority adhere to the reason already given. However this may +be, the Turks and the Turcomans belong both to the same family, +and follow no other life than that of wandering over the +country, driving their herds from one good pasture to another, +and taking with them their wives and their children and all +their property, including money as well as flocks.</p> + +<p>The Turks did not dwell then in houses, but in tents made of +skins, as do in these days the Comanos and Tartars; and when +they had to move from one place to another, they divided themselves +into companies according to their different dialects, and +chose a <i>cabdillo</i> (judge), who settled their disputes, and rendered +justice to those who deserved it. And this nomadic race cultivated +no fields, nor vineyards, nor orchards, nor arable lands of +any kind; neither did they buy or sell for money: but traded +their flocks among one another, and also their milk and cheese, +and pitched their tents in the places where they found the best +pasturage; and when the grass was exhausted, they sought fresh +herbage elsewhere. And whenever they reached the border of a +strange land, they sent before them special envoys, the most +worthy and honorable of their men, to the kings or lords of +such countries, to ask of them the privilege of pasturage on their +lands for a space; for which they were willing to pay such rent +or tax as might be agreed upon. After this manner they lived +among each nation in whose territory they happened to be.</p> + +<p>From 'La Gran Conquista de Ultramar,' Chapter xiii.</p> +<br><br> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i3"><a name="TO_THE_MONTH_OF_MARY"></a><b>TO THE MONTH OF MARY</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i6">From the 'Cantigas'</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +Welcome, O May, yet once again we greet thee!<br> +So alway praise we her, the Holy Mother,<br> +Who prays to God that he shall aid us ever<br> +Against our foes, and to us ever listen.<br> +Welcome, O May! loyally art thou welcome!<br> +So alway praise we her, the Mother of kindness,<br> +Mother who alway on us taketh pity,<br> +Mother who guardeth us from woes unnumbered.<br> +Welcome, O May! welcome, O month well favored!<br> +So let us ever pray and offer praises<br> +To her who ceases not for us, for sinners,<br> +To pray to God that we from woes be guarded.<br> +Welcome, O May! O joyous month and stainless!<br> +So will we ever pray to her who gaineth<br> +Grace from her Son for us, and gives each morning<br> +Force that by us the Moors from Spain are driven.<br> +Welcome, O May, of bread and wine the giver!<br> +Pray then to her, for in her arms, an infant<br> +She bore the Lord! she points us on our journey,<br> +The journey that to her will bear us quickly!<br> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="ALFRED_THE_GREAT"></a>ALFRED THE GREAT</h2> + +<h3>(849-901)</h3> +<br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-i.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>n the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford may be seen an antique +jewel, consisting of an enameled figure in red, blue, and +green, enshrined in a golden frame, and bearing the legend +"Alfred mec heht gewyrcean" (Alfred ordered me made). This +was discovered in 1693 in Newton Park, near Athelney, and through +it one is enabled to touch the far-away life of a thousand years ago. +But greater and more imperishable than this archaic gem is the gift +that the noble King left to the English nation--a gift that affects +the entire race of English-speaking people. For it was Alfred who +laid the foundations for a national literature.</p> + +<p>Alfred, the younger son of Ethelwulf, king of the West Saxons, +and Osberga, daughter of his cup-bearer, was born in the palace at +Wantage in the year 849. He grew up at his father's court, a migratory +one, that moved from Kent to Devonshire and from Wales to +the Isle of Wight whenever events, raids, or the Witan (Parliament) +demanded. At an early age Alfred was sent to pay homage to the +Pope in Rome, taking such gifts as rich vessels of gold and silver, +silks, and hangings, which show that Saxons lacked nothing in +treasure. In 855 Ethelwulf visited Rome with his young son, bearing +more costly presents, as well as munificent sums for the shrine of +St. Peter's; and returning by way of France, they stopped at the +court of Charles the Bold. Once again in his home, young Alfred +applied himself to his education. He became a marvel of courage at +the chase, proficient in the use of arms, excelled in athletic sports, +was zealous in his religious duties, and athirst for knowledge. His +accomplishments were many; and when the guests assembled in the +great hall to make the walls ring with their laughter over cups of +mead and ale, he could take his turn with the harpers and minstrels +to improvise one of those sturdy bold ballads that stir the blood +to-day with their stately rhythms and noble themes.</p> + +<p>Ethelwulf died in 858, and eight years later only two sons, Ethelred +and Alfred, were left to cope with the Danish invaders. They +won victory after victory, upon which the old chroniclers love to +dwell, pausing to describe wild frays among the chalk-hills and +dense forests, which afforded convenient places to hide men and to +bury spoils.</p> + +<p>Ethelred died in 871, and the throne descended to Alfred. His +kingdom was in a terrible condition, for Wessex, Kent, Mercia, Sussex, +and Surrey lay at the mercy of the marauding enemy. "The +land," says an old writer, "was as the Garden of Eden before them, +and behind them a desolate wilderness." London was in ruins; the +Danish standard, with its black Raven, fluttered everywhere; and the +forests were filled with outposts and spies of the "pagan army." +There was nothing for the King to do but gather his men and dash +into the fray to "let the hard steel ring upon the high helmet." +Time after time the Danes are overthrown, but, like the heads of the +fabled Hydra, they grow and flourish after each attack. They have +one advantage: they know how to command the sea, and numerous +as the waves that their vessels ride so proudly and well, the invaders +arrive and quickly land to plunder and slay.</p> + +<p>Alfred, although but twenty-five, sees the need for a navy, and in +875 gathers a small fleet to meet the ships of the enemy, wins one +prize, and puts the rest to flight. The chroniclers now relate that he +fell into disaster and became a fugitive in Selwood Forest, while +Guthrum and his host were left free to ravage. From this period +date the legends of the King's visit in disguise to the hut of the +neat-herd, and his burning the bread he was set to watch; his penetrating +into the camp of the Danes and entertaining Guthrum by his +minstrelsy while discovering his plans and force; the vision of St. +Cuthbert; and the fable of his calling five hundred men by the +winding of his horn.</p> + +<p>Not long after he was enabled to emerge from the trials of exile +in Athelney; and according to Asser, "In the seventh week after +Easter, he rode to Egbert's Stone in the eastern part of Selwood or +the Great Wood, called in the old British language Coit-mawr. +Here he was met by all the neighboring folk of Somersetshire, Wiltshire, +and Hampshire, who had not for fear of the Pagans fled +beyond the sea; and when they saw the king alive after such great +tribulation, they received him, as he deserved, with joy and acclamations +and all encamped there for the night." Soon afterward +he made a treaty with the Danes, and became king of the whole of +England south of the Thames.</p> + +<p>It was now Alfred's work to reorganize his kingdom, to strengthen +the coast defenses, to rebuild London, to arrange for a standing +army, and to make wise laws for the preservation of order and +peace; and when all this was accomplished, he turned his attention +to the establishment of monasteries and colleges. "In the mean-time," +says old Asser, "the King, during the frequent wars and +other trammels of this present life, the invasions of the Pagans, and +his own daily infirmities of body, continued to carry on the government, +and to exercise hunting in all its branches; to teach his +workers in gold and artificers of all kinds, his falconers, hawkers, +and dog-keepers, to build houses majestic and good, beyond all the +precedents of his ancestors, by his new mechanical inventions, to +recite the Saxon books, and more especially to learn by heart the +Saxon poems, and to make others learn them also; for he alone +never desisted from studying, most diligently, to the best of his +ability; he attended the mass and other daily services of religion: +he was frequent in psalm-singing and prayer, at the proper hours, +both of the night and of the day. He also went to the churches, as +we have already said, in the night-time, to pray, secretly and unknown +to his courtiers; he bestowed alms and largesses both on his +own people and on foreigners of all countries; he was affable and +pleasant to all, and curious to investigate things unknown."</p> + +<p>As regards Alfred's personal contribution to literature, it may be +said that over and above all disputed matters and certain lost works, +they represent a most valuable and voluminous assortment due +directly to his own royal and scholarly pen. History, secular and +churchly, laws and didactic literature, were his field; and though it +would seem that his actual period of composition did not much exceed +ten years, yet he accomplished a vast deal for any man, especially any +busy sovereign and soldier.</p> + +<p>An ancient writer, Ethelwerd, says that he translated many books +from Latin into Saxon, and William of Malmesbury goes so far as to +say that he translated into Anglo-Saxon almost all the literature of +Rome. Undoubtedly the general condition of education was deplorable, +and Alfred felt this deeply. "Formerly," he writes, "men +came hither from foreign lands to seek instruction, and now when +we desire it, we can only obtain it from abroad." Like Charlemagne +he drew to his court famous scholars, and set many of them to work +writing chronicles and translating important Latin books into Anglo-Saxon. +Among these was the 'Pastoral Care of Pope Gregory,' to +which he wrote the Preface; but with his own hand he translated +the 'Consolations of Philosophy,' by Boethius, two manuscripts of +which still exist. In this he frequently stops to introduce observations +and comments of his own. Of greater value was his translation of +the 'History of the World,' by Orosius, which he abridged, and to +which he added new chapters giving the record of coasting voyages +in the north of Europe. This is preserved in the Cotton MSS. in the +British Museum. His fourth translation was the 'Ecclesiastical History +of the English Nation,' by Bede. To this last may be added +the 'Blossom Gatherings from St. Augustine,' and many minor compositions +in prose and verse, translations from the Latin fables and +poems, and his own note-book, in which he jots, with what may be +termed a journalistic instinct, scenes that he had witnessed, such as +Aldhelm standing on the bridge instructing the people on Sunday +afternoons; bits of philosophy; and such reflections as the following, +which remind one of Marcus Aurelius:--"Desirest thou power? But +thou shalt never obtain it without sorrows--sorrows from strange +folk, and yet keener sorrows from thine own kindred." and "Hardship +and sorrow! Not a king but would wish to be without these if +he could. But I know that he cannot." Alfred's value to literature +is this: he placed by the side of Anglo-Saxon poetry,--consisting of +two great poems, Caedmon's great song of the 'Creation' and Cynewulf's +'Nativity and Life of Christ,' and the unwritten ballads passed +from lip to lip,--four immense translations from Latin into Anglo-Saxon +prose, which raised English from a mere spoken dialect to a +true language. From his reign date also the famous Anglo-Saxon +Chronicle and the Anglo-Saxon Gospels; and a few scholars are +tempted to class the magnificent 'Beowulf' among the works of this +period. At any rate, the great literary movement that he inaugurated +lasted until the Norman Conquest.</p> + +<p>In 893 the Danes once more disturbed King Alfred, but he foiled +them at all points, and they left in 897 to harry England no more +for several generations. In 901 he died, having reigned for thirty +years in the honor and affection of his subjects. Freeman in his +'Norman Conquest' says that "no other man on record has ever so +thoroughly united all the virtues both of the ruler and of the private +man." Bishop Asser, his contemporary, has left a half-mythical +eulogy, and William of Malmesbury, Roger of Wendover, Matthew +of Westminster, and John Brompton talk of him fully and freely. +Sir John Spellman published a quaint biography in Oxford in 1678, +followed by Powell's in 1634, and Bicknell's in 1777. The modern +lives are by Giles, Pauli, and Hughes.</p> +<br> + +<h3><a name="KING_ALFRED_ON_KING-CRAFT"></a>KING ALFRED ON KING-CRAFT</h3> + +<center>Comment in his Translation of Boethius's 'Consolations of Philosophy'</center> + +<p>The mind then answered and thus said: O Reason, indeed +thou knowest that covetousness and the greatness of this +earthly power never well pleased me, nor did I altogether +very much yearn after this earthly authority. But nevertheless I +was desirous of materials for the work which I was commanded +to perform; that was, that I might honorably and fitly guide and +exercise the power which was committed to me. Moreover, thou +knowest that no man can show any skill nor exercise or control +any power, without tools and materials. There are of every +craft the materials without which man cannot exercise the craft. +These, then, are a king's materials and his tools to reign with: +that he have his land well peopled; he must have prayer-men, +and soldiers, and workmen. Thou knowest that without these +tools no king can show his craft. This is also his materials +which he must have besides the tools: provisions for the three +classes. This is, then, their provision: land to inhabit, and gifts +and weapons, and meat, and ale, and clothes, and whatsoever is +necessary for the three classes. He cannot without these preserve +the tools, nor without the tools accomplish any of those +things which he is commanded to perform. Therefore, I was +desirous of materials wherewith to exercise the power, that my +talents and power should not be forgotten and concealed. For +every craft and every power soon becomes old, and is passed +over in silence, if it be without wisdom: for no man can accomplish +any craft without wisdom. Because whatsoever is done +through folly, no one can ever reckon for craft. This is now +especially to be said: that I wished to live honorably whilst I +lived, and after my life, to leave to the men who were after me, +my memory in good works.</p> +<br> + +<h3><a name="ALFREDS_PREFACE"></a>ALFRED'S PREFACE TO THE VERSION OF POPE GREGORY'S 'PASTORAL CARE'</h3> + +<p>King Alfred bids greet Bishop Waerferth with his words lovingly +and with friendship; and I let it be known to thee +that it has very often come into my mind, what wise men +there formerly were throughout England, both of sacred and secular +orders; and what happy times there were then throughout +England; and how the kings who had power of the nation in +those days obeyed God and his ministers; and they preserved +peace, morality, and order at home, and at the same time enlarged +their territory abroad; and how they prospered both with +war and with wisdom; and also the sacred orders, how zealous +they were, both in teaching and learning, and in all the services +they owed to God; and how foreigners came to this land in +search of wisdom and instruction, and how we should now have +to get them from abroad if we would have them. So general +was its decay in England that there were very few on this side +of the Humber who could understand their rituals in English, +or translate a letter from Latin into English; and I believe +there were not many beyond the Humber. There were so few +that I cannot remember a single one south of the Thames when +I came to the throne. Thanks be to God Almighty that we +have any teachers among us now. And therefore I command +thee to do as I believe thou art willing, to disengage thyself +from worldly matters as often as thou canst, that thou mayst +apply the wisdom which God has given thee wherever thou +canst. Consider what punishments would come upon us on +account of this world if we neither loved it (wisdom) ourselves +nor suffered other men to obtain it: we should love the name +only of Christian, and very few of the virtues.</p> + +<p>When I considered all this I remembered also how I saw, +before it had been all ravaged and burnt, how the churches +throughout the whole of England stood filled with treasures and +books, and there was also a great multitude of God's servants; +but they had very little knowledge of the books, for they could +not understand anything of them, because they were not written +in their own language. As if they had said, "Our forefathers, +who formerly held these places, loved wisdom, and through it +they obtained wealth and bequeathed it to us. In this we can +still see their tracks, but we cannot follow them, and therefore +we have lost both the wealth and the wisdom, because we would +not incline our hearts after their example."</p> + +<p>When I remembered all this, I wondered extremely that the +good and wise men, who were formerly all over England, and +had perfectly learnt all the books, did not wish to translate +them into their own language. But again, I soon answered +myself and said, "They did not think that men would ever be +so careless, and that learning would so decay; therefore they +abstained from translating, and they trusted that the wisdom in +this land might increase with our knowledge of languages."</p> + +<p>Then I remember how the law was first known in Hebrew, +and again, when the Greeks had learnt it, they translated the +whole of it into their own language, and all other books besides. +And again, the Romans, when they had learnt it, they translated +the whole of it through learned interpreters into their own +language. And also all other Christian nations translated a part +of them into their own language. Therefore it seems better to +me, if ye think so, for us also to translate some books which are +most needful for all men to know, into the language which we +can all understand, and for you to do as we very easily can if we +have tranquillity enough; that is, that all the youth now in +England of free men, who are rich enough to be able to devote +themselves to it, be set to learn as long as they are not fit for +any other occupation, until that they are well able to read English +writing: and let those be afterward taught more in the Latin +language who are to continue learning and be promoted to a +higher rank. When I remember how the knowledge of Latin had +formerly decayed throughout England, and yet many could read +English writing, I began among other various and manifold +troubles of this kingdom, to translate into English the book which +is called in Latin 'Pastoralis,' and in English 'Shepherd's Book,' +sometimes word by word and sometimes according to the sense, +as I had learnt it from Plegmund, my archbishop, and Asser, my +bishop, and Grimbold, my mass-priest, and John, my mass-priest. +And when I had learnt it as I could best understand it, and as I +could most clearly interpret it, I translated it into English; and +I will send a copy to every bishopric in my kingdom; and on +each there is a clasp worth fifty mancus. And I command, in +God's name, that no man take the clasp from the book or the +book from the minister: it is uncertain how long there may be +such learned bishops as now, thanks be to God, there are nearly +everywhere; therefore, I wish them always to remain in their +place, unless the bishop wish to take them with him, or they be +lent out anywhere, or any one make a copy from them.</p> +<br> + +<h3><a name="BLOSSOM_GATHERINGS_FROM_ST._AUGUSTINE"></a>BLOSSOM GATHERINGS FROM ST. AUGUSTINE</h3> + +<p>In every tree I saw something there which I needed at home, +therefore I advise every one who is able and has many +wains, that he trade to the same wood where I cut the stud +shafts, and there fetch more for himself and load his wain with +fair rods, that he may wind many a neat wall and set many a +comely house and build many a fair town of them; and thereby +may dwell merrily and softly, so as I now yet have not done. +But He who taught me, to whom the wood was agreeable, He may +make me to dwell more softly in this temporary cottage, the while +that I am in this world, and also in the everlasting home which +He has promised us through St. Augustine, and St. Gregory, and +St. Jerome, and through other holy fathers; as I believe also +that for the merits of all these He will make the way more convenient +than it was before, and especially the carrying and the +building: but every man wishes after he has built a cottage on +his lord's lease by his help, that he may sometimes rest him +therein and hunt, and fowl, and fish, and use it every way under +the lease both on water and on land, until the time that he earn +book-land and everlasting heritage through his lord's mercy. So +do enlighten the eyes of my mind so that I may search out the +right way to the everlasting home and the everlasting glory, and +the everlasting rest which is promised us through those holy +fathers. May it be so! ...</p> + +<p>It is no wonder though men swink in timber working, and in +the wealthy Giver who wields both these temporary cottages and +eternal homes. May He who shaped both and wields both, grant +me that I may be meet for each, both here to be profitable and +thither to come.</p> +<br> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="WHERE_TO_FIND_TRUE_JOY"></a>WHERE TO FIND TRUE JOY</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>From 'Boethius'</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Oh! It is a fault of weight,</p> +<p class="i1">Let him think it out who will,</p> +<p>And a danger passing great</p> +<p class="i1">Which can thus allure to ill</p> +<p class="i2">Careworn men from the rightway,</p> +<p class="i2">Swiftly ever led astray.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Will ye seek within the wood</p> +<p class="i1">Red gold on the green trees tall?</p> +<p>None, I wot, is wise that could,</p> +<p class="i1">For it grows not there at all:</p> +<p class="i2">Neither in wine-gardens green</p> +<p class="i2">Seek they gems of glittering sheen.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Would ye on some hill-top set,</p> +<p class="i1">When ye list to catch a trout,</p> +<p>Or a carp, your fishing-net?</p> +<p class="i1">Men, methinks, have long found out</p> +<p class="i2">That it would be foolish fare,</p> +<p class="i2">For they know they are not there.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>In the salt sea can ye find,</p> +<p class="i1">When ye list to start an hunt,</p> +<p>With your hounds, the hart or hind?</p> +<p class="i1">It will sooner be your wont</p> +<p class="i2">In the woods to look, I wot,</p> +<p class="i2">Than in seas where they are not.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Is it wonderful to know</p> +<p class="i1">That for crystals red or white</p> +<p>One must to the sea-beach go,</p> +<p class="i1"> Or for other colors bright,</p> +<p class="i2">Seeking by the river's side</p> +<p class="i2">Or the shore at ebb of tide?</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Likewise, men are well aware</p> +<p class="i1">Where to look for river-fish;</p> +<p>And all other worldly ware</p> +<p class="i1">Where to seek them when they wish;</p> +<p class="i2">Wisely careful men will know</p> +<p class="i2">Year by year to find them so.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>But of all things 'tis most sad</p> +<p class="i1">That they foolish are so blind,</p> +<p>So besotted and so mad,</p> +<p class="i1">That they cannot surely find</p> +<p class="i2">Where the ever-good is nigh</p> +<p class="i2">And true pleasures hidden lie.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Therefore, never is their strife</p> +<p class="i1">After those true joys to spur;</p> +<p>In this lean and little life</p> +<p class="i1">They, half-witted, deeply err</p> +<p class="i2">Seeking here their bliss to gain,</p> +<p class="i2">That is God Himself in vain.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Ah! I know not in my thought</p> +<p class="i1">How enough to blame their sin,</p> +<p>None so clearly as I ought</p> +<p class="i1">Can I show their fault within;</p> +<p class="i2">For, more bad and vain are they</p> +<p class="i2">And more sad than I can say.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>All their hope is to acquire</p> +<p class="i1">Worship goods and worldly weal;</p> +<p>When they have their mind's desire,</p> +<p class="i1">Then such witless Joy they feel,</p> +<p class="i2">That in folly they believe</p> +<p class="i2">Those True Joys they then receive.</p> +</div></div> +<br> +<p>Works of Alfred the Great, Jubilee Edition (Oxford and Cambridge, 1852).</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i3"><b><a name="A_SORROWFUL_FYTTE"></a>A SORROWFUL FYTTE</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i6">From 'Boethius'</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Lo! I sting cheerily</p> +<p class="i1">In my bright days,</p> +<p>But now all wearily</p> +<p class="i1">Chaunt I my lays;</p> +<p>Sorrowing tearfully,</p> +<p class="i1">Saddest of men,</p> +<p>Can I sing cheerfully,</p> +<p class="i1">As I could then?</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Many a verity</p> +<p class="i1">In those glad times</p> +<p>Of my prosperity</p> +<p class="i1">Taught I in rhymes;</p> +<p>Now from forgetfulness</p> +<p class="i1">Wanders my tongue,</p> +<p>Wasting in fretfulness,</p> +<p class="i1">Metres unsung.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Worldliness brought me here</p> +<p class="i1">Foolishly blind,</p> +<p>Riches have wrought me here</p> +<p class="i1">Sadness of mind;</p> +<p>When I rely on them,</p> +<p class="i1">Lo! they depart,--</p> +<p>Bitterly, fie on them!</p> +<p class="i1">Rend they my heart.</p> +<p>Why did your songs to me,</p> +<p class="i1">World-loving men,</p> +<p>Say joy belongs to me</p> +<p class="i1">Ever as then?</p> +<p>Why did ye lyingly</p> +<p class="i1">Think such a thing,</p> +<p>Seeing how flyingly</p> +<p class="i1">Wealth may take wing?</p> +</div></div> +<br> +<p>Works of Alfred the Great, Jubilee Edition (Oxford and Cambridge, 1852).</p> +<br> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="CHARLES_GRANT_ALLEN"></a>CHARLES GRANT ALLEN</h2> + +<h3>(1848-)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-t.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>he Irish-Canadian naturalist, Charles Grant Blairfindie Allen, +who turns his industrious hand with equal facility to scientific +writing, to essays, short stories, botanical treatises, +biography, and novels, is known to literature as Grant Allen, as +"Arbuthnot Wilson," and as "Cecil Power."</p> + +<p>His work may be divided into two classes: fiction and popular +essays. The first shows the author to be familiar with varied scenes +and types, and exhibits much feeling for dramatic situations. His +list of novels is long, and includes among others, 'Strange Stories,' +'Babylon,' 'This Mortal Coil,' 'The Tents of Shem,' 'The Great +Taboo,' 'Recalled to Life,' 'The Woman Who Did,' and 'The British +Barbarians.' In many of these books he has woven his plots around +a psychological theme; a proof that science interests him more than +invention. His essays are written for unscientific readers, and carefully +avoid all technicalities and tedious discussions. Most persons, +he says, "would much rather learn why birds have feathers than +why they have a keeled sternum, and they think the origin of bright +flowers far more attractive than the origin of monocotyledonous +seeds or esogenous stems."</p> + +<p>Grant Allen was born in Kingston, Canada, February 24th, 1848. +After graduation at Merton College, Oxford, he occupied for four +years the chair of logic and philosophy at Queen's College, Spanish +Town, Jamaica, which he resigned to settle in England, where he +now resides. Early in his career he became an enthusiastic follower +of Darwin and Herbert Spencer, and published the attractive books +entitled 'Science in Arcady,' 'Vignettes from Nature,' 'The Evolutionist +at Large,' and 'Colin Clout's Calendar.' In his preface to +'Vignettes from Nature,' he says that the "essays are written from +an easy-going, half-scientific half-aesthetic standpoint." In this spirit +he rambles in the woods, in the meadows, at the seaside, or upon +the heather-carpeted moor, finding in such expeditions material and +suggestions for his lightly moving essays, which expound the problems +of Nature according to the theories of his acknowledged masters. +A fallow deer grazing in a forest, a wayside berry, a guelder +rose, a sportive butterfly, a bed of nettles, a falling leaf, a mountain +tarn, the hole of a hedgehog, a darting humming-bird, a ripening +plum, a clover-blossom, a spray of sweet-briar, a handful of wild +thyme, or a blaze of scarlet geranium before a cottage door, furnish +him with a text for the discussion of "those biological and cosmical +doctrines which have revolutionized the thought of the nineteenth +century," as he says in substance.</p> + +<p>Somewhat more scientific are 'Psychological Aesthetics,' 'The +Color Sense,' 'The Color of Flowers,' and 'Flowers and their Pedigrees'; +and still deeper is 'Force and Energy' (1888), a theory of +dynamics in which he expresses original views. In 'Psychological +Aesthetics' (1877), he first seeks to explain "such simple pleasures in +bright color, sweet sound, or rude pictorial imitation as delight the +child and the savage, proceeding from these elementary principles +to the more and more complex gratifications of natural scenery, +painting, and poetry." In 'The Color Sense' he defines all that we +do not owe to the color sense, for example the rainbow, the sunset, +the sky, the green or purple sea, the rocks, the foliage of trees and +shrubs, hues of autumn, effects of iridescent light, or tints of minerals +and precious stones; and all that we do owe, namely, "the +beautiful flowers of the meadow and the garden-roses, lilies, cowslips, +and daisies; the exquisite pink of the apple, the peach, the +mango, and the cherry, with all the diverse artistic wealth of +oranges, strawberries, plums, melons, brambleberries, and pomegranates; +the yellow, blue, and melting green of tropical butterflies; the +magnificent plumage of the toucan, the macaw, the cardinal-bird, +the lory, and the honey-sucker; the red breast of our homely robin; +the silver or ruddy fur of the ermine, the wolverene, the fox, the +squirrel, and the chinchilla; the rosy cheeks and pink lips of the +English maiden; the whole catalogue of dyes, paints, and pigments; +and last of all, the colors of art in every age and nation, from the +red cloth of the South Seas, the lively frescoes of the Egyptian and +the subdued tones of Hellenic painters, to the stained windows of +Poictiers and the Madonna of the Sistine Chapel." Besides these +books, Mr. Allen has written for the series called 'English Worthies' +a sympathetic 'Life of Charles Darwin' (1885).</p> +<br> + +<h3><a name="THE_COLORATION_OF_FLOWERS"></a>THE COLORATION OF FLOWERS</h3> + +<center>From 'The Colors of Flowers'</center> + +<p>The different hues assumed by petals are all thus, as it were, +laid up beforehand in the tissues of the plant, ready to be +brought out at a moment's notice. And all flowers, as we +know, easily sport a little in color. But the question is, Do their +changes tend to follow any regular and definite order? Is there +any reason to believe that the modification runs from any one +color toward any other? Apparently there is. The general conclusion +to be set forth in this work is the statement of such a +tendency. All flowers, it would seem, were in their earliest form +yellow; then some of them became white; after that, a few of +them grew to be red or purple; and finally, a comparatively +small number acquired various shades of lilac, mauve, violet, or +blue. So that if this principle be true, such a flower as the harebell +will represent one of the most highly developed lines of +descent; and its ancestors will have passed successively through +all the intermediate stages. Let us see what grounds can be +given for such a belief.</p> + +<p>Some hints of a progressive law in the direction of a color-change +from yellow to blue are sometimes afforded to us even by +the successive stages of a single flower. For example, one of our +common little English forget-me-nots, <i>Myosotis versicolor</i>, is pale +yellow when it first opens; but as it grows older, it becomes +faintly pinkish, and ends by being blue, like the others of its +race. Now, this sort of color-change is by no means uncommon; +and in almost all known cases it is always in the same direction, +from yellow or white, through pink, orange, or red, to purple or +blue. For example, one of the wall-flowers, <i>Cheiranthus chamoeleo</i>, +has at first a whitish flower, then a citron-yellow, and finally +emerges into red or violet. The petals of <i>Stytidium fructicosum</i> +are pale yellow to begin with, and afterward become light rose-colored. +An evening primrose, <i>Oenothera tetraptera</i>, has white +flowers in its first stage, and red ones at a later period of development. +<i>Cobea scandens</i> goes from white to violet; <i>Hibiscus +mutabilis</i> from white through flesh-colored to red. The common +Virginia stock of our gardens <i>(Malcolmia)</i> often opens of a pale +yellowish green, then becomes faintly pink; afterward deepens +into bright red; and fades away at the last into mauve or blue. +Fritz Müller's <i>Lantana</i> is yellow on its first day, orange on its +second, and purple on the third. The whole family of <i>Boraginaceae</i> +begin by being pink and end with being blue. The garden convolvulus +opens a blushing white and passes into full purple. In +all these and many other cases the general direction of the +changes is the same. They are usually set down as due to varying +degrees of oxidation in the pigmentary matter. If this be so, +there is a good reason why bees should be specially fond of blue, +and why blue flowers should be specially adapted for fertilization +by their aid. For Mr. A.R. Wallace has shown that color is +most apt to appear or to vary in those parts of plants or animals +which have undergone the highest amount of modification. The +markings of the peacock and the argus pheasant come out upon +their immensely developed secondary tail-feathers or wing-plumes; +the metallic hues of sun-birds, or humming-birds, show themselves +upon their highly specialized crests, gorgets, or lappets. It +is the same with the hackles of fowls, the head ornaments of +fruit-pigeons, and the bills of toucans. The most exquisite colors +in the insect world are those which are developed on the greatly +expanded and delicately feathered wings of butterflies; and the +eye-spots which adorn a few species are usually found on their +very highly modified swallow-tail appendages. So too with flowers: +those which have undergone most modification have their +colors most profoundly altered. In this way, we may put it down +as a general rule (to be tested hereafter) that the least developed +flowers are usually yellow or white; those which have undergone +a little more modification are usually pink or red; and those which +have been most highly specialized of any are usually purple, lilac, +or blue. Absolute deep ultramarine probably marks the highest +level of all.</p> + +<p>On the other hand, Mr. Wallace's principle also explains why +the bees and butterflies should prefer these specialized colors to +all others, and should therefore select those flowers which display +them by preference over any less developed types; for bees and +butterflies are the most highly adapted of all insects to honey-seeking +and flower-feeding. They have themselves on their side +undergone the largest amount of specialization for that particular +function. And if the more specialized and modified flowers, +which gradually fitted their forms and the position of their honey-glands +to the forms of the bees or butterflies, showed a natural +tendency to pass from yellow through pink and red to purple +and blue, it would follow that the insects which were being +evolved side by side with them, and which were aiding at the +same time in their evolution, would grow to recognize these +developed colors as the visible symbols of those flowers from +which they could obtain the largest amount of honey with the +least possible trouble. Thus it would finally result that the +ordinary unspecialized flowers, which depended upon small insect +riff-raff, would be mostly left yellow or white; those which +appealed to rather higher insects would become pink or red; and +those which laid themselves out for bees or butterflies, the aristocrats +of the arthropodous world, would grow for the most part +to be purple or blue.</p> + +<p>Now, this is very much what we actually find to be the +case in nature. The simplest and earliest flowers are those with +regular, symmetrical open cups, like the <i>Ranunculus</i> genus, the +<i>Potentillas</i>, and the <i>Alsine</i> or chickweeds, which can be visited +by any insects whatsoever; and these are in large part yellow or +white. A little higher are flowers like the Campions or <i>Sileneoe</i>, +and the stocks (<i>Matthiola</i>), with more or less closed cups, whose +honey can only be reached by more specialized insects; and these +are oftener pink or reddish. More profoundly modified are those +irregular one-sided flowers, like the violets, peas, and orchids, +which have assumed special shapes to accommodate bees and +other specific honey-seekers; and these are often purple and not +unfrequently blue. Highly specialized in another way are the +flowers like harebells (<i>Campanulaceoe</i>), scabious (<i>Dipsaceoe</i>), and +heaths (<i>Ericaceoe</i>), whose petals have all coalesced into a tubular +corolla; and these might almost be said to be usually purple or +blue. And finally, highest of all are the flowers like labiates +(rosemary, <i>Salvia</i>, etc.) and speedwells (<i>Veronica</i>), whose tubular +corolla has been turned to one side, thus combining the united +petals with the irregular shape; and these are almost invariably +purple or blue.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="AMONG_THE_HEATHER"></a>AMONG THE HEATHER</h3> + +<center>From 'The Evolutionist at Large'</center> +<br> + +<p>I suppose even that apocryphal person, the general reader, would +be insulted at being told at this hour of the day that all +bright-colored flowers are fertilized by the visits of insects, +whose attentions they are specially designed to solicit. Everybody +has heard over and over again that roses, orchids, and +columbines have acquired their honey to allure the friendly bee, +their gaudy petals to advertise the honey, and their divers shapes +to insure the proper fertilization by the correct type of insect. +But everybody does not know how specifically certain blossoms +have laid themselves out for a particular species of fly, beetle, +or tiny moth. Here on the higher downs, for instance, most flowers +are exceptionally large and brilliant; while all Alpine climbers +must have noticed that the most gorgeous masses of bloom +in Switzerland occur just below the snow-line. The reason is, +that such blossoms must be fertilized by butterflies alone. Bees, +their great rivals in honey-sucking, frequent only the lower meadows +and slopes, where flowers are many and small: they seldom +venture far from the hive or the nest among the high peaks and +chilly nooks where we find those great patches of blue gentian +or purple anemone, which hang like monstrous breadths of tapestry +upon the mountain sides. This heather here, now fully opening +in the warmer sun of the southern counties--it is still but +in the bud among the Scotch hills, I doubt not--specially lays +itself out for the humble-bee, and its masses form almost his +highest pasture-grounds; but the butterflies--insect vagrants that +they are--have no fixed home, and they therefore stray far +above the level at which bee-blossoms altogether cease to grow. +Now, the butterfly differs greatly from the bee in his mode of +honey-hunting: he does not bustle about in a business-like manner +from one buttercup or dead-nettle to its nearest fellow; but +he flits joyously, like a sauntering straggler that he is, from a +great patch of color here to another great patch at a distance, +whose gleam happens to strike his roving eye by its size and +brilliancy. Hence, as that indefatigable observer, Dr. Hermann +Müller, has noticed, all Alpine or hill-top flowers have very large +and conspicuous blossoms, generally grouped together in big clusters +so as to catch a passing glance of the butterfly's eye. +As soon as the insect spies such a cluster, the color seems to act +as a stimulant to his broad wings, just as the candle-light does to +those of his cousin the moth. Off he sails at once, as if by automatic +action, towards the distant patch, and there both robs the +plant of its honey, and at the same time carries to it on his legs +and head fertilizing pollen from the last of its congeners which +he favored with a call. For of course both bees and butterflies +stick on the whole to a single species at a time; or else the +flowers would only get uselessly hybridized, instead of being +impregnated with pollen from other plants of their own kind. +For this purpose it is that most plants lay themselves out to +secure the attention of only two or three varieties among their +insect allies, while they make their nectaries either too deep or +too shallow for the convenience of all other kinds.</p> + +<p>Insects, however, differ much from one another in their aesthetic +tastes, and flowers are adapted accordingly to the varying +fancies of the different kinds. Here, for example, is a spray of +common white galium, which attracts and is fertilized by small +flies, who generally frequent white blossoms. But here again, +not far off, I find a luxuriant mass of the yellow species, known +by the quaint name of "lady's-bedstraw,"--a legacy from the old +legend which represents it as having formed Our Lady's bed in +the manger at Bethlehem. Now why has this kind of galium +yellow flowers, while its near kinsman yonder has them snowy +white? The reason is that lady's-bedstraw is fertilized by small +beetles; and beetles are known to be one among the most color-loving +races of insects. You may often find one of their number, +the lovely bronze and golden-mailed rose-chafer, buried deeply in +the very centre of a red garden rose, and reeling about when +touched as if drunk with pollen and honey. Almost all the +flowers which beetles frequent are consequently brightly decked +in scarlet or yellow. On the other hand, the whole family of the +umbellates, those tall plants with level bunches of tiny blossoms, +like the fool's-parsley, have all but universally white petals; and +Müller, the most statistical of naturalists, took the trouble to +count the number of insects which paid them a visit. He found +that only fourteen per cent. were bees, while the remainder consisted +mainly of miscellaneous small flies and other arthropodous +riff-raff, whereas, in the brilliant class of composites, including +the asters, sunflowers, daisies, dandelions, and thistles, nearly +seventy-five per cent. of the visitors were steady, industrious bees. +Certain dingy blossoms which lay themselves out to attract wasps, +are obviously adapted, as Müller quaintly remarks, "to a less aesthetically +cultivated circle of visitors." But the most brilliant +among all insect-fertilized flowers are those which specially affect +the society of butterflies; and they are only surpassed in this +respect throughout all nature by the still larger and more magnificent +tropical species which owe their fertilization to humming-birds +and brush-tongued lories.</p> + +<p>Is it not a curious, yet a comprehensible circumstance, that +the tastes which thus show themselves in the development, by +natural selection, of lovely flowers, should also show themselves +in the marked preference for beautiful mates? Poised on yonder +sprig of harebell stands a little purple-winged butterfly, one of +the most exquisite among our British kinds. That little butterfly +owes its own rich and delicately shaded tints to the long selective +action of a million generations among its ancestors. So we find +throughout that the most beautifully colored birds and insects are +always those which have had most to do with the production of +bright-colored fruits and flowers. The butterflies and rose-beetles +are the most gorgeous among insects; the humming-birds and parrots +are the most gorgeous among birds. Nay, more, exactly like +effects have been produced in two hemispheres on different tribes +by the same causes. The plain brown swifts of the North have +developed among tropical West Indian and South American +orchids the metallic gorgets and crimson crests of the humming-bird; +while a totally unlike group of Asiatic birds have developed +among the rich flora of India and the Malay Archipelago the +exactly similar plumage of the exquisite sun-birds. Just as bees +depend upon flowers, and flowers upon bees, so the color-sense of +animals has created the bright petals of blossoms; and the bright +petals have reacted upon the tastes of the animals themselves, +and through their tastes upon their own appearance.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_HERONS_HAUNT"></a>THE HERON'S HAUNT</h3> + +<center>From 'Vignettes from Nature'</center> + +<p>Most of the fields on the country-side are now laid up for +hay, or down in the tall haulming corn; and so I am +driven from my accustomed botanizing grounds on the +open, and compelled to take refuge in the wild bosky moor-land +back of Hole Common. Here, on the edge of the copse, +the river widens to a considerable pool, and coming upon it +softly through the wood from behind--the boggy, moss-covered +ground masking and muffling my foot-fall--I have surprised a +great, graceful ash-and-white heron, standing all unconscious on +the shallow bottom, in the very act of angling for minnows. +The heron is a somewhat rare bird among the more cultivated +parts of England; but just hereabouts we get a sight of one +not infrequently, for they still breed in a few tall ash-trees at +Chilcombe Park, where the lords of the manor in mediaeval +times long preserved a regular heronry to provide sport for +their hawking. There is no English bird, not even the swan, +so perfectly and absolutely graceful as the heron. I am leaning +now breathless and noiseless against the gate, taking a good +look at him, as he stands half-knee deep on the oozy bottom, +with his long neck arched over the water, and his keen purple +eye fixed eagerly upon the fish below. Though I am still +twenty yards from where he poises lightly on his stilted legs, I +can see distinctly his long pendent snow-white breast-feathers, +his crest of waving black plumes, falling loosely backward over +the ash-gray neck, and even the bright red skin of his bare +legs just below the feathered thighs. I dare hardly move +nearer to get a closer view of his beautiful plumage; and +still I will try. I push very quietly through the gate, but not +quite quietly enough for the heron. One moment he raises his +curved neck and poises his head a little on one side to listen +for the direction of the rustling; then he catches a glimpse of +me as I try to draw back silently behind a clump of flags and +nettles; and in a moment his long legs give him a good spring +from the bottom, his big wings spread with a sudden flap sky-wards, +and almost before I can note what is happening he is +off and away to leeward, making a bee-line for the high trees +that fringe the artificial water in Chilcombe Hollow.</p> + +<p>All these wading birds the herons, the cranes, the bitterns, +the snipes, and the plovers are almost necessarily, by the very +nature of their typical conformation, beautiful and graceful in +form. Their tall, slender legs, which they require for wading, +their comparatively light and well-poised bodies, their long, +curved, quickly-darting necks and sharp beaks, which they need +in order to secure their rapid-swimming prey, all these things +make the waders, almost in spite of themselves, handsome and +shapely birds. Their feet, it is true, are generally rather large +and sprawling, with long, wide-spread toes, so as to distribute +their weight on the snow-shoe principle, and prevent them from +sinking in the deep soft mud on which they tread; but then we +seldom see the feet, because the birds, when we catch a close +view of them at all, are almost always either on stilts in the +water, or flying with their legs tucked behind them, after their +pretty rudder-like fashion. I have often wondered whether it +is this general beauty of form in the waders which has turned +their aesthetic tastes, apparently, into such a sculpturesque line. +Certainly, it is very noteworthy that whenever among this +particular order of birds we get clear evidence of ornamental +devices, such as Mr. Darwin sets down to long-exerted selective +preferences in the choice of mates, the ornaments are almost +always those of form rather than those of color.</p> + +<p>The waders, I sometimes fancy, only care for beauty of +shape, not for beauty of tint. As I stood looking at the heron +here just now, the same old idea seemed to force itself more +clearly than ever upon my mind. The decorative adjuncts--the +curving tufted crest on the head, the pendent silvery gorget on +the neck, the long ornamental quills of the pinions--all look +exactly as if they were deliberately intended to emphasize and +heighten the natural gracefulness of the heron's form. May it +not be, I ask myself, that these birds, seeing one another's +statuesque shape from generation to generation, have that shape +hereditarily implanted upon the nervous system of the species, +in connection with all their ideas of mating and of love, just +as the human form is hereditarily associated with all our deepest +emotions, so that Miranda falling in love at first sight with +Ferdinand is not a mere poetical fiction, but the true illustration +of a psychological fact? And as on each of our minds and +brains the picture of the beautiful human figure is, as it were, +antecedently engraved, may not the ancestral type be similarly +engraved on the minds and brains of the wading birds? If so, +would it not be natural to conclude that these birds, having thus +a very graceful form as their generic standard of taste, a graceful +form with little richness of coloring, would naturally choose +as the loveliest among their mates, not those which showed any +tendency to more bright-hued plumage (which indeed might be +fatal to their safety, by betraying them to their enemies, the falcons +and eagles), but those which most fully embodied and carried +furthest the ideal specific gracefulness of the wading type? ... +Forestine flower-feeders and fruit-eaters, especially in the +tropics, are almost always brightly colored. Their chromatic +taste seems to get quickened in their daily search for food +among the beautiful blossoms and brilliant fruits of southern +woodlands. Thus the humming-birds, the sun-birds, and the +brush-tongued lories, three very dissimilar groups of birds as +far as descent is concerned, all alike feed upon the honey and +the insects which they extract from the large tubular bells of +tropical flowers; and all alike are noticeable for their intense +metallic lustre or pure tones of color. Again, the parrots, the +toucans, the birds of paradise, and many other of the more beautiful +exotic species, are fruit-eaters, and reflect their inherited +taste in their own gaudy plumage. But the waders have no such +special reasons for acquiring a love for bright hues. Hence +their aesthetic feeling seems rather to have taken a turn toward +the further development of their own graceful forms. Even the +plainest wading birds have a certain natural elegance of shape +which supplies a primitive basis for aesthetic selection to work on.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="JAMES_LANE_ALLEN"></a>JAMES LANE ALLEN</h2> + +<h3>(1850-)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-t.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>he literary work of James Lane Allen was begun with maturer +powers and wider culture than most writers exhibit in their +first publications. His mastery of English was acquired with +difficulty, and his knowledge of Latin he obtained through years of +instruction as well as of study. The wholesome open-air atmosphere +which pervades his stories, their pastoral character and love of nature, +come from the tastes bequeathed to him by three generations of +paternal ancestors, easy-going gentlemen farmers of the blue-grass +region of Kentucky. On a farm near Lexington, in this beautiful +country of stately homes, fine herds, and great flocks, the author was +born, and there he spent his childhood and youth.</p> + +<p>About 1885 he came to New York to devote himself to literature; +for though he had contributed poems, essays, and criticisms to leading +periodicals, his first important work was a series of articles +descriptive of the "Blue-Grass Region," published in Harper's Magazine. +The field was new, the work was fresh, and the author's ability +was at once recognized. Inevitably he chose Kentucky for the scene +of his stories, knowing and loving, as he did, her characteristics and +her history. While preparing his articles on 'The Blue-Grass Region,' +he had studied the Trappist Monastery and the Convent of Loretto, +as well as the records of the Catholic Church in Kentucky; and his +first stories, 'The White Cowl' and 'Sister Dolorosa,' which appeared +in the Century Magazine, were the first fruits of this labor. A controversy +arose as to the fairness of these portraitures; but however +opinions may differ as to his characterization, there can be no question +of the truthfulness of the exposition of the mediaeval spirit of +those retreats.</p> + +<p>This tendency to use a historic background marks most of Mr. +Allen's stories. In 'The Choir Invisible,' a tale of the last century, +pioneer Kentucky once more exists. The old clergyman of 'Flute +and Violin' lived and died in Lexington, and had been long forgotten +when his story "touched the vanishing halo of a hard and +saintly life." The old negro preacher, with texts embroidered on his +coat-tails, was another figure of reality, unnoticed until he became +one of the 'Two Gentlemen of Kentucky.' In Lexington lived and +died "King Solomon," who had almost faded from memory when +his historian found the record of the poor vagabond's heroism during +the plague, and made it memorable in a story that touches the heart +and fills the eyes. 'A Kentucky Cardinal,' with 'Aftermath,' its +second part, is full of history and of historic personages. 'Summer +in Arcady: A Tale of Nature,' the latest of Mr. Allen's stories, is no +less based on local history and no less full of local color than his +other tales, notwithstanding its general unlikeness.</p> + +<p>This book sounds a deeper note than the earlier tales, although +the truth which Mr. Allen sees is not mere fidelity to local types, but +the essential truth of human nature. His realism has always a poetic +aspect. Quiet, reserved, out of the common, his books deal with +moods rather than with actions; their problems are spiritual rather +than physical; their thought tends toward the higher and more difficult +way of life.</p> +<br> + +<h3><a name="A_COURTSHIP"></a>A COURTSHIP</h3> +<center>From 'Summer in Arcady'</center> + +<p>The sunlight grew pale the following morning; a shadow crept +rapidly over the blue; bolts darted about the skies like +maddened redbirds; the thunder, ploughing its way down +the dome as along zigzag cracks in the stony street, filled the +caverns of the horizon with reverberations that shook the earth; +and the rain was whirled across the landscape in long, white, +wavering sheets. Then all day quiet and silence throughout +Nature except for the drops, tapping high and low the twinkling +leaves; except for the new melody of woodland and meadow +brooks, late silvery and with a voice only for their pebbles and +moss and mint, but now yellow and brawling and leaping-back +into the grassy channels that were their old-time beds; except +for the indoor music of dripping eaves and rushing gutters and +overflowing rain-barrels. And when at last in the gold of the +cool west the sun broke from the edge of the gray, over what a +green, soaked, fragrant world he reared the arch of Nature's +peace!</p> + +<br> +<a name="435.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><img src="images/435.jpg" width="40%" alt=""> +<br> +<b> A COURTSHIP.<br> +Photogravure from Painting by H. Vogka.</b></p><br> + +<p>Not a little blade of corn in the fields but holds in an emerald +vase its treasures of white gems. The hemp-stalks bend so +low under the weight of their plumes, that were a vesper sparrow +to alight on one for his evening hymn, it would go with +him to the ground. The leaning barley and rye and wheat flash +in the last rays their jeweled beards. Under the old apple-trees, +golden-brown mushrooms are already pushing upward +through the leaf-loam, rank with many an autumn's dropping. +About the yards the peonies fall with faces earthward. In +the stable-lots the larded porkers, with bristles as clean as frost, +and flesh of pinky whiteness, are hunting with nervous nostrils +for the lush purslain. The fowls are driving their bills up and +down their wet breasts. And the farmers who have been shelling +corn for the mill come out of their barns, with their coats +over their shoulders, on the way to supper, look about for the +plough-horses, and glance at the western sky, from which the +last drops are falling.</p> + +<p>But soon only a more passionate heat shoots from the sun +into the planet. The plumes of the hemp are so dry again, that +by the pollen shaken from their tops you can trace the young +rabbits making their way out to the dusty paths. The shadows +of white clouds sail over purple stretches of blue-grass, hiding +the sun from the steady eye of the turkey, whose brood is +spread out before her like a fan on the earth. At early morning +the neighing of the stallions is heard around the horizon; at +noon the bull makes the deep, hot pastures echo with his majestic +summons; out in the blazing meadows the butterflies strike +the afternoon air with more impatient wings; under the moon +all night the play of ducks and drakes goes on along the margins +of the ponds. Young people are running away and marrying; +middle-aged farmers surprise their wives by looking in on +them at their butter-making in the sweet dairies; and Nature +is lashing everything--grass, fruit, insects, cattle, human +creatures--more fiercely onward to the fulfillment of her ends. She +is the great heartless haymaker, wasting not a ray of sunshine +on a clod, but caring naught for the light that beats upon a +throne, and holding man and woman, with their longing for immortality, +and their capacities for joy and pain, as of no more +account than a couple of fertilizing nasturtiums.</p> + +<p>The storm kept Daphne at home. On the next day the earth +was yellow with sunlight, but there were puddles along the path, +and a branch rushing swollen across the green valley in the +fields. On the third, her mother took the children to town to be +fitted with hats and shoes, and Daphne also, to be freshened up +with various moderate adornments, in view of a protracted meeting +soon to begin. On the fourth, some ladies dropped in to +spend the day, bearing in mind the episode at the dinner, and +having grown curious to watch events accordingly. On the fifth, +her father carried out the idea of cutting down some cedar-trees +in the front yard for fence posts; and whenever he was working +about the house, he kept her near to wait on him in unnecessary +ways. On the sixth, he rode away with two hands and an empty +wagon-bed for some work on the farm; her mother drove off to +another dinner--dinners never cease in Kentucky, and the wife +of an elder is not free to decline invitations; and at last she was +left alone in the front porch, her face turned with burning eagerness +toward the fields. In a little while she had slipped away.</p> + +<p>All these days Hilary had been eager to see her. He was +carrying a good many girls in his mind that summer; none in +his heart; but his plans concerning these latter were for the time +forgotten. He hung about that part of his farm from which he +could have descried her in the distance. Each forenoon and +afternoon, at the usual hour of her going to her uncle's, he rode +over and watched for her. Other people passed to and fro,--children +and servants,--but not Daphne; and repeated disappointments +fanned his desire to see her.</p> + +<p>When she came into sight at last, he was soon walking beside +her, leading his horse by the reins.</p> + +<p>"I have been waiting to see you, Daphne," he said, with a +smile, but general air of seriousness. "I have been waiting a +long time for a chance to talk to you."</p> + +<p>"And I have wanted to see you," said Daphne, her face +turned away and her voice hardly to be heard. "I have been +waiting for a chance to talk to you."</p> + +<p>The change in her was so great, so unexpected, it contained +an appeal to him so touching, that he glanced quickly at her. +Then he stopped short and looked searchingly around the +meadow.</p> + +<p>The thorn-tree is often the only one that can survive on these +pasture lands. Its spikes, even when it is no higher than the +grass, keep off the mouths of grazing stock. As it grows higher, +birds see it standing solitary in the distance and fly to it, as a +resting-place in passing. Some autumn day a seed of the wild +grape is thus dropped near its root; and in time the thorn-tree +and the grape-vine come to thrive together.</p> + +<p>As Hilary now looked for some shade to which they could +retreat from the blinding, burning sunlight, he saw one of these +standing off at a distance of a few hundred yards. He slipped +the bridle-reins through the head-stall, and giving his mare a +soft slap on the shoulder, turned her loose to graze.</p> + +<p>"Come over here and sit down out of the sun," he said, starting +off in his authoritative way. "I want to talk to you."</p> + +<p>Daphne followed in his wake, through the deep grass.</p> + +<p>When they reached the tree, they sat down under the rayless +boughs. Some sheep lying there ran round to the other side and +stood watching them, with a frightened look in their clear, peaceful +eyes.</p> + +<p>"What's the matter?" he said, fanning his face, and tugging +with his forefinger to loosen his shirt collar from his moist neck. +He had the manner of a powerful comrade who means to succor +a weaker one.</p> + +<p>"Nothing," said Daphne, like a true woman.</p> + +<p>"Yes, but there is," he insisted. "I got you into trouble. I +didn't think of that when I asked you to dance."</p> + +<p>"You had nothing to do with it," retorted Daphne, with a flash. +"I danced for spite."</p> + +<p>He threw back his head with a peal of laughter. All at once +this was broken off. He sat up, with his eyes fixed on the lower +edge of the meadow.</p> + +<p>"Here comes your father," he said gravely.</p> + +<p>Daphne turned. Her father was riding slowly through the +bars. A wagon-bed loaded with rails crept slowly after him.</p> + +<p>In an instant the things that had cost her so much toil and +so many tears to arrange,--her explanations, her justifications, +and her parting,--all the reserve and the coldness that she had +laid up in her heart, as one fills high a little ice-house with fear +of far-off summer heat,--all were quite gone, melted away. +And everything that he had planned to tell her was forgotten +also at the sight of that stern figure on horseback bearing unconsciously +down upon them.</p> + +<p>"If I had only kept my mouth shut about his old fences," +he said to himself. "Confound my bull!" and he looked anxiously +at Daphne, who sat with her eyes riveted on her father. +The next moment she had turned, and they were laughing in +each other's faces.</p> + +<p>"What shall I do?" she cried, leaning over and burying her +face in her hands, and lifting it again, scarlet with excitement.</p> + +<p>"Don't do anything," he said calmly.</p> + +<p>"But Hilary, if he sees us, we are lost."</p> + +<p>"If he sees us, we are found."</p> + +<p>"But he mustn't see me here!" she cried, with something +like real terror. "I believe I'll lie down in the grass. Maybe +he'll think I am a friend of yours."</p> + +<p>"My friends all sit up in the grass," said Hilary.</p> + +<p>But Daphne had already hidden.</p> + +<p>Many a time, when a little girl, she had amused herself by +screaming like a hawk at the young guineas, and seeing them +cuddle invisible under small tufts and weeds. Out in the stable +lot, where the grass was grazed so close that the geese could +barely nip it, she would sometimes get one of the negro men +to scare the little pigs, for the delight of seeing them squat as +though hidden, when they were no more hidden than if they +had spread themselves out upon so many dinner dishes. All of +us reveal traces of this primitive instinct upon occasion. Daphne +was doing her best to hide now.</p> + +<p>When Hilary realized it he moved in front of her, screening +her as well as possible.</p> + +<p>"Hadn't you better lie down, too?" she asked.</p> + +<p>"No," he replied quickly.</p> + +<p>"But if he sees you, he might take a notion to ride over this +way!"</p> + +<p>"Then he'll have to ride."</p> + +<p>"But, Hilary, suppose he were to find me lying down here +behind you, hiding?"</p> + +<p>"Then he'll have to find you."</p> + +<p>"You get me into trouble, and then you won't help me out!" +exclaimed Daphne with considerable heat.</p> + +<p>"It might not make matters any better for me to hide," he +answered quietly. "But if he comes over here and tries to get +us into trouble, I'll see then what I can do."</p> + +<p>Daphne lay silent for a moment, thinking. Then she nestled +more closely down, and said with gay, unconscious archness: +"I'm not hiding because I'm afraid of him. I'm doing it just +because I want to."</p> + +<p>She did not know that the fresh happiness flushing her at +that moment came from the fact of having Hilary between herself +and her father as a protector; that she was drinking in the +delight a woman feels in getting playfully behind the man she +loves in the face of danger: but her action bound her to him +and brought her more under his influence.</p> + +<p>His words showed that he also felt his position,--the position +of the male who stalks forth from the herd and stands the silent +challenger. He was young, and vain of his manhood in the +usual innocent way that led him to carry the chip on his +shoulder for the world to knock off; and he placed himself +before Daphne with the understanding that if they were discovered, +there would be trouble. Her father was a violent man, +and the circumstances were not such that any Kentucky father +would overlook them. But with his inward seriousness, his face +wore its usual look of reckless unconcern.</p> + +<p>"Is he coming this way?" asked Daphne, after an interval of +impatient waiting.</p> + +<p>"Straight ahead. Are you hid?"</p> + +<p>"I can't see whether I'm hid or not. Where is he now?"</p> + +<p>"Right on us."</p> + +<p>"Does he see you?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Do you think he sees me?"</p> + +<p>"I'm sure of it."</p> + +<p>"Then I might as well get up," said Daphne, with the courage +of despair, and up she got. Her father was riding along +the path in front of them, but not looking. She was down +again like a partridge.</p> + +<p>"How could you fool me, Hilary? Suppose he <i>had</i> been +looking!"</p> + +<p>"I wonder what he thinks I'm doing, sitting over here in the +grass like a stump," said Hilary. "If he takes me for one, he +must think I've got an awful lot of roots."</p> + +<p>"Tell me when it's time to get up."</p> + +<p>"I will."</p> + +<p>He turned softly toward her. She was lying on her side, with +her burning cheek in one hand. The other hand rested high on +the curve of her hip. Her braids had fallen forward, and lay in +a heavy loop about her lovely shoulders. Her eyes were closed, +her scarlet lips parted in a smile. The edges of her snow-white +petticoats showed beneath her blue dress, and beyond these one +of her feet and ankles. Nothing more fragrant with innocence +ever lay on the grass.</p> + +<p>"Is it time to get up now?"</p> + +<p>"Not yet," and he sat bending over her.</p> + +<p>"Now?"</p> + +<p>"Not yet," he repeated more softly.</p> + +<p>"Now, then?"</p> + +<p>"Not for a long time."</p> + +<p>His voice thrilled her, and she glanced up at him. His laughing +eyes were glowing down upon her under his heavy mat of +hair. She sat up and looked toward the wagon crawling away in +the distance; her father was no longer in sight.</p> + +<p>One of the ewes, dissatisfied with a back view, stamped her +forefoot impatiently, and ran round in front, and out into the +sun. Her lambs followed, and the three, ranging themselves +abreast, stared at Daphne, with a look of helpless inquiry.</p> + +<p>"Sh-pp-pp!" she cried, throwing up her hands at them, irritated. +"Go away!"</p> + +<p>They turned and ran; the others followed; and the whole +number, falling into line, took a path meekly homeward. They +left a greater sense of privacy under the tree. Several yards off +was a small stock-pond. Around the edge of this the water +stood hot and green in the tracks of the cattle and the sheep, +and about these pools the yellow butterflies were thick, alighting +daintily on the promontories of the mud, or rising two by two +through the dazzling atmosphere in columns of enamored flight.</p> + +<p>Daphne leaned over to the blue grass where it swayed unbroken +in the breeze, and drew out of their sockets several stalks +of it, bearing on their tops the purplish seed-vessels. With them +she began to braid a ring about one of her fingers in the old +simple fashion of the country.</p> + +<p>As they talked, he lay propped on his elbow, watching her +fingers, the soft slow movements of which little by little wove a +spell over his eyes. And once again the power of her beauty +began to draw him beyond control. He felt a desire to seize her +hands, to crush them in his. His eyes passed upward along her +tapering wrists, the skin of which was like mother-of-pearl; upward +along the arm to the shoulder--to her neck--to her deeply +crimsoned cheeks--to the purity of her brow--to the purity of +her eyes, the downcast lashes of which hid them like conscious +fringes.</p> + +<p>An awkward silence began to fall between them. Daphne +felt that the time had come for her to speak. But, powerless +to begin, she feigned to busy herself all the more devotedly +with braiding the deep-green circlet. Suddenly he drew himself +through the grass to her side.</p> + +<p>"Let <i>me</i>!"</p> + +<p>"No!" she cried, lifting her arm above his reach and looking +at him with a gay threat. "You don't know how."</p> + +<p>"I do know how," he said, with his white teeth on his red +underlip, and his eyes sparkling; and reaching upward, he laid +his hand in the hollow of her elbow and pulled her arm down.</p> + +<p>"No! No!" she cried again, putting her hands behind her +back. "You will spoil it!"</p> + +<p>"I will not spoil it," he said, moving so close to her that his +breath was on her face, and reaching round to unclasp her hands.</p> + +<p>"No! No! No!" she cried, bending away from him. "I don't +want any ring!" and she tore it from her finger and threw it out +on the grass. Then she got up, and, brushing the grass-seed off +her lap, put on her hat.</p> + +<p>He sat cross-legged on the grass before her. He had put on +his hat, and the brim hid his eyes.</p> + +<p>"And you are not going to stay and talk to me?" he said in +a tone of reproachfulness, without looking up.</p> + +<p>She was excited and weak and trembling, and so she put out +her hand and took hold of a strong loop of the grape-vine hanging +from a branch of the thorn, and laid her cheek against her +hand and looked away from him.</p> + +<p>"I thought you were better than the others," he continued, +with the bitter wisdom of twenty years. "But you women are +all alike. When a man gets into trouble, you desert him. You +hurry him on to the devil. I have been turned out of the +church, and now you are down on me. Oh, well! But you +know how much I have always liked you, Daphne."</p> + +<p>It was not the first time he had acted this character. It had +been a favorite role. But Daphne had never seen the like. She +was overwhelmed with happiness that he cared so much for her; +and to have him reproach her for indifference, and see him suffering +with the idea that she had turned against him--that +instantly changed the whole situation. He had not heard then +what had taken place at the dinner. Under the circumstances, +feeling certain that the secret of her love had not been discovered, +she grew emboldened to risk a little more.</p> + +<p>So she turned toward him smiling, and swayed gently as she +clung to the vine.</p> + +<p>"Yes; I have my orders not even to speak to you! Never +again!" she said, with the air of tantalizing.</p> + +<p>"Then stay with me a while now," he said, and lifted slowly +to her his appealing face. She sat down, and screened herself +with a little feminine transparency.</p> + +<p>"I can't stay long: it's going to rain!"</p> + +<p>He cast a wicked glance at the sky from under his hat; there +were a few clouds on the horizon.</p> + +<p>"And so you are never going to speak to me again?" he +said mournfully.</p> + +<p>"Never!" How delicious her laughter was.</p> + +<p>"I'll put a ring on your finger to remember me by."</p> + +<p>He lay over in the grass and pulled several stalks. Then he +lifted his eyes beseechingly to hers.</p> + +<p>"Will you let me?"</p> + +<p>Daphne hid her hands. He drew himself to her side and +took one of them forcibly from her lap.</p> + +<p>With a slow, caressing movement he began to braid the +grass ring around her finger--in and out, around and around, +his fingers laced with her fingers, his palm lying close upon her +palm, his blood tingling through the skin upon her blood. He +made the braiding go wrong, and took it off and began over +again. Two or three times she drew a deep breath, and stole a +bewildered look at his face, which was so close to hers that his +hair brushed it--so close that she heard the quiver of his own +breath. Then all at once he folded his hands about hers with a +quick, fierce tenderness, and looked up at her. She turned her +face aside and tried to draw her hand away. His clasp tightened. +She snatched it away, and got up with a nervous laugh.</p> + +<p>"Look at the butterflies! Aren't they pretty?"</p> + +<p>He sprang up and tried to seize her hand again.</p> + +<p>"You shan't go home yet!" he said, in an undertone.</p> + +<p>"Shan't I?" she said, backing away from him. "Who's +going to keep me?"</p> + +<p>"<i>I am</i>," he said, laughing excitedly and following her closely.</p> + +<p>"My father's coming!" she cried out as a warning.</p> + +<p>He turned and looked: there was no one in sight.</p> + +<p>"He <i>is</i> coming--sooner or later!" she called.</p> + +<p>She had retreated several yards off into the sunlight of the +meadow.</p> + +<p>The remembrance of the risk that he was causing her to run +checked him. He went over to her.</p> + +<p>"When can I see you again--soon?"</p> + +<p>He had never spoken so seriously to her before. He had +never before been so serious. But within the last hour Nature +had been doing her work, and its effect was immediate. His +sincerity instantly conquered her. Her eyes fell.</p> + +<p>"No one has any right to keep us from seeing each other!" +he insisted. "We must settle that for ourselves."</p> + +<p>Daphne made no reply.</p> + +<p>"But we can't meet here any more--with people passing +backward and forward!" he continued rapidly and decisively. +"What has happened to-day mustn't happen again."</p> + +<p>"No!" she replied, in a voice barely to be heard. "It must +never happen again. We can't meet here."</p> + +<p>They were walking side by side now toward the meadow-path. +As they reached it he paused.</p> + +<p>"Come to the back of the pasture--to-morrow!--at four +o'clock!" he said, tentatively, recklessly.</p> + +<p>Daphne did not answer as she moved away from him along +the path homeward.</p> + +<p>"Will you come?" he called out to her.</p> + +<p>She turned and shook her head. Whatever her own new +plans may have become, she was once more happy and laughing.</p> + +<p>"Come, Daphne!"</p> + +<p>She walked several paces further and turned and shook her +head again.</p> + +<p>"Come!" he pleaded.</p> + +<p>She laughed at him.</p> + +<p>He wheeled round to his mare grazing near. As he put his +foot into the stirrup, he looked again: she was standing in the +same place, laughing still.</p> + +<p>"<i>You</i> go," she cried, waving him good-by. "There'll not be +a soul to disturb you! To-morrow--at four o'clock!"</p> + +<p>"Will you be there?" he said.</p> + +<p>"Will you?" she answered.</p> + +<p>"I'll be there to-morrow," he said, "and every other day till +you come."</p> + +<p>By permission of the Macmillan Company, Publishers.</p> +<br> + +<h3><a name="OLD_KING_SOLOMONS_CORONATION"></a>OLD KING SOLOMON'S CORONATION</h3> + +<p>From 'Flute and Violin, and Other Kentucky Tales and Romances' +1891, by Harper and Brothers.</p> + +<p>He stood on the topmost of the court-house steps, and for a +moment looked down on the crowd with the usual air of +official severity.</p> + +<p>"Gentlemen," he then cried out sharply, "by an ordah of the +cou't I now offah this man at public sale to the highes' biddah. +He is able-bodied but lazy, without visible property or means of +suppoht, an' of dissolute habits. He is therefoh adjudged guilty +of high misdemeanahs, an' is to be sole into labah foh a twelvemonth. +How much, then, am I offahed foh the vagrant? How +much am I offahed foh ole King Sol'mon?"</p> + +<p>Nothing was offered for old King Solomon. The spectators +formed themselves into a ring around the big vagrant, and settled +down to enjoy the performance.</p> + +<p>"Staht 'im, somebody."</p> + +<p>Somebody started a laugh, which rippled around the circle.</p> + +<p>The sheriff looked on with an expression of unrelaxed severity, +but catching the eye of an acquaintance on the outskirts, he exchanged +a lightning wink of secret appreciation. Then he lifted +off his tight beaver hat, wiped out of his eyes a little shower of +perspiration which rolled suddenly down from above, and warmed +a degree to his theme.</p> + +<p>"Come, gentlemen," he said more suasively, "it's too hot to +stan' heah all day. Make me an offah! You all know ole King +Sol'mon; don't wait to be interduced. How much, then, to staht +'im? Say fifty dollahs! Twenty-five! Fifteen! Ten! Why, +gentlemen! Not <i>ten</i> dollahs? Remembah, this is the Blue-Grass +Region of Kentucky--the land of Boone an' Kenton, the home +of Henry Clay!" he added, in an oratorical <i>crescendo</i>.</p> + +<p>"He ain't wuth his victuals," said an oily little tavern-keeper, +folding his arms restfully over his own stomach and cocking up +one piggish eye into his neighbor's face. "He ain't wuth his +'taters."</p> + +<p>"Buy 'im foh 'is rags!" cried a young law student, with a +Blackstone under his arm, to the town rag picker opposite, who +was unconsciously ogling the vagrant's apparel.</p> + +<p>"I <i>might</i> buy 'im foh 'is <i>scalp</i>," drawled a farmer, who had +taken part in all kinds of scalp contests, and was now known to +be busily engaged in collecting crow scalps for a match soon to +come off between two rival counties.</p> + +<p>"I think I'll buy 'im foh a hat sign," said a manufacturer of +ten-dollar Castor and Rhorum hats. This sally drew merry attention +to the vagrant's hat, and the merchant felt rewarded.</p> + +<p>"You'd bettah say the town ought to buy 'im an' put 'im up +on top of the cou't-house as a scarecrow foh the cholera," said +some one else.</p> + +<p>"What news of the cholera did the stage coach bring this +mohning?" quickly inquired his neighbor in his ear; and the two +immediately fell into low, grave talk, forgot the auction, and +turned away.</p> + +<p>"Stop, gentlemen, stop!" cried the sheriff, who had watched +the rising tide of good humor, and now saw his chance to float +in on it with spreading sails. "You're runnin' the price in the +wrong direction--down, not up. The law requires that he be +sole to the highes' biddah, not the lowes'. As loyal citizens, +uphole the constitution of the commonwealth of Kentucky an' +make me an offah; the man is really a great bargain. In the +first place, he would cos' his ownah little or nothin', because, as +you see, he keeps himself in cigahs an' clo'es; then, his main +article of diet is whisky--a supply of which he always has on +ban'. He don't even need a bed, foh you know he sleeps jus' +as well on any doohstep; noh a chair, foh he prefers to sit roun' +on the curbstones. Remembah, too, gentlemen, that ole King +Sol'mon is a Virginian--from the same neighbohhood as Mr. +Clay. Remembah that he is well educated, that he is an <i>awful</i> +Whig, an' that he has smoked mo' of the stumps of Mr. Clay's +cigahs than any other man in existence. If you don't b'lieve <i>me,</i> +gentlemen, yondah goes Mr. Clay now; call <i>him</i> ovah an' ask +'im foh yo'se'ves."</p> + +<p>He paused, and pointed with his right forefinger towards +Main Street, along which the spectators, with a sudden craning +of necks, beheld the familiar figure of the passing statesman.</p> + +<p>"But you don't need <i>any</i>body to tell these fac's, gentlemen," +he continued. "You merely need to be reminded that ole King +Sol'mon is no ohdinary man. Mo'ovah he has a kine heaht; he +nevah spoke a rough wohd to anybody in this worl', an' he is as +proud as Tecumseh of his good name an' charactah. An', gentlemen," +he added, bridling with an air of mock gallantry and laying +a hand on his heart, "if anythin' fu'thah is required in the +way of a puffect encomium, we all know that there isn't anothah +man among us who cuts as wide a swath among the ladies. +The'foh, if you have any appreciation of virtue, any magnanimity +of heaht; if you set a propah valuation upon the descendants of +Virginia, that mothah of Presidents; if you believe in the pure +laws of Kentucky as the pioneer bride of the Union; if you love +America an' love the worl'--make me a gen'rous, high-toned +offah foh ole King Sol'mon!"</p> + +<p>He ended his peroration amid a shout of laughter and applause, +and feeling satisfied that it was a good time for returning +to a more practical treatment of his subject, proceeded in a sincere +tone:--</p> + +<p>"He can easily earn from one to two dollahs a day, an' from +three to six hundred a yeah. There's not anothah white man in +town capable of doin' as much work. There's not a niggah ban' +in the hemp factories with such muscles an' such a chest. <i>Look</i> +at 'em! An', if you don't b'lieve me, step fo'ward and <i>feel</i> 'em. +How much, then, is bid foh 'im?"</p> + +<p>"One dollah!" said the owner of a hemp factory, who had +walked forward and felt the vagrant's arm, laughing, but coloring +up also as the eyes of all were quickly turned upon him. In +those days it was not an unheard-of thing for the muscles of a +human being to be thus examined when being sold into servitude +to a new master.</p> + +<p>"Thank you!" cried the sheriff, cheerily. "One precinc' +heard from! One dollah! I am offahed one dollah foh ole King +Sol'mon. One dollah foh the king! Make it a half. One dollah +an' a half. Make it a half. One dol-dol-dol-dollah!"</p> + +<p>Two medical students, returning from lectures at the old Medical +Hall, now joined the group, and the sheriff explained:</p> + +<p>"One dollah is bid foh the vagrant ole King Sol'mon, who is +to be sole into labah foh a twelvemonth. Is there any othah +bid? Are you all done? One dollah, once--"</p> + +<p>"Dollah and a half," said one of the students, and remarked +half jestingly under his breath to his companion, "I'll buy him +on the chance of his dying. We'll dissect him."</p> + +<p>"Would you own his body if he <i>should</i> die?"</p> + +<p>"If he dies while bound to me, I'll arrange <i>that</i>."</p> + +<p>"One dollah an' a half," resumed the sheriff, and falling into +the tone of a facile auctioneer he rattled on:--</p> + +<p>"One dollah an' a half foh ole Sol'mon--sol, sol, sol,--do, re, +mi, fa, sol,--do, re, mi, fa, sol! Why, gentlemen, you can set +the king to music!"</p> + +<p>All this time the vagrant had stood in the centre of that close +ring of jeering and humorous bystanders--a baffling text from +which to have preached a sermon on the infirmities of our imperfect +humanity. Some years before, perhaps as a master-stroke of +derision, there had been given to him that title which could but +heighten the contrast of his personality and estate with every +suggestion of the ancient sacred magnificence; and never had the +mockery seemed so fine as at this moment, when he was led +forth into the streets to receive the lowest sentence of the law +upon his poverty and dissolute idleness. He was apparently in +the very prime of life--a striking figure, for nature at least had +truly done some royal work on him. Over six feet in height, +erect, with limbs well shaped and sinewy, with chest and neck full +of the lines of great power, a large head thickly covered with long, +reddish hair, eyes blue, face beardless, complexion fair but discolored +by low passions and excesses--such was old King Solomon. +He wore a stiff, high, black Castor hat of the period, with +the crown smashed in and the torn rim hanging down over one +ear; a black cloth coat in the old style, ragged and buttonless; a +white cotton shirt, with the broad collar crumpled wide open at +the neck and down his sunburnt bosom; blue jean pantaloons, +patched at the seat and the knees; and ragged cotton socks that +fell down over the tops of his dusty shoes, which were open at +the heels.</p> + +<p>In one corner of his sensual mouth rested the stump of a +cigar. Once during the proceedings he had produced another, +lighted it, and continued quietly smoking. If he took to himself +any shame as the central figure of this ignoble performance, no +one knew it. There was something almost royal in his unconcern. +The humor, the badinage, the open contempt, of which he +was the public target, fell thick and fast upon him, but as harmlessly +as would balls of pith upon a coat of mail. In truth, there +was that in his great, lazy, gentle, good-humored bulk and bearing +which made the gibes seem all but despicable. He shuffled +from one foot to the other as though he found it a trial to stand +up so long, but all the while looking the spectators full in the +eyes without the least impatience. He suffered the man of the +factory to walk round him and push and pinch his muscles as +calmly as though he had been the show bull at a country fair. +Once only, when the sheriff had pointed across the street at the +figure of Mr. Clay, he had looked quickly in that direction with +a kindling light in his eye and a passing flush on his face. For +the rest, he seemed like a man who has drained his cup of human +life and has nothing left him but to fill again and drink without +the least surprise or eagerness.</p> + +<p>The bidding between the man of the factory and the student +had gone slowly on. The price had reached ten dollars. The +heat was intense, the sheriff tired. Then something occurred to +revivify the scene. Across the market place and toward the steps +of the court-house there suddenly came trundling along in breathless +haste a huge old negress, carrying on one arm a large shallow +basket containing apple-crab lanterns and fresh gingerbread. +With a series of half-articulate grunts and snorts she approached +the edge of the crowd and tried to force her way through. She +coaxed, she begged, she elbowed and pushed and scolded, now +laughing, and now with the passion of tears in her thick, excited +voice. All at once, catching sight of the sheriff, she lifted one +ponderous brown arm, naked to the elbow, and waved her hand +to him above the heads of those in front.</p> + +<p>"Hole on marster! hole on!" she cried in a tone of humorous +entreaty. "Don' knock 'im off till I come! Gim <i>me</i> a bid at 'im!"</p> + +<p>The sheriff paused and smiled. The crowd made way tumultuously, +with broad laughter and comment.</p> + +<p>"Stan' aside theah an' let Aun' Charlotte in!"</p> + +<p>"<i>Now</i> you'll see biddin'!"</p> + +<p>"Get out of the way foh Aun' Charlotte!"</p> + +<p>"Up, my free niggah! Hurrah foh Kentucky."</p> + +<p>A moment more and she stood inside the ring of spectators, +her basket on the pavement at her feet, her hands plumped +akimbo into her fathomless sides, her head up, and her soft, +motherly eyes turned eagerly upon the sheriff. Of the crowd +she seemed unconscious, and on the vagrant before her she had +not cast a single glance.</p> + +<p>She was dressed with perfect neatness. A red and yellow +Madras kerchief was bound about her head in a high coil, and +another over the bosom of her stiffly starched and smoothly +ironed blue cottonade dress. Rivulets of perspiration ran down +over her nose, her temples, and around her ears, and disappeared +mysteriously in the creases of her brown neck. A single drop +accidentally hung glistening like a diamond on the circlet of one +of her large brass earrings.</p> + +<p>The sheriff looked at her a moment, smiling but a little disconcerted. +The spectacle was unprecedented.</p> + +<p>"What do you want heah, Aun' Charlotte?" he asked kindly. +"You can't sell yo' pies an' gingerbread heah."</p> + +<p>"I don' <i>wan</i>' sell no pies en gingerbread," she replied, contemptuously. +"I wan' bid on <i>him</i>," and she nodded sidewise at +the vagrant. "White folks allers sellin' niggahs to wuk fuh +<i>dem</i>; I gwine to buy a white man to wuk fuh <i>me</i>. En he +gwine t' git a mighty hard mistiss, you heah <i>me</i>!"</p> + +<p>The eyes of the sheriff twinkled with delight.</p> + +<p>"Ten dollahs is offahed foh ole King Sol'mon. Is theah any +othah bid. Are you all done?"</p> + +<p>"Leben," she said.</p> + +<p>Two young ragamuffins crawled among the legs of the crowd +up to her basket and filched pies and cake beneath her very +nose.</p> + +<p>"Twelve!" cried the student, laughing.</p> + +<p>"Thirteen!" she laughed, too, but her eyes flashed.</p> + +<p>"<i>You are bidding against a niggah</i>" whispered the student's +companion in his ear.</p> + +<p>"So I am; let's be off," answered the other, with a hot flush +on his proud face.</p> + +<p>Thus the sale was ended, and the crowd variously dispersed. +In a distant corner of the courtyard the ragged urchins were +devouring their unexpected booty. The old negress drew a red +handkerchief out of her bosom, untied a knot in a corner of it, +and counted out the money to the sheriff. Only she and the +vagrant were now left on the spot.</p> + +<p>"You have bought me. What do you want me to do?" he +asked quietly.</p> + +<p>"Lohd, honey!" she answered, in a low tone of affectionate +chiding, "I don' wan' you to do <i>no thin</i>'! I wuzn' gwine t' 'low +dem white folks to buy you. Dey'd wuk you till you dropped +dead. You go 'long en do ez you please."</p> + +<p>She gave a cunning chuckle of triumph in thus setting at +naught the ends of justice, and in a voice rich and musical +with affection, she said, as she gave him a little push:</p> + +<p>"You bettah be gittin' out o' dis blazin' sun. G' on home! I +be 'long by-en-by."</p> + +<p>He turned and moved slowly away in the direction of Water +Street, where she lived; and she, taking up her basket, shuffled +across the market place toward Cheapside, muttering to herself +the while:</p> + +<p>"I come mighty nigh gittin' dar too late, foolin' long wid +dese pies. Sellin' <i>him</i> 'ca'se he don' wuk! Umph! if all de men +in dis town dat don' wuk wuz to be tuk up en sole, d' wouldn' +be 'nough money in de town to buy em! Don' I see 'em settin' +'roun' dese taverns f'om mohnin' till night?"</p> + +<p>Nature soon smiles upon her own ravages and strews our +graves with flowers, not as memories, but for other flowers when +the spring returns.</p> + +<p>It was one cool, brilliant morning late in that autumn. The +air blew fresh and invigorating, as though on the earth there +were no corruption, no death. Far southward had flown the +plague. A spectator in the open court square might have seen +many signs of life returning to the town. Students hurried +along, talking eagerly. Merchants met for the first time and +spoke of the winter trade. An old negress, gayly and neatly +dressed, came into the market place, and sitting down on a sidewalk +displayed her yellow and red apples and fragrant gingerbread. +She hummed to herself an old cradle-song, and in +her soft, motherly black eyes shone a mild, happy radiance. A +group of young ragamuffins eyed her longingly from a distance. +Court was to open for the first time since the spring. The +hour was early, and one by one the lawyers passed slowly in. +On the steps of the court-house three men were standing: +Thomas Brown, the sheriff; old Peter Leuba, who had just +walked over from his music store on Main Street; and little +M. Giron, the French confectioner. Each wore mourning on his +hat, and their voices were low and grave.</p> + +<p>"Gentlemen," the sheriff was saying, "it was on this very +spot the day befoah the cholera broke out that I sole 'im as a +vagrant. An' I did the meanes' thing a man can evah do. I +hel' 'im up to public ridicule foh his weakness an' made spoht +of 'is infirmities. I laughed at 'is povahty an' 'is ole clo'es. I +delivahed on 'im as complete an oration of sarcastic detraction +as I could prepare on the spot, out of my own meanness an' +with the vulgah sympathies of the crowd. Gentlemen, if I only +had that crowd heah now, an' ole King Sol'mon standin' in the +midst of it, that I might ask 'im to accept a humble public +apology, offahed from the heaht of one who feels himself unworthy +to shake 'is han'! But gentlemen, that crowd will nevah +reassemble. Neahly ev'ry man of them is dead, an' ole King +Sol'mon buried them."</p> + +<p>"He buried my friend Adolphe Xaupi," said François Giron, +touching his eyes with his handkerchief.</p> + +<p>"There is a case of my best Jamaica rum for him whenever +he comes for it," said old Leuba, clearing his throat.</p> + +<p>"But, gentlemen, while we are speakin' of ole King Sol'mon +we ought not to forget who it is that has suppohted 'im. Yondah +she sits on the sidewalk, sellin' 'er apples an' gingerbread."</p> + +<p>The three men looked in the direction indicated.</p> + +<p>"Heah comes ole King Sol'mon now," exclaimed the sheriff.</p> + +<p>Across the open square the vagrant was seen walking slowly +along with his habitual air of quiet, unobtrusive preoccupation. +A minute more and he had come over and passed into the court-house +by a side door.</p> + +<p>"Is Mr. Clay to be in court to-day?"</p> + +<p>"He is expected, I think."</p> + +<p>"Then let's go in: there will be a crowd."</p> + +<p>"I don't know: so many are dead."</p> + +<p>They turned and entered and found seats as quietly as possible; +for a strange and sorrowful hush brooded over the court-room. +Until the bar assembled, it had not been realized how +many were gone. The silence was that of a common overwhelming +disaster. No one spoke with his neighbor; no one +observed the vagrant as he entered and made his way to a seat +on one of the meanest benches, a little apart from the others. +He had not sat there since the day of his indictment for +vagrancy. The judge took his seat, and making a great effort +to control himself, passed his eyes slowly over the court-room. +All at once he caught sight of old King Solomon sitting against +the wall in an obscure corner; and before any one could know +what he was doing, he had hurried down and walked up to the +vagrant and grasped his hand. He tried to speak, but could not. +Old King Solomon had buried his wife and daughter,--buried +them one clouded midnight, with no one present but himself.</p> + +<p>Then the oldest member of the bar started up and followed +the example; and then the other members, rising by a common +impulse, filed slowly back and one by one wrung that hard and +powerful hand. After them came the other persons in the court-room. +The vagrant, the gravedigger, had risen and stood +against the wall, at first with a white face and a dazed expression, +not knowing what it meant; afterwards, when he understood +it, his head dropped suddenly forward and his tears fell +thick and hot upon the hands that he could not see. And his +were not the only tears. Not a man in the long file but paid +his tribute of emotion as he stepped forward to honor that +image of sadly eclipsed but still effulgent humanity. It was not +grief, it was not gratitude, nor any sense of making reparation +for the past. It was the softening influence of an act of heroism, +which makes every man feel himself a brother hand in +hand with every other;--such power has a single act of moral +greatness to reverse the relations of men, lifting up one, and +bringing all others to do him homage.</p> + +<p>It was the coronation scene in the life of 'Ole' King Solomon +of Kentucky.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="WILLIAM_ALLINGHAM"></a>WILLIAM ALLINGHAM</h2> + +<h3>(1828-1889)</h3> +<br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-e.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>ach form of verse has, in addition to its laws of structure, a +subtle quality as difficult to define as the perfume of a +flower. The poem, 'An Evening,' given below, may be +classified both as a song and as a lyric; yet it needs no music other +than its own rhythms, and the full close to each verse which falls +upon the ear like a soft and final chord ending a musical composition. +A light touch and a feeling for shades of meaning are required +to execute such dainty verse. In 'St. Margaret's Eve,' and in many +other ballads, Allingham expresses the broader, more dramatic sweep +of the ballad, and reveals his Celtic ancestry.</p> + +<p>The lovable Irishman, William Allingham, worked hard to enter +the brotherhood of poets. When he was only fourteen his father +took him from school to become clerk in the town bank of which he +himself was manager. "The books which he had to keep for the +next seven years were not those on which his heart was set," says +Mr. George Birkbeck Hill. But this fortune is almost an inevitable +part, and probably not the worst part, of the training for a literary +vocation; and he justified his ambitions by pluckily studying alone +till he had mastered Greek, Latin, French, and German.</p> + +<p>Mr. Hill, in his 'Letters of D.G. Rossetti' (Atlantic Monthly, +May, 1896), thus quotes Allingham's own delightful description of his +early home at Ballyshannon, County Donegal:--</p> + +<blockquote> +"The little old town where I was born has a voice of its own, low, solemn, +persistent, humming through the air day and night, summer and winter. +Whenever I think of that town I seem to hear the voice. The river which +makes it rolls over rocky ledges into the tide. Before spreads a great ocean in +sunshine or storm; behind stretches a many-islanded lake. On the south runs +a wavy line of blue mountains; and on the north, over green rocky hills rise +peaks of a more distant range. The trees hide in glens or cluster near the +river; gray rocks and bowlders lie scattered about the windy pastures. The +sky arches wide over all, giving room to multitudes of stars by night, and +long processions of clouds blown from the sea; but also, in the childish memory +where these pictures live, to deeps of celestial blue in the endless days of +summer. An odd, out-of-the-way little town, ours, on the extreme western +edge of Europe; our next neighbors, sunset way, being citizens of the great +new republic, which indeed, to our imagination, seemed little if at all farther +off than England in the opposite direction." +</blockquote> + +<p>Of the cottage in which he spent most of his childhood and +youth he writes:--</p> + +<blockquote> +"Opposite the hall door a good-sized walnut-tree leaned its wrinkled stem +towards the house, and brushed some of the second-story panes with its +broad, fragrant leaves. To sit at that little upper window when it was open to +a summer twilight, and the great tree rustled gently, and sent one leafy spray +so far that it even touched my face, was an enchantment beyond all telling. +Killarney, Switzerland, Venice, could not, in later life, come near it. On three +sides the cottage looked on flowers and branches, which I count as one of the +fortunate chances of my childhood; the sense of natural beauty thus receiving +its due share of nourishment, and of a kind suitable to those early years." +</blockquote> + +<p>At last a position in the Customs presented itself:--</p> + +<blockquote> +"In the spring of 1846 I gladly took leave forever of discount ledgers +and current accounts, and went to Belfast for two months' instruction in the +duties of Principal Coast Officer of Customs; a tolerably well-sounding title, +but which carried with it a salary of but £80 a year. I trudged daily about +the docks and timber-yards, learning to measure logs, piles of planks, and, +more troublesome, ships for tonnage; indoors, part of the time practiced customs +book-keeping, and talked to the clerks about literature and poetry in a +way that excited some astonishment, but on the whole, as I found at parting, +a certain degree of curiosity and respect. I preached Tennyson to them. +My spare time was mostly spent in reading and haunting booksellers' shops +where, I venture to say, I laid out a good deal more than most people, in proportion +to my income, and managed to get glimpses of many books which I +could not afford or did not care to buy. I enjoyed my new position, on the +whole, without analysis, as a great improvement on the bank; and for the +rest, my inner mind was brimful of love and poetry, and usually all external +things appeared trivial save in their relation to it." +</blockquote> + +<p>Of Allingham's early song-writing, his friend Arthur Hughes +says:--</p> + +<blockquote> +"Rossetti, and I think Allingham himself, told me, in the early days of our +acquaintance, how in remote Ballyshannon, where he was a clerk in the Customs, +in evening walks he would hear the Irish girls at their cottage doors +singing old ballads, which he would pick up. If they were broken or incomplete, +he would add to them or finish them; if they were improper he would +refine them. He could not get them sung till he got the Dublin Catnach of +that day to print them, on long strips of blue paper, like old songs, and if +about the sea, with the old rough woodcut of a ship on the top. He either +gave them away or they were sold in the neighborhood. Then, in his evening +walks, he had at last the pleasure of hearing some of his own ballads sung at +the cottage doors by the blooming lasses, who were quite unaware that it was +the author who was passing by." +</blockquote> + +<p>In 1850 Allingham published a small volume of lyrics whose freshness +and delicacy seemed to announce a new singer, and four years +later his 'Day and Night Songs' strengthened this impression. +Stationed as revenue officer in various parts of England, he wrote +much verse, and published also the 'The Rambles of Patricius Walker,' +a collection of essays upon his walks through England; 'Lawrence +Bloomfield in Ireland,' the tale of a young landlord's efforts to +improve the condition of his tenantry; an anthology, 'Nightingale +Valley' (1862), and an excellent collection of English ballads, 'The +Ballad Book' (1865).</p> + +<p>In 1870 he gladly embraced an opportunity to leave the Customs +for the position of assistant editor of Fraser's Magazine under Froude, +whom he afterward succeeded as editor. He was now a member of +a brilliant literary circle, knew Tennyson, Ruskin, and Carlyle, and +was admitted into the warm friendship of the Pre-Raphaelites. But +in no way does he reflect the Pre-Raphaelite spirit by which he was +surrounded; nor does he write his lyrics in the metres and rhythms +of mediaeval France. He is as oblivious of rondeaux, ballades, and +roundels, as he is of fair damosels with cygnet necks and full pomegranate +lips. He is a child of nature, whose verse is free from all +artificial inspiration or expression, and seems to flow easily, clearly, +and tenderly from his pen. Some of it errs in being too fanciful. +In the Flower-Songs, indeed, he sometimes becomes trivial in his +comparison of each English poet to a special flower; but his poetry +is usually sincere with an undercurrent of pathos, as in 'The Ruined +Chapel,' 'The Winter Pear,' and the 'Song.' For lightness of touch +and aerial grace, 'The Bubble' will bear comparison with any verse +of its own <i>genre</i>. 'Robin Redbreast' has many delightful lines; and +in 'The Fairies' one is taken into the realm of Celtic folklore, which +is Allingham's inheritance, where the Brownies, the Pixies, and the +Leprechauns trip over the dew-spangled meadows, or dance on the +yellow sands, and then vanish away in fantastic mists. Quite different +is 'Lovely Mary Donnelly,' which is a sample of the popular songs +that made him a favorite in his own country.</p> + +<p>After his death at Hampstead in 1889, his body was cremated +according to his wish, when these lines of his own were read:--</p> + +<blockquote> +"Body to purifying flame,<br> +Soul to the Great Deep whence it came,<br> +Leaving a song on earth below,<br> +An urn of ashes white as snow."<br> +</blockquote> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"><b><a name="THE_RUINED_CHAPEL"></a>THE RUINED CHAPEL</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>By the shore, a plot of ground</p> +<p>Clips a ruined chapel round,</p> +<p>Buttressed with a grassy mound;</p> +<p class="i1">Where Day and Night and Day go by</p> +<p>And bring no touch of human sound.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Washing of the lonely seas,</p> +<p>Shaking of the guardian trees,</p> +<p>Piping of the salted breeze;</p> +<p class="i1">Day and Night and Day go by</p> +<p>To the endless tune of these.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Or when, as winds and waters keep</p> +<p>A hush more dead than any sleep,</p> +<p>Still morns to stiller evenings creep,</p> +<p class="i1">And Day and Night and Day go by;</p> +<p>Here the silence is most deep.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The empty ruins, lapsed again</p> +<p>Into Nature's wide domain,</p> +<p>Sow themselves with seed and grain</p> +<p class="i1">As Day and Night and Day go by;</p> +<p>And hoard June's sun and April's rain.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Here fresh funeral tears were shed;</p> +<p>Now the graves are also dead;</p> +<p>And suckers from the ash-tree spread,</p> +<p class="i1">While Day and Night and Day go by;</p> +<p>And stars move calmly overhead.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">From 'Day and Night Songs.'</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"><b><a name="THE_WINTER_PEAR"></a>THE WINTER PEAR</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Is always Age severe?</p> +<p class="i2">Is never Youth austere?</p> +<p class="i2">Spring-fruits are sour to eat;</p> +<p class="i2">Autumn's the mellow time.</p> +<p>Nay, very late in the year,</p> +<p class="i2">Short day and frosty rime,</p> +<p>Thought, like a winter pear,</p> +<p class="i2">Stone-cold in summer's prime,</p> +<p>May turn from harsh to sweet.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">From 'Ballads and Songs.'</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"><b><a name="SONG"></a>SONG</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>O spirit of the Summer-time!</p> +<p class="i1">Bring back the roses to the dells;</p> +<p>The swallow from her distant clime,</p> +<p class="i1">The honey-bee from drowsy cells.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Bring back the friendship of the sun;</p> +<p class="i1">The gilded evenings calm and late,</p> +<p>When weary children homeward run,</p> +<p class="i1">And peeping stars bid lovers wait.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Bring back the singing; and the scent</p> +<p class="i1">Of meadow-lands at dewy prime;</p> +<p>Oh, bring again my heart's content,</p> +<p class="i1">Thou Spirit of the Summer-time!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">From 'Day and Night Songs.'</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"><b><a name="THE_BUBBLE"></a>THE BUBBLE</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>See the pretty planet!</p> +<p class="i3">Floating sphere!</p> +<p>Faintest breeze will fan it</p> +<p class="i3">Far or near;</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>World as light as feather;</p> +<p class="i3">Moonshine rays,</p> +<p>Rainbow tints together,</p> +<p class="i3">As it plays.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Drooping, sinking, failing,</p> +<p class="i3">Nigh to earth,</p> +<p>Mounting, whirling, sailing,</p> +<p class="i3">Full of mirth;</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Life there, welling, flowing,</p> +<p class="i3">Waving round;</p> +<p>Pictures coming, going,</p> +<p class="i3">Without sound.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Quick now, be this airy</p> +<p class="i3">Globe repelled!</p> +<p>Never can the fairy</p> +<p class="i3">Star be held.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Touched--it in a twinkle</p> +<p class="i3">Disappears!</p> +<p>Leaving but a sprinkle,</p> +<p class="i3">As of tears.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">From 'Ballads and Songs.'</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"><b><a name="ST._MARGARETS_EVE"></a>ST. MARGARET'S EVE</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>I built my castle upon the seaside,</p> +<p class="i1">The waves roll so gayly O,</p> +<p>Half on the land and half in the tide,</p> +<p class="i4">Love me true!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Within was silk, without was stone,</p> +<p class="i1">The waves roll so gayly O,</p> +<p>It lacks a queen, and that alone,</p> +<p class="i4">Love me true!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The gray old harper sang to me,</p> +<p class="i1">The waves roll so gayly O,</p> +<p>"Beware of the Damsel of the Sea!"</p> +<p class="i4">Love me true!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Saint Margaret's Eve it did befall,</p> +<p class="i1">The waves roll so gayly O,</p> +<p>The tide came creeping up the wall,</p> +<p class="i4">Love me true!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>I opened my gate; who there should stand--</p> +<p class="i1">The waves roll so gayly O,</p> +<p>But a fair lady, with a cup in her hand,</p> +<p class="i4">Love me true!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The cup was gold, and full of wine,</p> +<p class="i1">The waves roll so gayly O,</p> +<p>"Drink," said the lady, "and I will be thine,"</p> +<p class="i4">Love me true!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>"Enter my castle, lady fair,"</p> +<p class="i1">The waves roll so gayly O,</p> +<p>"You shall be queen of all that's there,"</p> +<p class="i4">Love me true!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>A gray old harper sang to me,</p> +<p class="i1">The waves roll so gayly O,</p> +<p>"Beware of the Damsel of the Sea!"</p> +<p class="i4">Love me true!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>In hall he harpeth many a year,</p> +<p class="i1">The waves roll so gayly O,</p> +<p>And we will sit his song to hear,</p> +<p class="i4">Love me true!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>"I love thee deep, I love thee true,"</p> +<p class="i1">The waves roll so gayly O,</p> +<p>"But ah! I know not how to woo,"</p> +<p class="i4">Love me true!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Down dashed the cup, with a sudden shock,</p> +<p class="i1">The waves roll so gayly O,</p> +<p>The wine like blood ran over the rock,</p> +<p class="i4">Love me true!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>She said no word, but shrieked aloud,</p> +<p class="i1">The waves roll so gayly O,</p> +<p>And vanished away from where she stood,</p> +<p class="i4"> Love me true!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>I locked and barred my castle door,</p> +<p class="i1">The waves roll so gayly O,</p> +<p>Three summer days I grieved sore,</p> +<p class="i4">Love me true!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>For myself a day, a night,</p> +<p class="i1">The waves roll so gayly O,</p> +<p>And two to moan that lady bright,</p> +<p class="i4">Love me true!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">>From 'Ballads and Songs.'</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i1"><b><a name="THE_FAIRIES"></a>THE FAIRIES</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i1">(A CHILD'S SONG)</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Up the airy mountain,</p> +<p class="i1">Down the rushy glen,</p> +<p>We daren't go a hunting</p> +<p class="i1">For fear of little men:</p> +<p>Wee folk, good folk,</p> +<p class="i1">Trooping all together;</p> +<p>Green jacket, red cap,</p> +<p class="i1">And white owl's feather.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Down along the rocky shore</p> +<p class="i1">Some have made their home;</p> +<p>They live on crispy pancakes</p> +<p class="i1">Of yellow-tide foam.</p> +<p>Some in the reeds</p> +<p class="i1">Of the black mountain-lake,</p> +<p>With frogs for their watch-dogs,</p> +<p class="i1">All night awake.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>High on the hill-top</p> +<p class="i1">The old King sits;</p> +<p>He is now so old and gray</p> +<p class="i1">He's nigh lost his wits.</p> +<p>With a bridge of white mist</p> +<p class="i1">Columbkill he crosses,</p> +<p>On his stately journeys</p> +<p class="i1">From Sliveleague to Rosses;</p> +<p>Or going up with music</p> +<p class="i1">On cold starry nights,</p> +<p>To sup with the Queen</p> +<p class="i1">Of the gay northern lights.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>They stole little Bridget</p> +<p class="i1">For seven years long;</p> +<p>When she came down again</p> +<p class="i1">Her friends were all gone.</p> +<p>They took her lightly back,</p> +<p class="i1">Between the night and morrow,</p> +<p>They thought that she was fast asleep,</p> +<p class="i1">But she was dead with sorrow.</p> +<p>They have kept her ever since</p> +<p class="i1">Deep within the lakes,</p> +<p>On a bed of flag leaves</p> +<p class="i1">Watching till she wakes.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>By the craggy hillside,</p> +<p class="i1">Through the mosses bare,</p> +<p>They have planted thorn-trees</p> +<p class="i1">For pleasure here and there.</p> +<p>Is any man so daring</p> +<p class="i1">As dig them up in spite,</p> +<p>He shall feel their sharpest thorns</p> +<p class="i1">In his bed at night.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Up the airy mountain,</p> +<p class="i1">Down the rushy glen,</p> +<p>We daren't go a hunting</p> +<p class="i1">For fear of little men:</p> +<p>Wee folk, good folk,</p> +<p class="i1">Trooping all together;</p> +<p>Green jacket, red cap,</p> +<p class="i1">And white owl's feather.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">From 'Ballads and Songs.'</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"><b><a name="ROBIN_REDBREAST"></a>ROBIN REDBREAST</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i3">(A CHILD'S SONG)</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Good-by, good-by, to Summer!</p> +<p class="i1">For Summer's nearly done;</p> +<p>The garden smiling faintly,</p> +<p class="i1">Cool breezes in the sun;</p> +<p>Our Thrushes now are silent,</p> +<p class="i1">Our Swallows flown away--</p> +<p>But Robin's here, in coat of brown,</p> +<p class="i1">With ruddy breast-knot gay.</p> +<p class="i2">Robin, Robin Redbreast,</p> +<p class="i3">Oh, Robin, dear!</p> +<p class="i2">Robin singing sweetly</p> +<p class="i3">In the falling of the year.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Bright yellow, red, and orange,</p> +<p class="i1">The leaves come down in hosts;</p> +<p>The trees are Indian Princes,</p> +<p class="i1">But soon they'll turn to Ghosts;</p> +<p>The scanty pears and apples</p> +<p class="i1">Hang russet on the bough,</p> +<p>It's Autumn, Autumn, Autumn late,</p> +<p class="i1">'Twill soon be winter now.</p> +<p class="i2">Robin, Robin Redbreast,</p> +<p class="i3">Oh, Robin, dear!</p> +<p class="i2">And welaway! my Robin,</p> +<p class="i3">For pinching times are near.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The fireside for the Cricket,</p> +<p class="i1">The wheatstack for the Mouse,</p> +<p>When trembling night-winds whistle</p> +<p class="i1">And moan all round the house.</p> +<p>The frosty ways like iron,</p> +<p class="i1">The branches plumed with snow--</p> +<p>Alas! in Winter, dead and dark,</p> +<p class="i1">Where can poor Robin go?</p> +<p class="i2">Robin, Robin Redbreast,</p> +<p class="i3">Oh, Robin, dear!</p> +<p class="i2">And a crumb of bread for Robin,</p> +<p class="i3">His little heart to cheer.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">>From 'Ballads and Songs.'</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"><b><a name="AN_EVENING"></a>AN EVENING</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Sunset's mounded cloud;</p> +<p class="i1">A diamond evening-star;</p> +<p class="i1">Sad blue hills afar:</p> +<p class="i2">Love in his shroud.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Scarcely a tear to shed;</p> +<p class="i1">Hardly a word to say;</p> +<p class="i1">The end of a summer's day;</p> +<p class="i2">Sweet Love is dead.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">From 'Day and Night Songs.'</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4"><b><a name="DAFFODIL"></a>DAFFODIL</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Gold tassel upon March's bugle-horn,</p> +<p class="i1">Whose blithe reveille blows from hill to hill</p> +<p class="i1">And every valley rings--O Daffodil!</p> +<p>What promise for the season newly born?</p> +<p>Shall wave on wave of flow'rs, full tide of corn,</p> +<p class="i1">O'erflow the world, then fruited Autumn fill</p> +<p class="i1">Hedgerow and garth? Shall tempest, blight, or chill</p> +<p>Turn all felicity to scathe and scorn?</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Tantarrara! the joyous Book of Spring</p> +<p class="i1">Lies open, writ in blossoms; not a bird</p> +<p class="i1">Of evil augury is seen or heard:</p> +<p>Come now, like Pan's old crew, we'll dance and sing,</p> +<p>Or Oberon's: for hill and valley ring</p> +<p class="i1">To March's bugle-horn,--Earth's blood is stirred.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">From 'Flower Pieces.'</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i3"><b><a name="LOVELY_MARY_DONNELLY"></a>LOVELY MARY DONNELLY</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4">(To an Irish Tune)</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>O lovely Mary Donnelly, it's you I love the best!</p> +<p>If fifty girls were round you, I'd hardly see the rest.</p> +<p>Be what it may the time of day, the place be where it will,</p> +<p>Sweet looks of Mary Donnelly, they bloom before me still.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Her eyes like mountain water that's flowing on a rock,</p> +<p>How clear they are, how dark they are! and they give me many a shock.</p> +<p>Red rowans warm in sunshine and wetted with a shower,</p> +<p>Could ne'er express the charming lip that has me in its power.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Her nose is straight and handsome, her eyebrows lifted up;</p> +<p>Her chin is very neat and pert, and smooth like a china cup;</p> +<p>Her hair's the brag of Ireland, so weighty and so fine,</p> +<p>It's rolling down upon her neck and gathered in a twine.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The dance o' last Whit Monday night exceeded all before;</p> +<p>No pretty girl for miles about was missing from the floor;</p> +<p>But Mary kept the belt of love, and oh, but she was gay!</p> +<p>She danced a jig, she sung a song, that took my heart away.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>When she stood up for dancing, her steps were so complete,</p> +<p>The music nearly killed itself to listen to her feet;</p> +<p>The fiddler moaned his blindness, he heard her so much praised,</p> +<p>But blessed himself he wasn't deaf, when once her voice she raised.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>And evermore I'm whistling or lilting what you sung,</p> +<p>Your smile is always in my heart, your name beside my tongue;</p> +<p>But you've as many sweethearts as you'd count on both your hands,</p> +<p>And for myself there's not a thumb or little finger stands.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Oh, you're the flower o' womankind in country or in town;</p> +<p>The higher I exalt you, the lower I'm cast down.</p> +<p>If some great lord should come this way, and see your beauty bright,</p> +<p>And you to be his lady, I'd own it was but right.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Oh, might we live together in a lofty palace hall,</p> +<p>Where joyful music rises, and where scarlet curtains fall!</p> +<p>Oh, might we live together in a cottage mean and small,</p> +<p>With sods of grass the only roof, and mud the only wall!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>O lovely Mary Donnelly, your beauty's my distress:</p> +<p>It's far too beauteous to be mine, but I'll never wish it less.</p> +<p>The proudest place would fit your face, and I am poor and low;</p> +<p>But blessings be about you, dear, wherever you may go!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i7">From 'Ballads and Songs.'</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="KARL_JONAS_LUDVIG_ALMQUIST"></a>KARL JONAS LUDVIG ALMQUIST</h2> + +<h3>(1793-1866)</h3> +<br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-a.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>lmquist, one of the most versatile writers of Sweden, was a +man of strange contrasts, a genius as uncertain as a will-o'-the-wisp. +His contemporary, the famous poet and critic +Atterbom, writes:--</p> + +<blockquote>"What did the great poets of past times possess which upheld them under +even the bitterest worldly circumstances? Two things: one a strong and +conscientious will, the other a single--not double, much less +manifold--determination for their work, oneness. They were not self-seekers; they sought, +they worshiped something better than themselves. The aim which stood +dimly before their inmost souls was not the enjoyment of flattered vanity; it +was a high, heroic symbol of love of honor and love of country, of heavenly +wisdom. For this they thought it worth while to fight, for this they even +thought it worth while to suffer, without finding the suffering in itself strange, +or calling earth to witness thereof.... The writer of 'Törnrosens Bok' +[The Book of the Rose] is one of these few; he does therefore already reign +over a number of youthful hearts, and out of them will rise his time of honor, +a time when many of the celebrities of the present moment will have faded +away." +</blockquote> + +<p>Almquist was born in Stockholm in 1793. When still a very +young man he obtained a good official position, but gave it up in +1823 to lead a colony of friends into the forests of Värmland, where +they intended to return to a primitive life close to the heart of +nature. He called this colony a "Man's-home Association," and +ordained that in the primeval forest the members should live in turf-covered +huts, wear homespun, eat porridge with a wooden spoon, +and enact the ancient freeholder. The experiment was not successful, +he tired of the manual work, and returning to Stockholm, became +master of the new Elementary School, and began to write text-books +and educational works. His publication of a number of epics, +dramas, lyrics, and romances made him suddenly famous. Viewed +as a whole, this collection is generally called 'The Book of the +Rose,' but at times 'En Irrande Hind' (A Stray Deer). Of this, the +two dramas, 'Signora Luna' and 'Ramido Marinesco,' contain some +of the pearls of Swedish literature. Uneven in the plan and execution, +they are yet masterly in dialogue, and their dramatic and +tragic force is great. Almquist's imagination showed itself as individual +as it is fantastic. Coming from a man hitherto known as the +writer of text-books and the advocate of popular social ideas, the +volumes aroused extraordinary interest. The author revealed himself +as akin to Novalis and Victor Hugo, with a power of language like +that of Atterbom, and a richness of color resembling Tegnèr's. Atterbom +himself wrote of 'Törnrosens Bok' that it was a work whose +"faults were exceedingly easy to overlook and whose beauties exceedingly +difficult to match."</p> + +<p>After this appeared in rapid succession, and written with equal +ease, lyrical, dramatic, educational, poetical, aesthetical, philosophical, +moral, and religious treatises, as well as lectures and studies in history +and law; for Almquist now gave all his time to literary labors. +His novels showed socialistic sympathies, and he put forth newspaper +articles and pamphlets on Socialism which aroused considerable +opposition. Moreover, he delighted in contradictions. One day he +wrote as an avowed Christian, extolling virtue, piety, and Christian +knowledge; the next, he abrogated religion as entirely unnecessary: +and his own explanation of this variability was merely--"I paint so +because it pleases me to paint so, and life is not otherwise."</p> + +<p>In 1851 was heard the startling rumor that he was accused of +forgery and charged with murder. He fled from Sweden and disappeared +from the knowledge of men. Going to America, he earned +under a fictitious name a scanty living, and became, it is said, the +private secretary of Abraham Lincoln. In 1866 he found himself +again under the ban of the law, his papers were destroyed, and he +escaped with difficulty to Bremen, where he died.</p> + +<p>One of his latest works was his excellent modern novel, 'Det Går +An' (It's All Right), a forerunner of the "problem novel" of the day. +It is an attack upon conventional marriage, and pictures the helplessness +of a woman in the hands of a depraved man. Its extreme +views called out violent criticism.</p> + +<p>He was a romanticist through and through, with a strong leaning +toward the French school. Among the best of his tales are 'Araminta +May,' 'Skällnora Quarn' (Skällnora's Mill), and 'Grimstahamns +Nybygge' (Grimstahamn's Settlement). His idyl 'Kapellet' (The +Chapel) is wonderfully true to nature, and his novel 'Palatset' (The +Palace) is rich in humor and true poesy. His literary fame will +probably rest on his romances, which are the best of their kind in +Swedish literature.</p> +<br> + +<h3><a name="CHARACTERISTICS_OF_CATTLE"></a>CHARACTERISTICS OF CATTLE</h3> + +<p>Any one with a taste for physiognomy should carefully observe +the features of the ox and the cow; their demeanor and +the expression of their eyes. They are figures which bear +an extraordinary stamp of respectability. They look neither joyful +nor melancholy. They are seldom evilly disposed, but never +sportive. They are full of gravity, and always seem to be going +about their business. They are not merely of great economic +service, but their whole persons carry the look of it. They are +the very models of earthly carefulness.</p> + +<p>Nothing is ever to be seen more dignified, more official-looking, +than the whole behavior of the ox; his way of carrying his +head, and looking around him. If anybody thinks I mean these +words for a sarcasm, he is mistaken: no slur on official life, or +on what the world calls a man's vocation, is intended. I hold +them all in as much respect as could be asked. And though I +have an eye for contours, no feeling of ridicule is connected in +my mind with any of these. On the contrary, I regard the ox +and the cow with the warmest feelings of esteem. I admire in +them a naïve and striking picture of one who minds his own +business; who submits to the claims of duty, not using the +word in its highest sense; who in the world's estimate is dignified, +steady, conventional, and middle-aged,--that is to say, +neither youthful nor stricken in years.</p> + +<p>Look at that ox which stands before you, chewing his cud +and gazing around him with such unspeakable thoughtfulness--but +which you will find, when you look more closely into his +eyes, is thinking about nothing at all. Look at that discreet, +excellent Dutch cow, which, gifted with an inexhaustible udder, +stands quietly and allows herself to be milked as a matter of +course, while she gazes into space with a most sensible expression. +Whatever she does, she does with the same imperturbable +calmness, and as when a person leaves an important trust to his +own time and to posterity. If the worth of this creature is +thus great on the one side, yet on the other it must be confessed +that she possesses not a single trait of grace, not a +particle of vivacity, and none of that quick characteristic retreating +from an object which indicates an internal buoyancy, an +elastic temperament, such as we see in a bird or fish.... +There is something very agreeable in the varied lowing of cattle +when heard in the distant country, and when replied to by a +large herd, especially toward evening and amid echoes. On the +other hand, nothing is more unpleasant than to hear all at once, +and just beside one, the bellowing of a bull, who thus authoritatively +announces himself, as if nobody else had any right to +utter a syllable in his presence.</p> +<br> + +<h3><a name="A_NEW_UNDINE"></a>A NEW UNDINE</h3> + +<center>From 'The Book of the Rose'</center> + +<p>Miss Rudensköld and her companion sat in one of the pews +in the cheerful and beautiful church of Normalm, which +is all that is left of the once famous cloister of St. Clara, +and still bears the saint's name. The sermon was finished, and +the strong full tones of the organ, called out by the skillful +hands of an excellent organist, hovered like the voices of unseen +angel choirs in the high vaults of the church, floated down to +the listeners, and sank deep into their hearts.</p> + +<p>Azouras did not speak a single word; neither did she sing, +for she did not know a whole hymn through. Nor did Miss +Rudensköld sing, because it was not her custom to sing in +church. During the organ solo, however, Miss Rudensköld ventured +to make some remarks about Dr. Asplund's sermon which +was so beautiful, and about the notices afterward which were so +tiresome. But when her neighbor did not answer, but sat looking +ahead with large, almost motionless eyes, as people stare +without looking at anything in particular, she changed her subject.</p> + +<p>At one of the organ tones which finished a cadence, Azouras +started, and blinked quickly with her eyelids, and a light sigh +showed that she came back to herself and her friend, from her +vague contemplative state of mind. Something indescribable, +very sad, shone in her eyes, and made them almost black; and +with a childlike look at Miss Rudensköld she asked, "Tell me +what that large painting over there represents."</p> + +<p>"The altar-piece? Don't you know? The altar-piece in Clara +is one of the most beautiful we possess."</p> + +<p>"What is going on there?" asked Azouras.</p> + +<p>Miss Rudensköld gave her a side glance; she did not know +that her neighbor in the pew was a girl without baptism, without +Christianity, without the slightest knowledge of holy religion, +a heathen--and knew less than a heathen, for such a one has +his teachings, although they are not Christian. Miss Rudensköld +thought the girl's question came of a momentary forgetfulness, +and answered, to remind her:--</p> + +<p>"Well, you see, it is one of the usual subjects, but unusually +well painted, that is all. High up among the other figures in +the painting you will see the half-reclining figure of one that is +dead--see what an expression the painter has put into the face!--That +is the Saviour."</p> + +<p>"The Saviour?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, God's son, you know; or God Himself."</p> + +<p>"And he is dead?" repeated Azouras to herself with wondering +eyes. "Yes, I believe that; it must be so: it is godlike to +die!"</p> + +<p>Miss Rudensköld looked at her neighbor with wide-opened +eyes. "You must not misunderstand this subject," she said. "It +is human to live and want to live; you can see that, too, in the +altar-piece, for all the persons who are human beings, like ourselves, +are alive."</p> + +<p>"Let us go out! I feel oppressed by fear--no, I will tarry +here until my fear passes away. Go, dearest, I will send you +word."</p> + +<p>Miss Rudensköld took leave of her; went out of the church +and over the churchyard to the Eastern Gate, which faces Oden's +lane....</p> + +<p>The girl meanwhile stayed inside; came to a corner in the +organ stairs; saw people go out little by little; remained unobserved, +and finally heard the sexton and the church-keeper go +away. When the last door was closed, Azouras stepped out of +her hiding-place. Shut out from the entire world, severed from +all human beings, she found herself the only occupant of the +large, light building, into which the sun lavishly poured his gold.</p> + +<p>Although she was entirely ignorant of our holy church customs +and the meaning of the things she saw around her, she had +nevertheless, sometimes in the past, when her mother was in +better health, been present at the church service as a pastime, +and so remembered one thing and another. The persons with +whom she lived, in the halls and corridors of the opera, hardly +ever went to God's house; and generally speaking, church-going +was not practiced much during this time. No wonder, then, that +a child who was not a member of any religious body, and who +had never received an enlightening word from any minister, +should neglect what the initiated themselves did not attend to +assiduously.</p> + +<p>She walked up the aisle, and never had the sad, strange feeling +of utter loneliness taken hold of her as it did now; it was +coupled with the apprehension of a great, overhanging danger. +Her heart beat wildly; she longed unspeakably--but for what? +for her wild free forest out there, where she ran around quick as +a deer? or for what?</p> + +<p>She walked up toward the choir and approached the altar railing. +"Here at least--I remember that once--but that was long +ago, and it stands like a shadow before my memory--I saw many +people kneel here: it must have been of some use to them? +Suppose I did likewise?"</p> + +<p>Nevertheless she thought it would be improper for her to +kneel down on the decorated cushions around the chancel. She +folded her hands and knelt outside of the choir on the bare stone +floor. But what more was she to do or say now? Of what use +was it all? Where was she to turn?</p> + +<p>She knew nothing. She looked down into her own thoughts +as into an immense, silent dwelling. Feelings of sorrow and a +sense of transiency moved in slow swells, like shining, breaking +waves, through her consciousness. "Oh--something to lean on--a +help--where? where? where?"</p> + +<p>She looked quietly about her; she saw nobody. She was sure +to meet the most awful danger when the door was opened, if +help did not come first.</p> + +<p>She turned her eyes back toward the organ, and in her +thoughts she besought grace of the straight, long, shining pipes. +But all their mouths were silent now.</p> + +<p>She looked up to the pulpit; nobody was standing there. In +the pews nobody. She had sent everybody away from here and +from herself.</p> + +<p>She turned her head again toward the choir. She remembered +that when she had seen so many gathered here, two ministers +in vestments had moved about inside of the railing and +had offered the kneeling worshipers something. No doubt to +help them! But now--there was nobody inside there. To be +sure she was kneeling here with folded hands and praying eyes; +but there was nobody, nobody, nobody who offered her the least +little thing. She wept.</p> + +<p>She looked out of the great church windows to the clear +noonday sky; her eyes beheld the delicate azure light which +spread itself over everything far, far away, but on nothing could +her eyes rest. There were no stars to be seen now, and the sun +itself was hidden by the window post, although its mild golden +light flooded the world.</p> + +<p>She looked away again, and her eyes sank to the ground. +Her knees were resting on a tombstone, and she saw many of +the same kind about her. She read the names engraven on the +stones; they were all Swedish, correct and well-known. "Oh," +she said to herself with a sigh, "I have not a name like others! +My names have been many, borrowed,--and oh, often changed. +I did not get one to be my very own! If only I had one like +other people! Nobody has written me down in a book as I have +heard it said others are written down. Nobody asks about me. +I have nothing to do with anybody! Poor Azouras," she whispered +low to herself. She wept much.</p> + +<p>There was no one else who said "poor Azouras Tintomara!" +but it was as if an inner, higher, invisible being felt sorry for +the outer, bodily, visible being, both one and the same person +in her. She wept bitterly over herself.</p> + +<p>"God is dead," she thought, and looked up at the large altar-piece +again. "But I am a human being; I must live." And +she wept more heartily, more bitterly....</p> + +<p>The afternoon passed, and the hour for vespers struck. The +bells in the tower began to lift their solemn voices, and keys +rattled in the lock. Then the heathen girl sprang up, and, much +like a thin vanishing mist, disappeared from the altar. She hid +in her corner again. It seemed to her that she had been forward, +and had taken liberties in the choir of the church to +which she had no right; and that in the congregation coming in +now, she saw persons who had a right to everything.</p> + +<p>Nevertheless, when the harmonious tones of the organ began +to mix with the fragrant summer air in the church, Azouras +stood radiant, and she felt quickly how the weight lifted from +her breast. Was it because of the tears she had shed? Or did +an unknown helper at this moment scatter the fear in her heart?</p> + +<p>She felt no more that it would be dangerous to leave the +church; she stole away, before vespers were over, came out into +the churchyard and turned off to the northern gate.</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i3"><b><a name="GODS_WAR"></a>GOD'S WAR</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>His mighty weapon drawing,</p> +<p class="i1">God smites the world he loves;</p> +<p>Thus, worthy of him growing,</p> +<p class="i1">She his reflection proves.</p> +<p>God's war like lightning striking,</p> +<p class="i1">The heart's deep core lays bare,</p> +<p>Which fair grows to his liking</p> +<p class="i1">Who is supremely fair.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Escapes no weakness shame,</p> +<p class="i1">No hid, ignoble feeling;</p> +<p class="i1">But when his thunder pealing</p> +<p>Enkindles life's deep flame,</p> +<p>And water clear upwelleth,</p> +<p class="i1">Flowing unto its goal,</p> +<p>God's grand cross standing, telleth</p> +<p class="i1">His truth unto the soul.</p> +<p class="i2">Sing, God's war, earth that shakes!</p> +<p class="i2">Sing, sing the peace he makes!</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="JOHANNA_AMBROSIUS"></a>JOHANNA AMBROSIUS</h2> + +<h3>(1854-)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-b.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>efore the year 1895 the name of the German peasant, Johanna +Ambrosius, was hardly known, even within her own country. +Now her melodious verse has made her one of the most +popular writers in Germany. Her genius found its way from the +humble farm in Eastern Prussia, where she worked in the field beside +her husband, to the very heart of the great literary circles. She was +born in Lengwethen, a parish village in Eastern Prussia, on the 3d of +August, 1854. She received only the commonest education, and every +day was filled with the coarsest toil. But her mind and soul were +uplifted by the gift of poetry, to which she gave voice in her rare +moments of leisure. A delicate, middle-aged woman, whose simplicity +is undisturbed by the lavish praises of literary men, she leads the +most unpretending of lives. Her work became known by the merest +chance. She sent a poem to a German weekly, where it attracted the +attention of a Viennese gentleman, Dr. Schrattenthal, who collected +her verses and sent the little volume into the world with a preface +by himself. This work has already gone through twenty-six editions. +The short sketch cited, written some years ago, is the only prose of +hers that has been published.</p> + +<p>The distinguishing characteristics of the poetry of this singularly +gifted woman are the deep, almost painfully intense earnestness pervading +its every line, the fine sense of harmony and rhythmic felicity +attending the comparatively few attempts she has thus far made, and +her tender touch when dwelling upon themes of the heart and home. +One cannot predict what her success will be when she attempts more +ambitious flights, but thus far she seems to have probed the aesthetic +heart of Germany to its centre.</p> +<br> + +<h3><a name="A_PEASANTS_THOUGHTS"></a>A PEASANT'S THOUGHTS</h3> + +<p>The first snow, in large and thick flakes, fell gently and silently +on the barren branches of the ancient pear-tree, standing +like a sentinel at my house door. The first snow of the +year speaks both of joy and sadness. It is so comfortable to sit +in a warm room and watch the falling flakes, eternally pure and +lovely. There are neither flowers nor birds about, to make you +see and hear the beautiful great world. Now the busy peasant +has time to read the stories in his calendar. And I, too, stopped +my spinning-wheel, the holy Christ-child's gift on my thirteenth +birthday, to fold my hands and to look through the calendar of +my thoughts.</p> + +<p>I did not hear a knock at the door, but a little man came in +with a cordial "Good morning, little sister!" I knew him well +enough, though we were not acquaintances. Half familiar, half +strange, this little time-worn figure looked. His queer face +seemed stamped out of rubber, the upper part sad, the lower +full of laughing wrinkles. But his address surprised me, for we +were not in the least related. I shook his horny hand, responding, +"Hearty thanks, little brother." "I call this good luck," +began little brother: "a room freshly scoured, apples roasting in +the chimney, half a cold duck in the cupboard; and you all alone +with cat and clock. It is easier talking when there are two, for +the third is always in the way."</p> + +<p>The old man amused me immensely. I sat down on the +bench beside him and asked after his wife and family. "Thanks, +thanks," he nodded, "all well and happy except our nestling +Ille. She leaves home to-morrow, to eat her bread as a dress-maker +in B--."--"And the other children, where are they?" +"Flown away, long ago! Do you suppose, little sister, that I +want to keep all fifteen at home like so many cabbages in +a single bed?" Fifteen children! Almost triumphantly, little +brother watched me. I owned almost as many brothers and +sisters myself, and fifteen children were no marvel to me. So I +asked if he were a grandfather too.</p> + +<p>"Of course," he answered gravely. "But I am going to tell +you how I came by fifteen children. You know how we peasant +folk give house and land to the eldest son, and only a few +coppers to the youngest children. A bad custom, that leads to +quarrels, and ends sometimes in murder. Fathers and mothers +can't bring themselves to part with the property, and so they +live with the eldest son, who doles out food and shelter, and gets +the farm in the end. So, in time, a family has some rich members +and more paupers. Now, we'd better sell the land and let +the children share alike; but then that way breaks estates too. +I was a younger child, and I received four hundred thalers;--a +large sum forty years ago. I didn't know anything but field +work. The saying that 'The peasant must be kept stupid or he +will not obey' was still printed in all the books. So I had to +look about for a family where a son was needed. One day, with +my four hundred thalers in my pocket, I went to a farm where +there was an unmarried daughter. When you go a-courting +among us, you pretend to mean to buy a horse. That's the +fashion. With us, a lie doesn't wear French rouge. The parents +of Marianne (that was her name) made me welcome. Brown +Bess was brought from the stable, and her neck, legs, and teeth +examined. I showed my willingness to buy her, which meant as +much as to say, 'Your daughter pleases me.' As proud as you +please, I walked through the buildings. Everything in plenty, all +right, not a nail wanting on the harrow, nor a cord missing from +the harness. How I strutted! I saw myself master, and I was +tickled to death to be as rich as my brother.</p> + +<p>"But I reckoned without my host. On tiptoe I stole into the +kitchen, where my sweetheart was frying ham and eggs. I +thought I might snatch a kiss. Above the noise of the sizzling +frying-pan and the crackling wood, I plainly heard the voice of +my--well, let us say it--bride, weeping and complaining to an +old house servant: 'It's a shame and a sin to enter matrimony +with a lie. I can't wed this Michael: not because he is ugly; +that doesn't matter in a man, but he comes too late! My heart +belongs to poor Joseph, the woodcutter, and I'd sooner be turned +out of doors than to make a false promise. Money blinds my +mother's eyes!' Don't be surprised, little sister, that I remember +these words so well. A son doesn't forget his father's blessing, +nor a prisoner his sentence. This was my sentence to poverty +and single-blessedness. I sent word to Marianne that she should +be happy--and so she was.</p> + +<p>"But now to my own story. I worked six years as farm hand +for my rich brother, and then love overtook me. The little +housemaid caught me in the net of her golden locks. What a +fuss it made in our family! A peasant's pride is as stiff as that +of your 'Vous' and 'Zus.' My girl had only a pair of willing +hands and a good heart to give to an ugly, pock-marked being +like me. My mother (God grant her peace!) caused her many a +tear, and when I brought home my Lotte she wouldn't keep the +peace until at last she found out that happiness depends on kindness +more than on money. On the patch of land that I bought, +my wife and I lived as happily as people live when there's love +in the house and a bit of bread to spare. We worked hard and +spent little. A long, scoured table, a wooden bench or so, a +chest or two of coarse linen, and a few pots and pans--that was +our furniture. The walls had never tasted whitewash, but Lotte +kept them scoured. She went to church barefoot, and put on +her shoes at the door. Good things such as coffee and plums, +that the poorest hut has now-a-days, we never saw. We didn't +save much, for crops sold cheap. But I didn't speculate, nor +squeeze money from the sweat of the poor. In time five pretty +little chatterboxes arrived, all flaxen-haired girls with blue eyes, +or brown. I was satisfied with girls, but the mother hankered +after a boy. That's a poor father that prefers a son to a +daughter. A man ought to take boys and girls alike, just as +God sends them. I was glad enough to work for my girls, and +I didn't worry about their future, nor build castles in the air for +them to live in. After fifteen years the boy arrived, but he took +himself quickly out of the world and coaxed his mother away +with him."</p> + +<p>Little brother was silent, and bowed his snow-white head. My +heart felt as if the dead wife flitted through the room and gently +touched the old fellow's thin locks. I saw him kneeling at her +death-bed, heard the little girls sobbing, and waited in silence till +he drew himself up, sighing deeply:--</p> + +<p>"My Lotte died; she left me alone. What didn't I promise +the dear Lord in those black hours! My life, my savings, yea, all +my children if He would but leave her to me. In vain. 'My +thoughts are not thy thoughts, saith the Lord, and My ways +are not thy ways.' It was night in my soul. I cried over my +children, and I only half did my work. At night I tumbled into +bed tearless and prayerless. Oh, sad time! God vainly knocked at +my heart's door until the children fell ill. Oh, what would become +of me if these flowers were gathered? What wealth these rosy +mouths meant to me, how gladly would they smile away my sorrow! +I had set myself up above the Lord. But by my children's +bedside I prayed for grace. They all recovered. I took my +motherless brood to God's temple to thank Him there. Church-going +won't bring salvation, but staying away from church makes +a man stupid and coarse.</p> + +<p>"But I am forgetting, little sister. I started to tell you +about my fifteen children. You see I made up my mind that I +had to find a mother for the chicks. I wouldn't chain a young +thing to my bonds, even if she understood housekeeping. I held +to the saying, 'Equal wealth, equal birth, equal years make a +good match.' When an old widower courts a young girl he looks +at her faults with a hundred eyes when he measures her with +his first wife. But a home without a wife is like spring without +blossoms. So, thinking this way, I chose a widow with ten +children."</p> + +<p>Twirling his thumbs, little brother smiled gayly as he looked +at me. "Five and ten make fifteen, I thought, and when fifteen +prayers rise to heaven, the Lord must hear. My two eldest +stepsons entered military service. We wouldn't spend all our +money on the boys and then console our poor girls with a husband. +I put three sons to trades. But my girls were my pride. +They learned every kind of work. When they could cook, wash, +and spin, we sent them into good households to learn more. +Two married young. Some of the rest are seamstresses and +housekeepers. One is a secretary, and our golden-haired Miez is +lady's-maid to the Countess H----. Both these girls are betrothed. +Miez is the brightest, and she managed to learn, even +at the village school. So much is written about education nowadays," +(little brother drew himself up proudly as he added, "I +take a newspaper,") "but the real education is to keep children +at work and make them unselfish. They must love their work. +Work and pray, these were my rules, and thank Heaven! all my +children are good and industrious.</p> + +<p>"Just think, last summer my dear girls sent me a suit of fine +city clothes and money to go a journey, begging their old father +to make them a visit. Oh, how pretty they looked when they +showed me round the city in spite of my homespun, for I +couldn't bring myself to wear the fine clothes, after all. The +best dressed one was our little lady's-maid, who had a gold watch +in her belt. So I said: 'Listen, child, that is not fit for you.' +But she only laughed. 'Indeed it is, little father. If my gracious +lady makes me a present, I'm not likely to be mistaken for +her on that account.'--'And girls, are you contented to be in +service?'--'Certainly, father: unless there are both masters and +servants the world would go out of its grooves. My good +Countess makes service so light, that we love and serve her. +Yes, little father,' added Miez, 'my gracious mistress chose Gustav +for me, and is going to pay for the wedding and start us in +housekeeping--God bless her!' Now see what good such a +woman does. If people would but learn that it takes wits to +command as well as to obey, they would get along well enough +in these new times of equality. Thank heaven! we country folk +shan't be ruined by idleness. When I saw my thatched roof +again, among the fir-trees, I felt as solemn as if I were going to +prayers. The blue smoke looked like incense. I folded my +hands, I thanked God."</p> + +<p>Little brother arose, his eyes bright with tears. He cast a +wistful look toward the apples in the chimney: "My old wife, +little sister?"--"Certainly, take them all, little brother, you are +heartily welcome to them."--"We are like children, my wife and +I, we carry tidbits to each other, now that our birds have all +flown away."--"That is right, old boy, and God keep thee!" I +said. From the threshold the words echoed back, "God keep +thee!"</p> + +<p>Translation of Miss H. Geist.</p> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="STRUGGLE_AND_PEACE"></a>STRUGGLE AND PEACE</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>A quarter-century warfare woke</p> +<p>No sabre clash nor powder smoke,</p> +<p>No triumph song nor battle cry;</p> +<p>Their shields no templared knights stood by.</p> +<p>Though fought were many battles hot,</p> +<p>Of any fight the world knew not</p> +<p>How great the perils often grew--</p> +<p class="i4">God only knew.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Within my deepest soul-depths torn,</p> +<p>In hands and feet wounds bleeding borne,</p> +<p>Trodden beneath the chargers' tread,</p> +<p>How I endured, felt, suffered, bled,</p> +<p>How wept and groaned I in my woe,</p> +<p>When scoffed the malice-breathing foe,</p> +<p>How pierced his scorn my spirit through,</p> +<p class="i4">God only knew.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The evening nears; cool zephyrs blow;</p> +<p>The struggle wild doth weaker grow;</p> +<p>The air with scarce a sigh is filled</p> +<p>From the pale mouth; the blood is stilled.</p> +<p>Quieted now my bitter pain;</p> +<p>A faint star lights the heavenly plain;</p> +<p>Peace cometh after want and woe--</p> +<p class="i4">My God doth know.</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p><b><a name="DO_THOU_LOVETOO"></a>DO THOU LOVE, TOO!</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>The waves they whisper</p> +<p class="i1">In Luna's glance,</p> +<p>Entrancing music</p> +<p class="i1">For the nixies' dance.</p> +<p>They beckon, smiling,</p> +<p class="i1">And wavewise woo,</p> +<p>While softly plashing:---</p> +<p class="i1">"Do thou love, too!"</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>In blossoming lindens</p> +<p class="i1">Doves fondly rear</p> +<p>Their tender fledglings</p> +<p class="i1">From year to year.</p> +<p>With never a pausing,</p> +<p class="i1">They bill and coo,</p> +<p>And twitter gently:--</p> +<p class="i1">"Do thou love, too!"</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4"><b><a name="INVITATION"></a>INVITATION</b></p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>How long wilt stand outside and cower?</p> +<p class="i1">Come straight within, beloved guest.</p> +<p>The winds are fierce this wintry hour:</p> +<p class="i1">Come, stay awhile with me and rest.</p> +<p>You wander begging shelter vainly</p> +<p class="i1">A weary time from door to door;</p> +<p>I see what you have suffered plainly:</p> +<p class="i1">Come, rest with me and stray no more!</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>And nestle by me, trusting-hearted;</p> +<p class="i1">Lay in my loving hands your head:</p> +<p>Then back shall come your peace departed,</p> +<p class="i1">Through the world's baseness long since fled;</p> +<p>And deep from out your heart upspringing,</p> +<p>Love's downy wings will soar to view,</p> +<p class="i1">The darling smiles like magic bringing</p> +<p>Around your gloomy lips anew.</p> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<p>Come, rest: myself will here detain you,</p> +<p class="i1">So long as pulse of mine shall beat;</p> +<p>Nor shall my heart grow cold and pain you,</p> +<p class="i1">Till carried to your last retreat.</p> +<p>You gaze at me in doubting fashion,</p> +<p class="i1">Before the offered rapture dumb;</p> +<p>Tears and still tears your sole expression:</p> +<p class="i1">Bedew my bosom with them--come!</p> +</div></div> +<br> + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="EDMONDO_DE_AMICIS"></a>EDMONDO DE AMICIS</h2> + +<h3>(1846-)</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-i.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>n 1869, 'Vita Militare' (Military Life), a collection of short +stories, was perhaps the most popular Italian volume of the +year. Read alike in court and cottage, it was everywhere +discussed and enthusiastically praised. Its prime quality was that +quivering sympathy which insures some success to any imaginative +work, however crudely written. But these sketches of all the grim +and amusing phases of Italian soldier life are drawn with an exquisite +precision. The reader feels the breathless discouragement of +the tired soldiers when new dusty vistas are revealed by a sudden +turn in the road ('A Midsummer March'); understands the strong +silent love between officer and orderly, suppressed by military etiquette +('The Orderly'); smiles with the soldiers at the pretty runaway +boy, idol of the regiment ('The Son of the Regiment'); pities +the humiliations of the conscript novice ('The Conscript'); thrills +with the proud sorrow of the old man whose son's colonel tells the +story of his heroic death ('Dead on the Field of Battle'). "When I +had finished reading it," said an Italian workman, "I would gladly +have pressed the hand of the first soldier whom I happened to +meet." The author was only twenty-three, and has since given the +world many delightful volumes, but nothing finer.</p> + +<p class="lft"><img src="images/480.png" width="50%" alt=""></p> + +<p>These sketches were founded upon personal knowledge, for De +Amicis began life as a soldier. After his early education at Coni +and Turin, he entered the military school at Modena, from which he +was sent out as sub-lieutenant in the third regiment of the line. He +saw active service in various expeditions against Sicilian brigands; +and in the war with Austria he fought at the battle of Custozza.</p> + +<p>His literary power seems to have been early +manifest; for in 1867 he became manager +of a newspaper, L'Italia Militare, at Florence; +and in 1871, yielding to his friends' +persuasions, he settled down to authorship +at Turin. His second book was the 'Ricordi,' +memorials dedicated to the youth of Italy, +of national events which had come within +his experience. Half a dozen later stories +published together were also very popular, +especially 'Gli Amici di Collegio' (College +Friends), 'Fortezza,' and 'La Casa Paterna' +(The Paternal Home). He has written +some graceful verse as well.</p> + +<p>But De Amicis soon craved the stimulus of novel environments, +of differing personalities; and he set out upon the travels which he +has so delightfully recounted. This ardent Italian longed for the +repose of "a gray sky," a critic tells us. He went first to Holland, +and experienced a joyous satisfaction in the careful art of that trim +little land. Later, a visit to North Africa in the suite of the Italian +ambassador prompted a brilliant volume, "Morocco," "which glitters +and flashes like a Damascus blade." Among his other well-known +books, descriptive of other trips, are 'Holland and Its People,' +'Spain,' 'London,' 'Paris,' and 'Constantinople,' which, translated +into many languages, have been widely read.</p> + +<p>That unfortunate though not uncommon traveler who finds <i>ennui</i> +everywhere must envy De Amicis his inexhaustible enthusiasm, his +power of epicurean enjoyment in the color and glory of every land. +His is a curiously optimistic nature. Always perceiving the beautiful +and picturesque in art and nature, he treats other aspects hopefully, +and ignores them when he may. He catches what is characteristic +in every nation as inevitably as he catches the physiognomy of a +land with its skies and its waters, its flowers and its atmosphere. +His is a realism transfigured by poetic imagination, which divines +essential things and places them in high relief.</p> + +<p>Very early in life De Amicis announced his love and admiration +of Manzoni, of whom he called himself a disciple. But his is a very +different mind. This Italian, born at Onéglia of Genoese parents, +has inherited the emotional nature of his country. He sees everything +with feeling, penetrating below the surface with sympathetic +insight. Italy gives him his sensuous zest in life. But from France, +through his love of her vigor and grace, his cordial admiration of +her literature, he has gained a refining and strengthening influence. +She has taught him that direct diction, that choice simplicity, which +forsakes the stilted Italian of literary tradition for a style far +simpler, stronger, and more natural.</p> +<br><br><br> + +<p>All selections used by permission of G. P. Putnam's Sons</p> +<br> + +<h3><a name="THE_LIGHT"></a>THE LIGHT</h3> + +<center>From 'Constantinople'</center> + +<p>And first of all, the light! One of my dearest delights at Constantinople +was to see the sun rise and set, standing upon +the bridge of the Sultana Validé. At dawn, in autumn, the +Golden Horn is almost always covered by a light fog, behind +which the city is seen vaguely, like those gauze curtains that +descend upon the stage to conceal the preparations for a scenic +spectacle. Scutari is quite hidden; nothing is to be seen but the +dark uncertain outline of her hills. The bridge and the shores +are deserted, Constantinople sleeps; the solitude and silence render +the spectacle more solemn. The sky begins to grow golden +behind the hills of Scutari. Upon that luminous strip are drawn, +one by one, black and clear, the tops of the cypress trees in the +vast cemetery, like an army of giants ranged upon the heights; +and from one cape of the Golden Horn to the other there shines +a tremulous light, faint as the first murmur of the awakening +city. Then behind the cypresses of the Asiatic shore comes forth +an eye of fire, and suddenly the white tops of the four minarets +of Saint Sophia are tinted with deep rose. In a few minutes, +from hill to hill, from mosque to mosque, down to the end of the +Golden Horn, all the minarets, one after the other, turn rose +color; all the domes, one by one, are silvered, the flush descends +from terrace to terrace, the tremulous light spreads, the great +veil melts, and all Stamboul appears, rosy and resplendent upon +her heights, blue and violet along the shores, fresh and young, as +if just risen from the waters.</p> + +<p>As the sun rises, the delicacy of the first tints vanishes in an +immense illumination, and everything remains bathed in white +light until toward evening. Then the divine spectacle begins +again. The air is so limpid that from Galata one can see clearly +every distant tree, as far as Kadi-Kioi. The whole of the +immense profile of Stamboul stands out against the sky with such +a clearness of line and rigor of color, that every minaret, obelisk, +and cypress-tree can be counted, one by one, from Seraglio Point +to the cemetery of Eyub. The Golden Horn and the Bosphorus +assume a wonderful ultramarine color; the heavens, the color of +amethyst in the East, are afire behind Stamboul, tinting the horizon +with infinite lights of rose and carbuncle, that make one +think of the first day of the creation; Stamboul darkens, Galata +becomes golden, and Scutari, struck by the last rays of the setting +sun, with every pane of glass giving back the glow, looks +like a city on fire.</p> + +<p>And this is the moment to contemplate Constantinople. There +is one rapid succession of the softest tints, pallid gold, rose and +lilac, which quiver and float over the sides of the hills and the +water, every moment giving and taking away the prize of beauty +from each part of the city, and revealing a thousand modest +graces of the landscape that have not dared to show themselves +in the full light. Great melancholy suburbs are lost in the +shadow of the valleys; little purple cities smile upon the heights; +villages faint as if about to die; others die at once like extinguished +flames; others, that seemed already dead, revive, and +glow, and quiver yet a moment longer under the last ray of the +sun. Then there is nothing left but two resplendent points upon +the Asiatic shore,--the summit of Mount Bulgurlu, and the +extremity of the cape that guards the entrance to the Propontis; +they are at first two golden crowns, then two purple caps, then +two rubies; then all Constantinople is in shadow, and ten thousand +voices from ten thousand minarets announce the close of +the day.</p> +<br> + +<h3><a name="RESEMBLANCES"></a>RESEMBLANCES</h3> + +<center>From 'Constantinople'</center> + +<p>In the first days, fresh as I was from the perusal of Oriental +literature, I saw everywhere the famous personages of history +and legend, and the figures that recalled them resembled +sometimes so faithfully those that were fixed in my imagination, +that I was constrained to stop and look at them. How many +times have I seized my friend by the arm, and pointing to a +person passing by, have exclaimed: "It is he, <i>cospetto!</i> do you +not recognize him?" In the square of the Sultana Validé, I frequently +saw the gigantic Turk who threw down millstones from +the walls of Nicaea on the heads of the soldiers of Baglione; I +saw in front of a mosque Umm Djemil, that old fury that sowed +brambles and nettles before Mahomet's house; I met in the book +bazaar, with a volume under his arm, Djemaleddin, the learned +man of Broussa, who knew the whole of the Arab dictionary by +heart; I passed quite close to the side of Ayesha, the favorite +wife of the Prophet, and she fixed upon my face her eyes, brilliant +and humid, like the reflection of stars in a well; I have +recognized, in the At-Meidan, the famous beauty of that poor +Greek woman killed by a cannon ball at the base of the serpentine +column; I have been face to face, in the Fanar, with Kara-Abderrahman, +the handsome young Turk of the time of Orkhan; +I have seen Coswa, the she-camel of the Prophet; I have encountered +Kara-bulut, Selim's black steed; I have met the poor +poet Fignahi, condemned to go about Stamboul tied to an ass +for having pierced with an insolent distich the Grand Vizier of +Ibrahim; I have been in the same café with Soliman the Big, +the monstrous admiral, whom four robust slaves hardly succeeded +in lifting from the divan; Ali, the Grand Vizier, who could not +find in all Arabia a horse that could carry him; Mahmoud Pasha, +the ferocious Hercules that strangled the son of Soliman; and the +stupid Ahmed Second, who continually repeated "Koso! Koso!" +(Very well, very well) crouching before the door of the copyists' +bazaar, in the square of Bajazet. All the personages of the +'Thousand and One Nights,' the Aladdins, the Zobeides, the +Sindbads, the Gulnares, the old Jewish merchants, possessors of +enchanted carpets and wonderful lamps, passed before me like a +procession of phantoms.</p> +<br> + +<h3><a name="BIRDS"></a>BIRDS</h3> + +<center>From 'Constantinople'</center> + +<p>Constantinople has one grace and gayety peculiar to itself, +that comes from an infinite number of birds of every kind, +for which the Turks nourish a warm sentiment and regard. +Mosques, groves, old walls, gardens, palaces, all resound with +song, the whistling and twittering of birds; everywhere wings +are fluttering, and life and harmony abound. The sparrows enter +the houses boldly, and eat out of women's and children's hands; +swallows nest over the café doors, and under the arches of the +bazaars; pigeons in innumerable swarms, maintained by legacies +from sultans and private individuals, form garlands of black and +white along the cornices of the cupolas and around the terraces +of the minarets; sea-gulls dart and play over the water; thousands +of turtle-doves coo amorously among the cypresses in the cemeteries; +crows croak about the Castle of the Seven Towers halcyons +come and go in long files between the Black Sea and +the Sea of Marmora; and storks sit upon the cupolas of the +mausoleums. For the Turk, each one of these birds has a gentle +meaning, or a benignant virtue: turtle-doves are favorable to +lovers, swallows keep away fire from the roofs where they build +their nests, storks make yearly pilgrimages to Mecca, halcyons +carry the souls of the faithful to Paradise. Thus he protects and +feeds them, through a sentiment of gratitude and piety; and they +enliven the house, the sea, and the sepulchre. Every quarter of +Stamboul is full of the noise of them, bringing to the city a sense +of the pleasures of country life, and continually refreshing the +soul with a reminder of nature.</p> +<br> + +<h3><a name="CORDOVA"></a>CORDOVA</h3> + +<center>From 'Spain'</center> + +<p>For a long distance the country offers no new aspect to the +feverish curiosity of the tourist. At Vilches there is a vast +plain, and beyond there the open country of Tolosa, where +Alphonso VIII., King of Castile, gained the celebrated victory +"de las Navas" over the Mussulman army. The sky was very +clear, and in the distance one could see the mountains of the +Sierra de Segura. Suddenly, there comes over one a sensation +which seems to respond to a suppressed exclamation of surprise: +the first aloes with their thick leaves, the unexpected heralds of +tropical vegetation, rise on both sides of the road. Beyond, the +fields studded with flowers begin to appear. The first are studded, +those which follow almost covered, then come vast stretches of +ground entirely clothed with poppies, daisies, lilies, wild mushrooms, +and ranunculuses, so that the country (as it presents itself +to view) looks like a succession of immense purple, gold, and +snowy-hued carpets. In the distance, among the trees, are innumerable +blue, white, and yellow streaks, as far as the eye can +reach; and nearer, on the banks of the ditches, the elevations of +ground, the slopes, and even on the edge of the road are flowers +in beds, clumps, and clusters, one above the other, grouped in +the form of great bouquets, and trembling on their stalks, which +one can almost touch with his hand. Then there are fields white +with great blades of grain, flanked by plantations of roses, orange +groves, immense olive groves, and hillsides varied by a thousand +shades of green, surmounted by ancient Moorish towers, scattered +with many-colored houses; and between the one and the other +are white and slender bridges that cross rivulets hidden by the +trees.</p> + +<p>On the horizon appear the snowy caps of the Sierra Nevada; +under that white streak lie the undulating blue ones of the nearer +mountains. The country becomes more varied and flourishing; +Arjonilla lies in a grove of olives, whose boundary one cannot +see; Pedro Abad, in the midst of a plain, covered with vineyards +and fruit-trees; Ventas di Alcolea, on the last hills of the Sierra +Nevada, peopled with villas and gardens. We are approaching +Cordova, the train flies along, we see little stations half hidden +by trees and flowers, the wind carries the rose leaves into the +carriages, great butterflies fly near the windows, a delicious perfume +permeates the air, the travelers sing; we pass through an +enchanted garden, the aloes, oranges, palms, and villas grow +more frequent; and at last we hear a cry--"Here is Cordova!"</p> + +<p>How many lovely pictures and grand recollections the sound +of that name awakens in one's mind! Cordova,--the ancient +pearl of the East, as the Arabian poets call it,--the city of +cities; Cordova of the thirty suburbs and three thousand mosques, +which inclosed within her walls the greatest temple of Islam! +Her fame extended throughout the East, and obscured the glory +of ancient Damascus. The faithful came from the most remote +regions of Asia to banks of the Guadalquivir to prostrate themselves +in the marvelous Mihrab of her mosque, in the light of the +thousand bronze lamps cast from the bells of the cathedrals of +Spain. Hither flocked artists, savants, poets from every part of +the Mahometan world to her flourishing schools, immense libraries, +and the magnificent courts of her caliphs. Riches and +beauty flowed in, attracted by the fame of her splendor. From +here they scattered, eager for knowledge, along the coasts of +Africa, through the schools of Tunis, Cairo, Bagdad, Cufa, and +even to India and China, in order to gather inspiration and +records; and the poetry sung on the slopes of the Sierra Morena +flew from lyre to lyre, as far as the valleys of the Caucasus, to +excite the ardor for pilgrimages. The beautiful, powerful, and +wise Cordova, crowned with three thousand villages, proudly +raised her white minarets in the midst of orange groves, and +spread around the valley a voluptuous atmosphere of joy and +glory.</p> + +<p>I leave the train, cross a garden, look around me. I am +alone. The travelers who were with me disappear here and +there; I still hear the noise of a carriage which is rolling off; +then all is quiet. It is midday, the sky is very clear, and the +air suffocating. I see two white houses; it is the opening of a +street; I enter and go on. The street is narrow, the houses as +small as the little villas on the slopes of artificial gardens, +almost all one story in height, with windows a few feet from +the ground, the roofs so low that one could almost touch them +with a stick, and the walls very white. The street turns; I +look, see no one, and hear neither step nor voice. I say to +myself:--"This must be an abandoned street!" and try another +one, in which the houses are white, the windows closed, and +there is nothing but silence and solitude around me. "Why, +where am I?" I ask myself. I go on; the street, which is so +narrow that a carriage could not pass, begins to wind; on the +right and left I see other deserted streets, white houses, and +closed windows. My step resounds as if in a corridor. The +whiteness of the walls is so vivid that even the reflection is +trying, and I am obliged to walk with my eyes half closed, for +it really seems as if I were making my way through the snow. +I reach a small square; everything is closed, and no one is to +be seen. At this point a vague feeling of melancholy seizes +me, such as I have never experienced before; a mixture of +pleasure and sadness, similar to that which comes to children +when, after a long run, they reach a lonely rural spot and +rejoice in their discovery, but with a certain trepidation lest +they should be too far from home. Above many roofs rise the +palm-trees of inner gardens. Oh, fantastic legends of Odalisk +and Caliph! On I go from street to street, and square to +square; I begin to meet some people, but they pass and disappear +like phantoms. All the streets resemble each other; the +houses have only three or four windows; and not a spot, scrawl, +or crack is to be seen on the walls, which are as smooth and +white as a sheet of paper. From time to time I hear a whisper +behind a blind, and see, almost at the same moment, a dark +head, with a flower in the hair, appear and disappear. I look +in at a door....</p> + +<p>A <i>patio!</i> How shall I describe a <i>patio?</i> It is not a court, +nor a garden, nor a room; but it is all three things combined. +Between the patio and the street there is a vestibule. On the +four sides of the patio rise slender columns, which support, up +to a level with the first floor, a species of gallery inclosed in +glass; above the gallery is stretched a canvas, which shades the +court. The vestibule is paved with marble, the door flanked +by columns, surmounted by bas-reliefs, and closed by a slender +iron gate of graceful design. At the end of the patio there is +a fountain; and all around are scattered chairs, work-tables, +pictures, and vases of flowers. I run to another door: there is +another patio, with its walls covered with ivy, and a number of +niches holding little statues, busts, and urns. I look in at a third +door: here is another patio, with its walls worked in mosaics, a +palm in the centre, and a mass of flowers all around. I stop at +a fourth door: after the patio there is another vestibule, after this +a second patio, in which one sees other statues, columns, and +fountains. All these rooms and gardens are so neat and clean +that one could pass his hand over the walls and on the ground +without leaving a trace; and they are fresh, odorous, and lighted +by an uncertain light, which increases their beauty and mysterious +appearance.</p> + +<p>On I go at random from street to street. As I walk, my +curiosity increases and I quicken my pace. It seems impossible +that a whole city can be like this; I am afraid of stumbling +across some house or coming into some street that will remind +me of other cities, and disturb my beautiful dream. But no, the +dream lasts; for everything is small, lovely, and mysterious. At +every hundred steps I reach a deserted square, in which I stop +and hold my breath; from time to time there appears a cross-road, +and not a living soul is to be seen; everything is white, +the windows closed, and silence reigns on all sides. At each +door there is a new spectacle; there are arches, columns, flowers, +jets of water, and palms; a marvelous variety of design, tints, +light, and perfume; here the odor of roses, there of oranges, +farther on of pinks; and with this perfume a whiff of fresh air, +and with the air a subdued sound of women's voices, the rustling +of leaves, and the singing of birds. It is a sweet and varied +harmony, that without disturbing the silence of the streets, +soothes the ear like the echo of distant music. Ah! it is not a +dream! Madrid, Italy, Europe, are indeed far away! Here one +lives another life, and breathes the air of a different world,--for +I am in the East.</p> +<br> + +<h3><a name="THE_LAND_OF_PLUCK"></a>THE LAND OF PLUCK</h3> + +<center>From 'Holland and Its People'</center> + +<p>Whoever looks for the first time at a large map of Holland +wonders that a country so constituted can continue to +exist. At the first glance it is difficult to see whether +land or water predominates, or whether Holland belongs most to +the continent or to the sea. Those broken and compressed +coasts; those deep bays; those great rivers that, losing the aspect +of rivers, seem bringing new seas to the sea; that sea which, +changing itself into rivers, penetrates the land and breaks it into +archipelagoes; the lakes, the vast morasses, the canals crossing +and recrossing each other, all combine to give the idea of a +country that may at any moment disintegrate and disappear. +Seals and beavers would seem to be its rightful inhabitants; but +since there are men bold enough to live in it, they surely cannot +ever sleep in peace.</p> + +<br> +<a name="491.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><img src="images/491.jpg" width="40%" alt=""> +<br> +<b>A DUTCH GIRL.<br> +Photogravure from Painting by H. Vogka.</b></p><br> + +<p>What sort of a country Holland is, has been told by many in +few words. Napoleon said it was an alluvion of French rivers,--the +Rhine, the Scheldt, and the Meuse,--and with this pretext he +added it to the Empire. One writer has defined it as a sort of +transition between land and sea. Another, as an immense crust +of earth floating on the water. Others, an annex of the old +continent, the China of Europe, the end of the earth and the +beginning of the ocean, a measureless raft of mud and sand; +and Philip II. called it the country nearest to hell.</p> + +<p>But they all agreed upon one point, and all expressed it in +the same words:--Holland is a conquest made by man over the +sea; it is an artificial country: the Hollanders made it; it exists +because the Hollanders preserve it; it will vanish whenever the +Hollanders shall abandon it.</p> + +<p>To comprehend this truth, we must imagine Holland as it was +when first inhabited by the first German tribes that wandered +away in search of a country.</p> + +<p>It was almost uninhabitable. There were vast tempestuous +lakes, like seas, touching one another; morass beside morass; one +tract after another covered with brushwood; immense forests of +pines, oaks, and alders, traversed by herds of wild horses, and +so thick were these forests that tradition says one could travel +leagues passing from tree to tree without ever putting foot to the +ground. The deep bays and gulfs carried into the heart of the +country the fury of the northern tempests. Some provinces disappeared +once every year under the waters of the sea, and were +nothing but muddy tracts, neither land nor water, where it was +impossible either to walk or to sail. The large rivers, without +sufficient inclination to descend to the sea, wandered here and +there uncertain of their way, and slept in monstrous pools and +ponds among the sands of the coasts. It was a sinister place, +swept by furious winds, beaten by obstinate rains, veiled in a +perpetual fog, where nothing was heard but the roar of the sea +and the voices of wild beasts and birds of the ocean. The first +people who had the courage to plant their tents there, had to +raise with their own hands dikes of earth to keep out the rivers +and the sea, and lived within them like shipwrecked men upon +desolate islands, venturing forth at the subsidence of the waters +in quest of food in the shape of fish and game, and gathering the +eggs of marine birds upon the sand.</p> + +<p>Caesar, passing by, was the first to name this people. The +other Latin historians speak with compassion and respect of these +intrepid barbarians who lived upon a "floating land," exposed to +the intemperance of a cruel sky and the fury of the mysterious +northern sea; and the imagination pictures the Roman soldiers, +who, from the heights of the uttermost citadels of the empire, +beaten by the waves, contemplated with wonder and pity those +wandering tribes upon their desolate land, like a race accursed of +heaven.</p> + +<p>Now, if we remember that such a region has become one of +the most fertile, wealthiest, and best regulated of the countries +of the world, we shall understand the justice of the saying that +Holland is a conquest made by man. But, it must be added, the +conquest goes on forever.</p> + +<p>To explain this fact--to show how the existence of Holland, +in spite of the great defensive works constructed by the inhabitants, +demands an incessant and most perilous struggle--it will +be enough to touch here and there upon a few of the principal +vicissitudes of her physical history, from the time when her +inhabitants had already reduced her to a habitable country.</p> + +<p>Tradition speaks of a great inundation in Friesland in the +sixth century. From that time every gulf, every island, and it +may be said every city, in Holland has its catastrophe to record. +In thirteen centuries, it is recorded that one great inundation, +beside smaller ones, has occurred every seven years; and the +country being all plain, these inundations were veritable floods. +Towards the end of the thirteenth century, the sea destroyed a +part of a fertile peninsula near the mouth of the Ems, and swallowed +up more than thirty villages. In the course of the same +century, a series of inundations opened an immense chasm in +northern Holland, and formed the Zuyder Zee, causing the death +of more than eighty thousand persons. In 1421 a tempest swelled +the Meuse, so that in one night the waters overwhelmed seventy-two +villages and one hundred thousand inhabitants. In 1532 the +sea burst the dikes of Zealand, destroying hundreds of villages, +and covering forever a large tract of country. In 1570 a storm +caused another inundation in Zealand and in the province of +Utrecht; Amsterdam was invaded by the waters, and in Friesland +twenty thousand people were drowned. Other great inundations +took place in the seventeenth century; two terrible ones at +the beginning and the end of the eighteenth; one in 1825 that +desolated North Holland, Friesland, Over-Yssel, and Gueldres; +and another great one of the Rhine, in 1855, which invaded +Gueldres and the province of Utrecht, and covered a great part +of North Brabant. Beside these great catastrophes, there happened +in different centuries innumerable smaller ones, which +would have been famous in any other country, but which in +Holland are scarcely remembered: like the rising of the lake of +Haarlem, itself the result of an inundation of the sea; flourishing +cities of the gulf of Zuyder Zee vanished under the waters; the +islands of Zealand covered again and again by the sea, and again +emerging; villages of the coast, from Helder to the mouths of +the Meuse, from time to time inundated and destroyed; and in +all these inundations immense loss of life of men and animals. +It is plain that miracles of courage, constancy, and industry must +have been accomplished by the Hollanders, first in creating and +afterwards in preserving such a country. The enemy from which +they had to wrest it was triple: the sea, the lakes, the rivers. +They drained the lakes, drove back the sea, and imprisoned the +rivers.</p> + +<p>To drain the lakes the Hollanders pressed the air into their +service. The lakes, the marshes, were surrounded by dikes, the +dikes by canals; and an army of windmills, putting in motion +force-pumps, turned the water into the canals, which carried it +off to the rivers and the sea. Thus vast tracts of land buried +under the water saw the sun, and were transformed, as if by +magic, into fertile fields, covered with villages, and intersected by +canals and roads. In the seventeenth century, in less than forty +years, twenty-six lakes were drained. At the beginning of the +present century, in North Holland alone, more than six thousand +hectares (or fifteen thousand acres) were thus redeemed from the +waters; in South Holland, before 1844, twenty-nine thousand +hectares; in the whole of Holland, from 1500 to 1858, three hundred +and fifty-five thousand hectares. Substituting steam-mills +for windmills, in thirty-nine months was completed the great +undertaking of the draining of the lake of Haarlem, which measured +forty-four kilometres in circumference, and forever threatened +with its tempests the cities of Haarlem, Amsterdam, and Leyden. +And they are now meditating the prodigious work of drying up +the Zuyder Zee, which embraces an area of more than seven +hundred square kilometres.</p> + +<p>The rivers, another eternal enemy, cost no less of labor and +sacrifice. Some, like the Rhine, which lost itself in the sands +before reaching the sea, had to be channeled and defended at +their mouths, against the tides, by formidable cataracts; others, +like the Meuse, bordered by dikes as powerful as those that +were raised against the ocean; others, turned from their course; +the wandering waters gathered together; the course of the affluents +regulated; the waters divided with rigorous measure in order +to retain that enormous mass of liquid in equilibrium, where the +slightest inequality might cost a province; and in this way all +the rivers that formerly spread their devastating floods about +the country were disciplined into channels and constrained to do +service.</p> + +<p>But the most tremendous struggle was the battle with the +ocean. Holland is in great part lower than the level of the sea; +consequently, everywhere that the coast is not defended by sand +banks it has to be protected by dikes. If these interminable bulwarks +of earth, granite, and wood were not there to attest the +indomitable courage and perseverance of the Hollanders, it would +not be believed that the hand of man could, even in many centuries, +have accomplished such a work. In Zealand alone the +dikes extend to a distance of more than four hundred kilometres. +The western coast of the island of Walcheren is defended by a +dike, in which it is computed that the expense of construction +added to that of preservation, if it were put out at interest, +would amount to a sum equal in value to that which the dike +itself would be worth were it made of massive copper. Around +the city of Helder, at the northern extremity of North Holland, +extends a dike ten kilometres long, constructed of masses of Norwegian +granite, which descends more than sixty metres into the +sea. The whole province of Friesland, for the length of eighty-eight +kilometres, is defended by three rows of piles sustained by +masses of Norwegian and German granite. Amsterdam, all the +cities of the Zuyder Zee, and all the islands,--fragments of vanished +lands,--which are strung like beads between Friesland and +North Holland, are protected by dikes. From the mouths of the +Ems to those of the Scheldt, Holland is an impenetrable fortress, +of whose immense bastions the mills are the towers, the cataracts +are the gates, the islands the advanced forts; and like a true +fortress, it shows to its enemy, the sea, only the tops of its bell-towers +and the roofs of its houses, as if in defiance and derision.</p> + +<p>Holland is a fortress, and her people live as in a fortress, on +a war footing with the sea. An army of engineers, directed by +the Minister of the Interior, spread over the country, and, ordered +like an army, continually spy the enemy, watch over the internal +waters, foresee the bursting of the dikes, order and direct the +defensive works. The expenses of the war are divided,--one +part to the State, one part to the provinces; every proprietor +pays, beside the general imposts, a special impost for the dikes, +in proportion to the extent of his lands and their proximity to +the water. An accidental rupture, an inadvertence, may cause a +flood; the peril is unceasing; the sentinels are at their posts upon +the bulwarks; at the first assault of the sea, they shout the war-cry, +and Holland sends men, material, and money. And even +when there is no great battle, a quiet, silent struggle is forever +going on. The innumerable mills, even in the drained districts, +continue to work unresting, to absorb and turn into the canals +the water that falls in rain and that which filters in from the sea. +Every day the cataracts of the bays and rivers close their gigantic +gates against the high tide trying to rush into the heart of +the land. The work of strengthening dikes, fortifying sand-banks +with plantations, throwing out new dikes where the banks are +low, straight as great lances, vibrating in the bosom of the sea +and breaking the first impetus of the wave, is forever going on. +And the sea eternally knocks at the river-gates, beats upon the +ramparts, growls on every side her ceaseless menace, lifting her +curious waves as if to see the land she counts as hers, piling up +banks of sand before the gates to kill the commerce of the cities, +forever gnawing, scratching, digging at the coast; and failing to +overthrow the ramparts upon which she foams and fumes in +angry effort, she casts at their feet ships full of the dead, that +they may announce to the rebellious country her fury and her +strength.</p> + +<p>In the midst of this great and terrible struggle Holland is +transformed: Holland is the land of transformations. A geographical +map of that country as it existed eight centuries ago +is not recognizable. Transforming the sea, men also are transformed. +The sea, at some points, drives back the land; it takes +portions from the continent, leaves them and takes them again; +joins islands to the mainland with ropes of sand, as in the case +of Zealand; breaks off bits from the mainland and makes new +islands, as in Wieringen; retires from certain coasts and makes +land cities out of what were cities of the sea, as Leuvarde; converts +vast tracts of plain into archipelagoes of a hundred islets, +as Biisbosch; separates a city from the land, as Dordrecht; forms +new gulfs two leagues broad, like the gulf of Dollart; divides +two provinces with a new sea, like North Holland and Friesland. +The effect of the inundations is to cause the level of the sea to +rise in some places and to sink in others; sterile lands are fertilized +by the slime of the rivers, fertile lands are changed into +deserts of sand. With the transformations of the waters alternate +the transformations of labor. Islands are united to continents, +like the island of Ameland; entire provinces are reduced to +islands, as North Holland will be by the new canal of Amsterdam, +which is to separate it from South Holland; lakes as large +as provinces disappear altogether, like the lake of Beemster; by +the extraction of peat, land is converted into lakes, and these +lakes are again transformed into meadows. And thus the country +changes its aspect according to the violence of nature or the +needs of men. And while one goes over it with the latest map +in hand, one may be sure that the map will be useless in a few +years, because even now there are new gulfs in process of formation, +tracts of land just ready to be detached from the mainland, +and great canals being cut that will carry life to uninhabited districts.</p> + +<p>But Holland has done more than defend herself against the +waters; she has made herself mistress of them, and has used +them for her own defense. Should a foreign army invade her +territory, she has but to open her dikes and unchain the sea and +the rivers, as she did against the Romans, against the Spaniards, +against the army of Louis XIV., and defend the land cities with +her fleet. Water was the source of her poverty, she has made +it the source of wealth. Over the whole country extends an +immense network of canals, which serves both for the irrigation +of the land and as a means of communication. The cities, by +means of canals, communicate with the sea; canals run from +town to town, and from them to villages, which are themselves +bound together by these watery ways, and are connected even to +the houses scattered over the country; smaller canals surround +the fields and orchards, pastures and kitchen-gardens, serving at +once as boundary wall, hedge, and road-way; every house is a +little port. Ships, boats, rafts, move about in all directions, as +in other places carts and carriages. The canals are the arteries +of Holland, and the water her life-blood. But even setting aside +the canals, the draining of the lakes, and the defensive works, on +every side are seen the traces of marvelous undertakings. The +soil, which in other countries is a gift of nature, is in Holland a +work of men's hands. Holland draws the greater part of her +wealth from commerce; but before commerce comes the cultivation +of the soil; and the soil had to be created. There were +sand-banks interspersed with layers of peat, broad downs swept +by the winds, great tracts of barren land apparently condemned +to an eternal sterility. The first elements of manufacture, iron +and coal, were wanting; there was no wood, because the forests +had already been destroyed by tempests when agriculture began; +there was no stone, there were no metals. Nature, says a Dutch +poet, had refused all her gifts to Holland; the Hollanders had to +do everything in spite of nature. They began by fertilizing the +sand. In some places they formed a productive soil with earth +brought from a distance, as a garden is made; they spread the +siliceous dust of the downs over the too watery meadows; they +mixed with the sandy earth the remains of peat taken from the +bottoms; they extracted clay to lend fertility to the surface of +their lands; they labored to break up the downs with the plow: +and thus in a thousand ways, and continually fighting off the +menacing waters, they succeeded in bringing Holland to a state +of cultivation not inferior to that of more favored regions. That +Holland, that sandy, marshy country which the ancients considered +all but uninhabitable, now sends out yearly from her confines +agricultural products to the value of a hundred millions of +francs, possesses about one million three hundred thousand head +of cattle, and in proportion to the extent of her territory may be +accounted one of the most populous of European States.</p> + +<p>It may be easily understood how the physical peculiarities of +their country must influence the Dutch people; and their genius +is in perfect harmony with the character of Holland. It is sufficient +to contemplate the monuments of their great struggle with +the sea in order to understand that their distinctive characteristics +must be firmness and patience, accompanied by a calm and constant +courage. That glorious battle, and the consciousness of +owing everything to their own strength, must have infused and +fortified in them a high sense of dignity and an indomitable spirit +of liberty and independence. The necessity of a constant struggle, +of a continuous labor, and of perpetual sacrifices in defense of +their existence, forever taking them back to a sense of reality, +must have made them a highly practical and economical people; +good sense should be their most salient quality, economy one of +their chief virtues; they must be excellent in all useful arts, +sparing of diversion, simple even in their greatness; succeeding +in what they undertake by dint of tenacity and a thoughtful and +orderly activity; more wise than heroic; more conservative than +creative; giving no great architects to the edifice of modern +thought, but the ablest of workmen, a legion of patient and +laborious artisans. And by virtue of these qualities of prudence, +phlegmatic activity, and the spirit of conservatism, they are ever +advancing, though by slow degrees; they acquire gradually, but +never lose what they have gained; holding stubbornly to their +ancient customs; preserving almost intact, and despite the neighborhood +of three great nations, their own originality; preserving +it through every form of government, through foreign invasions, +through political and religious wars, and in spite of the immense +concourse of strangers from every country that are always coming +among them; and remaining, in short, of all the northern races, +that one which, though ever advancing in the path of civilization, +has kept its antique stamp most clearly.</p> + +<p>It is enough also to remember its form in order to comprehend +that this country of three millions and a half of inhabitants, +although bound in so compact a political union, although recognizable +among all the other northern peoples by certain traits +peculiar to the population of all its provinces, must present a +great variety. And so it is in fact. Between Zealand and Holland +proper, between Holland and Friesland, between Friesland +and Gueldres, between Groningen and Brabant, in spite of +vicinity and so many common tics, there is no less difference +than between the more distant provinces of Italy and France; +difference of language, costume, and character; difference of race +and of religion. The communal regime has impressed an indelible +mark upon this people, because in no other country does it +so conform to the nature of things. The country is divided into +various groups of interests organized in the same manner as the +hydraulic system. Whence, association and mutual help against +the common enemy, the sea; but liberty for local institutions +and forces. Monarchy has not extinguished the ancient municipal +spirit, and this it is that renders impossible a complete fusion +of the State, in all the great States that have made the attempt. +The great rivers and gulfs are at the same time commercial +roads serving as national bonds between the different provinces, +and barriers which defend old traditions and old customs in each.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="THE_DUTCH_MASTERS"></a>THE DUTCH MASTERS</h3> + +<center>From 'Holland and Its People'</center> + +<p>The Dutch school of painting has one quality which renders it +particularly attractive to us Italians; it is above all others +the most different from our own, the very antithesis or the +opposite pole of art. The Dutch and Italian schools are the most +original, or, as has been said, the only two to which the title +rigorously belongs; the others being only daughters or younger +sisters, more or less resembling them.</p> + +<p>Thus even in painting Holland offers that which is most sought +after in travel and in books of travel: the new.</p> + +<p>Dutch painting was born with the liberty and independence of +Holland. As long as the northern and southern provinces of the +Low Countries remained under the Spanish rule and in the Catholic +faith, Dutch painters painted like Belgian painters; they studied +in Belgium, Germany, and Italy; Heemskerk imitated Michael +Angelo, Bloemart followed Correggio, and "Il Moro" copied +Titian, not to indicate others: and they were one and all pedantic +imitators, who added to the exaggerations of the Italian style a +certain German coarsenesss, the result of which was a bastard +style of painting, still inferior to the first, childish, stiff in design, +crude in color, and completely wanting in chiaroscuro, but at least +not a servile imitation, and becoming, as it were, a faint prelude +of the true Dutch art that was to be.</p> + +<p>With the war of independence, liberty, reform, and painting +also were renewed. With religious traditions fell artistic traditions; +the nude nymphs, Madonnas, saints, allegory, mythology, +the ideal--all the old edifice fell to pieces. Holland, animated by +a new life, felt the need of manifesting and expanding it in a +new way; the small country, become all at once glorious and +formidable, felt the desire for illustration; the faculties which had +been excited and strengthened in the grand undertaking of creating +a nation, now that the work was completed, overflowed and +ran into new channels. The conditions of the country were favorable +to the revival of art. The supreme dangers were conjured +away; there was security, prosperity, a splendid future; the heroes +had done their duty, and the artists were permitted to come to +the front; Holland, after many sacrifices, and much suffering, +issued victoriously from the struggle, lifted her face among her +people and smiled. And that smile is art.</p> + +<p>What that art would necessarily be, might have been guessed +even had no monument of it remained. A pacific, laborious, practical +people, continually beaten down, to quote a great German +poet, to prosaic realities by the occupations of a vulgar burgher +life; cultivating its reason at the expense of its imagination; living, +consequently, more in clear ideas than in beautiful images; +taking refuge from abstractions; never darting its thoughts beyond +that nature with which it is in perpetual battle; seeing only that +which is, enjoying only that which it can possess, making its happiness +consist in the tranquil ease and honest sensuality of a life +without violent passions or exorbitant desires;--such a people +must have tranquillity also in their art, they must love an art that +pleases without startling the mind, which addresses the senses +rather than the spirit; an art full of repose, precision, and delicacy, +though material like their lives: in one word, a realistic art, +in which they can see themselves as they are and as they are content +to be.</p> + +<p>The artists began by tracing that which they saw before their +eyes--the house. The long winters, the persistent rains, the +dampness, the variableness of the climate, obliged the Hollander +to stay within doors the greater part of the year. He loved his +little house, his shell, much better than we love our abodes, for +the reason that he had more need of it, and stayed more within +it; he provided it with all sorts of conveniences, caressed it, made +much of it; he liked to look out from his well-stopped windows +at the falling snow and the drenching rain, and to hug himself +with the thought, "Rage, tempest, I am warm and safe!" Snug +in his shell, his faithful housewife beside him, his children about +him, he passed the long autumn and winter evenings in eating +much, drinking much, smoking much, and taking his well-earned +ease after the cares of the day were over. The Dutch painters +represented these houses and this life in little pictures proportionate +to the size of the walls on which they were to hang; the bedchambers +that make one feel a desire to sleep, the kitchens, the +tables set out, the fresh and smiling faces of the house-mothers, +the men at their ease around the fire; and with that conscientious +realism which never forsakes them, they depict the dozing cat, the +yawning dog, the clucking hen, the broom, the vegetables, the +scattered pots and pans, the chicken ready for the spit. Thus +they represent life in all its scenes, and in every grade of the +social scale--the dance, the <i>conversazione</i>, the orgie, the feast, the +game; and thus did Terburg, Metzu, Netscher, Dow, Mieris, Steen, +Brouwer, and Van Ostade become famous.</p> + +<p>After depicting the house, they turned their attention to the +country. The stern climate allowed but a brief time for the +admiration of nature, but for this very reason Dutch artists +admired her all the more; they saluted the spring with a livelier +joy, and permitted that fugitive smile of heaven to stamp itself +more deeply on their fancy. The country was not beautiful, but +it was twice dear because it had been torn from the sea and +from the foreign oppressor. The Dutch artist painted it lovingly; +he represented it simply, ingenuously, with a sense of +intimacy which at that time was not to be found in Italian or +Belgian landscape. The flat, monotonous country had, to the +Dutch painter's eyes, a marvelous variety. He caught all the +mutations of the sky, and knew the value of the water, with its +reflections, its grace and freshness, and its power of illuminating +everything. Having no mountains, he took the dikes for background; +with no forests, he imparted to a single group of trees +all the mystery of a forest; and he animated the whole with +beautiful animals and white sails.</p> + +<p>The subjects of their pictures are poor enough,--a windmill, +a canal, a gray sky; but how they make one think! A few +Dutch painters, not content with nature in their own country, +came to Italy in search of hills, luminous skies, and famous +ruins; and another band of select artists is the result,--Both, +Swanevelt, Pynacker, Breenberg, Van Laer, Asselyn. But the +palm remains with the landscapists of Holland; with Wynants +the painter of morning, with Van der Neer the painter of night, +with Ruysdael the painter of melancholy, with Hobbema the +illustrator of windmills, cabins, and kitchen gardens, and with +others who have restricted themselves to the expression of the +enchantment of nature as she is in Holland.</p> + +<p>Simultaneously with landscape art was born another kind of +painting, especially peculiar to Holland,--animal painting. Animals +are the riches of the country; that magnificent race of +cattle which has no rival in Europe for fecundity and beauty. +The Hollanders, who owe so much to them, treat them, one +may say, as part of the population; they wash them, comb +them, dress them, and love them dearly. They are to be seen +everywhere; they are reflected in all the canals, and dot with +points of black and white the immense fields that stretch on +every side, giving an air of peace and comfort to every place, +and exciting in the spectator's heart a sentiment of Arcadian gentleness +and patriarchal serenity. The Dutch artists studied these +animals in all their varieties, in all their habits, and divined, as +one may say, their inner life and sentiments, animating the tranquil +beauty of the landscape with their forms. Rubens, Luyders, +Paul de Vos, and other Belgian painters, had drawn animals with +admirable mastery; but all these are surpassed by the Dutch +artists Van der Velde, Berghem, Karel du Jardin, and by the +prince of animal painters, Paul Potter, whose famous "Bull," in +the gallery of the Hague, deserves to be placed in the Vatican +beside the "Transfiguration" by Raphael.</p> + +<p>In yet another field are the Dutch painters great,--the sea. +The sea, their enemy, their power, and their glory, forever +threatening their country, and entering in a hundred ways into +their lives and fortunes; that turbulent North Sea, full of sinister +color, with a light of infinite melancholy upon it, beating forever +upon a desolate coast, must subjugate the imagination of the +artist. He passes, indeed, long hours on the shore, contemplating +its tremendous beauty, ventures upon its waves to study the +effects of tempests, buys a vessel and sails with his wife and +family, observing and making notes, follows the fleet into battle +and takes part in the fight; and in this way are made marine +painters like William Van der Velde the elder and William the +younger, like Backhuysen, Dubbels, and Stork.</p> + +<p>Another kind of painting was to arise in Holland, as the +expression of the character of the people and of republican +manners. A people which without greatness had done so many +great things, as Michelet says, must have its heroic painters, if +we call them so, destined to illustrate men and events. But this +school of painting,--precisely because the people were without +greatness, or to express it better, without the form of greatness,--modest, +inclined to consider all equal before the country, +because all had done their duty, abhorring adulation, and the +glorification in one only of the virtues and the triumph of +many,--this school has to illustrate not a few men who have +excelled, and a few extraordinary facts, but all classes of citizenship +gathered among the most ordinary and pacific of burgher +life. From this come the great pictures which represent five, +ten, thirty persons together, arquebusiers, mayors, officers, professors, +magistrates, administrators; seated or standing around a +table, feasting and conversing; of life size, most faithful likenesses; +grave, open faces, expressing that secure serenity of +conscience by which may be divined rather than seen the nobleness +of a life consecrated to one's country, the character of that +strong, laborious epoch, the masculine virtues of that excellent +generation; all this set off by the fine costume of the time, so +admirably combining grace and dignity,--those gorgets, those +doublets, those black mantles, those silken scarves and ribbons, +those arms and banners. In this field stand pre-eminent Van der +Helst, Hals, Govaert, Flink, and Bol.</p> + +<p>Descending from the consideration of the various kinds of +painting, to the special manner by means of which the artist +excelled in treatment, one leads all the rest as the distinctive +feature of Dutch painting--the light.</p> + +<p>The light in Holland, by reason of the particular conditions +of its manifestation, could not fail to give rise to a special manner +of painting. A pale light, waving with marvelous mobility +through an atmosphere impregnated with vapor, a nebulous veil +continually and abruptly torn, a perpetual struggle between light +and shadow,--such was the spectacle which attracted the eye of +the artist. He began to observe and to reproduce all this agitation +of the heavens, this struggle which animates with varied and +fantastic life the solitude of nature in Holland; and in representing +it, the struggle passed into his soul, and instead of representing +he created. Then he caused the two elements to contend +under his hand; he accumulated darkness that he might split and +seam it with all manner of luminous effects and sudden gleams +of light; sunbeams darted through the rifts, sunset reflections +and the yellow rays of lamp-light were blended with delicate +manipulation into mysterious shadows, and their dim depths +were peopled with half-seen forms; and thus he created all sorts +of contrasts, enigmas, play and effect of strange and unexpected +chiaroscuro. In this field, among many, stand conspicuous +Gerard Dow, the author of the famous four-candle picture, and +the great magician and sovereign illuminator Rembrandt.</p> + +<p>Another marked feature of Dutch painting was to be color. +Besides the generally accepted reasons that in a country where +there are no mountainous horizons, no varied prospects, no great +<i>coup d'oeil</i>,--no forms, in short, that lend themselves to design,--the +artist's eye must inevitably be attracted by color; and that +this might be peculiarly the case in Holland, where the uncertain +light, the fog-veiled atmosphere, confuse and blend the outlines +of all objects, so that the eye, unable to fix itself upon the +form, flies to color as the principal attribute that nature presents +to it,--besides these reasons, there is the fact that in a country +so flat, so uniform, and so gray as Holland, there is the same +need of color as in southern lands there is need of shade. The +Dutch artists did but follow the imperious taste of their countrymen, +who painted their houses in vivid colors, as well as their +ships, and in some places the trunks of their trees and the +palings and fences of their fields and gardens; whose dress was +of the gayest, richest hues; who loved tulips and hyacinths even +to madness. And thus the Dutch painters were potent colorists, +and Rembrandt was their chief.</p> + +<p>Realism, natural to the calmness and slowness of the Dutch character, +was to give to their art yet another distinctive feature,--finish, +which was carried to the very extreme of possibility. It +is truly said that the leading quality of the people may be found +in their pictures; viz., patience. Everything is represented with +the minuteness of a daguerreotype; every vein in the wood of a +piece of furniture, every fibre in a leaf, the threads of cloth, the +stitches in a patch, every hair upon an animal's coat, every +wrinkle in a man's face; everything finished with microscopic precision, +as if done with a fairy pencil, or at the expense of the +painter's eyes and reason. In reality a defect rather than an +excellence, since the office of painting is to represent not what <i>is</i>, +but what the eye sees, and the eye does not see everything; but +a defect carried to such a pitch of perfection that one admires, +and does not find fault. In this respect the most famous prodigies +of patience were Dow, Mieris, Potter, and Van der Heist, +but more or less all the Dutch painters.</p> + +<p>But realism, which gives to Dutch art so original a stamp and +such admirable qualities, is yet the root of its most serious defects. +The artists, desirous only of representing material truths, gave to +their figures no expression save that of their physical sentiments. +Grief, love, enthusiasm, and the thousand delicate shades of feeling +that have no name, or take a different one with the different +causes that give rise to them, they express rarely, or not at all. +For them the heart does not beat, the eyes do not weep, the lips +do not quiver. One whole side of the human soul, the noblest +and highest, is wanting in their pictures. More: in their faithful +reproduction of everything, even the ugly, and especially the ugly, +they end by exaggerating even that, making defects into deformities +and portraits into caricatures; they calumniate the national +type; they give a burlesque and graceless aspect to the human +countenance. In order to have the proper background for such +figures, they are constrained to choose trivial subjects: hence the +great number of pictures representing beer-shops, and drinkers +with grotesque, stupid faces, in absurd attitudes; ugly women and +ridiculous old men; scenes in which one can almost hear the +brutal laughter and the obscene words. Looking at these pictures, +one would naturally conclude that Holland was inhabited by the +ugliest and most ill-mannered people on the earth. We will not +speak of greater and worse license. Steen, Potter, and Brouwer, +the great Rembrandt himself, have all painted incidents that are +scarcely to be mentioned to civilized ears, and certainly should +not be looked at. But even setting aside these excesses, in the +picture galleries of Holland there is to be found nothing that elevates +the mind, or moves it to high and gentle thoughts. You +admire, you enjoy, you laugh, you stand pensive for a moment +before some canvas; but coming out, you feel that something is +lacking to your pleasure, you experience a desire to look upon a +handsome countenance, to read inspired verses, and sometimes +you catch yourself murmuring, half unconsciously, "O Raphael!"</p> + +<p>Finally, there are still two important excellences to be recorded +of this school of painting: its variety, and its importance as the +expression--the mirror, so to speak--of the country. If we +except Rembrandt with his group of followers and imitators, +almost all the other artists differ very much from one another; +no other school presents so great a number of original masters. +The realism of the Dutch painters is born of their common love +of nature: but each one has shown in his work a kind of love +peculiarly his own; each one has rendered a different impression +which he has received from nature; and all, starting from the +same point, which was the worship of material truth, have arrived +at separate and distinct goals. Their realism, then, inciting them +to disdain nothing as food for the pencil, has so acted that Dutch +art succeeds in representing Holland more completely than has +ever been accomplished by any other school in any other country. +It has been truly said that should every other visible witness of +the existence of Holland in the seventeenth century--her period +of greatness--vanish from the earth, and the pictures remain, in +them would be found preserved entire the city, the country, the +ports, the ships, the markets, the shops, the costumes, the arms, +the linen, the stuffs, the merchandise, the kitchen utensils, the +food, the pleasures, the habits, the religious belief and superstitions, +the qualities and effects of the people; and all this, which +is great praise for literature, is no less praise for her sister art.</p> + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h2><a name="HENRI_FREDERIC_AMIEL"></a>HENRI FRÉDÉRIC AMIEL</h2> + +<h3>(1821-1881)</h3> + +<h3>BY RICHARD BURTON</h3><br> + +<p class="par"><img src="images/letter-t.png" width="30%" alt=""></p> +<p>he French have long been writers of what they call 'Pensées,'--those +detached thoughts or meditations which, for depth, +illumination, and beauty, have a power of life, and come +under the term "literature." Their language lends itself to the +expression of subjective ideas with lucidity, brilliance, charm. The +French quality of mind allows that expression to be at once dignified +and happily urbane. Sometimes these sayings take the form of the +cynical epigrams of a La Rochefoucauld; are expanded into sententious +aphorisms by a La Bruyère; or reveal more earnest and athletic +souls, who pierce below the social surface froth to do battle with the +demons of the intellect. To this class belong men like the +seventeenth-century Pascal and the nineteenth-century Amiel.</p> + +<p>The career of Henri Frédéric Amiel illustrates the dubiety of too +hasty judgment of a man's place or power in the world. A Genevese +by birth, of good parentage, early orphaned, well educated, +much traveled, he was deemed, on his return in the springtime of +his manhood to his native town as professor in the Academy of +Geneva, to be a youth of great promise, destined to become distinguished. +But the years slipped by, and his literary performance, +consisting of desultory essays and several slight volumes of verse, +was not enough to justify the prophecy. His life more and more +became that of a bachelor recluse and valetudinarian. When he +died, in 1881, at sixty years of age, after much suffering heroically +borne, as pathetic entries in the last leaves of his Diary remain to +show, there was a feeling that here was "one more faithful failure." +But the quiet, brooding teacher in the Swiss city which has at one +time or another immured so many rare minds, had for years been +jotting down his reflections in a private journal. It constitutes the +story of his inner life, never told in his published writings. When a +volume of the 'Journal Intime' appeared the year after his taking +off, the world recognized in it not only an intellect of clarity and +keenness, and a heart sensitive to the widest spiritual problems, but +the revelation of a typical modern mood. The result was that Amiel, +being dead, yet spoke to his generation, and his fame was quick and +genuine. The apparent disadvantage point of Geneva proved, after +all, the fittest abiding-place for the poet-philosopher. A second volume +of extracts, two years later, found him in an assured place as +a writer of 'Pensées.'</p> + +<p>The 'Journal' of Amiel is symptomatic of his time,--perhaps one +reason why it met with so sympathetic a response. It mirrors the +intellectual doubtings, the spiritual yearnings and despairs of a strenuous +and pure soul in a rationalistic atmosphere. In the day of +scientific test and of skepticism, of the readjustment of conventions +and the overthrow of sacrosanct traditions, one whose life is that of +thought rather than of action finds much to perplex, to weary, and +to sadden. So it was with the Swiss professor. He was always in +the sanctum sanctorum of his spirit, striving to attain the truth; with +Hamlet-like irresolution he poised in mind before the antinomies +of the universe, alert to see around a subject, having the modern +thinker's inability to be partisan. This way of thought is obviously +unhealthy, or at least has in it something of the morbid. It implies +the undue introspection which is well-nigh the disease of this century. +There is in it the failure to lose one's life in objective incident +and action, that one may find it again in regained balance of +mind and bodily health. Amiel had the defect of his quality; but +he is clearly to be separated from those shallow or exaggerated specimens +of subjectivity illustrated by present-day women diarists, like +Bashkirtseff and Kovalevsky. The Swiss poet-thinker had a vigor of +thought and a broad culture; his aim was high, his desire pure, and +his meditations were often touched with imaginative beauty. Again +and again he flashes light into the darkest penetralia of the human +soul. At times, too, there is in him a mystic fervor worthy of St. +Augustine. If his dominant tone is melancholy, he is not to be +called a pessimist. He believed in the Good at the central core of +things. Hence is he a fascinating personality, a stimulative force. +And these outpourings of an acute intellect, and a nature sensitive to +the Ideal, are conveyed in a diction full of literary feeling and flavor. +Subtlety, depth, tenderness, poetry, succeed each other; nor are the +crisp, compressed sayings, the happy <i>mots</i> of the epigrammatist, +entirely lacking. And pervading all is an impression of character.</p> + +<p>Like Pascal, Amiel was a thinker interested above all in the soul +of man. He was a psychologist, seeking to know the secret of the +Whence, the Why, and the Whither. Like Joubert, whose journal +resembled his own in its posthumous publication, his reflections will +live by their weight, their quality, their beauty of form. Nor are +these earlier writers of "Pensées" likely to have a more permanent +place among the seed-sowers of thought. Amiel himself declared +that "the pensée-writer is to the philosopher what the dilettante is +to the artist. He plays with thought, and makes it produce a crowd +of pretty things of detail; but he is more anxious about truths than +truth, and what is essential in thought, its sequence, its unity, +escapes him.... In a word, the pensée-writer deals with what +is superficial and fragmentary." While these words show the fine +critical sense of the man, they do an injustice to his own work. +Fragmentary it is, but neither superficial nor petty. One recognizes +in reading his wonderfully suggestive pages that here is a rare +personality, indeed,--albeit "sicklied o'er with the pale cast of +thought."</p> + +<p>In 1889 an admirable English translation of Amiel by Mrs. +Humphry Ward, the novelist, appeared in London. The introductory +essay by Mrs. Ward is the best study of him in our language. The +appended selections are taken from the Ward translation.</p> + +<p class="rgt"><img src="images/510.png" width="60%" alt=""></p> +<br><br><br> +<br><br><hr style="width: 35%;"><br><br> +<h3><a name="EXTRACTS_FROM_AMIELS_JOURNAL"></a>EXTRACTS FROM AMIEL'S JOURNAL</h3> + +<a name="Christs_Real_Message"></a> +<p>October 1st, 1849.--Yesterday, Sunday, I read through and +made extracts from the Gospel of St. John. It confirmed +me in my belief that about Jesus we must believe no one +but Himself, and that what we have to do is to discover the true +image of the Founder behind all the prismatic refractions through +which it comes to us, and which alter it more or less. A ray of +heavenly light traversing human life, the message of Christ has +been broken into a thousand rainbow colors, and carried in a +thousand directions. It is the historical task of Christianity to +assume with every succeeding age a fresh metamorphosis, and to +be forever spiritualizing more and more her understanding of the +Christ and of salvation.</p> + +<p>I am astounded at the incredible amount of Judaism and +formalism which still exists nineteen centuries after the Redeemer's +proclamation, "It is the letter which killeth"--after his protest +against a dead symbolism. The new religion is so profound +that it is not understood even now, and would seem a blasphemy +to the greater number of Christians. The person of Christ is the +centre of it. Redemption, eternal life, divinity, humanity, propitiation, +incarnation, judgment, Satan, heaven and hell,--all +these beliefs have been so materialized and coarsened that with a +strange irony they present to us the spectacle of things having a +profound meaning and yet carnally interpreted. Christian boldness +and Christian liberty must be reconquered; it is the Church +which is heretical, the Church whose sight is troubled and her +heart timid. Whether we will or no, there is an esoteric doctrine--there +is a relative revelation; each man enters into God so +much as God enters into him; or, as Angelus, I think, said, "The +eye by which I see God is the same eye by which He sees me."</p> + +<a name="Duty"></a> +<p>Duty has the virtue of making us feel the reality of a positive +world while at the same time detaching us from it.</p> + +<a name="Joubert"></a> +<p>February 20th, 1851.--I have almost finished these two volumes +of [Joubert's] 'Pensées' and the greater part of the +'Correspondance.' This last has especially charmed me; it +is remarkable for grace, delicacy, atticism, and precision. The +chapters on metaphysics and philosophy are the most insignificant. +All that has to do with large views, with the whole of things, is +very little at Joubert's command: he has no philosophy of history, +no speculative intuition. He is the thinker of detail, and his +proper field is psychology and matters of taste. In this sphere of +the subtleties and delicacies of imagination and feeling, within +the circle of personal affections and preoccupations, of social and +educational interests, he abounds in ingenuity and sagacity, in +fine criticisms, in exquisite touches. It is like a bee going from +flower to flower, a teasing, plundering, wayward zephyr, an +aeolian harp, a ray of furtive light stealing through the leaves. +Taken as a whole, there is something impalpable and immaterial +about him, which I will not venture to call effeminate, but which +is scarcely manly. He wants bone and body: timid, dreamy, and +clairvoyant, he hovers far above reality. He is rather a soul, a +breath, than a man. It is the mind of a woman in the character +of a child, so that we feel for him less admiration than tenderness +and gratitude.</p> + +<a name="Greeks_vs_Moderns"></a> +<p>November 10th, 1852.--How much have we not to learn from +the Greeks, those immortal ancestors of ours! And how +much better they solved their problem than we have solved +ours! Their ideal man is not ours; but they understood infinitely +better than we, how to reverence, cultivate, and ennoble the +man whom they knew. In a thousand respects we are still barbarians +beside them, as Béranger said to me with a sigh in 1843: +barbarians in education, in eloquence, in public life, in poetry, in +matters of art, etc. We must have millions of men in order to +produce a few elect spirits: a thousand was enough in Greece. +If the measure of a civilization is to be the number of perfected +men that it produces, we are still far from this model people. +The slaves are no longer below us, but they are among us. Barbarism +is no longer at our frontiers: it lives side by side with +us. We carry within us much greater things than they, but we +ourselves are smaller. It is a strange result. Objective civilization +produced great men while making no conscious effort toward +such a result; subjective civilization produces a miserable and imperfect +race, contrary to its mission and its earnest desire. The +world grows more majestic, but man diminishes. Why is this?</p> + +<p>We have too much barbarian blood in our veins, and we lack +measure, harmony, and grace. Christianity, in breaking man up +into outer and inner, the world into earth and heaven, hell and +paradise, has decomposed the human unity, in order, it is true, to +reconstruct it more profoundly and more truly. But Christianity +has not yet digested this powerful leaven. She has not yet conquered +the true humanity; she is still living under the antinomy +of sin and grace, of here below and there above. She has not +penetrated into the whole heart of Jesus. She is still in the <i>narthex</i> +of penitence; she is not reconciled, and even the churches +still wear the livery of service, and have none of the joy of the +daughters of God, baptized of the Holy Spirit.</p> + +<p>Then, again, there is our excessive division of labor; our bad +and foolish education which does not develop the whole man; and +the problem of poverty. We have abolished slavery, but without +having solved the question of labor. In law, there are no more +slaves--in fact, there are many. And while the majority of men +are not free, the free man, in the true sense of the term, can +neither be conceived nor realized. Here are enough causes for +our inferiority.</p> + +<a name="Nature_Teutonic"></a> +<p>November 12th, 1852.--St. Martin's summer is still lingering, +and the days all begin in mist. I ran for a quarter of an +hour round the garden to get some warmth and suppleness. +Nothing could be lovelier than the last rosebuds, or the delicate +gaufred edges of the strawberry leaves embroidered with hoar-frost, +while above them Arachne's delicate webs hung swaying in +the green branches of the pines,--little ball-rooms for the fairies, +carpeted with powdered pearls, and kept in place by a thousand +dewy strands, hanging from above like the chains of a lamp, and +supporting them from below like the anchors of a vessel. These +little airy edifices had all the fantastic lightness of the elf-world, +and all the vaporous freshness of dawn. They recalled to me the +poetry of the North, wafting to me a breath from Caledonia or +Iceland or Sweden, Frithjof and the Edda, Ossian and the Hebrides. +All that world of cold and mist, of genius and of reverie, +where warmth comes not from the sun but from the heart, where +man is more noticeable than nature,--that chaste and vigorous +world, in which will plays a greater part than sensation, and +thought has more power than instinct,--in short, the whole romantic +cycle of German and Northern poetry, awoke little by little +in my memory and laid claim upon my sympathy. It is a poetry +of bracing quality, and acts upon one like a moral tonic. Strange +charm of imagination! A twig of pine-wood and a few spider-webs +are enough to make countries, epochs, and nations live again +before her.</p> + +<a name="Training_of_Children"></a> +<p>January 6th, 1853.--Self-government with tenderness,--here +you have the condition of all authority over children. The +child must discover in us no passion, no weakness of which +he can make use; he must feel himself powerless to deceive or to +trouble us; then he will recognize in us his natural superiors, and +he will attach a special value to our kindness, because he will respect +it. The child who can rouse in us anger, or impatience, or +excitement, feels himself stronger than we, and a child respects +strength only. The mother should consider herself as her child's +sun, a changeless and ever radiant world, whither the small restless +creature, quick at tears and laughter, light, fickle, passionate, +full of storms, may come for fresh stores of light, warmth, and +electricity, of calm and of courage. The mother represents goodness, +providence, law; that is to say, the divinity, under that form +of it which is accessible to childhood. If she is herself passionate, +she will inculcate in her child a capricious and despotic God, or +even several discordant gods. The religion of a child depends +on what its mother and its father are, and not on what they +say. The inner and unconscious ideal which guides their life is +precisely what touches the child; their words, their remonstrances, +their punishments, their bursts of feeling even, are for him +merely thunder and comedy; what they worship--this it is which +his instinct divines and reflects.</p> + +<p>The child sees what we are, behind what we wish to be. +Hence his reputation as a physiognomist. He extends his power +as far as he can with each of us; he is the most subtle of diplomatists. +Unconsciously he passes under the influence of each +person about him, and reflects it while transforming it after his +his own nature. He is a magnifying mirror. This is why the +first principle of education is, Train yourself; and the first rule +to follow, if you wish to possess yourself of a child's will, is, +Master your own.</p> + +<a name="Mozart_and_Beethoven"></a> +<p>December 17th, 1856.--This evening was the second quartet +concert. It stirred me much more than the first; the music +chosen was loftier and stronger. It was the quartette in D +minor of Mozart, and the quartette in C major of Beethoven, separated +by a Spohr concerto.</p> + +<p>The work of Mozart, penetrated as it is with mind and +thought, represents a solved problem, a balance struck between +aspiration and executive capacity, the sovereignty of a grace +which is always mistress of itself, marvelous harmony and perfect +unity. His quartette describes a day in one of those Attic souls +who prefigure on earth the serenity of Elysium.</p> + +<p>In Beethoven's, on the other hand, a spirit of tragic irony +paints for you the mad tumult of existence, as it dances forever +above the threatening abyss of the infinite. No more unity, no +more satisfaction, no more serenity! We are spectators of the +eternal duel between the two great forces, that of the abyss +which absorbs all finite things, and that of life which defends and +asserts itself, expands, and enjoys.</p> + +<p>The soul of Beethoven was a tormented soul. The passion +and the awe of the infinite seemed to toss it to and fro from +heaven to hell. Hence its vastness. Which is the greater, Mozart +or Beethoven? Idle question! The one is more perfect, the other +more colossal. The first gives you the peace of perfect art, beauty +at first sight. The second gives you sublimity, terror, pity, a +beauty of second impression. The one gives that for which the +other rouses a desire. Mozart has the classic purity of light and +the blue ocean. Beethoven the romantic grandeur which belongs</p> + +<center>(Continued in Volume II)</center> +<br> +<br> +<hr class="full" noshade> + +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12369 ***</div> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/12369-h/images/006.png b/12369-h/images/006.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..d6b7d07 --- /dev/null +++ b/12369-h/images/006.png diff --git a/12369-h/images/019.png b/12369-h/images/019.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..dc3b322 --- /dev/null +++ b/12369-h/images/019.png diff --git a/12369-h/images/021.png b/12369-h/images/021.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..ef39e30 --- /dev/null +++ b/12369-h/images/021.png diff --git a/12369-h/images/031.png b/12369-h/images/031.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..14dddf6 --- /dev/null +++ b/12369-h/images/031.png diff --git a/12369-h/images/038.png b/12369-h/images/038.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 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