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diff --git a/13778-h/13778-h.htm b/13778-h/13778-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3e0ef70 --- /dev/null +++ b/13778-h/13778-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,8467 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content= + "text/html; charset=UTF-8" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of Little Journeys To The Homes Of Famous Women, by Elbert Hubbard. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + P { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + } + hr {text-align: center; width: 50%;} + html>body hr {margin-right: 25%; margin-left: 25%; width: 50%;} + hr.full {width: 100%;} + html>body hr.full {margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 0%; width: 100%;} + hr.short {text-align: center; width: 20%;} + html>body hr.short {margin-right: 40%; margin-left: 40%; width: 20%;} + + BODY{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + img {border: none;} + .ctr {text-align: center;} + .linenum {position: absolute; top: auto; left: 4%;} /* poetry number */ + .note {margin-left: 2em; margin-right: 2em; margin-bottom: 1em;} /* footnote */ + .blkquot {margin-left: 4em; margin-right: 4em;} /* block indent */ + .pagenum {position: absolute; left: 92%; font-size: smaller; text-align: right;} /* page numbers */ + .sidenote {width: 20%; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em; padding-left: 1em; font-size: smaller; float: right; clear: right;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span {display: block; margin: 0; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4em;} + .poem span.i10 {display: block; margin-left: 10em;} + .poem span.i15 {display: block; margin-left: 15em;} + .poem span.i17 {display: block; margin-left: 17em;} + .poem span.i19 {display: block; margin-left: 19em;} + .poem span.i21 {display: block; margin-left: 21em;} + .poem span.i25 {display: block; margin-left: 25em;} + .poem .caesura {vertical-align: -200%;} + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13778 ***</div> + +<h1>Little Journeys To The Homes Of Famous Women</h1> + +<h2>Elbert Hubbard</h2> + +<h3>Memorial Edition</h3> + +<h4>Printed and made into a Book by The Roycrofters, +who are in East Aurora, Erie County, New York</h4> + +<h3>New York</h3> + +<h3>1916</h3> + +<p><a name="II_Page_1"></a></p> + +<hr class="full" /> + +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> +<p><a href="#ELBERT_HUBBARD_II"><b>ELBERT HUBBARD II</b></a><br /> +<a href="#ELIZABETH_B_BROWNING"><b>ELIZABETH B. BROWNING</b></a><br /> +<a href="#MADAME_GUYON"><b>MADAME GUYON</b></a><br /> +<a href="#HARRIET_MARTINEAU"><b>HARRIET MARTINEAU</b></a><br /> +<a href="#CHARLOTTE_BRONTE"><b>CHARLOTTE BRONTE</b></a><br /> +<a href="#CHRISTINA_ROSSETTI"><b>CHRISTINA ROSSETTI</b></a><br /> +<a href="#ROSA_BONHEUR"><b>ROSA BONHEUR</b></a><br /> +<a href="#MADAME_DE_STAEL"><b>MADAME DE STAEL</b></a><br /> +<a href="#ELIZABETH_FRY"><b>ELIZABETH FRY</b></a><br /> +<a href="#MARY_LAMB"><b>MARY LAMB</b></a><br /> +<a href="#JANE_AUSTEN"><b>JANE AUSTEN</b></a><br /> +<a href="#EMPRESS_JOSEPHINE"><b>EMPRESS JOSEPHINE</b></a><br /> +<a href="#MARY_W_SHELLEY"><b>MARY W. SHELLEY</b></a></p> + +<p><a name="II_Page_2"></a></p> +<p><a name="II_Page_3"></a></p> + +<hr class="full" /> +<p><a name="ELBERT_HUBBARD_II"></a></p><h2>ELBERT HUBBARD II</h2> + +<h3>BERT HUBBARD</h3> +<p><a name="II_Page_4"></a></p> +<div class="blkquot"><p>We are not sent into this world to do anything into +which we can not put our hearts. We have certain +work to do for our bread and that is to be done strenuously, +other work to do for our delight and that is to +be done heartily; neither is to be done by halves or +shifts, but with a will; and what is not worth this effort +is not to be done at all.<br /> +<span style='margin-left: 10em;'>—<i>John Ruskin</i></span></p></div> + +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_5"></a></p> +<p>I am Elbert Hubbard's son, and I +am entirely familiar with the proposition +that "Genius never reproduces."</p> + +<p>Heretofore, it has always been necessary +to sign my name, "Elbert +Hubbard II"—but now there is an +embarrassment in that signature, +an assumption that I do not feel.</p> + +<p>There is no Second Elbert Hubbard. To five hundred +Roycrofters, to the Village of East Aurora, and to a +few dozen personal friends scattered over the face of +the earth, I am Bert Hubbard, plain Bert Hubbard—and +as Bert Hubbard I want to be known to you.</p> + +<p>I lay no claim to having inherited Elbert Hubbard's +Genius, his Personality, his Insight into the Human +Heart. I am another and totally different sort of man.</p> + +<p>I know my limitations.</p> + +<p>Also, I am acquainted with such ability as I possess, +and I believe that it can be directed to serve you.</p> + +<p>I got my schooling in East Aurora.</p> + +<p>I have never been to College. But I have traveled across +this Country several times with my Father.</p> + +<p>I have +traveled abroad with him. One time we walked from +Edinburgh to London to prove that we could do it.</p> + +<p>My Father has been my teacher—and I do not at all +<a name="II_Page_6"></a>envy the College Man.</p> + +<p>For the last twenty years I +have been working in the Roycroft Shops.</p> + +<p>I believe +I am well grounded in Business—also, in Work.</p> + +<p>When I was twelve years old my father transferred Ali +Baba to the garden—and I did the chores around the +house and barn for a dollar a week. From that day +forward I earned every dollar that ever came to me.</p> + +<p>I fed the printing-press at four dollars a week. Then, +when we purchased a gas-engine, I was promoted to be +engineer, and given a pair of long overalls.</p> + +<p>Two or three years later I was moved into the General +Office, where I opened mail and filled in orders.</p> + +<p>Again, I was promoted into the Private Office and +permitted to sign my name under my Father's, on +checks.</p> + +<p>Then the responsibility of purchasing materials +was given me.</p> + +<p>One time or another I have worked in every Department +of the Roycroft Shops.</p> + +<p>My association with Elbert Hubbard has been friendly, +brotherly. I have enjoyed his complete confidence—and +I have tried to deserve it.</p> + +<p>He believed in me, loved me, hoped for me. Whether +I disappointed him at times is not important. I know +my average must have pleased him, because the night +he said Farewell to the Roycrofters he spoke well of +me, very well of me, and he left the Roycroft Institution +in my charge.</p> + +<p>He sailed away on the "Lusitania" intending to be +<a name="II_Page_7"></a>gone several weeks. His Little Journey has been prolonged +into Eternity.</p> + +<p>But the work of Elbert and Alice Hubbard is not done. +With them one task was scarcely under way when +another was launched. Whether complete or incomplete, +there had to be an end to their effort sometime, and this +is the end.</p> + +<p>Often Elbert Hubbard would tell the story of Tolstoy, +who stopped at the fence to question the worker in the +field, "My Man, if you knew you were to die tomorrow, +what would you do today?" And the worker begrimed +with sweat would answer, "I would plow!"</p> + +<p>That's the way Elbert Hubbard lived and died, and +yet he did more—he planned for the future. He planned +the future of the Roycroft Shop. Death did not meet +him as a stranger. He came as a sometime-expected +friend. Father was not unprepared.</p> + +<p>The plan that would have sustained us the seven weeks +he was in Europe will sustain us seven years—and +another seven years.</p> + +<p>Elbert Hubbard's work will go on.</p> + +<p>I know of no Memorial that would please Elbert Hubbard +half so well as to broaden out the Roycroft Idea.</p> + +<p>So we will continue to make handmade Furniture, +hand-hammered Copper, Modeled Leather. We shall +still triumph in the arts of Printing and Bookmaking.</p> + +<p>The Roycroft Inn will continue to swing wide its welcoming +door, and the kind greeting is always here for you.</p> + +<p>"<a name="II_Page_8"></a>The Fra" will not miss an issue, and you who have +enjoyed it in the past will continue to enjoy it!</p> + +<p>"The Philistine" belonged to Elbert Hubbard. He +wrote it himself for just twenty years and one month. +No one else could have done it as he did. No one else +can now do it as he did.</p> + +<p>So, for very sentimental reasons—which overbalance +the strong temptation to continue "The Philistine"—I +consider it a duty to pay him the tribute of discontinuing +the little Magazine of Protest.</p> + +<p>The Roycrofters, Incorporated, is a band of skilled +men and women. For years they have accomplished the +work that has invited your admiration. You may expect +much of them now. The support they have given me, +the confidence they have in me, is as a great mass of +power and courage pushing me on to success.</p> + +<p>This thought I would impress upon you: It will not be +the policy of The Roycrofters to imitate or copy. This +place from now on is what we make it. The past is past, +the future spreads a golden red against the eastern sky.</p> + +<p>I have the determination to make a Roycroft Shop—that +Elbert Hubbard, leaning out over the balcony, will +look down and say, "Good boy, Bert—good boy!"</p> + +<p>I have Youth and Strength.</p> + +<p>I have Courage.</p> + +<p>My Head is up.</p> + +<p>Forward—all of us—March!</p> + +<p><a name="II_Page_9"></a><a name="II_Page_10"></a><a name="II_Page_11"></a></p> + +<hr class="full" /> +<p><a name="ELIZABETH_B_BROWNING"></a></p><h2>ELIZABETH B. BROWNING</h2> +<p><a name="II_Page_12"></a></p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>I have been in the meadows all the day,<br /></span> +<span>And gathered there the nosegay that you see;<br /></span> +<span>Singing within myself as bird or bee<br /></span> +<span>When such do fieldwork on a morn of May.<br /></span> +<span class="i17"><i>Irreparableness</i><br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_13"></a><a name="II_Page_14"></a><a name="II_Page_15"></a></p> +<p class="ctr"><a href="./images/ljv2-1.jpg"><img src="./images/ljv2-1_th.jpg" alt="ELIZABETH B. BROWNING" /></a></p><p class="ctr">ELIZABETH B. BROWNING</p> + +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_16"></a><a name="II_Page_17"></a></p> +<p>Writers of biography usually begin +their preachments with the rather +startling statement, "The subject +of this memoir was born"——Here +follows a date, the name of the place +and a cheerful little Mrs. Gamp +anecdote: this as preliminary to +"launching forth."</p> + +<p>It was the merry Andrew Lang, I believe, who filed a +general protest against these machine-made biographies, +pleading that it was perfectly safe to assume the +man was born; and as for the time and place it mattered +little. But the merry man was wrong, for Time +and Place are often masters of Fate.</p> + +<p>For myself, I rather like the good old-fashioned way +of beginning at the beginning. But I will not tell where +and when Elizabeth was born, for I do not know. And +I am quite sure that her husband did not know. The +encyclopedias waver between London and Herefordshire, +just according as the writers felt in their hearts +that genius should be produced in town or country. +One man, with opinions pretty well ossified on this subject, +having been challenged for his statement that +Mrs. Browning was born at Hope End, rushed into +print in a letter to the "Gazette" with the countercheck +quarrelsome to the effect, "You might as well expect +<a name="II_Page_18"></a>throstles to build nests on Fleet Street 'buses, as for +folks of genius to be born in a big city." As apology for +the man's ardor I will explain that he was a believer in +the Religion of the East and held that spirits choose +their own time and place for materialization.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Ritchie, authorized by Mr. Browning, declared +Burn Hill, Durham, the place, and March Sixth, Eighteen +Hundred Nine, the time. In reply, John H. Ingram +brings forth a copy of the Tyne "Mercury," for March +Fourteenth, Eighteen Hundred Nine, and points to +this:</p> + +<p>"In London, the wife of Edward M. Barrett, of a +daughter."</p> + +<p>Mr. Browning then comes forward with a fact that +derricks can not budge, that is, "Newspapers have +ever had small regard for truth." Then he adds, "My +wife was born March Sixth, Eighteen Hundred Six, +at Carlton Hall, Durham, the residence of her father's +brother." One might ha' thought that this would be +the end on't, but it wasn't, for Mr. Ingram came out +with this sharp rejoinder: "Carlton Hall was not in +Durham, but in Yorkshire. And I am authoritatively +informed that it did not become the residence of +S. Moulton Barrett until some time after Eighteen +Hundred Ten. Mr. Browning's latest suggestions in +this matter can not be accepted. In Eighteen Hundred +Six, Edward Barrett, not yet twenty years of age, is +scarcely likely to have already been the father of the two +<a name="II_Page_19"></a>children assigned to him." And there the matter rests. +Having told this much I shall proceed to launch forth.</p> + +<p>The earlier years of Elizabeth Barrett's life were spent +at Hope End, near Ledbury, Herefordshire. I visited +the place and thereby added not only one day, but +several to my life, for Ali counts not the days spent in +the chase. There is a description of Hope End written +by an eminent clergyman, to whom I was at once +attracted by his literary style. This gentleman's diction +contains so much clearness, force and elegance +that I can not resist quoting him verbatim: "The +residentiary buildings lie on the ascent of the contiguous +eminences, whose projecting parts and bending +declivities, modeled by Nature, display astonishing +harmoniousness. It contains an elegant profusion of +wood, disposed in the most careless yet pleasing order; +much of the park and its scenery is in view of the residence, +from which vantage-point it presents a most +agreeable appearance to the enraptured beholder." +So there you have it!</p> + +<p>Here Elizabeth Barrett lived until she was twenty. +She never had a childhood—'t was dropped out of her +life in some way, and a Greek grammar inlaid instead. +Of her mother we know little. She is never quoted; +never referred to; her wishes were so whisperingly +expressed that they have not reached us. She glides, a +pale shadow, across the diary pages. Her husband's +will was to her supreme; his whim her conscience. We +<a name="II_Page_20"></a>know that she was sad, often ill, that she bore eight +children. She passed out seemingly unwept, unhonored +and unsung, after a married existence of sixteen years.</p> + +<p>Elizabeth Barrett had the same number of brothers +and sisters that Shakespeare had; and we know no +more of the seven Barretts who were swallowed by +oblivion than we do of the seven Shakespeares that +went not astray.</p> + +<p>Edward Moulton Barrett had a sort of fierce, passionate, +jealous affection for his daughter Elizabeth. He +set himself the task of educating her from her very +babyhood. He was her constant companion, her tutor, +adviser, friend. When six years old she studied Greek, +and when nine made translations in verse. Mr. Barrett +looked on this sort of thing with much favor, and +tightened his discipline, reducing the little girl's hours +for study to a system as severe as the laws of Draco. +Of course, the child's health broke. From her thirteenth +year she appears to us like a beautiful spirit with an +astral form; or she would, did we not perceive that +this beautiful form is being racked with pain. No wonder +some one has asked, "Where then was the Society +for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children?"</p> + +<p>But this brave spirit did not much complain. She had +a will as strong as her father's, and felt a Spartan pride +in doing all that he asked and a little more. She studied, +wrote, translated, read and thought.</p> + +<p>And to spur +her on and to stimulate her, Mr. Barrett published +<a name="II_Page_21"></a>several volumes of her poems. It was immature, pedantic +work, but still it had a certain glow and gave +promise of the things yet to come.</p> + +<p>One marked event in the life of Elizabeth Barrett +occurred when Hugh Stuart Boyd arrived at Hope +End. He was a fine, sensitive, soul—a poet by nature +and a Greek scholar of repute. He came on Mr. Barrett's +invitation to take Mr. Barrett's place as tutor. +The young girl was confined to her bed through the +advice of physicians; Boyd was blind.</p> + +<p>Here at once was a bond of sympathy. No doubt this +break in the monotony of her life gave fresh courage +to the fair young woman. The gentle, sightless poet +relaxed the severe hours of study. Instead of grim +digging in musty tomes they talked: he sat by her +bedside holding the thin hands (for the blind see by +the sense of touch), and they talked for hours—or +were silent, which served as well. Then she would +read to the blind man and he would recite to her, for +he had the blind Homer's memory. She grew better, +and the doctors said that if she had taken her medicine +regularly, and not insisted on getting up and walking +about as guide for the blind man, she might have gotten entirely well.</p> + +<p>In that fine poem, "Wine of Cyprus," addressed to +Boyd, we see how she acknowledges his goodness. +There is no wine equal to the wine of friendship; and +love is only friendship—plus something else. There is +<a name="II_Page_22"></a>nothing so hygienic as friendship.</p> + +<p>Hell is a separation, +and Heaven is only a going home to our friends.</p> + +<p>Mr. Barrett's fortune was invested in sugar-plantations +in Jamaica. Through the emancipation of the blacks his +fortune took to itself wings. He had to give up his +splendid country home—to break the old ties. It was +decided that the family should move to London. +Elizabeth had again taken to her bed. The mattress on +which she lay was borne down the steps by four men; +one man might have carried her alone, for she weighed +only eighty-five pounds, so they say.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_23"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>Crabb Robinson, who knew everything +and everybody, being very much such a +man as John Kenyon, has left on record the +fact that Mr. Kenyon had a face like a +Benedictine monk, a wit that never lagged, a generous +heart, and a tongue that ran like an Alpine cascade.</p> + +<p>A razor with which you can not shave may have better +metal in it than one with a perfect edge. One has been +sharpened and the other not. And I am very sure that +the men who write best do not necessarily know the +most; Fate has put an edge on them—that's all. A +good kick may start a stone rolling, when otherwise +it rests on the mountain-side for a generation.</p> + +<p>Kenyon was one type of the men who rest on the +mountain-side. He dabbled in poetry, wrote book-reviews, +collected rare editions, attended first nights, +spoke mysteriously of "stuff" he was working on; +and sometimes confidentially told his lady friends of +his intention to bring it out when he had gotten it +into shape, asking their advice as to bindings, etc. +Men of this type rarely bring out their stuff, for the +reason that they never get it into shape. When they +refer to the novel they have on the stocks, they refer +to a novel they intend to write. It is yet in the ink-bottle. +And there it remains—all for the want of one +good kick—but perhaps it's just as well.</p> + +<p>Yet these friendly beings are very useful members of +society. They are brighter companions and better +<a name="II_Page_24"></a>talkers than the men who exhaust themselves in creative +work and at odd times favor their friends with +choice samples of literary irritability. John Kenyon +wrote a few bright little things, but his best work was +in the encouragement he gave others. He sought out +all literary lions and tamed them with his steady +glance. They liked his prattle and good-cheer, and he +liked them for many reasons—one of which was because +he could go away and tell how he advised them about +this, that and the other. Then he fed them, too.</p> + +<p>And so unrivaled was Kenyon in this line that he won +for himself the title of "The Feeder of Lions." Now, +John Kenyon—rich, idle, bookish and generous—saw +in the magazines certain fine little poems by one +Elizabeth Barrett. He also ascertained that she had +published several books. Mr. Kenyon bought one of +these volumes and sent it by a messenger with a little +note to Miss Barrett telling how much he had enjoyed +it, and craved that she would inscribe her name and +his on the fly-leaf and return by bearer. Of course she +complied with such a modest request so gracefully +expressed; these things are balm to poets' souls. Next, +Mr. Kenyon called to thank Miss Barrett for the autograph. +Soon after, he wrote to inform her of a startling +fact that he had just discovered: they were kinsmen, +cousins or something—a little removed, but cousins +still. In a few weeks they wrote letters back and forth +beginning thus: Dear Cousin.</p> + +<p><a name="II_Page_25"></a>And I am glad of this cousinly arrangement between +lonely young people. They grasp at it; and it gives an +excuse for a bit of closer relationship than could otherwise +exist with propriety. Goodness me! is he not my +cousin? Of course he may call as often as he chooses. +It is his right.</p> + +<p>But let me explain here that at this time Mr. Kenyon +was not so very young—that is, he was not absurdly +young: he was fifty. But men who really love books +always have young hearts. Kenyon's father left him +a fortune, no troubles had ever come his way, and his +was not the temperament that searches them out. +He dressed young, looked young, acted young, felt +young.</p> + +<p>No doubt John Kenyon sincerely admired Elizabeth +Barrett, and prized her work. And while she read his +mind a deal more understandingly than he did her +poems, she was grateful for his kindly attention and +well-meant praise. He set about to get her poems into +better magazines and to find better publishers for her +work. He was not a gifted poet himself, but to dance +attendance on one afforded a gratification to his artistic +impulse. He could not write sublime verse himself, +but he could tell others how. So Miss Barrett showed +her poems to Mr. Kenyon, and Mr. Kenyon advised +that the P's be made bolder and the tails to the Q's be +lengthened. He also bought her a new kind of manuscript +paper, over which a quill pen would glide with glee: +<a name="II_Page_26"></a>it was the kind Byron used. But best of all, Mr. Kenyon +brought his friends to call on Miss Barrett; and many +of these friends were men with good literary instincts. +The meeting with these strong minds was no doubt a +great help to the little lady, shut up in a big house +and living largely in dreams.</p> + +<p>Mary Russell Mitford was in London about this time +on a little visit, and of course was sought out by John +Kenyon, who took her sightseeing. She was fifty years +old, too; she spoke of herself as an old maid, but didn't +allow others to do so. Friends always spoke of her as +"Little Miss Mitford," not because she was little, +but because she acted so. Among other beautiful +sights that Mr. Kenyon wished to show gushing little +Mary Mitford was a Miss Barrett who wrote things. +So together they called on Miss Barrett.</p> + +<p>Little Miss Mitford looked at the pale face in its +frame of dark curls, lying back among the pillows. +Little Miss Mitford bowed and said it was a fine day; +then she went right over and kissed Miss Barrett, and +these two women held each other's hands and talked +until Mr. Kenyon twisted nervously and hinted that +it was time to go.</p> + +<p>Miss Barrett had not been out for two months, but +now these two insisted that she should go with them. +The carriage was at the door, they would support her +very tenderly, Mr. Kenyon himself would drive—so +there could be no accidents and they would bring her +<a name="II_Page_27"></a>back the moment she was tired. So they went, did +these three, and as Mr. Kenyon himself drove there +were no accidents.</p> + +<p>I can imagine that James the coachman gave up the +reins that day with only an inward protest, and after +looking down and smiling reassurance Mr. Kenyon +drove slowly towards the Park; little Miss Mitford +forgot her promise not to talk incessantly; and the +"dainty, white-porcelain lady" brushed back the +raven curls from time to time and nodded indulgently.</p> + +<p>Not long ago I called at Number Seventy-four +Gloucester Place, where the Barretts lived. It is a +plain, solid brick house, built just like the ten thousand +other brick houses in London where well-to-do +tradesmen live. The people who now occupy the house +never heard of the Barretts, and surely do not belong +to a Browning Club. I was told that if I wanted to +know anything about the place I should apply to the +"Agent," whose name is 'Opkins and whose office is in +Clifford Court, off Fleet Street. The house probably +has not changed in any degree in these fifty years, +since little Miss Mitford on one side and Mr. Kenyon +on the other, tenderly helped Miss Barrett down the +steps and into the carriage.</p> + +<p>I lingered about Gloucester Place for an hour, but +finding that I was being furtively shadowed by various +servants, and discovering further that a policeman had +been summoned to look after my case, I moved on.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_28"></a></p> +<p>That night after the ride, Miss Mitford wrote a +letter home and among other things she said: "I called +today at a Mr. Barrett's. The eldest daughter is about +twenty-five. She has some spinal affection, but she is +a charming, sweet young woman who reads Greek as I +do French. She has published some translations from +Æschylus and some striking poems. She is a delightful +creature, shy, timid and modest."</p> + +<p>The next day Mr. Kenyon gave a little dinner in honor +of Miss Mitford, who was the author of a great book +called, "Our Village." That night when Miss Mitford +wrote her usual letter to the folks down in the country, +telling how she was getting along, she described this +dinner-party. She says: "Wordsworth was there—an +adorable old man. Then there was Walter Savage +Landor, too, as splendid a person as Mr. Kenyon himself, +but not so full of sweetness and sympathy. But best +of all, the charming Miss Barrett, who translated the +most difficult of the Greek plays, 'Prometheus Bound.' +She has written most exquisite poems, too, in almost +every modern style. She is so sweet and gentle, and +so pretty that one looks at her as if she were some +bright flower." Then in another letter Miss Mitford +adds: "She is of a slight, delicate figure, with a shower +of dark curls falling on either side of a most expressive +face; large tender eyes, richly fringed by dark lashes; a +smile like a sunbeam, and such a look of youthfulness +that I had some difficulty in persuading a friend that +<a name="II_Page_29"></a>she was really the translator of Æschylus and the +author of the 'Essay on Mind.'"</p> + +<p>When Miss Mitford went back home, she wrote Miss +Barrett a letter 'most every day. She addresses her as +"My Sweet Love," "My Dearest Sweet," and "My +Sweetest Dear." She declares her to be the gentlest, +strongest, sanest, noblest and most spiritual of all +living persons. And moreover she wrote these things +to others and published them in reviews. She gave +Elizabeth Barrett much good advice and some not so +good. Among other things she says: "Your one fault, +my dear, is obscurity. You must be simple and plain. +Think of the stupidest person of your acquaintance, +and when you have made your words so clear that +you are sure he will understand, you may venture to +hope it will be understood by others."</p> + +<p>I hardly think that this advice caused Miss Barrett to +bring her lines down to the level of the stupidest person +she knew. She continued to write just as she chose. Yet +she was grateful for Miss Mitford's glowing friendship, +and all the pretty gush was accepted, although perhaps +with good large pinches of the Syracuse product.</p> + +<p>Of course there are foolish people who assume that +gushing women are shallow, but this is jumping at +conclusions. A recent novel gives us a picture of "a +tall soldier," who, in camp, was very full of brag and +bluster. We are quite sure that when the fight comes +on this man with the lubricated tongue will prove an +<a name="II_Page_30"></a>arrant coward; we assume that he will run at the first +smell of smoke. But we are wrong—he stuck; and +when the flag was carried down in the rush, he rescued +it and bore it bravely so far to the front that when he +came back he brought another—the tawdry, red flag +of the enemy!</p> + +<p>I slip this in here just to warn hasty folk against the +assumption that talkative people are necessarily vacant-minded. +Man has a many-sided nature, and like the +moon reveals only certain phases at certain times. +And as there is one side of the moon that is never +revealed at all to dwellers on the planet Earth, so +mortals may unconsciously conceal certain phases of +soul-stuff from each other.</p> + +<p>Miss Barrett seems to have written more letters and +longer ones to Miss Mitford than to any of her other +correspondents, save one. Yet she was aware of this +rather indiscreet woman's limitations and wrote down +to her understanding.</p> + +<p>To Richard H. Horne she wrote freely and at her +intellectual best. With this all-round, gifted man she +kept up a correspondence for many years; and her +letters now published in two stout volumes afford a +literary history of the time. At the risk of being accused +of lack of taste, I wish to say that these letters of +Miss Barrett's are a deal more interesting to me than +any of her longer poems. They reveal the many-sided +qualities of the writer, and show the workings of her +<a name="II_Page_31"></a>mind in various moods. Poetry is such an exacting +form that it never allows the author to appear in dressing-gown +and slippers; neither can he call over the +back fence to his neighbor without loss of dignity.</p> + +<p>Horne was author, editor and publisher. His middle +name was Henry, but following that peculiar penchant +of the ink-stained fraternity to play flimflam with +their names, he changed the Henry to Hengist; so we +now see it writ thus: R. Hengist Horne.</p> + +<p>He found a market for Miss Barrett's wares. More +properly, he insisted that she should write certain things +to fit certain publications in which he was interested. +They collaborated in writing several books. They met +very seldom, and their correspondence has a fine friendly +flavor about it, tempered with a disinterestedness that is +unique. They encourage each other, criticize each other. +They rail at each other in witty quips and quirks, and at +times the air is so full of gibes that it looks as if a quarrel +were appearing on the horizon—no bigger than a man's +hand—but the storm always passes in a gentle shower of +refreshing compliments.</p> + +<p>Meantime, dodging in and out, we see the handsome, +gracious and kindly John Kenyon.</p> + +<p>Much of the time Miss Barrett lived in a darkened +room, seeing no one but her nurse, the physician and her +father. Fortune had smiled again on Edward Barrett—a +legacy had come his way, and although he no longer +owned the black men in Jamaica, yet they were again +<a name="II_Page_32"></a>working for him. Sugar-cane mills ground slow, but +small.</p> + +<p>The brilliant daughter had blossomed in intellect until +she was beyond her teacher. She was so far ahead that +he called to her to wait for him. He could read Greek; +she could compose in it. But she preferred her native +tongue, as every scholar should. Now, Mr. Barrett was +jealous of the fame of his daughter. The passion of +father for daughter, of mother for son—there is often +something very loverlike in it—a deal of whimsy! Miss +Barrett's darkened room had been illumined by a light +that the gruff and goodly merchant wist not of. Loneliness +and solitude and physical pain and heart-hunger +had taught her things that no book recorded nor tutor +knew. Her father could not follow her; her allusions +were obscure, he said, wilfully obscure; she was growing +perverse.</p> + +<p>Love is a pain at times. To ease the hurt the lover would +hurt the beloved. He badgers her, pinches her, provokes +her. One step more and he may kill her.</p> + +<p>Edward Barrett's daughter, she of the raven curls and +gentle ways, was reaching a point where her father's +love was not her life. A good way to drive love away is +to be jealous. He had seen it coming years before; he +brooded over it; the calamity was upon him. Her fame +was growing: some one called her the Shakespeare of +women. First, her books had been published at her +father's expense; next, editors were willing to run their +<a name="II_Page_33"></a>own risks, and now messengers with bank-notes waited +at the door and begged to exchange the bank-notes for +manuscript. John Kenyon said, "I told you so," but +Edward Barrett scowled. He accused her foolishly; he +attempted to dictate to her—she must use this ink or +that. Why? Because he said so. He quarreled with her +to ease the love-hurt that was smarting in his heart.</p> + +<p>Poor, little, pale-faced poet! Earthly success has nothing +left for thee! Thy thoughts, too great for speech, fall on +dull ears. Even thy father, for whom thou first took up +pen, doth not understand thee! and a mother's love +thou hast never known. And fame without love—how +barren! Heaven is thy home. Let slip thy thin, white +hands on the thread of life and glide gently out at ebb +of tide—out into the unknown. It can not but be better +than this—God understands! Compose thy troubled +spirit, give up thy vain hopes. See! thy youth is past, +little woman; look closely! there are gray hairs in thy +locks, thy face is marked with lines of care, and have I +not seen signs of winter in thy veins? Earth holds +naught for thee. Come, take thy pen and write, just a +last good-by, a tender farewell, such as thou alone canst +say. Then fold thy thin hands, and make peace with all +by passing out and away, out and away—God understands!</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_34"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>Elizabeth Barrett was thirty-seven, +and Miss Mitford, up to London from the +country for a couple of days, wrote home that +she had lost her winsome beauty.</p> + +<p>John Kenyon had turned well into sixty, but he carried +his years in a jaunty way. He wore a moss-rose bud in +the lapel of his well-fitting coat. His linen was immaculate, +and the only change people saw in him was that he +wore spectacles in place of a monocle.</p> + +<p>The physicians allowed Mr. Kenyon to visit the darkened +room whenever he chose, for he never stayed so +very long, neither was he ever the bearer of bad news.</p> + +<p>Did the greatest poetess of the age (temporarily slightly +indisposed) know one Browning—Robert Browning, a +writer of verse? Why, no; she had never met him, but of +course she knew of him, and had read everything he had +written. He had sent her one of his books once. He was +surely a man of brilliant parts—so strong and farseeing! +He lives in Italy, with the monks, they say. What a +pity the English people do not better appreciate him!</p> + +<p>"But he may succeed yet," said Mr. Kenyon. "He is +not old."</p> + +<p>"Oh, of course, such genius must some day be recognized. +But he may be gone then—how old did you say +he was?"</p> + +<p>Mr. Kenyon had not said; but he now explained that +Mr. Browning was thirty-four, that is to say, just the +age of himself, ahem! Furthermore, Mr. Browning did +<a name="II_Page_35"></a>not live in Italy—that is, not now, for at that present +moment he was in London. In fact, Mr. Kenyon had +lunched with him an hour before. They had talked of +Miss Barrett (for who else was there among women +worth talking of!) and Mr. Browning had expressed a +wish to see her. Mr. Kenyon had expressed a wish that +Mr. Browning should see her, and now if Miss Barrett +would express a wish that Mr. Browning should call +and see her, why, Mr. Kenyon would fetch him—doctors +or no doctors.</p> + +<p>And he fetched him.</p> + +<p>And I'm glad, aren't you?</p> + +<p>Now Robert Browning was not at all of the typical poet +type. In stature, he was rather short; his frame was +compact and muscular. In his youth, he had been a +wrestler—carrying away laurels of a different sort from +those which he was to wear later. His features were +inclined to be heavy; in repose his face was dull, and +there was no fire in his glance. He wore loose-fitting, +plain, gray clothes, a slouch-hat and thick-soled shoes. +At first look you would have said he was a well-fed, +well-to-do country squire. On closer acquaintance you +would have been impressed with his dignity, his perfect +poise and his fine reserve. And did you come to know +him well enough you would have seen that beneath that +seemingly phlegmatic outside there was a spiritual +nature so sensitive and tender that it responded to all +the finer thrills that play across the souls of men. Yet if +<a name="II_Page_36"></a>there ever was a man who did not wear his heart upon +his sleeve for daws to peck at, it was Robert Browning. +He was clean, wholesome, manly, healthy, inside and +out. He was master of self.</p> + +<p>Of course, the gentle reader is sure that the next act +will show a tender love-scene. And were I dealing with +the lives of Peter Smith and Martha the milkmaid, the +gentle reader might be right.</p> + +<p>But the love of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett +is an instance of the Divine Passion. Take off thy shoes, +for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground! This +man and woman had gotten well beyond the first flush +of youth; there was a joining of intellect and soul which +approaches the ideal. I can not imagine anything so +preposterous as a "proposal" passing between them; +I can not conceive a condition of hesitancy and timidity +leading up to a dam-bursting "avowal." They met, +looked into each other's eyes, and each there read his +fate: no coyness, no affectation, no fencing—they loved. +Each at once felt a heart-rest in the other. Each had at +last found the other self.</p> + +<p>That exquisite series of poems, "Sonnets From the +Portuguese," written by Elizabeth Barrett before her +marriage and presented to her husband afterward, was +all told to him over and over by the look from her eyes, +the pressure of her hands, and in gentle words (or +silence) that knew neither shame nor embarrassment.</p> + +<p>And now it seems to me that somewhere in these pages I +<a name="II_Page_37"></a>said that friendship was essentially hygienic. I wish to +make that remark again, and to put it in italics. The +Divine Passion implies the most exalted form of friendship +that man can imagine.</p> + +<p>Elizabeth Barrett ran up the shades and flung open the +shutters. The sunlight came dancing through the apartment, +flooding each dark corner and driving out all the +shadows that lurked therein. It was no longer a darkened +room.</p> + +<p>The doctor was indignant; the nurse resigned.</p> + +<p>Miss Mitford wrote back to the country that Miss +Barrett was "really looking better than she had for +years."</p> + +<p>As for poor Edward Moulton Barrett—he raved. He +tried to quarrel with Robert Browning, and had there +been only a callow youth with whom to deal, Browning +would simply have been kicked down the steps, and that +would have been an end of it. But Browning had an +even pulse, a calm eye and a temper that was imperturbable. +His will was quite as strong as Mr. Barrett's.</p> + +<p>And so it was just a plain runaway match—the ideal +thing after all. One day when the father was out of the +way they took a cab to Marylebone Parish Church +and were married. The bride went home alone, and it +was a week before her husband saw her; because he +would not be a hypocrite and go ask for her by her +maiden name. And had he gone, rung the bell and +asked to see Elizabeth Barrett Browning, no one would +<a name="II_Page_38"></a>have known whom he wanted. At the end of the week, +the bride stole down the steps alone, leading her dog +Flush by a string, and met her lover-husband on the +corner. Next day, they wrote back from Calais, asking +forgiveness and craving blessings, after the good old +custom of Gretna Green. But Edward Moulton Barrett +did not forgive—still, who cares!</p> + +<p>Yet we do care, too, for we regret that this man, so +strong and manly in many ways, could not be reconciled +to this exalted love. Old men who nurse wrath are +pitiable sights. Why could not Mr. Barrett have followed +the example of John Kenyon?</p> + +<p>Kenyon commands both our sympathy and admiration. +When the news came to him that Robert Browning and +Elizabeth Barrett were gone, it is said that he sobbed +like a youth to whom has come a great, strange sorrow. +For months he was not known to smile, yet after a year +he visited the happy home in Florence. When John +Kenyon died he left by his will fifty thousand dollars +"to my beloved and loving friends, Robert Browning +and Elizabeth Barrett, his wife."</p> + +<p>The old-time novelists always left their couples at the +church-door. It was not safe to follow further—they +wished to make a pleasant story. It seems meet to take +our leave of the bride and groom at the church: life +often ends there. However, it sometimes is the place +where life really begins. It was so with Elizabeth Barrett +and Robert Browning—they had merely existed before; +<a name="II_Page_39"></a>now, they began to live.</p> + +<p>Much, very much has been +written concerning this ideal mating, and of the life of +Mr. and Mrs. Browning in Italy. But why should I +write of the things of which George William Curtis, +Kate Field, Anthony Trollope and James T. Fields have +written? No, we will leave the happy pair at the altar, +in Marylebone Parish Church, and while the organ peals +the wedding-march we will tiptoe softly out. +<a name="II_Page_40"></a><a name="II_Page_41"></a></p> + + +<hr class="full" /> +<p><a name="MADAME_GUYON"></a></p><h2>MADAME GUYON</h2> +<p><a name="II_Page_42"></a></p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>To me remains nor place nor time;<br /></span> +<span>My country is in every clime;<br /></span> +<span>I can be calm and free from care,<br /></span> +<span>On any shore, since God is there.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>While place we seek or place we shun,<br /></span> +<span>The soul finds happiness in none;<br /></span> +<span>But with a God to guide our way,<br /></span> +<span>'Tis equal joy to go or stay.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Could I be cast where Thou art not,<br /></span> +<span>That were indeed a dreadful lot;<br /></span> +<span>But regions none remote I call,<br /></span> +<span>Secure of finding God in all.<br /></span> +<span class="i10"><i>God Is Everywhere</i><br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_43"></a></p> +<p class="ctr"><a href="./images/ljv2-2.jpg"><img src="./images/ljv2-2_th.jpg" alt="MADAME GUYON" /></a></p><p class="ctr">MADAME GUYON</p> + +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_44"></a><a name="II_Page_45"></a></p> +<p>Jeanne Marie Bouvier sat one +day writing at her little oaken desk, +when her father approached and, +kissing her very gently on the forehead, +told her that he had arranged +for her marriage, and that her future +husband was soon to arrive. Jeanne's +fingers lost their cunning, the pen +dropped; she arose to her feet, but her tongue was dumb.</p> + +<p>Jeanne Marie was only sixteen, but you would have +thought her twenty, for she was tall and dignified—she +was as tall as her father: she was five feet nine. She had +a splendid length of limb, hips that gave only a suggestion +of curve line, a slender waist, a shapely, well-poised +neck, and a head that might have made a Juno +envious. The face and brow were not those of Venus—rather +they belonged to Minerva; for the nose was large, +the chin full, and the mouth no pea's blossom. The hair +was light brown, but when the sun shone on it people +said it was red. It was as generous in quantity and +unruly in habits as the westerly wind. Her eyes were all +colors, changing according to her mood. Withal, she +had freckles, and no one was ever so rash as to call her +pretty.</p> + +<p>Now, Jeanne's father had not kissed her for two years, +for he was a very busy man: he had not time for soft +<a name="II_Page_46"></a>demonstration. He was rich, he was religious, and he +was looked upon as a model citizen in every way.</p> + +<p>The daughter had grown like a sunflower, and her +intellect had unfolded as a moss-rose turns from bud to +blossom. This splendid girl had thought and studied and +dreamed dreams. She had imagined she heard a voice +speaking to her: "Arise, maiden, and prepare thee, for +I have a work for thee to do!"</p> + +<p>Her wish and prayer was to enter a convent, and after +consecrating herself to God in a way that would allow of +no turning back, to go forth and give to men and +women the messages that had come to her. And these +things filled the heart of the worthy bourgeois with +alarm; so he said to his wife one day: "That girl will be +a foot taller than I am in a year, and even now when I +give her advice, she opens her big eyes and looks at me +in a way that thins my words to whey. She will get us +into trouble yet! She may disgrace us! I think—I think +I'll find her a husband."</p> + +<p>Yet that would not have been a difficult task. She was +loved by a score of youths, but had never spoken to any +of them. They stood at corners and sighed as she walked +by; and others, with religious bent, timed her hours for +mass and took positions in church from whence they +could see her kneel. Still others patroled the narrow +street that led to her home, with hopes that she might +pass that way, so that they might touch the hem of her +garment.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_47"></a></p> +<p>These things were as naught to Jeanne Marie. She had +never yet seen a man for whose intellect she did not +have both a pity and a contempt.</p> + +<p>But Claude Bouvier did not pick a husband for his +daughter from among the simple youths of the town. +He wrote to a bachelor friend, Jacques Guyon by name, +and told him he could have the girl if he wanted her—that +is, after certain little preliminaries had been +arranged.</p> + +<p>Now, Jacques Guyon had been at the Bouvier residence +on a visit three months before, and had looked the lass +over stealthily with peculiar interest, and had intimated +that if Monsieur Bouvier wished to get rid of her it +could be brought about. So, after some weeks had passed, +Monsieur bethought him of the offer of Jacques Guyon, +and he concluded that inasmuch as Guyon was rich and +respectable it would be a good match.</p> + +<p>So he wrote to Guyon, and Guyon replied that he would +come, probably within a fortnight—just as soon as his +rheumatism got better.</p> + +<p>Monsieur Claude Bouvier read the letter, and walking +into the next room, surprised Jeanne Marie by kissing +her tenderly on her forehead—all as herein truthfully +recorded.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_48"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>So Jacques Guyon came, came in his carriage, +with two servants riding on horseback in +front and another riding on horseback behind. +Jeanne Marie sat on the floor, tailor fashion, +up in her little room of the old stone house, and peeked +out of the diamond-paned gable-window very cautiously; +and she was sorely disappointed.</p> + +<p>In some of her dreams (and these dreams she thought +were very bad), she had pictured a lover coming alone +on a foam-flecked charger; and as the steed paused, the +rider leaped lightly from saddle to ground, kissing his +hand to her as she peeked through the curtains. For he +discovered her when she hoped he would not, but she +did not care much if he did.</p> + +<p>But Monsieur Guyon's eyes did not search the windows. +He got out of the carriage with difficulty, and his breath +came wheezy and short as he mounted the steps. His +complexion was dusty blue, his nose tinged with carmine, +his eyes watery, and his girth aldermanic. He was +growing old, and, saddest of all, he was growing old +rebelliously and therefore ungracefully—dyeing his +whiskers purple.</p> + +<p>That evening when Jeanne Marie was introduced to +Monsieur Guyon at dinner she found him very polite +and very gracious. His breeches were real black velvet +and his stockings were silk, and the buckles on his shoes +were polished silver and the frill of his shirt was finest +lace. His conversation was directed mostly to Jeanne's +<a name="II_Page_49"></a>father, so Jeanne did not feel nearly so uncomfortable +as she had expected.</p> + +<p>The next day a notary came, and long papers were +written out, and red and green seals placed on them, +and then everybody held up his right hand as the notary +mumbled something, and then all signed their names. +The room seemed to be teetering up and down, and it +looked quite like rain. Monsieur Bouvier stood on his +tiptoes and again kissed his daughter on the forehead, +and Monsieur Guyon, taking her hand, lifted the long, +slender fingers to his lips, and told her that she would +soon be a great lady and the mistress of a splendid +mansion, and have everything that one needed to make +one happy.</p> + +<p>And so they were married by a bishop, with two priests +and three curates to assist. The ceremony was held at +the great stone church; and as the procession came out, +the verger had a hard time to keep the crowd back, so +that the little girls in white could go before and strew +flowers in their pathway. The organ pealed, and the +chimes clanged and rang as if the tune and the times +were out of joint; then other bells from other parts of +the old town answered, and across the valley rang +mellow and soft the chapel-bell of Montargis Castle.</p> + +<p>Jeanne was seated in a carriage—how she got there she +never knew; by her side sat Jacques Guyon. The post-boys +were lashing their horses into a savage run, like +devils running away with the souls of innocents, and +<a name="II_Page_50"></a>behind clattered the mounted, liveried servant. People +on the sidewalks waved good-bys and called God-bless-yous. +Soon the sleepy old town was left behind and the +horses slowed down to a lazy trot. Jeanne looked back, +like Lot's wife: only a church-spire could be seen. She +hoped that she might be turned into a pillar of salt—but +she wasn't. She crouched into the corner of the seat +and cried a good honest cry.</p> + +<p>And Monsieur Jacques Guyon smiled and muttered to +himself, "Her father said she was a bit stubborn, but +I'll see that she gets over it!"</p> + +<p>And this was over three hundred years ago. It doesn't +seem like it, but it was.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_51"></a></p> +<hr /> +<p>Read the lives of great men and you will come +to the conclusion that it is harder to find a +gentleman than a genius. While the clock +ticks off the seconds, count on your fingers—within +five minutes, if you can—five such gentlemen as +Sir Philip Sidney! Of course, I know before you speak +that Fenelon will be the first on your tongue. Fenelon, +the low-voiced, the mild, the sympathetic, the courtly, +the gracious! Fenelon, favored by the gods with beauty +and far-reaching intellect! Fenelon, who knew the gold +of silence. Fenelon, on whose lips dwelt grace, and who +by the magic of his words had but to speak to be +believed and to be beloved.</p> + +<p>When Louis the Little made that most audacious +blunder which cost France millions in treasure and +untold loss in men and women, Fenelon wrote to the +Prime Minister: "These Huguenots have many virtues +that must be acknowledged and conserved. We must +hold them by mildness. We can not produce conformity +by force. Converts made in this manner are hypocrites. +No power is great enough to bind the mind—thought +forever escapes. Give civil liberty to all, not by approving +all religions, but by permitting in patience what God +allows."</p> + +<p>"You shall go as missionary to these renegades!" was +the answer—half-ironical, half-earnest.</p> + +<p>"I will go only on one condition."</p> + +<p>"And that is?"</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_52"></a></p> +<p>"That from my province you withdraw all armed +men—all sign of compulsion of every sort!"</p> + +<p>Fenelon was of noble blood, but his sympathies were +ever with the people. The lowly, the weak, the oppressed, +the persecuted—these were ever the objects of his +solicitude—these were first in his mind.</p> + +<p>It was in prison that Fenelon first met Madame Guyon. +Fenelon was thirty-seven, she was forty. He occasionally +preached at Montargis, and while there had heard of +her goodness, her piety, her fervor, her resignation. He +had small sympathy for many of her peculiar views, +but now she was sick and in prison and he went to her +and admonished her to hold fast and to be of good-cheer.</p> + +<p>Twelve years before this Madame Guyon had been +left a widow. She was the mother of five children—two +were dead. The others were placed under the care of +kind kinsmen; and Madame Guyon went forth to give +her days to study and to teaching. This action of placing +her children partly in the care of others has been harshly +criticized. But there is one phase of the subject that I +have never seen commented upon—and that is that a +mother's love for her offspring bears a certain ratio to +the love she bore their father. Had Madame Guyon ever +carried in her arms a love-child, I can not conceive of +her allowing this child to be cared for by others—no +matter how competent.</p> + +<p>The favor that had greeted Madame Guyon wherever +she went was very great. Her animation and devout +<a name="II_Page_53"></a>enthusiasm won her entrance into the homes of the +great and noble everywhere. She organized societies of +women that met for prayer and conversation on exalted +themes. The burden of her philosophy was "Quietism"—the +absolute submission of the human soul to the will +of God. Give up all, lay aside all striving, all reaching +out, all unrest, cease penance and lie low in the Lord's +hand. He doeth all things well. Make life one continual +prayer for holiness—wholeness—harmony; and thus all +good will come to us—we attract the good; we attract +God—He is our friend—His spirit dwells with us. She +taught of power through repose, and told that you can +never gain peace by striving for it like fury.</p> + +<p>This philosophy, stretching out in limitless ramifications, +bearing on every phase and condition of life, +touched everywhere with mysticism, afforded endless +opportunity for thought.</p> + +<p>It is the same philosophy that is being expressed by +thousands of prominent men and women today. It +embraced all that is vital and best in our so-called +"advanced thought"; for in good sooth none of our +new "liberal sects" has anything that has not been +taught before in olden time.</p> + +<p>But Madame Guyon's success was too great. The +guardians of a dogmatic religion are ever on the scent +for heresy. They are jealous, and fearful, and full of +alarm lest their "institution" shall topple. Quietism +was making head, and throughout France the name of +<a name="II_Page_54"></a>Madame Guyon was becoming known. She went from +town to town, and from city to city, and gave courses +of lectures. Women flocked to hear her, they organized +clubs. Preachers sometimes appeared and argued with +her, but by the high fervor of her speech she quickly +silenced them. Then they took revenge by thundering +sermons against her after she had gone. As she traveled +she left in her wake a pyrotechnic display of elocutionary +denunciation. They dared her to come back and +fight it out. The air was full of challenges. One prelate +was good enough to say, "This woman may teach +primitive Christianity—but if people find God everywhere, +what's to become of us!"</p> + +<p>And although the theme is as great as Fate and as +serious as Death, one can not suppress a smile to think +how the fear of losing their jobs has ever caused men to +run violently to and fro and up and down in the earth, +crying peace, peace, when there is no peace.</p> + +<p>Now, it was the denunciation and wild demonstration +of her fearing foes that advertised the labors of Madame +Guyon. For strong people are not so much advertised +by their loving friends as by their rabid enemies.</p> + +<p>This happened quite a while ago; but as mankind moves +in a circle (and not always a spiral, either) it might have +happened yesterday. Make the scene Ohio: slip Bossuet +out and Doctor Buckley in; condense the virtues of Miss +Frances E. Willard and Miss Susan B. Anthony into +one, and let this one stand for Madame Guyon; call it +<a name="II_Page_55"></a>New Transcendentalism, dub the Madame a New +Woman, and there you have it!</p> + +<p>But with this difference: petitions to the President of +the United States to arrest this female offender and +shut her up in the Chicago jail, indefinitely, after a mock +trial, would avail not. Yet persecution has its compensation, +and the treatment that Madame Guyon received +emphasized the truths she taught and sent them ringing +through the schools and salons and wherever thinking +people gathered themselves together. Yes, persecution +has its compensation. In its state of persecution a religion +is pure, if ever; its decline begins when its prosperity +commences. Prosperous men are never wise and seldom +good. Woe unto you when all men shall speak well of you!</p> + +<p>Surely, persecution has its compensation! When +Madame Guyon was sick and in prison, was she not +visited by Fenelon? Ah, 'twas worth the cost. Sympathy +is the first attribute of love as well as its last. +And I am not sure but that sympathy is love's own +self, vitalized mayhap by some divine actinic ray. Only +a thorn-crowned, bleeding Christ could win the adoration +of the world. Only the souls who have suffered are +well loved. Thus does Golgotha find its recompense. +Hark ye and take courage, ye who are in bonds! Gracious +spirits, seen or unseen, will minister to you now, +where otherwise they would have passed without a sign! +But from the day Fenelon met Madame Guyon his +fortune began to decline. People looked at him askance. +<a name="II_Page_56"></a>By a grim chance he was made one of a committee of +three to investigate the charges brought against the +woman. The court took a year for its task. Fenelon +read everything that Madame Guyon had published, +conversed much with her, inquired into her history and +when asked for his verdict said, "I find no fault in her."</p> + +<p>He talked with Madame de Maintenon, and Madame +de Maintenon talked with the King, and the offender +was released.</p> + +<p>Soon Fenelon began to utter in his sermons the truths +he had learned from Madame Guyon. And he gave her +due credit. He explained that she was a good Catholic—that +she loved the Church—that she lived up to all the +Church taught, and besides knowing all that Churchmen +knew she knew many things beside.</p> + +<p>Have a care, Archbishop of Cambrai! Enemies are upon +thy track. Defend not defenseless womanhood: knowest +thou not what they have said of her? Speak what thou +art taught and keep thy inmost thoughts for thyself +alone. Have a care, Fenelon! thy bishopric hangs by a +spider's thread.</p> + +<p>The years kept slipping past as the years will. Twelve +summers had come, and twelve times had autumn +leaves known their time to fall. Madame Guyon was +again in prison. A stranger was Archbishop of Cambrai: +Fenelon no longer a counselor of kings—a tutor of +royalty. His voice was silenced, his pen chained. He was +allowed to retire to a rural parish. There he lived with +<a name="II_Page_57"></a>the peasants—revered, beloved. The country where he +dwelt was battle-scarred and bleeding; the smoke of +devastation still hung over it. Not a family but had +been robbed of its best. Death had stalked rampant. +Fenelon shared the poverty of the people, their lowliness, +their sorrows. All the tragedy of their life was his; +he said to them, "I know, I know!"</p> + +<p>Twelve years of Madame Guyon's life were spent in +prison. Toward the last she was allowed to live in +nominal freedom. But despotism, with savage leer and +stealthy step, saw that Fenelon was kept far away. In +those declining days, when the shadows were lengthening +toward the east, her time and talents were given to +teaching the simple rudiments of knowledge to the +peasantry, to alleviating their material wants and to +ministering to the sick. It was a forced retirement, and +yet it was a retirement that was in every way in accord +with her desires. But in spite of the persecution that +followed her, and the obloquy heaped upon her name, +and the bribe of pardon if she would but recant, she +never retracted nor wavered in her inward or outward +faith, even in the estimation of a hair. The firm reticence +as to the supreme secrets of her life, and her steadfast +loyalty to that which she honestly believed was truth, +must ever command the affectionate admiration of all +those who prize integrity of mind and purity of purpose, +who hold fast to the divinity of love, and who believe +in the things unseen which are eternal.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_58"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>The town of Montargis is one day's bicycle +journey from Paris. As for the road, though +one be a wayfaring man and from the States +he could not err therein. You simply follow +the Seine as if you were intent on discovering its source, +keeping to the beautiful highway that follows the +winding stream. And what a beautiful, clear, clean bit +of water it is! In Paris, your washerwoman takes your +linen to the river, just as they did in the days of Pharaoh, +and the bundle comes back sweet as the breath of June. +Imagine the result of such recklessness in Chicago!</p> + +<p>But as I rode out of Paris that bright May day it +seemed Monday all along the way; for dames with +baskets balanced on their heads were making their way +to the waterside, followed by troops of barefoot or +sabot-shod children. There was one fine young woman +with a baby in her arms, and the innocent firstborn was +busily taking its breakfast as the mother walked calmly +along, bearing on her well-poised head the family wash. +And a mile farther on, as if she had seen her rival and +gone her one better, was another woman with a two-year-old +cherub perched secure on top of the gently +swaying basket, proud as a cardinal about to be consecrated. +It was a study in balancing that I have never +seen before nor since; and I only ask those to believe it +who know things so true that they dare not tell them. +As the day wore on, I saw that the wash was being +completed, for the garments were spread out on the +<a name="II_Page_59"></a>greenest of green grass, or on the bushes that lined the +way. By ten o'clock I was nearing Fontainebleau, and +the clothes were nearly ready to take in—but not quite. +For while waiting for the warm sun and the gentle +breeze to dry them, the thrifty dames, who were +French and make soup out of everything, put in the +time by laundering the children. It seemed like that +economic stroke of good housewives who use the soapy +wash-water for scrubbing the kitchen-floor. There they +were, dozens of hopefuls on whom the fate of the nation +rested—creepers to ten-year-olds—being scrubbed and +dipped, or playing parlez-vous tag in lieu of towel, as +innocent of clothes as Carlyle's imaginary House of +Lords.</p> + +<p>And so I passed off from the road that traced the Seine +to a road that kept company with the canal. I followed +the towpath, even in spite of warnings that 't was +'gainst the law. It was a one-horse canal, for many of +the gaily painted boats were drawn only by a single, +shaggy-limbed Percheron. The boats were sharp-prowed +and narrow; and on some were bareheaded +women knitting, and men carving curious things out of +blocks of wood, as they journeyed. And I said to myself, +if "it is the pace that kills," these people are making a +strong bid for immortality. I hailed the lazily moving +craft, waving my hat, and the slow-going tourists called +back cheerily.</p> + +<p>By and by I came to a great, wide plain that stretched +<a name="II_Page_60"></a>away like a tideless summer sea. The wheat and lentils +and pulse were planted in long strips. In one place I +thought I could trace the good old American flag (that +you never really love unless you are on a foreign shore) +made with alternate strips of millet and peas, with a +goodly patch of cabbages in the corner for stars. But +possibly this was imagination, for I had been thinking +that in a week it would be the Fourth of July and I was +far from home—in a land where firecrackers are +unknown.</p> + +<p>Coming to a little rise of ground, I could see, lying calm +and quiet amid the world of rich, growing grain, the +town of Montargis. Across on the blue hillside was +Montargis Castle, framed in a mass of foliage. I stopped +to view the scene, and the echo of vesper-bells came +pealing gently over the miles, as the nodding poppies at +my feet bowed reverently in the breeze.</p> + +<p>Villages in France viewed from a distance seem so +restful and idyllic. There is no sound of strife, no trace +of rivalry, no vain pride; only white houses—the homes +of good men and gentle women, and cherub children; +and all the church-steeples truly point to God. Yet on +closer view—but what of that!</p> + +<p>When I reached the town, the church whose spire I had +seen from the distance beckoned me first. I turned off +from the wide thoroughfare, intending just to get a +glance at the outside of the building as I passed. But +the great iron gates thrown invitingly open, and a rusty, +<a name="II_Page_61"></a>dusty dog of Flanders lying in the entry waiting for his +master, told me that there was service within. So I +entered, passing through the noiseless, swinging door, +and into the dim twilight of the house of prayer. A score +of people were there, and standing in the aisle was a +white-robed priest. He was speaking, and his voice +came so gently, so sure withal, so exquisitely modulated, +that I paused and, leaning against a pillar, listened. I +think it was the first time I ever heard a preacher +speaking in a large church who did not speak so loud +that an echo chased his sentences round and round the +vaulted dome and strangled the sense. The tone was +conversational and the manner so free from canting +conventionality that I moved up closer to get a view +of the face.</p> + +<p>It was too dark to see well, but I came under the spell +of the man's earnest eloquence. The sacred stillness, the +falling night, the odor from incense and banks of flowers +piled about the feet of an image of the Holy Virgin—evidently +brought by the peasantry, having nothing +else to give—made a combination of melting conditions +that would have subdued a heart of stone.</p> + +<p>The preacher ceased to speak, and as he raised his hands +in benediction, I, involuntarily, with the other worshipers, +knelt on the stone floor and bowed my head in +silent reverie.</p> + +<p>Suddenly, I was aroused by a crashing noise at my +elbow, and glancing round saw that an old man near me +<a name="II_Page_62"></a>had merely dropped his cane. A heavy cudgel it was +that falling on the stone flagging sent a thundering +reverberation through the vaulted chambers.</p> + +<p>The worshipers were slipping out, one by one, and soon +no one was left but the old man of the cudgel and myself. +He wore wooden shoes, and was holding the cordwood +fast between his knees, rolling his hat nervously in his +big hands. "He's a stranger, too," I said to myself; +"he is the man who owns the rusty dog of Flanders, +and he is waiting to give the priest some message!"</p> + +<p>I leaned over towards my neighbor and asked, "The +priest—what is his name?"</p> + +<p>"Father Francis, Monsieur!" and the old man swayed +back and forward in his seat as if moved by some inward +emotion, still fingering his hat.</p> + +<p>Just then the priest came out from behind the altar, +wearing a black robe instead of the white one. He moved +down with a sort of quiet majesty straight towards us. +We arose as one man; it was as though some one had +pressed a button.</p> + +<p>Father Francis walked by me, bowing slightly, and +shook hands with my old neighbor. They stood talking +in an undertone.</p> + +<p>A last struggling ray of light from the dying sun came in +over the chancel and flooded the great room for an +instant. It allowed me to get a good look at the face +of the priest. As I stood there staring at him I heard +him say to the old man as he bade him good-by, "Yes, +<a name="II_Page_63"></a>tell her I'll be there in the morning."</p> + +<p>Then he turned to me, and I was still staring. And as I stared I +was repeating to myself the words the people said when +Dante used to pass, "There is the man who has been +to Hell!"</p> + +<p>"You are an Englishman?" said Father Francis to +me pleasantly as he held out his hand. +"Yes," I said; "I am an Englishman—that is, no—an +American!"</p> + +<p>I was wondering if he had really heard me make that +Dante remark; and anyway, I had been rudely staring +at him and listening with both ears to his conversation +with the old man. I tried to roll my hat, and had I a +cudgel I would surely have dropped it; and with it all I +wondered if the dog of Flanders waiting outside was +not getting impatient for me!</p> + +<p>"Oh, an American! I'm glad—I have very dear friends +in America!"</p> + +<p>Then I saw that Father Francis did not look so much +like the exiled Florentine as I had thought, for his smile +was winning as that of a woman, the corners of his +mouth did not turn down, and the nose had not the +Roman curve. Dante was an exile: this man was at +home—and would have been, anywhere.</p> + +<p>He was tall, slender and straight; he must have been +sixty years old, but the face in spite of its furrows was +singularly handsome. Grave, yet not depressed, it +showed such feminine delicacy of feeling, such grace, +<a name="II_Page_64"></a>such high intellect, that I stood and gazed as I might +at a statue in bronze. But plain to see, he was a man +of sorrow and acquainted with grief. The face spake +of one to whom might have come a great tribulation, +and who by accepting it had purchased redemption +for all time from all the petty troubles of earth.</p> + +<p>"You must stay here as long as you wish, and you +will come to our old church again, I hope!" said the +Father. He smiled, nodded his head and started to +leave me alone.</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes, I'll come again—I'll come in the morning, +for I want to talk with you about Madame Guyon—she +was married in this church they told me—is that +true?" I clutched a little. Here was a man I could not +afford to lose—one of the elect!</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes; that was a long time ago, though. Are you +interested in Madame Guyon? I am glad—not to +know Fenelon seems a misfortune. He used to preach +from that very pulpit, and Madame was baptized at +that font and confirmed here. I have pictures of them +both; and I have their books—one of the books is a +first edition. Do you care for such things?"</p> + +<p>When I was broke in London, in the Fall of Eighty-nine! +Do I care for such things? I can not recall what +I said, but I remembered that this brown-skinned +priest with his liquid, black eyes, and the look of +sorrow on his handsome face, stood out before me like +the picture of a saint.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_65"></a></p> +<p>I made an engagement to meet him the next morning, +when he bethought him of his promise to the old man +of the cudgel and wooden shoes.</p> + +<p>"Come now, then—come with me now. My house is +just next door!"</p> + +<p>And so we walked up the main aisle of the old church, +around the altar where Madame Guyon used to kneel, +and by a crooked, little passageway entered a house +fully as old as the church. A woman who might have +been as old as the house was setting the table in a +little dining-room. She looked up at me through brass-rimmed +spectacles, and without orders or any one +saying a word she whisked off the tablecloth, replaced it +with a snowy, clean one, and put on two plates instead +of one. Then she brought in toasted brown bread and +tea, and a steaming dish of lentils, and fresh-picked +berries in a basket all lined with green leaves.</p> + +<p>It was not a very sumptuous repast, but 't was enough. +Afterward I learned that Father Francis was a vegetarian. +He did not tell me so, neither did he apologize +for absence of fermented drink, nor for his failure to +supply tobacco and pipes.</p> + +<p>Now, I have heard that there be priests who hold in +their cowled heads choice recipes for spiced wines, and +who carry hidden away in their hearts all the mysteries +of the chafing-dish; but Father Francis was not one +of these. His form was thin, but the bronze of his face +was the bronze that comes from red corpuscles, and +<a name="II_Page_66"></a>the strongly corded neck and calloused, bony hands +told of manly abstinence and exercise in the open air, +and sleep that follows peaceful thoughts, knowing no +chloral.</p> + +<p>After the meal, Father Francis led the way to his little +study upstairs. He showed me his books and read to +me from his one solitary "First Edition." Then he +unlocked a little drawer in an old chiffonier and brought +out a package all wrapped in chamois. This parcel +held two miniature portraits, one of Fenelon and one +of Madame Guyon.</p> + +<p>"That picture of Fenelon belonged to Madame Guyon. +He had it painted for her and sent it to her while she +was in prison at Vincennes. The other I bought in +Paris—I do not know its history."</p> + +<p>The good priest had work to do, and let me know it +very gently, thus: "You have come a long way, +brother, the road was rough—I know you must be +weary. Come, I'll show you to your room."</p> + +<p>He lighted a candle and took me to a bedroom at the +end of the hall. It was a little room, very clean, but +devoid of all ornament, save a picture of the Madonna +and her Babe, that hung over the head of the little +iron bedstead. It was a painting—not very good. I +think Father Francis painted it himself; the face of +the Holy Mother was very human—divinely human—as +motherhood should be.</p> + +<p>Father Francis was right: +the way had been rough and I was tired.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_67"></a></p> +<p>The treetops sang a cooing lullaby and the nightwinds +sighed solemnly as they wandered through the +hallway and open doors. It did not take me long to +go to sleep. Later, the wind blew up fresh and cool. +I was too sleepy to get up and hunt for more covering, +and yet I was cold as I curled up in a knot and dreamed +I was first mate with Peary on an expedition in search +of the North Pole. And the last I remember was a +vision of a gray-robed priest tiptoeing across the stone +floor; of his throwing over me a heavy blanket and +then hastily tiptoeing out again.</p> + +<p>The matin-bells, or the birds, or both, awoke me early, +but when I got downstairs I found my host had preceded +me. His fine face looked fresh and strong, and +yet I wondered when he had slept.</p> + +<p>After breakfast, the old housekeeper hovered near.</p> + +<p>"What is it, Margaret?" said the Father, gently.</p> + +<p>"You haven't forgotten your engagement?" asked +the woman, with just a quaver of anxiety.</p> + +<p>"Oh no, Margaret"; then turning to me, "Come, you +shall go with me—we will talk of Fenelon and Madame +Guyon as we walk. It is eight miles and back, but you +will not mind the distance. Oh, didn't I tell you where +I'm going? You saw the old man at the church last +night—it is his daughter—she is dying—dying of +consumption. She has not been a good girl. She went +away to Paris, three years ago, and her parents never +heard from her. We tried to find her, but could not; +<a name="II_Page_68"></a>and now she has come home of her own accord—come +home to die. I baptized her twenty years ago—how +fast the time has flown!"</p> + +<p>The priest took a stout staff from the corner, and +handing me its mate we started away. Down the +white, dusty highway we went; out on the stony road +where yesterday, as the darkness gathered, trudged +an old man in wooden shoes and with a cordwood +cudgel—at his heels a dog of Flanders.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_69"></a></p> + + +<hr class="full" /> +<p><a name="HARRIET_MARTINEAU"></a></p><h2>HARRIET MARTINEAU</h2> +<p><a name="II_Page_70"></a></p> +<div class="blkquot"><p>You better live your best and act your best and think +your best today; for today is the sure preparation for +tomorrow and all the other tomorrows that follow.<br /> +<span style='margin-left: 25em;'>—<i>Life's Uses</i></span></p></div> +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_71"></a></p> +<p class="ctr"><a href="./images/ljv2-3.jpg"><img src="./images/ljv2-3_th.jpg" alt="HARRIET MARTINEAU" /></a></p><p class="ctr">HARRIET MARTINEAU</p> +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_72"></a><a name="II_Page_73"></a></p> + +<p>I believe it was Thackeray who +once expressed a regret that Harriet +Martineau had not shown +better judgment in choosing her +parents.</p> + +<p>She was born into one of those +big families where there is not love +enough to go 'round. The mother +was a robustious woman with a termagant temper; +she was what you call "practical." She arose each +morning, like Solomon's ideal wife, while it was yet +dark, and proceeded to set her house in order. She +made the children go to bed when they were not +sleepy and get up when they were. There was no +beauty-sleep in that household, not even forty winks; +and did any member prove recreant and require a +douse of cold water, not only did he get the douse but +he also heard quoted for a year and a day that remark +concerning the sluggard, "A little sleep, a little slumber, +a little folding of the hands to sleep: so shall thy +poverty come as one that traveleth, and thy want as +an armed man."</p> + +<p>This big, bustling Amazon was never known to weep +but once, and that was when Lord Nelson died. To show +any emotion would have been to reveal a weakness, +and a caress would have been proof positive of folly. +<a name="II_Page_74"></a>Life was a stern business and this earth-journey a +warfare. She cooked, she swept, she scrubbed, she +sewed.</p> + +<p>And although she withheld every loving word and +kept back all demonstration of affection, yet her children +were always well cared for: they were well clothed, +they had plenty to eat, and a warm place to sleep. +And in times of sickness this mother would send all +others to rest, and herself would watch by the bedside +until the shadows stole away and the sunrise came +again. I wonder where you have lived all your life if +you have never known a woman like that?</p> + +<p>In the morning, as soon as the breakfast things were +done and the men folks had gone to the cloth-factory, +Mrs. Martineau would marshal her daughters in the +sitting-room to sew. And there they sewed for four +hours every forenoon for more than four years; and as +they sewed some one would often read aloud to them, +for Mrs. Martineau believed in education—education +gotten on the wing.</p> + +<p>Sewing-machines and knitting-machines have done +more to emancipate women than all the preachers. +Think of the days when every garment worn by men, +women and children was made by the never-resting +hands of women!</p> + +<p>And as the girls in that thrifty Norwich household +sewed and listened to the reader, they occasionally +spoke in monotone of what was read—-all save Harriet: +<a name="II_Page_75"></a>Harriet sewed. And the other girls thought Harriet +very dull, and her mother was sure of it, and called her +stupid, and sometimes shook her and railed at her, +endeavoring to arouse her out of her lethargy.</p> + +<p>Harriet has herself left on record somewhat of her +feelings in those days. In her child-heart there was a +great aching void. Her life was wrong—the lives about +her were wrong—she did not know how, and could not +then trace the subject far enough to tell why. She was +a-hungered, she longed for tenderness, for affection +and the close confidence that knows no repulse. She +wanted them all to throw down their sewing for just +five minutes, and sit in the silence with folded hands. +She longed for her mother to hold her on her lap so, +that she could pillow her head on her shoulder with +her arms about her neck, and have a real good cry. +Then all her troubles and pains would be gone.</p> + +<p>But the slim little girl never voiced any of these foolish +thoughts; she knew better. She choked back her +tears and leaning over her sewing tried hard to be +"good."</p> + +<p>"She is so stupid that she never listens to what one +reads to her," said her mother one day.</p> + +<p>One of that family still lives. I saw him not long ago +and talked with him face to face concerning some of +the things here written—Doctor James Martineau, +ninety-two years old.</p> + +<p>The others are all dead now—all are gone. In the +<a name="II_Page_76"></a>cemetery at Norwich is a plain, slate slab, "To the +Memory of Elizabeth Martineau, Mother of Harriet +Martineau." * * * And so she sleeps, remembered for what? +As the mother of a stupid little girl who +tried hard to be good, but didn't succeed very well, +and who did not listen when they read aloud.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_77"></a></p> +<hr /> +<p>It seems sometimes that there is no such +thing as a New Year—it is only the old +year come back. These folks about us—have +they not lived before? Surely they +are the same creatures that have peopled earth in the +days agone; they are busy about the same things, they +chase after the same trifles, they commit the same +mistakes, and blunder as men have always blundered.</p> + +<p>Only last week, a teacher in one of the primary +schools of Chicago reported to her principal that a +certain little boy in her room was so hopelessly dull +and perverse that she despaired of teaching him anything. +The child would sit with open mouth and look +at her as she would talk to the class, and five minutes +afterward he could not or would not repeat three words +of what had been said. She had scolded him, made him +stand on the floor, kept him in after school, and even +whipped him—but all in vain. The principal looked +into the case, scratched his head, stroked his whiskers, +coughed, and decided that the public-school funds +should not be wasted in trying to "teach imbeciles," +and so reported to the parents. He advised them to +send the boy to a Home for the Feeble-Minded, sending +the message by an older brother. So the parents +took the child to the Home and asked that he be admitted. +The Matron took the little boy on her lap, +talked to him, read to him, showed him pictures and +said to the astonished parents, "This child has fully +<a name="II_Page_78"></a>as much intelligence as any of your other children, +perhaps more—but he is deaf!"</p> + +<p>Harriet Martineau from her twelfth year was very +deaf, and she was also devoid of the senses of taste +and smell.</p> + +<p>"Oh, these are terrible tribulations to befall a mortal!" +we exclaim with uplifted hands. But on sober second +thought I am not sure that I know what is a tribulation +and what a blessing. I'm not positive that I would +know a blessing should I see it coming up the street. +For as I write it comes to me that the Great Big Black +Things that have loomed against the horizon of my +life, threatening to devour me, simply loomed and +nothing more. They harmed me not. The things that +have really made me miss my train have always been +sweet, soft, pretty, pleasant things of which I was not +in the, least afraid.</p> + +<p>Mother Nature is kind, and if she deprives us of one +thing she gives us another, and happiness seems to be +meted out to each and all in equal portions. Harriet's +afflictions caused her to turn her mind to other things +than those which filled the hearts of girls of her own +age. Society chatter held nothing for her, she could +not hear it if she would; and she ate the food that +agreed with her, not that which was merely pleasant +to the taste. She began to live in a world of thought +and ideas. The silence meant much.</p> + +<p>"The first requisite is that man should be a good +<a name="II_Page_79"></a>animal." I used to think that Herbert Spencer in +voicing this aphorism struck twelve. But I am no +longer enthusiastic about the remark. The senses of +most dumb animals are far better developed than +those of man. Hounds can trace footsteps over flat +rocks, even though a shower has fallen in the interval; +cats can see in the dark; rabbits hear sounds that men +never hear; horses detect an impurity in water that a +chemical analysis does not reveal, and homing pigeons +would gain nothing by carrying a compass. And so I +feel safe in saying that if any man were so good and +perfect an animal that he had the hound's sense of +smell, the cat's eyesight, the rabbit's sense of hearing, +the horse's sense of taste, and the homing pigeon's +"locality," he would not be one whit better prepared +to appreciate Kipling's "Dipsy Chanty," and not a +hair's breadth nearer a point where he could write a +poem equal to it.</p> + +<p>No college professor can see so far as a Sioux Indian, +neither can he hear so well as a native African. There +are rays of light that no unaided human eye can trace, +and there are sounds subtler than human ear can detect. +These five bodily faculties that we are pleased to call +the senses were developed by savage man. He holds +them in common with the brute. And now that man +is becoming partly civilized he is in danger of losing +them. Faculties not used are taken away. Dame Nature +seems to consider that anything you do not utilize is +<a name="II_Page_80"></a>not needed; and as she is averse to carrying dead +freight she drops it out.</p> + +<p>But man can think, and the more he thinks and the +further he projects his thought, the less need he has +for his physical senses. Homer's matchless vision was +the rich possession of a blind man; Milton never saw +Paradise until he was sightless, and Helen Keller +knows a world of things that were neither told to her in +lectures nor read from books. The far-reaching intellect +often goes with a singularly imperfect body, and these +things seem to point to the truth that the body is one +thing and the soul another.</p> + +<p>I make no argument for impoverished vitality, nor do I +plead the cause of those who enjoy poor health. Yet +how often do we find that the confessional of a family +or a neighborhood is the bedside of one who sees the +green fields only as did the Lady of Shalott, by holding +a looking-glass so that it reflects the out-of-doors. +Let me carry that simile one step further, and say that +the mirror of the soul when kept free from fleck and +stain, reveals the beauties of the universe. And I am +not sure but that the soul, freed from the distractions +of sense and the trammels of flesh, glides away to a +height where things are observed for the first time in +their true proportions.</p> + +<p>"The soul knows all things," says Emerson, "and knowledge +is only a remembering."</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_81"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>The Martineaus were Huguenots, a stern, +sturdy stock that suffered exile rather than +forego the right of free-thought and free +speech. These are the people who are the salt +of the earth. And yet as I read history I see that they are +the people who have been hunted by dogs, and followed +by armed men carrying fagots. The driving of the +Huguenots from France came near bankrupting the land, +and the flight of Jews and Huguenots into England +helped largely to make that country the counting-house +of the world. Take the Quakers, Puritans, Huguenots +and other refugees from America and it is no longer +the land of the free or the home of the brave.</p> + +<p>Of the seven Presidents who presided over the deliberations +of that first Continental Congress in Philadelphia, +three were Huguenots: Henry Laurens, John Jay and +Elias Boudinot, and in the seats there were Puritans +not a few.</p> + +<p>"By God, Sir, we can not afford to persecute the +Quakers," said a certain American a long while ago. +"Their religion may be wrong, but the people who cling +to an idea are the only people we need. If we must +persecute, let us persecute the complacent."</p> + +<p>Harriet Martineau had all the restless independence +of will that marked her ancestry. She set herself to +acquire knowledge, and she did. When she was twenty +she spoke three languages and could read in four. +She knew history, astronomy, physical science, and it +<a name="II_Page_82"></a>crowded her teacher in mathematics very hard to keep +one lesson in advance of her. Besides, she could sew +and cook and "keep house." Yet it was all gathered +by labor and toil and lift. By taking thought she had +added cubits to her stature.</p> + +<p>But at twenty, a great light suddenly shone around her. +Love came and revealed the wonders of Earth and +Heaven. She had ever been of a religious nature, but +now her religion was vitalized and spiritualized. Deity +was no longer a Being who dwelt at a great distance +among the stars, but the Divine Life was hers. It flowed +through her, nourished her and gave her strength.</p> + +<p>Renan suggests that one reason why religion remains +on such a material plane for many is because they +have never known a great and vitalizing love—a love +where intellect, spirit and sex find their perfect mate. +Love is the great enlightener. And in my own mind I +am fully persuaded that comparatively few mortals +ever experience this rebirth that a great love gives. +We grope our way through life. Nature's first thought +is for reproduction of the species; she has so overloaded +physical passion that men and women marry when +the blood is warm and intellect callow. Girls marry +for life the first man that offers, and forever put behind +them the possibilities of a love that would enable them +to lift up their eyes to the hills from whence cometh +their help. Very, very seldom do the years that bring +a calmer pulse reveal a mating of mind and spirit.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_83"></a></p> +<p>When love came to Harriet, she began to write, her +first book being a little volume called "Devotional +Exercises." These daily musings on Divine things +and these sweetly limpid prayers were all written out +first for herself and her lover. But it came to her that +what was a help to them might be a help to others. +A publisher was found, and the little work had a large +sale and found appreciative readers for many years.</p> + +<p>Today, out under the trees, I read this first book written +by Miss Martineau. How gently sweet and perfect +are these prayers asking for a clean heart and a right +spirit! And yet at this time Harriet Martineau had +gotten well beyond the idea that God was a great, big +man who could be beseeched and moved to alter His +plans because some creature on the planet Earth asked +it. Her religion was pure Theism, with no confounding +dogmas about who was to be saved and who damned. +The state of infants who died unbaptized and of the +heathen who passed away without ever having heard +of Jesus did not trouble her at all. She already accepted +the truth of necessity, believing that every act of life +was the result of a cause. We do what we do, and are +what we are, on account of impulses given us by previous training, +previous acts or conditions under which we live and have lived.</p> + +<p>If then, everything in this world happens because +something else happened a thousand years ago or +yesterday, and the result could not possibly be different +<a name="II_Page_84"></a>from what it is, why besiege Heaven with prayers?</p> + +<p>The answer is simple. Prayer is an emotional exercise; +an endeavor to bring the will into a state of harmony +with the Divine Will; a rest and a composure that gives +strength by putting us in position to partake of the +strength of the Universal. The man who prays today is +as a result stronger tomorrow, and thus is prayer +answered. By right thinking does the race grow. An act +is only a crystallized thought; and this young girl's +little book was designed as a help to right thinking. +The things it taught are so simple that no man need +go to a theological seminary to learn them: the Silence +will tell him all if he will but listen and incline his heart. +Love had indeed made Harriet's spirit free. And to no +woman can love mean so much as to one who is aware +that she is physically deficient. Homely women are apt +to make the better wives, and in all my earth-pilgrimage +I never saw a more devoted love—a diviner tenderness—than +that which exists between a man of my acquaintance, +sound in every sense and splendid in physique, +and his wife, who has been blind from her birth. For +weeks after I first met this couple there rang in my ears +that expression of Victor Hugo's, "To be blind and to +be loved—what happier fate!"</p> + +<p>But Harriet's lover +was poor in purse and his family was likewise poor, +and the thrifty Martineaus vigorously opposed the mating. +In fact, Harriet's mother hooted at it and spoke of it +with scorn; and Harriet answered not back, but hid +<a name="II_Page_85"></a>her love away in her heart—biding the time when her +lover should make for himself a name and a place, and +have money withal to command the respect of even +mill-owners.</p> + +<p>So the days passed, and the months went by, and three +years counted themselves with the eternity that lies +behind. Harriet's lover had indeed proved himself +worthy. He had worked his way through college, had +been graduated at the Divinity School, and his high +reputation for character and his ability as a speaker +won for him at once a position to which many older +than he aspired. He became the pastor of the Unitarian +Church at Manchester—and this was no small matter!</p> + +<p>Now Norwich, where the Martineaus lived, is a long +way from Manchester, where Harriet's lover preached, +or it was then, in stagecoach times. It cost money, too, +to send letters.</p> + +<p>And there was quite an interval once when Harriet +sent several letters, and anxiously looked for one; but +none arrived.</p> + +<p>Then word came that the brilliant young preacher was +ill; he wished to see his betrothed. She started to go to +him, but her parents opposed such an unprecedented +thing. She hesitated, deferred her visit—intending soon +to go at all hazards—hoping all the while to hear better +news.</p> + +<p>Word came that Harriet's lover was dead. +Soon after this the Martineau mills, through various +<a name="II_Page_86"></a>foolish speculations, got into a bad way. Harriet's father +found himself with more debts than he could pay; his +endeavors to buffet the storm broke his health—he gave +up hope, languished and died.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Martineau and the family were thus suddenly +deprived of all means of support. The boys were sent +to work in the mills, and the two older girls, having five +sound senses each, found places where they could do +housework and put money in their purses. +Harriet Martineau stayed at home and kept house. +She also studied, read and wrote a little—there was +no other way!</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_87"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>Six years passed, and the name of Harriet +Martineau was recognized as a power in the +land. Her "Illustrations of Political Economy" +had sold well up into the hundred +thousands. The little stories were read by old and young, +rich and poor, learned and unlearned. Sir Robert Peel +had written Harriet a personal letter of encouragement; +Lord Brougham had paid for and given away a thousand +copies of the booklets; Richard Cobden had publicly +endorsed them; Coleridge had courted the author; +Florence Nightingale had sung her praises, and the +Czar of Russia had ordered that "all the books of +Harriet Martineau's found in Russia shall be destroyed." +Besides, she had incurred the wrath of King Philippe of +France, who after first lavishly praising her and ordering +the "Illustrations" translated into French, to be used +in the public schools, suddenly discovered a hot chapter +entitled, "The Error Called the Divine Right of +Kings," and although Philippe was only a "citizen-king" +he made haste to recall his kind words.</p> + +<p>And I wish here to remark in parentheses that the +author who has not made warm friends and then lost +them in an hour by writing things that did not agree +with the preconceived idea of these friends, has either +not written well or not been read. Every preacher who +preaches ably has two doors to his church—one where +the people come in and another through which he +preaches them out. And I do not see how any man, +<a name="II_Page_88"></a>even though he be divine, could expect or hope to have +as many as twelve disciples and hold them for three +years without being doubted, denied and betrayed. If +you have thoughts, and honestly speak your mind, +Golgotha for you is not far away.</p> + +<p>Harriet Martineau was essentially an agitator. She +entered into life in its fullest sense, and no phase of +existence escaped her keen and penetrating investigation. +From writing books giving minute directions to +housemaids, to lengthy advice to prime ministers, her +work never lagged. She was widely read, beloved, +respected, feared and well hated.</p> + +<p>When her political-economy tales were selling their +best, the Government sent her word that on application +she could have a pension of two hundred pounds a year +for life. A pension of this kind comes nominally as a +reward for excellent work or heroic service. But a +pension may mean something else: it often implies that +the receiver shall not offend nor affront the one that +bestows it. Could we trace the true inner history of +pensions granted by monarchies, we would find that +they are usually diplomatic moves.</p> + +<p>Harriet made no response to the generous offer of a +lifelong maintenance from the State, but continued to +work away after her own methods. Yet the offer of a +pension did her good in one way: it suggested the +wisdom of setting aside a sum that would support her +when her earning powers were diminished. From her +<a name="II_Page_89"></a>two books written concerning her trip to America she +received the sum of seven thousand five hundred dollars. +With this she purchased an insurance policy in the form +of a deferred annuity, providing that from her fiftieth +year to her death she should receive the annual sum of +five hundred dollars. Nowhere in all the realm of Grub +Street do we find a man who set such an example of cool +wisdom for this crippled woman. At this time she was +supporting her mother, who had become blind, and also +a brother, who was a slave to drink.</p> + +<p>Twenty-five years after the first offer of pension, the +Government renewed the proposition. But Harriet +said that her needs were few and her wants simple; that +she had enough anyway, and besides, she could not consent +to the policy of pensioning one class of persons for +well-doing and forgetting all the toilers who have +worked just as conscientiously, but along lowly lines; if +she ever did need aid, she would do as other old women +were obliged to do, that is, apply to the parish.</p> + +<p>Miss Martineau wrote for the "Daily London News" +alone, sixteen hundred forty-two editorials. She also +wrote more than two hundred magazine articles, and +published upwards of fifty books. Her work was not +classic, for it was written for the times. That her influence +for good on the thought of the times was wide and far-reaching, +all thoughtful men agree. And he who influences +the thought of his times influences all the times +that follow. He has made his impress on eternity.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_90"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>Opinions may differ as to what constitutes +Harriet Martineau's best work, but my view +is that her translation and condensation of +Auguste Comte's six volumes into two will +live when all her other work is forgotten. Comte's own +writings were filled with many repetitions and rhetorical +flounderings. He was more of a philosopher than a +writer. He had an idea too big for him to express, but he +expressed at it right bravely. Miss Martineau, trained +writer and thinker, did not translate verbally: she +caught the idea, and translated the thought rather than +the language. And so it has come about that her work +has been literally translated back into French and is +accepted as a textbook of Positivism, while the original +books of the philosopher are merely collected by +museums and bibliophiles as curiosities.</p> + +<p>Comte taught that man passes through three distinct +mental stages in his development: First, man attributes +all phenomena to a "Personal God," and to this God +he servilely prays. Second, he believes in a "Supreme +Essence," a "Universal Principle" or a "First Cause," +and seeks to discover its hiding-place. Third, he ceases +to hunt out the unknowable, and is content to live and +work for a positive present good, fully believing that +what is best today can not fail to bring the best results +tomorrow.</p> + +<p>Harriet had long considered that one reason for the +very slow advancement of civilization was that men +<a name="II_Page_91"></a>had ever busied themselves with supernatural concerns; +and in fearsome endeavors to make themselves secure +for another world had neglected this. Man had tried +to make peace with the skies instead of peace with his +neighbor. She also thought she saw clearly that right +living was one thing, and a belief in theological dogma +another. That these things sometimes go together, she +of course admitted, but a belief in a "vicarious atonement" +and a "miraculous conception" she did not +believe made a man a gentler husband, a better neighbor +or a more patriotic citizen. Man does what he does +because he thinks at the moment it is the best thing +to do. And if you could make men believe that peace, +truth, honesty and industry were the best standards to +adopt—bringing the best results—all men would adopt +them.</p> + +<p>There are no such things as reward and punishment, as +these terms are ordinarily used: there are only good +results and bad results. We sow, and reap what we have +sown.</p> + +<p>Miss Martineau had long believed these things, but +Comte proved them—proved them in six ponderous +tomes—and she set herself the task to simplify his +philosophy.</p> + +<p>There is one point of attraction that Comte's thought +had for Harriet Martineau that I have never seen +mentioned in print—that is, his mental attitude on the +value of love in a well-ordered life.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_92"></a></p> +<p>In the springtime of his manhood, Auguste Comte, +sensitive, confiding, generous, loved a beautiful girl. +She did not share his intellectual ambitions, his divine +aspiration: she was only a beautiful animal. Man +proposes, but is not always accepted. She married +another, and Comte was disconsolate—for a day.</p> + +<p>He pondered the subject, read the lives of various great +men, talked with monks and sundry friars gray, and +after five years wrote out at length the reasons why a +man, in order to accomplish a far-reaching and splendid +work, must live the life of a celibate. "To achieve," +said Comte, "you must be married to your work."</p> + +<p>Comte lived for some time content in this philosophy, +constantly strengthening it and buttressing it against +attack; for we believe a thing first and skirmish for our +proof afterward. But when past forty, and his hair was +turning to silver, and crow's-feet were showing themselves +in his fine face, and when there was a halt in his +step and his laughter had died away into a weary smile, +he met a woman whose nature was as finely sensitive +and as silkenly strong as his own. She had intellect, +aspiration, power. She was gentle, and a womanly +woman withal; his best mood was matched by hers, she +sympathized with his highest ideal.</p> + +<p>They loved and they married.</p> + +<p>The crow's-feet disappeared from Comte's face, the +halt in his step was gone, the laugh returned, and people +said that the silver in his hair was becoming.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_93"></a></p> +<p>Shortly after, Comte set himself to work overhauling all +the foolish things he had said about the necessity of +celibacy. He declared that a man without his mate only +stumbled his way through life. There was the male man +and the female man, and only by working together +could these two souls hope to progress. It requires two +to generate thought. Comte felt sure that he was writing +the final word. He avowed that there was no more to +say. He declared that should his wife go hence the fountains +of his soul would dry up, his mind would famish, +and the light of his life would go out in darkness.</p> + +<p>The gods were envious of such love as this.</p> + +<p>Comte's mate passed away.</p> + +<p>He was stricken dumb; the calamity was too great for +speech or tears.</p> + +<p>But five years after, he got down his books and went +over his manuscripts and again revised his philosophy +of what constitutes the true condition for the highest +and purest thought. To have known a great and exalted +love and have it fade from your grasp and flee as +shadow, living only in memory, is the highest good, he +wrote. A great sorrow at one stroke purchases a redemption +from all petty troubles; it sinks all trivial annoyances +into nothingness, and grants the man lifelong +freedom from all petty, corroding cares. His feelings +have been sounded to their depths—the plummet has +touched bottom. Fate has done her worst: she has +brought him face to face with the Supreme Calamity, +<a name="II_Page_94"></a>and thereafter there is nothing that can inspire terror.</p> + +<p>The memory of a great love can never die from out +the heart. It affords a ballast 'gainst all the storms that +blow. And although it lends an unutterable sadness, it +imparts an unspeakable peace.</p> + +<p>A great love, even when fully possessed, affords no +complete gratification. There is an essence in it that +eludes all ownership. Its highest use seems to be a +purifying impulse for nobler endeavor. It says at the +last, "Arise, and get thee hence, for this is not thy +rest."</p> + +<p>Where there is this haunting memory of a great love +lost there is always forgiveness, charity, and a sympathy +that makes the man brother to all who endure and suffer. +The individual himself is nothing; he has nothing to +hope for, nothing to gain, nothing to win, nothing to +lose; for the first time and the last he has a selflessness +that is wide as the world, and wherein there is no room +for the recollection of a wrong. In this memory of a +great love, there is a nourishing source of strength by +which the possessor lives and works; he is in communication +with elemental conditions.</p> + +<p>Harriet Martineau was a lifelong widow of the heart. +That first great passion of her early womanhood, the +love that was lost, remained with her all the days of her +life: springing fresh every morning, her last thought as +she closed her eyes at night. Other loves came to her, +attachments varying in nature and degree, but in this +<a name="II_Page_95"></a>supreme love all was fused and absorbed. In this love, +you get the secret of power.</p> + +<p>A great love is a pain, yet it is a benison and a benediction. +If we carry any possession from this world to +another it is the memory of a great love. For even in the +last hour, when the coldness of death shall creep into +the stiffening limbs, and the brain shall be stunned and +the thoughts stifled, there shall come to the tongue a +name, a name not mentioned aloud for years—there +shall come a name; and as the last flickering rays of life +flare up to go out on earth forever, the tongue will speak +this name that was long, long ago burned into the soul +by the passion of a love that fadeth not away. +<a name="II_Page_96"></a><a name="II_Page_97"></a></p> + + +<hr class="full" /> +<p><a name="CHARLOTTE_BRONTE"></a></p><h2>CHARLOTTE BRONTE</h2> +<p><a name="II_Page_98"></a></p> +<div class="blkquot"><p>I was not surprised, when I went down into the hall, +to see that a brilliant June morning had succeeded to the +tempest of the night, and to feel through the open glass +door the breathing of a fresh and fragrant breeze. +Nature must be gladsome when I was so happy. A +beggar woman and her little boy, pale, ragged objects +both, were coming up the walk, and I ran down and +gave them all the money I happened to have in my +purse—some three or four shillings: good or bad they +must partake of my jubilee. The rooks cawed and +blither birds sung, but nothing was so merry or so +musical as my own rejoicing heart.<br /> +<span style='margin-left: 17em;'>—<i>Jane Eyre</i></span></p></div> + +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_99"></a></p> +<p class="ctr"><a href="./images/ljv2-4.jpg"><img src="./images/ljv2-4_th.jpg" alt="CHARLOTTE BRONTE" /></a></p><p class="ctr">CHARLOTTE BRONTE</p> +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_100"></a><a name="II_Page_101"></a></p> + +<p>Rumor has it that there be Americans +who are never happy unless +passing for Englishmen. And I think +I have discovered a like anomaly on +the part of the sons of Ireland—a +wish to pass for Frenchmen. On +Continental hotel-registers the good, +honest name of O'Brian often turns +queer somersaults, and more than once in "The +States" does the kingly prefix of O evolve itself into +Van or De, which perhaps is quite proper, seeing they +all mean the same thing. One cause of this tendency +may lie in the fact that Saint Patrick was a native of +France; although Saint Patrick may or may not have +been chosen patron saint on account of his nationality. +But the patron saint of Ireland being a Frenchman, +what more natural, and therefore what more proper, +than that the whole Emerald Isle should slant toward +the people who love art and rabbit-stew! Anyway, from +the proud patronymic of Patricius to plain Pat is quite +a drop, and my heart is with Paddy in his efforts to +get back.</p> + +<p>When Patrick Prunty of County Down, Ireland, shook +off the shackles of environment, and the mud of the +peat-bog, and went across to England, presenting himself +at the gates of Saint John's College, Cambridge, +<a name="II_Page_102"></a>asking for admittance, I am glad he handed in his name +as Mr. P. Bronte, accent on the last syllable.</p> + +<p>There is a gentle myth abroad that preachers are +"called," while other men adopt a profession or get a +job, but no Protestant Episcopal clergyman I have ever +known, and I have known many, ever made any such +claim. They take up the profession because it supplies +honors and a "living." Then they can do good, too, and +all men want to do good. So they hie them to a divinity +school and are taught the mysteries of theological tierce +and thrust; and interviewing a clerical tailor they are +ready to accept the honors and partake of the living. +After a careful study of the life of Patrick Bronte I can +not find that his ambition extended beyond the desirable +things I have named—that is to say, inclusively, +honors and a living.</p> + +<p>He was tall, athletic, dark, and surely a fellow of force +and ambition to set his back on the old and boldly rap +for admittance at the gates of Cambridge. He was a +pretty good student, too, although a bit quarrelsome +and sometimes mischievous—throwing his force into +quite unnecessary ways, as Irishmen are apt to do. He +fell in love, of course, and has not an Irishman in love +been likened to Vesuvius in state of eruption? We know +of at least one charming girl who refused to marry him, +because he declined, unlike Othello, to tell the story of +his life. And it was assumed that any man who would +not tell who "his folks" were, was a rogue and a varlet +<a name="II_Page_103"></a>and a vagrom at heart. And all the while Monsieur +Bronte had nothing worse to conceal than that he was +from County Down and his name Prunty. He wouldn't +give in and tell the story of his life to slow music, and +so the girl wept and then stormed, and finally Bronte +stormed and went away, and the girl and her parents +were sure that the Frenchman was a murderer escaping +justice. Fortunate, aye, thrice fortunate is it for the +world that neither Bronte nor the girl wavered even in +the estimation of a hair.</p> + +<p>Bronte got through school and came out with tuppence +worth of honors. When thirty, we find him established +as curate at the shabby little town of Hartshead, in +Yorkshire. Little Miss Branwell, from Penzance, came +up there on a visit to her uncle, and the Reverend Mr. +Bronte at once fell violently in love with her dainty +form and gentle ways. I say "violently," for that's +the kind of man Bronte was. Darwin says, "The faculty +of amativeness is not aroused except by the unfamiliar." +Girls who go away visiting, wearing their best bib and +tucker, find lovers without fail. One-third of all +marriages in the United States occur in just this way: the +bib and tucker being sprung on the young man as a +surprise, dazzles and hypnotizes him into an avowal +and an engagement.</p> + +<p>And so they were married—were the Reverend Patrick +Bronte and Miss Maria Branwell. He was big, bold and +dictatorial; she was little, shy and sensitive. The babies +<a name="II_Page_104"></a>came—one in less than a year, then a year apart. The +dainty little woman had her troubles, we are sure of +that. Her voice comes to us only as a plaintive echo. +When she asked to have the bread passed, she always +apologized. Once her aunt sent her a present of a pretty +silk dress, for country clergymen's wives do not have +many luxuries—don't you know that?—and Patrick +Bronte cut the dress into strips before her eyes and then +threw the pieces, and the little slippers to match, into +the fireplace, to teach his wife humility. He used to +practise with a pistol and shoot in the house to steady +the lady's nerves, and occasionally he got plain drunk. +A man like Bronte in a little town with a tired little wife, +and with inferior people, is a despot. He busies himself +with trifles, looks after foolish details, and the neighbors +let him have his own way and his wife has to, +and the result is that he becomes convinced in his own +mind that he is the people and that wisdom will die +with him.</p> + +<p>And yet Bronte wrote some pretty good poetry, and +had faculties that rightly developed might have made +him an excellent man. He should have gone down to +London (or up, because it is south) and there come into +competition with men as strong as himself. Fate should +have seized him by the hair and bumped his head against +stone walls and cuffed him thoroughly, and kicked him +into line, teaching him humility, then out of the scrimmage +we might have gotten a really superior product.</p> + +<p><a name="II_Page_105"></a>Mrs. Bronte became a confirmed invalid. A man can +not always badger a woman; God is good—she dies. +Little Maria Branwell had been married eight years; +when she passed out she left six children, "all of a size," +a neighbor woman has written. Over her grave is a +tablet erected by her husband informing the wayfarer +that "she has gone to meet her Savior." At the bottom +is this warning to all women: "Be ye also ready; for +in such an hour as ye think not the Son of Man cometh."</p> + +<p>Five of these motherless children were girls and one +a boy.</p> + +<p>As you stand there in that stone church at +Haworth reading the inscription above Maria Branwell's +grave, you can also read the death record of the +babes she left. The mother died on September Fifteenth, +Eighteen Hundred Twenty-one; her oldest daughter, +Maria, on May Sixth, Eighteen Hundred Twenty-five; +Elizabeth, June Fifteenth, Eighteen Hundred +Twenty-five; Patrick Branwell, on September Twenty-fourth, +Eighteen Hundred Forty-eight; Emily, December +Nineteenth, Eighteen Hundred Forty-eight; Anne, +May Twenty-eighth, Eighteen Hundred Forty-nine; +and Charlotte, on March Thirty-first, Eighteen Hundred +Fifty-five. Those whom the gods love die young: the +Reverend Patrick Bronte lived to be eighty-five years old.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_106"></a></p> +<hr /> +<p>I got out of the train at Keighley, which you +must pronounce "Keethley," and leaving +my valise with the station-master started on +foot for Haworth, four miles away.</p> + +<p>Keighley is a manufacturing town where various old +mansions have been turned into factories, and new +factories have sprung up, square, spick-span, trimmed-stone +buildings, with fire-escapes and red tanks on top.</p> + +<p>One of these old mansions I saw had a fine copper roof +that shone in the sun like a monster Lake Superior +agate. It stands a bit back from the road, and on one +great gatepost is a brass plate reading "Cardigan Hall," +and on the other a sign, "No Admittance—Apply at +the Office." So I applied at the office, which is evidently +the ancient lodge, and asked if Mr. Cardigan was in. +Four clerks perched on high stools, crouching over big +ledgers, dropped their pens and turning on their spiral +seats looked at me with staring eyes, and with mouths +wide open. I repeated the question and one of the +quartette, a wheezy little old man in spectacles and +with whiskers on his neck, clambered down from his +elevated position and ambled over near, walking around +me, eying me curiously.</p> + +<p>"Go wan wi' yer wurruk, ye idlers!" he suddenly commanded +the others. And then he explained to me that +Mr. Cardigan was not in, neither was Mr. Jackson. In +fact, Mr. Cardigan had not been in for a hundred years—being +dead. But if I wanted to look at goods I could +<a name="II_Page_107"></a>be accommodated with bargains fully five per cent +below Lunnon market. The little old man was in such +serious earnest that I felt it would be a sin to continue +a joke. I explained that I was only a tourist in search of +the picturesque, and thereby did I drop ten points in +the old man's estimation. But this did I learn, that +Lord Cardigan has won deathless fame by attaching his +name to a knit jacket, just as the name Jaeger will go +clattering down the corridors of time attached to a +"combination suit."</p> + +<p>This splendid old mansion was once the ancestral home +of a branch of the noble family of Cardigan. But things +got somewhat shuffled, through too many hot suppers +up to London (being south), and stacks of reds and +stacks of blues were drawn in towards the dealer, and so +the old mansion fell under the hammer of the auctioneer. +What an all-powerful thing is an auctioneer's hammer! +And now from the great parlors, and the library, and the +"hall," and the guest-chambers echo the rattle of +spinning-jennies and the dull booming of whirling +pulleys. And above the song of whirring wheels came +the songs of girls at their work—voices that alone might +have been harsh and discordant, but blending with the +monotone of the factory's roar were really melodious.</p> + +<p>"We cawn't keep the nasty things from singin'," +said the old man apologetically.</p> + +<p>"Why should you?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"Huh, mon! but they sing sacred songs, and chaunts, +<a name="II_Page_108"></a>and a' that, and say all together from twenty rooms, a +hundred times a day, 'Aws ut wuz in th' beginnin,' uz +now awn ever shawl be, worl' wi'out end, Aamen.' It's +not right. I've told Mr. Jackson. Listen now, didn't +I tell ye?"</p> + +<p>"Then you are a Churchman?"</p> + +<p>And the old man wiped his glasses and told me that he +was a Churchman, although an unworthy one, and had +been for fifty-four years, come Michaelmas. Yes, he had +always lived here, was born only across the beck away—his +father was gamekeeper for Lord Cardigan, and +afterwards agent. He had been to Haworth many times, +although not for ten years. He knew the Reverend +Patrick Bronte well, for the Incumbent from Haworth +used to preach at Keighley once a year, and sometimes +twice. Bronte was a fine man, with a splendid voice for +intoning, and very strict about keeping out all heresies +and such. He had a lot of trouble, had Bronte: his wife +died and left him with eight or ten children, all smart, +but rather wild. They gave him a lot of bother, especially +the boy. One of the girls married Mr. Bronte's +curate, Mr. Nicholls, a very decent kind of man who +comes to Keighley once a year, and always comes to the +factory to ask how things are going.</p> + +<p>Yes, Mr. Nicholls' first wife died years and years ago. +She used to write things—novels; but no one should read +novels; novels are stories that are not so—things that +never happened; they tell of folks that never was.</p> + +<p><a name="II_Page_109"></a>Having no argument to present in way of rebuttal, I +shook hands with the old man and started away. He +walked with me to the road to put me on the right way +to Haworth.</p> + +<p>Looking back as I reached the corner, I saw four +"clarks" watching me intently from the office windows, +and above the roar and jangle of machinery was borne +on the summer breeze the sound of sacred song—shrill +feminine voices:</p> + +<p>"Aws ut wuz in th' beginnin', uz now awn ever shawl +be, worl' wi'out end—Aamen!"</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_110"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>As one moves out of Keighley the country +becomes stony; the trees are left behind, and +there rises on all sides billow on billow of +purple heather. The way is rough as the +Pilgrim's Progress road to Paradise. These hillside moors +are filled with springs that high up form rills, then +brooks, then cascades or "becks," and along the +Haworth road, wherever one of these hurrying, scurrying, +dancing becks crosses the highway, there is a factory +devoted to keeping alive the name of Cardigan. Next +to the factory is a "pub.," and publics and factories +checker themselves all along the route. Mixed in with +these are long rows of tenement-houses well built of +stone, with slate roofs, but with a grimy air of desolation +about them that surely drives their occupants to +drink. To have a home a man must build it himself. +Forty houses in a row, all alike, are not homes at all.</p> + +<p>I believe an observant man once wrote of the hand being +subdued to what it works in. The man who wrote that +surely never tramped along the Haworth road as the +bell rang for twelve o'clock. From out the factories +poured a motley mob of men, women and children, not +only with hands dyed, but with clothing, faces and heads +as well. Girls with bright-green hair, and lemon-colored +faces, leered and jeered at me as they hastened pellmell +with hats askew, and stockings down, and dragging +shawls, for home or public-house. Red and maroon +children ran, and bright-scarlet men smoked stolidly, +<a name="II_Page_111"></a>taking their time with genuine grim Yorkshire sullen +sourness.</p> + +<p>"How far is it to Haworth?" I asked one such specimen.</p> + +<p>"Ef ye pay th' siller for a double pot a' 'arf and 'arf. +Hi might tell ye"; and he jerked his thumb over his +shoulder toward a ginshop near by.</p> + +<p>"Very well," said I; "I'll buy you a double pot of +'arf and 'arf, this time."</p> + +<p>The man seemed a bit surprised, but no smile came over +his spattered rainbow face as he led the way into the +drink-shop. The place was crowded with men and women +scrambling for penny sandwiches and drinks fermented +and spirituous. Some of these women had babies at their +breasts, the babies being brought by appointment by +older children who stayed at home while the mothers +worked. And as the mothers gulped their Triple XXX, +and swallowed hunks of black bread, the little innocents +dined. The mothers were rather kindly disposed, though, +and occasionally allowed the youngsters to take sips out +of their foaming glasses, or at least to drain them. +Suddenly a woman with purple hair spied me and called +in falsetto:</p> + +<p>"Ah, Sawndy McClure has caught a gen'l'mon. Why +didn't I see 'im fust an' 'arve 'im fer a pet?"</p> + +<p>There was a guffaw at my expense and 'arf and 'arf as +well, for all the party, or else quarrel. As it was, my +stout stick probably saved me from the "personal +touch." I stayed until the factory-bells rang, and out +<a name="II_Page_112"></a>my new-found friends scurried for fear of being the fatal +five minutes late and getting locked out. Some of them +shook my hand as they went, and others pounded me +on the back for luck, and several of the girls got my +tag and shouted, "You're it!"</p> + +<p>I used to think that Yorkshire folks were hopelessly +dull and sublimely stupid, quarrelsome withal and pigheaded +to the thirty-second degree; but I have partially +come to the conclusion that their glum ways often +conceal a peculiar kind of grim humor, and beneath the +tough husk is considerable good nature.</p> + +<p>The absence of large trees makes it possible to see the +village of Haworth several miles away. It seems to cling +to the stony hillside as if it feared being blown into +space. There is a hurrying, rushing rill here, too, that +turns a little woolen-mill. Then there is a "Black Bull" +tavern, with a stable-yard at the side and rows of +houses on the one street, all very straight up and down. +One misses the climbing roses of the ideal merry England, +and the soft turf and spreading yews and the +flowering hedgerows where throstles and linnets play +hide-and-seek the livelong day. It is all cold gray stone, +lichen-covered, and the houses do not invite you to +enter, and the gardens bid no welcome, and only the +great purple wastes of moorland greet you as a friend +and brother.</p> + +<p>Outside the Black Bull sits a solitary hostler, who feels it +would be a weakness to show any good humor. So he +<a name="II_Page_113"></a>bottles his curiosity and scowls from under red, bushy +eyebrows.</p> + +<p>Turning off the main street is a narrow road leading to +the church—square and gray and cold. Next to it is the +parsonage, built of the same material, and beyond is the +crowded city of the dead.</p> + +<p>I plied the knocker at the parsonage door and asked for +the rector. He was away at Kendal to attend a funeral, +but his wife was at home—a pleasant, matronly woman +of near sixty, with smooth, white hair. She came to the +door knitting furiously, but from her regulation smile I +saw that visitors were not uncommon.</p> + +<p>"You want to see the home of the Brontes? That's +right, come right in. This was the study of the Reverend +Patrick Bronte, Incumbent of this Parish for fifty years."</p> + +<p>She sang her little song and knitted and shifted the +needles and measured the foot, for the stocking was +nearly done. It was a blue stocking (although she +wasn't) with a white toe; and all the time she led me +from room to room telling me about the Brontes—how +there were the father, mother and six children. They +all came together. The mother died shortly, and then +two of the little girls died. That left three girls and +Branwell the boy. He was petted and made too much of +by his father and everybody. He was the one that always +was going to do great things. He made the girls wait +on him and cuffed them if they didn't, and if they did, +and all the time told of the things he was going to do. +<a name="II_Page_114"></a>But he never did them, for he spent most of his time at +the taverns. After a while he died—died of the tremens.</p> + +<p>The three Bronte girls, Emily, Charlotte and Annie, +wrote a novel apiece, and never showed them to their +father or to any one. They called 'emselves Currer, +Ellis and Acton Bell, and their novels were the greatest +ever written—they wrote them 'emselves with no man +to help. Their father was awful mad about it, but when +the money began to come in he felt better. Emily died +when she was twenty-seven. She was the brightest of +them all; then Annie died, and only Charlotte and the +old man were left. Charlotte married her father's curate, +but old Mr. Bronte wouldn't go to the wedding: he +went to the Black Bull instead. Miss Wooler gave the +bride away—some one had to give her away, you +know. The bride was thirty-eight. She died in less them +a year, and old Mr. Bronte and Charlotte's husband +lived here alone together.</p> + +<p>This was Charlotte's room; this is the desk where she +wrote "Jane Eyre"—leastwise they say it is. This is +the chair she sat in, and under that framed glass are +several sheets of her manuscript. The writing is almost +too small to read; and so fine and yet so perfect and +neat! She was a wonderful tidy body, very small and +delicate and gentle, yet with a good deal of her father's +energy.</p> + +<p>Here are letters she wrote: you can look at them if you +choose. This footstool she made and covered herself. +<a name="II_Page_115"></a>It is filled with heather-blossoms—just as she left it. +Those books were hers, too—many of them given to her +by great authors. See, there is Thackeray's name +written by himself, and a letter from him pasted inside +the front cover. He was a big man they say, but he +wrote very small, and Charlotte wrote just like him, +only better, and now there are hundreds of folks write +like 'em both. Then here's a book with Miss Martineau's +name, and another from Robert Browning—do +you know who he was?</p> + +<p>Yes, the church is always open. Go in and stay as long +as you choose; at the door is a poorbox and if you wish +to put something in you can do so—a sixpence most +visitors put in, or a shilling if you insist upon it. You +know we are not a rich parish—the wool all goes to +Manchester now, and the factory-hands are on half-pay +and times are scarce. You will come again some +time, come when the heather is in bloom, won't you? +That's right. Oh, stay! the boxwood there in the garden +was planted by Charlotte's own hands—perhaps you +would like a sprig of it—there, I thought you would!</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_116"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>All who write concerning the Brontes dwell +on the sadness and the tragedy of their lives. +They picture Charlotte's earth-journey as +one devoid of happiness, lacking all that +sweetens and makes for satisfaction. They forget that +she wrote "Jane Eyre," and that no person utterly +miserable ever did a great work; and I assume that they +know not of the wild, splendid, intoxicating joy that +follows a performance well done. To be sure, "Jane +Eyre" is a tragedy, but the author of a tragedy must +be greater than the plot—greater than his puppets. He +is their creator, and his life runs through and pervades +theirs, just as the life of our Creator flows through us. +In Him we live and move and have our being. And I +submit that the writer of a tragedy is not cast down or +undone at the time he pictures his heroic situations +and conjures forth his strutting spirits. When the play +ends and the curtain falls on the fifth act, there is still +one man alive, and that is the author. He may be +gorged with crime and surfeited with blood, but there +is a surging exultation in his veins as he views the ruin +that his brain has wrought.</p> + +<p>Charlotte loved the great stretch of purple moors, hill +on hill fading away into eternal mist. And the wild +winds that sighed and moaned at casements or raged +in sullen wrath, tugging at the roof, were her friends. +She loved them all, and thought of them as visiting +spirits. They were her properties, and no writer who +<a name="II_Page_117"></a>ever lived has made such splendid use of winds and +storm-clouds and driving rain as did Charlotte Bronte. +People who point to the chasing, angry clouds and the +swish of dripping rosebushes blown against the cottage-windows +as proof of Charlotte Bronte's chronic depression +know not the eager joy of a storm walk. And I am +sure they never did as one I know did last night: saddle +a horse at ten o'clock and gallop away into the darkness; +splash, splash in the sighing, moaning, bellowing, +driving November rain. There's joy for you! ye who +toast your feet on the fender and cultivate sick headache +around the base-burner—there's a life that ye +never guess!</p> + +<p>But Charlotte knew the clouds by night and the swift-sailing +moon that gave just one peep out and disappeared. +She knew the rifts where the stars shone through, +and out alone in the breeze that blew away her cares +she lifted her voice in thankfulness for the joy of mixing +with the elements, and that her spirit was one with the +boisterous winds of heaven.</p> + +<p>People who live in beautiful, quiet valleys, where roses +bloom all the year through, are not necessarily happy.</p> + +<p>Southern California—the Garden of Eden of the world—evolves +just as many cases per capita of melancholia +as bleak, barren Maine. Wild, rocky, forbidding Scotland +has produced more genius to the acre than beautiful +England: and I have found that sailor Jack, facing +the North Atlantic winter storms, year after year, is a +<a name="II_Page_118"></a>deal jollier companion than the Florida cracker whose +chief adversary is the mosquito.</p> + +<p>Charlotte Bronte wrote three great books: "Jane +Eyre," "Shirley" and "Villette." From the lonely, +bleak parsonage on that stony hillside she sent forth +her swaying filament of thought and lassoed the world. +She lived to know that she had won. Money came to +her, all she needed, honors, friends and lavish praise. +She was the foremost woman author of her day. Her +name was on every tongue. She had met the world in +fair fight; without patrons, paid advocates, or influential +friends she made her way to the very front. Her genius +was acknowledged. She accomplished all that she set +out to do and more—far more. The great, the learned, +the titled, the proud—all those who reverence the tender +heart and far-reaching mind—acknowledged her as +queen.</p> + +<p>So why prate of her sorrows! Did she not work them up +into art? Why weep over her troubles when these were +the weapons with which she won? Why sit in sackcloth +on account of her early death, when it is appointed +unto all men once to die, and with her the grave was +swallowed up in victory?</p> + + +<p><a name="II_Page_119"></a></p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p><a name="CHRISTINA_ROSSETTI"></a></p><h2>CHRISTINA ROSSETTI</h2> +<p><a name="II_Page_120"></a></p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>My life is but a working-day,<br /></span> +<span>Whose tasks are set aright:<br /></span> +<span>A while to work, a while to pray,<br /></span> +<span>And then a quiet night.<br /></span> +<span>And then, please God, a quiet night<br /></span> +<span>Where Saints and Angels walk in white.<br /></span> +<span>One dreamless sleep from work and sorrow,<br /></span> +<span>But reawakening on the morrow.<br /></span> +<span class="i15">—<i>In Patience</i><br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_121"></a></p> +<p class="ctr"><a href="./images/ljv2-5.jpg"><img src="./images/ljv2-5_th.jpg" alt="CHRISTINA ROSSETTI" /></a></p><p class="ctr">CHRISTINA ROSSETTI</p> +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_122"></a><a name="II_Page_123"></a></p> + +<p>As a study in heredity, the Rossetti +family is most interesting. Genius +seems so sporadic a stuff that when +we find an outcrop along the line of +a whole family we are wont to mark +it on memory's chart in red. We +talk of the Herschels, of Renan and +his sister, of the Beechers, and the +Fields, in a sort of awe, mindful that Nature is parsimonious +in giving out transcendent talent, and may +never do the like again. So who can forget the Rossettis—two +brothers, Dante Gabriel and William Michael, +and two sisters, Maria and Christina—each of whom +stands forth as far above the ordinary, yet all strangely +dependent upon one another?</p> + +<p>The girls sing songs to the brothers, and to each other, +inscribing poems to "my loving sister"; when Dante +Gabriel, budding forth as artist, wishes a model for a +Madonna, he chooses his sister Christina, and in his +sketch mantles the plain features with a divine gentleness +and heavenly splendor such as only the loving heart +can conjure forth. In the last illness of Maria, Christina +watches away the long, lagging hours of night, almost +striving with her brothers for the right of serving; and +at Birchington-on-the-Sea, Dante Gabriel waits for +death, wearing out his friends by insane suspicions, and +<a name="II_Page_124"></a>only the sister seems equal to ministering to this mind +diseased, plucking from memory its rooted sorrow.</p> + +<p>In a few years Christina passes out, and of the four, +only William is left; and the task of his remaining years +is to put properly before the world the deathless lives of +his brother and sisters gone.</p> + +<p>Gabriel Rossetti, father of the illustrious four, was an +Italian poet who wrote patriotic hymns, and wrote them +so well that he was asked to sing them elsewhere than in +Italy. This edict of banishment was followed by an +order that the poet be arrested and executed.</p> + +<p>The orders of banishment and execution appear quite +Milesian viewed across the years, but to Rossetti it +was no joke. To keep his head in its proper place and +to preserve his soul alive, he departed one dark night +for England. He arrived penniless, with no luggage save +his lyre, but with muse intact. Yet it was an Italian +lyre, and therefore of small avail for amusing Britons. +Very naturally, Rossetti made the acquaintance of +other refugees, and exile makes fast friends. It is only +in prosperity that we throw our friends overboard.</p> + +<p>He came to know the Polidori family—Tuscan refugees—proud, +intellectual and rich. He loved one of the +daughters of Seignior Polidori, and she loved him. He +was forty and she was twenty-three—but what of that! +A position as Professor of Languages was secured for +him in King's College. He rented the house at Thirty-eight +Charlotte Street, off Portland Place, and there, +<a name="II_Page_125"></a>on February Seventeenth, Eighteen Hundred Twenty-seven, +was born their first child, Maria Francesca; on +May Twelfth, Eighteen Hundred Twenty-eight, was +born Dante Gabriel; on September Twenty-fifth, Eighteen +Hundred Twenty-nine, William Michael; on +December Fifth, Eighteen Hundred Thirty, Christina +Georgiana. The mother of this quartette was a sturdy +little woman with sparkling wit and rare good sense. +She used to remark that her children were all of a +size, and that it was no more trouble to bring up four +than one, a suggestion thrown in here gratis for the +benefit of young married folks, in the hope that they +will mark and inwardly digest. In point of well-ballasted, +all-round character, fit for Earth or Heaven, none of +the four Rossetti children was equal to his parents. +They all seem to have had nerves outside of their +clothes. Perhaps this was because they were brought +up in London. A city is no place for children—nor +grown people either, I often think. Birds and children +belong in the country. Paved streets, stone sidewalks, +smoke-begrimed houses, signs reading, "Keep Off +the Grass", prying policemen, and zealous ash-box +inspectors are insulting things to greet the gaze of the +little immigrants fresh from God. Small wonder is it, +as they grow up, that they take to drink and drugs, seeking +in these a respite from the rattle of wheels and the +never-ending cramp of unkind condition. But Nature +understands herself: the second generation, city-bred, +<a name="II_Page_126"></a>is impotent.</p> + +<p>No pilgrim from "the States" should +visit the city of London without carrying two books: +a Baedeker's "London" and Hutton's "Literary +Landmarks." The chief advantage of the former is +that it is bound in flaming red, and carried in the hand, +advertises the owner as an American, thus saving all +formal introductions. In the rustle, bustle and tussle +of Fleet Street, I have held up my book to a party of +Americans on the opposite sidewalk, as a ship runs up +her colors, and they, seeing the sign, in turn held up +theirs in merry greeting; and we passed on our way +without a word, ships that pass in the afternoon and +greet each other in passing. Now, I have no desire to +rival the flamboyant Baedeker, nor to eclipse my good +friend Laurence Hutton. But as I can not find that +either mentions the name "Rossetti," I am going to +set down (not in malice) the places in London that +are closely connected with the Rossetti family, nothing +extenuating.</p> + +<p>London is the finest city in the world for the tourist +who desires liberty as wide as the wind, and who +wishes to live cheaply and live well. In New York, if +you want lodgings at a moderate price, you must +throttle your pride and forsake respectability; but +they do things different in Lunnon, you know. From +Gray's Inn Road to Portland Place, and from Oxford +Street to Euston Road, there is just about a square +mile—a section, as they say out West—of lodging-<a name="II_Page_127"></a>houses. +Once this part of London was given up to the +homes of the great and purse-proud and all that. It is +respectable yet, and if you are going to be in London +a week you can get a good room in one of these old-time +mansions, and pay no more for it than you would +pay for a room in an American hotel for one day. And +as for meals, your landlady will get you anything you +want and serve it for you in the daintiest style, and +you will also find that a shilling and a little courtesy +will go a very long way in securing creature comforts. +American women in London can live in this way just +as well as men. If you are a schoolma'am from Peoria, +taking your vacation, follow my advice and make +your home in the "Bedford District," within easy +reach of Stopford Brooke's chapel, and your London +visit will stand out forever as a bright oasis in memory's +desert waste. All of which I put in here because Larry +Hutton forgot to mention it and Mein Herr Baedeker +didn't think it worth while.</p> + +<p>When in London I usually get a room near the British +Museum for ten shillings a week; and when I want to +go anywhere I walk up to the Gower Street Station, +past the house where the mother of Charles Dickens +had her Young Ladies' Establishment, and buying a +ticket at the "Booking-Office" am duly set down near +the desired objective point. You can go anywhere by +the "Metropolitan," or if you prefer to take Mr. Gladstone's +advice, you climb to the top of an Oxford +<a name="II_Page_128"></a>Street bus, and if you sit next the driver you have a +directory, guide and familiar friend all at your service.</p> + +<p>Charlotte Street is a narrow little passage running +just two squares, parallel with Portland Place. The +houses are built in blocks of five (or more), of the +plainest of plain bricks. The location is not far from +the Gower Street Station of the Metropolitan Railway, +and only a few minutes' walk from the British Museum. +Number Thirty-eight is the last but one on the east +side of the street. When I first saw it, there was a sign +in the window, "Apartments," and back of this fresh +cambric curtains. Then the window had been cleaned, +too, for a single day of neglect in London tells its tale, +as does the record of crime on a rogue's face. I paused +and looked the place over with interest. I noted that +the brass plate with the "No. 38" on it had been +polished until it had been nearly polished out of sight, +like a machine-made sonnet too much gone over. The +steps had been freshly sanded, and a little lemon-tree +nodding in one of the windows made the rusty old +house look quite inviting. A stout little woman with +a big market-basket, bumped into me and apologized, +for I had stepped backwards to get a better look at +the upstairs windows. The stout little woman set +down her basket on the steps, took a bunch of keys +from a pocket under her big, white, starched apron, +selected one, turned to me, smiled, and asked, "Mebbe, +Sir, you wasn't looking for apartments, I dunno?" +<a name="II_Page_129"></a>Then she explained that the house was hers, and that +if I would step in she would show me the rooms. There +were two of 'em she could spare. The first floor front +was already let, and so was the front parlor—to a +young barrister. Her husband was a ticket-taker at +Euston Station, and didn't get much since last cutdown. +Would I care to pay as much as ten shillings, +and would I want breakfast? It would only be ninepence, +and I could have either a chop or ham and eggs. +She looked after her boarders herself, just as if they +were her own folks, and only took respectable single +gentlemen who came well recommended. She knew I +would like the room, and if ten shillings was too much +I could have the back room for seven and six.</p> + +<p>I thought the back room would answer; but explained +that I was an American and was going to remain in +London only a short time. Of course the lady knew I +was an American: she knew it from my hat and from +my foreign accent and—from the red book I had in +my hand. And did I know the McIntyres that lived +in Michigan?</p> + +<p>I evaded the question by asking if she knew the Rossettis +who once lived in this house. "Oh, yes; I know +Mr. William and Miss Christina. They came here +together a year ago, and told me they were born here +and that their brother Dante and their sister, too, +were born here. I think they were all writin' folks, +weren't they? Miss Rossetti anyway writes poetry, +<a name="II_Page_130"></a>I know that. One of my boarders gave me one of her +books for Christmas. I'll show it to you. You don't +think seven and six is too much for a room like this, +do you?"</p> + +<p>I inwardly noted that the ceilings were much lower +than those of my room in Russell Square and that the +furniture was old and worn and that the room looked +out on an army of sooty chimney-pots, but I explained +that seven and six seemed a very reasonable price, and +that ninepence for breakfast with ham and eggs was +cheap enough, provided the eggs were strictly fresh.</p> + +<p>So I paid one week's rent in advance on the spot, +and going back to Russell Square told my landlady +that I had found friends in another part of the city +and would not return for two days. My sojourn at +Number Thirty-eight Charlotte Street developed nothing +further than the meager satisfaction of sleeping +for two nights in the room in which Dante Gabriel +Rossetti was born, and making the acquaintance of the +worthy ticket-taker, who knew all four of the Rossettis, +as they had often passed through his gate.</p> + +<p>Professor Rossetti lived for twelve years at Thirty-eight +Charlotte Street; he then moved to Number Fifty +in the next block, which is a somewhat larger house. +It was here that Mazzini used to come. The house had +been made over somewhat, and is now used as an +office by the Registrar of Vital Statistics. This is the +place where Dante Gabriel and a young man named +<a name="II_Page_131"></a>Holman Hunt had a studio, and where another young +artist by the name of William Morris came to visit +them; and here was born "The Germ," that queer +little chipmunk magazine in which first appeared +"Hand and Soul" and "The Blessed Damozel," +written by Dante Gabriel when eighteen, the same +age at which Bryant wrote "Thanatopsis." William +Bell Scott used to come here, too. Scott was a great +man in his day. He had no hair on his head or face, +not even eyebrows. Every follicle had grown aweary +and quit. But Mr. Scott was quite vain of the shape +of his head, for well he might be, since several choice +sonnets had been combed out of it. Sometimes when +the wine went round and things grew merry, then +sentimental, then confidential, Scott would snatch off +his wig to display to the company his fine phrenological +development, and tell a story about Nelson, who, too, +used to wear a wig just like his, and after every battle +would take it off and hand it over to his valet to have +the bullets combed out of it.</p> + +<p>The elder Rossetti died in this house, and was carried +to Christ Church in Woburn Square, and thence to +Highgate. His excellent wife waited to see the genius +of her children blossom and be acknowledged. She followed +thirty years later, and was buried in the same +grave with her husband, where, later, Christina was +to join them.</p> + +<p>Frances Mary Polidori was born at Forty-two Broad +<a name="II_Page_132"></a>Street, Golden Square, the same street in which William +Blake was born. I found the street and Golden +Square, but could not locate the house. The policeman +on the beat declared that no one by the name of Rossetti +or Blake was in business thereabouts; and further +he never heard of Polly Dory. William Michael Rossetti's +home is one in a row of houses called Saint +Edmund's Terrace. It is near the Saint John's Road +Station, just a step from Regent's Park, and faces the +Middlesex Waterworks. It is a fine old house, built +of stone I should judge, stuccoed on the outside. With +a well-known critic I called there, and found the master +wearing a long dressing-gown that came to his +heels, a pair of new carpet slippers and a black plush +cap, all so dusty that we guessed the owner had been +sifting ashes in the cellar. He was most courteous and +polite. He worships at the shrine of Whitman, Emerson +and Thoreau, and regards America as the spot from +whence must come the world's intellectual hope. +"Great thoughts, like beautiful flowers, are produced +by transplantation and the commingling of many +elements." These are his words, and the fact that the +Rossetti genius is the result of transplanting need not +weigh in the scale as 'gainst the truth of the remark. +Shortly after this call, at an Art Exhibition, I again +met William Michael Rossetti. I talked with him some +moments—long enough to discover that he was not +aware we had ever met. This caused me to be rather +<a name="II_Page_133"></a>less in love with the Rossetti genius than I was before.</p> + +<p>The wife of Dante Gabriel Rossetti died, aged +twenty-nine, at Fourteen Chatham Place, near Blackfriars +Bridge. The region thereabouts has been changed +by the march of commerce, and if the original house +where the artist lived yet stands I could not find it. +It was here that the Preraphaelites made history: Madox +Brown, Burne-Jones, Ruskin, William Morris and the +MacDonalds. Burne-Jones married one of the MacDonald +daughters; Mr. Poynter, now Director of the +National Gallery, another; Mr. Kipling still another—with +Rudyard Kipling as a result, followed in due +course by Mulvaney, Ortheris and Learoyd, who are +quite as immortal as the rest.</p> + +<p>At this time Professor Rossetti was dead, and William +Michael, Maria, Christina and the widowed mother +were living at One Hundred Sixty-six Albany Street, +fighting off various hungry wolves that crouched +around the door. Albany Street is rather shabby now, +and was then, I suppose. At One Hundred Twelve +Albany Street lives one Dixon, who takes marvelous +photographs of animals in the Zoological Gardens, +with a pocket camera, and then enlarges the pictures +a hundred times. These pictures go the round world +over and command big prices. Mr. Dixon was taking +for me, at the National Gallery, the negatives from +which I made photogravures for my Ruskin-Turner +book. Mr. Dixon knows more in an artistic and literary +<a name="II_Page_134"></a>way than any other man in London (I believe), but +he is a modest gentleman and only emits his facts under +cross-examination or under the spell of inspiration. +Together we visited the house at One Hundred Sixty-six +Albany Street.</p> + +<p>It was vacant at the time, and we rummaged through +every room, with the result that we concluded it makes +very little difference where genius is housed. On one +of the windows of a little bedroom we found the word +"Christina" cut with a diamond. When and by whom +it was done I do not know. Surely the Rossettis had +no diamonds when they lived here. But Mr. Dixon had +a diamond and with his ring he cut beneath the word +just noted the name, "Dante Gabriel Rossetti." I have +recently heard that the signature has been identified +as authentic by a man who was familiar with Rossetti's +handwriting.</p> + +<p>When the firm of Morris and Company, Dealers in +Art Fabrics, was gotten under way, and Dante Gabriel +had ceased to argue details with that pre-eminently +sane man, William Morris, his finances began to prosper. +Morris directed and utilized the energies of his +partners. He marshaled their virtues into a solid phalanx +and marched them on to victory. No doubt that +genius usually requires a keeper. But Morris was a +genius himself and a giant in more ways than one, for +he ruled his own spirit, thus proving himself greater +than one who taketh a city.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_135"></a></p> +<p>In Eighteen Hundred Sixty-two, we find Dante Gabriel +throwing out the fact that his income was equal to +about ten thousand dollars a year. He took the beautiful +house at Eighteen Cheyne Walk, Chelsea, near the +little street where lived a Scotchman by the name of +Thomas Carlyle, and in the same block where afterwards +lived George Eliot, and where she died. He +wanted his brother and sisters and his mother to +share his prosperity, and so he planned that they +should all come and live with him; and besides, Mr. +Swinburne and George Meredith were to come, too. +It was to be one big happy family. But the good old +mother knew the human heart better than did her +brilliant son. She has left on record these words: "Yes, +my children all have talent, great talent; I only wish +they had a little commonsense!"</p> + +<p>So for the present she remained with William, her +daughters, and her two aged unmarried sisters in the +plain old house in Albany Street. But Dante Gabriel +moved to Cheyne Walk, and began that craze for +collecting blue china that has swept like a blight over +the civilized world. His collection was sold for three +thousand five hundred dollars some years after—to pay +his debts—less than one-half of what it had cost him. +Yet when he had money he generously divided it with +the folks up in Albany Street. But by and by William, +too, got to making money, and the quarters at Number +One Hundred Sixty-six were abandoned for something +<a name="II_Page_136"></a>better.</p> + +<p>William was married and had taken a house +of his own—I don't know where. The rest of the household +consisted of the widow, Mrs. Rossetti, Miss Charlotte +Lydia Polidori, Maria and Christina—and seven +cats. And so we find this family of five women living +in peace and comfort, with their books and pictures +and cats, at Thirty Torrington Square, in a drowsy, +faded, ebb-tide mansion. Maria was never strong; she +fell into a decline and passed away. The management +of the household then devolved on Christina. Her +burdens must have been heavy in those days, or did she +make them light by cheerful doing? She gave up +society, refused the thought of marriage, and joined +that unorganized sisterhood of mercy—the women +who toil that others may live. But she sang at her +work, as the womanly woman ever does. For although +a woman may hold no babe in her arms, the lullaby +leaps to her tongue, and at eventide she sings songs +to the children of her brain—sweet idealization of the +principle of mother-love.</p> + +<p>Christina Rossetti comes to us as one of those splendid +stars that are so far away they are seen only at rare +intervals. She never posed as a "literary person"—reading +her productions at four-o'clocks, and winning +high praise from the unbonneted and the discerning +society editor. She never even sought a publisher. Her +first volume of verses was issued by her grandfather +Polidori unknown to her—printed by his own labor +<a name="II_Page_137"></a>when she was seventeen and presented to her. What a +surprise it must have been to this gentle girl to have +one of her own books placed in her hands! There seems +to have been an almost holy love in this proud man's +heart for his granddaughter. His love was blind, or +near-sighted at least, as love is apt to be (and I am +glad!), for some of the poems in this little volume are +sorry stuff. Later, her brothers issued her work and +found market for it; and once we find Dante Gabriel +almost quarreling with that worthy Manxman, Hall +Caine, because the Manxman was compiling a volume +of the best English sonnets and threatening to leave +Christina Rossetti out.</p> + +<p>Christina had the faculty of seizing beautiful moments, +exalted feelings, sublime emotions, and working them +up into limpid song that comes echoing to us as from +across soft seas. In all her lines there is a half-sobbing +undertone—the sweet minor chord that is ever present +in the songs of the Choir Invisible, whose music is the +gladness as well as the sadness of the world.</p> + +<p>I have a dear friend who is an amateur photographic +artist, which be it known is quite a different thing +from a kodak fiend. The latter is continually snapping +a machine at incongruous things; he delights in catching +people in absurd postures; he pictures the foolish, +the irrelevant, the transient and the needless. But +what does my friend picture? I'll tell you. He catches +pictures only of beautiful objects: swaying stalks of +<a name="II_Page_138"></a>goldenrod, flights of thistle-down, lichen on old stone +walls, barks of trees, oak-leaves, bunches of acorns, +single sprays of apple-blossoms. Last Spring he found +two robins building a nest in a cherry-tree: he placed +his camera near them, and attaching a fine wire to +spring the shutter, took a picture of Mr. and Mrs. +Robin Redbreast laying down the first coarse straws +for their nest. Then he took a picture every day for +thirty days of that nest—from the time four blue eggs +are shown until four, wide-open mouths are held hungrily +for dainty grubs. This series of photographs forms +an Epic of Creation. So, if you ask me to solve the question +of whether photography is art, I'll answer: it all +depends upon what you picture, and how you present it.</p> + +<p>Christina Rossetti focused her thought on the beautiful +object and at the best angle, so the picture she +brings us is nobly ordered and richly suggestive.</p> + +<p>And so the days passed in study, writing, housework, +and caring for old ladies three. Dante Gabriel, talented, +lovable, erratic, had gotten into bad ways, as a man +will who turns night into day and tries to get the start +of God Almighty, thinking he has found a substitute +for exercise and oxygen. Finally he was taken to Birchington, +on the Isle of Thanet (where Octave found her +name). He was mentally ill, to a point where he had +through his delusions driven away all his old-time +friends.</p> + +<p>Christina, aged fifty-one, and the mother, +aged eighty-two, went to take care of him, and they +<a name="II_Page_139"></a>did for him with all the loving tenderness what they +might have done for a sick baby; but with this difference—they +had to fight his strength. Yet still there +were times when his mind was sweet and gentle as in +the days of old; and toward the last these periods of +restful peace increased, and there were hours when the +brother, sister and aged mother held sweet converse, +almost as when children they were taught at this +mother's knee. Dante Gabriel Rossetti died April +Ninth, Eighteen Hundred Ninety-two. His grave is in +the old country churchyard at Birchington.</p> + +<p>Two years afterward the mother passed out; in Eighteen +Hundred Ninety, Eliza Polidori died, aged eighty-seven; +and in Eighteen Hundred Ninety-three, her +sister Charlotte joined her, aged eighty-four. In Christ's +Church, Woburn Square, you can see memorial tablets +to these fine souls, and if you get acquainted with the +gentle old rector he will show you a pendant star and +crescent, set with diamonds, given by the Sultan during +the Crimean war, "To Miss Charlotte Lydia Polidori +for distinguished services as Nurse." And he will +also show you a silver communion set marked with the +names of these three sisters, followed by that of "Christina +Georgiana Rossetti."</p> + +<p>And so they all went to their soul's rest and left Christina +alone in the big house with its echoing halls—too +big by half for its lonely, simple-hearted mistress and +her pets. She felt that her work was done, and feeling +<a name="II_Page_140"></a>so, the end soon came. She died December Twenty-ninth, +Eighteen Hundred Ninety-four—passing from +a world that she had never much loved, where she had +lived a life of sacrifice, suffering many partings, enduring +many pains. Glad to go, rejoicing that the end was +nigh, and soothed by the thought that beyond lay a +Future, she fell asleep.</p> + + + +<hr class="full" /><p><a name="II_Page_141"></a></p> +<p><a name="ROSA_BONHEUR"></a></p><h2>ROSA BONHEUR</h2> +<p><a name="II_Page_142"></a></p> +<div class="blkquot"><p>The boldness of her conceptions is sublime. As a Creative +Artist I place her first among women, living or +dead. And if you ask me why she thus towers above her +fellows, by the majesty of her work silencing every +detractor, I will say it is because she listens to God, and +not to man. She is true to self.<br /> +<span style='margin-left: 10em;'>—<i>Victor Hugo</i></span></p></div> + +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_143"></a></p> +<p class="ctr"><a href="./images/ljv2-6.jpg"><img src="./images/ljv2-6_th.jpg" alt="ROSA BONHEUR" /></a></p><p class="ctr">ROSA BONHEUR</p> +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_144"></a><a name="II_Page_145"></a></p> + +<p>When I arrive in Paris I always go +first to the Y.M.C.A. headquarters +in the Rue de Treville—that +fine building erected and presented +to the Association by Banker Stokes +of New York. There's a good table-d'hote +dinner there every day for +a franc; then there tare bathrooms +and writing-rooms and reading-rooms, and all are +yours if you are a stranger. The polite Secretary does +not look like a Christian: he has a very tight hair-cut, +a Vandyke beard and lists of lodgings that can be had +for twenty, fifteen or ten francs a week. Or, should you +be an American Millionaire and be willing to pay thirty +francs a week, the secretary knows a nice Protestant +lady who will rent you her front parlor on the first +floor and serve you coffee each morning without extra +charge.</p> + +<p>Not being a millionaire, I decided, the last time I was +there, on a room at fifteen francs a week on the fourth +floor. A bright young fellow was called up, duly introduced, +and we started out to inspect the quarters.</p> + +<p>The house we wanted was in a little side street that +leads off the Boulevard Montmartre. It was a very +narrow and plain little street, and I was somewhat disappointed. +Yet it was not a shabby street, for there are +<a name="II_Page_146"></a>none such in Paris; all was neat and clean, and as I +caught sight of a birdcage hanging in one of the windows +and a basket of ferns in another I was reassured +and rang the bell.</p> + +<p>The landlady wore a white cap, a winning smile and a +big white apron. A bunch of keys dangling at her belt +gave the necessary look of authority. She was delighted +to see me—everybody is glad to see you in Paris—and +she would feel especially honored if I would consent +to remain under her roof. She only rented her rooms +to those who were sent to her by her friends, and +among her few dear friends none was so dear as Monsieur +ze Secretaire of ze Young Men Christians.</p> + +<p>And so I was shown the room—away up and up and +up a dark winding stairway of stone steps with an iron +balustrade. It was a room about the size of a large +Jordan-Marsh drygoods-box.</p> + +<p>The only thing that +tempted me to stay was the fact that the one window +was made up of little diamond panes set in a leaden +sash, and that this window looked out on a little courtway +where a dozen palms and as many ferns grew lush +and green in green tubs and where in the center a +fountain spurted. So a bargain was struck and the +landlady went downstairs to find her husband to send +him to the Gare Saint Lazare after my luggage.</p> + +<p>What a relief it is to get settled in your own room! It +is home and this is your castle. You can do as you +please here; can I not take mine ease in mine inn?</p> + +<p><a name="II_Page_147"></a>I took off my coat and hung it on the corner of the high +bedpost of the narrow, little bed and hung my collar +and cuffs on the floor; and then leaned out of the window +indulging in a drowsy dream of sweet content. +'Twas a long, dusty ride from Dieppe, but who cares—I +was now settled, with rent paid for a week!</p> + +<p>All around the courtway were flower-boxes in the windows; +down below, the fountain cheerfully bubbled +and gurgled, and from clear off in the unseen rumbled +the traffic of the great city. And coming from somewhere, +as I sat there, was the shrill warble of a canary. +I looked down and around, but could not see the +feathered songster, as the novelists always call a bird. +Then I followed the advice of the Epworth League +and looked up, not down, out, not in, and there directly +over my head hung the cage all tied up in chiffon (I +think it was chiffon). I was surprised, for I felt sure it +could not be possible there was a room higher than +mine—when I had come up nine stairways! Then I +was more surprised; for just as I looked up, a woman +looked down and our eyes met. We both smiled a foolish +smile of surprise; she dodged in her head and I gazed +at the houses opposite with an interest quite unnecessary.</p> + +<p>She was not a very young woman, nor very pretty—in +fact, she was rather plain—but when she leaned out +to feed her pet and found a man looking up at her she +proved her divine femininity beyond cavil. Was there +<a name="II_Page_148"></a>ever a more womanly action? And I said to myself, +"She is not handsome—but God bless her, she is +human!"</p> + +<p>Details are tiresome—so suffice it to say that next day +the birdcage was lowered that I might divide my apple +with Dickie (for he was very fond of apple). The second +day, when the cage was lowered I not only fed Dickie +but wrote a message on the cuttlefish. The third day, +there was a note twisted in the wires of the cage inviting +me up to tea.</p> + +<p>And I went.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_149"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>There were four girls living up there in one +attic-room. Two of these girls were Americans, +one English and one French. One of the +American girls was round and pink and +twenty; the other was older. It was the older one that +owned the bird, and invited me up to tea. She met me +at the door, and we shook hands like old-time friends. +I was introduced to the trinity in a dignified manner, +and we were soon chatting in a way that made Dickie +envious, and he sang so loudly that one of the girls +covered the cage with a black apron.</p> + +<p>With four girls I felt perfectly safe, and as for the girls +there was not a shadow of a doubt that they were safe, +for I am a married man. I knew they must be nice girls, +for they had birds and flower-boxes. I knew they had +flower-boxes, for twice it so happened that they sprinkled +the flowers while I was leaning out of the window +wrapped in reverie.</p> + +<p>This attic was the most curious room I ever saw. It +was large—running clear across the house. It had four +gable-windows, and the ceiling sloped down on the +sides, so there was danger of bumping your head if you +played pussy-wants-a-corner. Each girl had a window +that she called her own, and the chintz curtains, made +of chiffon (I think it was chiffon), were tied back with +different-colored ribbons. This big room was divided +in the center by a curtain made of gunny-sack stuff, +and this curtain was covered with pictures such as were +<a name="II_Page_150"></a>never seen on land or sea. The walls were papered with +brown wrapping-paper, tacked up with brass-headed +nails, and this paper was covered with pictures such +as were never seen on sea or land.</p> + +<p>The girls were all art students, and when they had +nothing else to do they worked on the walls, I imagined, +just as the Israelites did in Jerusalem years ago. One +half of the attic was studio, and this was where the +table was set. The other half of the attic had curious +chairs and divans and four little iron beds enameled in +white and gold, and each bed was so smoothly made up +that I asked what they were for. White Pigeon said they +were bric-a-brac—that the Attic Philosophers rolled +themselves up in the rugs on the floor when they wished +to sleep; but I have thought since that White Pigeon +was chaffing me.</p> + +<p>White Pigeon was the one I saw that first afternoon +when I looked up, not down, out, not in. She was from +White Pigeon, Michigan, and from the very moment +I told her I had a cousin living at Coldwater who was +a conductor on the Lake Shore, we were as brother and +sister. White Pigeon was thirty or thirty-five, mebbe; +she had some gray hairs mixed in with the brown, and +at times there was a tinge of melancholy in her laugh +and a sort of half-minor key in her voice. I think she +had had a Past, but I don't know for sure.</p> + +<p>Women under thirty seldom know much, unless Fate +has been kind and cuffed them thoroughly, so the little +<a name="II_Page_151"></a>peachblow Americaine did not interest me. The peachblow +was all gone from White Pigeon's cheek, but she +was fairly wise and reasonably good—I'm certain of +that. She called herself a student and spoke of her +pictures as "studies," but she had lived in Paris ten +years. Peachblow was her pupil—sent over from Bradford, +Pennsylvania, where her father was a "producer." +White Pigeon told me this after I had drunk five cups +of tea and the Anglaise and the Soubrette were doing +the dishes. Peachblow the while was petulantly taking +the color out of a canvas that was a false alarm.</p> + +<p>White Pigeon had copied a Correggio in the Louvre +nine years before, and sold the canvas to a rich wagon-maker +from South Bend. Then orders came from South +Bend for six more Louvre masterpieces. It took a year +to complete the order and brought White Pigeon a +thousand dollars. She kept on copying and occasionally +receiving orders from America; and when no orders +came, potboilers were duly done and sent to worthy +Hebrews in Saint Louis who hold annual Art Receptions +and sell at auction paintings painted by distinguished +artists with unpronounceable names, who +send a little of their choice work to Saint Louis, because +the people in Saint Louis appreciate really choice things.</p> + +<p>"And the mural decorations—which one of you did +those?" I remarked, as a long pause came stealing in.</p> + +<p>"Did you hear what Mr. Littlejourneys asked?" +called White Pigeon to the others.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_152"></a></p> +<p>"No; what was it?"</p> + +<p>"He wants to know which one +of us decorated the walls!"</p> + +<p>"Mr. Littlejourneys meant illumined the walls," jerked +Peachblow, over her shoulder.</p> + +<p>Then Anglaise gravely brought a battered box of crayon +and told me I must make a picture somewhere on the +wall or ceiling: all the pictures were made by visitors—no +visitor was ever exempt.</p> + +<p>I took the crayons and made a picture such as was +never seen on land or sea. Having thus placed myself +on record, I began to examine the other decorations. +There were heads and faces, and architectural scraps, +trees and animals, and bits of landscape and ships that +pass in the night. Most of the work was decidedly +sketchy, but some of the faces were very good.</p> + +<p>Suddenly my eye spied the form of a sleeping dog, a +great shaggy Saint Bernard with head outstretched on +his paws, sound asleep. I stopped and whistled.</p> + +<p>The girls laughed.</p> + +<p>"It is only the picture of a dog," said Soubrette.</p> + +<p>"I know; but you should pay dog-tax on such a picture—did +you draw it?" I asked White Pigeon.</p> + +<p>"Did I! If I could draw like that, would I copy pictures +in the Louvre?"</p> + +<p>"Well, who drew it?"</p> + +<p>"Can't you guess?"</p> + +<p>"Of course I can guess. I am a Yankee—I guess Rosa +Bonheur."</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_153"></a></p> +<p>"Well, you have guessed right."</p> + +<p>"Stop joking and +tell me who drew the Saint Bernard."</p> + +<p>"Madame Rosalie, or Rosa Bonheur, as you call her."</p> + +<p>"But she never came here!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, she did—once. Soubrette is her great-grandniece, +or something."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and Madame Bonheur pays my way and keeps +me in the Ecole des Beaux Arts. I'm not ashamed for +Monsieur Littlejourneys to know!" said Soubrette +with a pretty pout; "I'm from Lyons, and my mother +and Madame Rosalie used to know each other years +ago."</p> + +<p>"Will Madame Rosalie, as you call her, ever come here +again?"</p> + +<p>"Perhaps."</p> + +<p>"Then I'll camp right here till she comes!"</p> + +<p>"You might stay a year and then be disappointed."</p> + +<p>"Then can't we go to see her?"</p> + +<p>"Never; she does not see visitors."</p> + +<p>"We might go visit her home," mused Soubrette, after +a pause.</p> + +<p>"Yes, if she is away," said Anglaise.</p> + +<p>"She's away now," said Soubrette; "she went to +Rouen yesterday."</p> + +<p>"Well, when shall we go?"</p> + +<p>"Tomorrow."</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_154"></a></p> +<hr /> +<p>And so Soubrette could not think of going when +it looked so much like rain, and Anglaise +could not think of going without Soubrette, +and Peachblow was getting nervous about +the coming examinations, and must study, as she knew +she would just die if she failed to pass.</p> + +<p>"You will anyway—sometime!" said White Pigeon.</p> + +<p>"Don't urge her; she may change her mind and go with +you," dryly remarked Anglaise with back towards us +as she dusted the mantel.</p> + +<p>Then I expressed my regret that the trinity could not +go, and White Pigeon expressed her regret because they +had to stay at home. And as we went down the stairs +together we chanted the Kyrie eleison for our small +sins, easing conscience by the mutual confession that +we were arrant hypocrites.</p> + +<p>"But still," mused White Pigeon, not quite satisfied, +"we really did not tell an untruth—that is, we did not +deceive them—they understood—I wouldn't tell a real +whopper, would you?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know—I think I did once."</p> + +<p>"Tell me about it," said White Pigeon.</p> + +<p>But I was saved, for just as we reached the bottom stair +there was a slight jingling of keys, and the landlady +came up through the floor with a big lunch-basket. She +pushed the basket into my hands and showering us with +Lombardy French pushed us out of the door, and away +we went into the morning gray, the basket carried +<a name="II_Page_155"></a>between us. The basket had a hinged cover, and out of +one corner emerged the telltale neck of a bottle. It did +not look just right; suppose we should meet some one +from Coldwater?</p> + +<p>But we did not meet any one from Coldwater. And +when we reached the railway-station we were quite +lost in the crowd, for there were dozens of picnickers all +carrying baskets, and from the cover of each basket +emerged the neck of a bottle. We felt quite at home +packed away in a Classe Trois carriage with a chattering +party of six High-School botanizing youngsters. When +the guard came to the window, touched his cap, +addressing me as Le Professeur, and asked for the +tickets for my family, they all laughed.</p> + +<p>Fontainebleau was the fourth stop from Paris. My +family scampered out and away and we followed +leisurely after. Fontainebleau is quite smug. There is a +fashionable hotel near the station, before which a fine +tall fellow in uniform parades. He looked at our basket +with contempt, and we looked at him in pity. Just +beyond the hotel are smart shops with windows filled +with many-colored trifles to tempt the tourist. The +shops gradually grew smaller and less gay, and residences +with high stone walls in front took their places, +and over these walls roses nodded. Then there came a +wide stretch of pasture, and the town of Fontainebleau +was left behind.</p> + +<p>The sun came out and came out and came out; birds +<a name="II_Page_156"></a>chirruped in the hedgerows and the daws in the high +poplars called and scolded. The mist still lingered on the +distant hills, and we could hear the tinkle of sheep-bells +and the barking of a dog coming out of the nothingness.</p> + +<p>White Pigeon wore flat-soled shoes and measured off +the paces with an easy swing. We walked in silence, +filled with the rich quiet of country sounds and country +sights. What a relief to get away from noisy, bustling, +busy Paris! God made the country!</p> + +<p>All at once the mists seemed to lift from the long range +of hills on the right and revealed the dark background +of forest, broken here and there with jutting rocks and +beetling crags. We stopped and sat down on the bank-side +to view the scene. Close up under the shadow of the +dark forest nestled a little white village. Near it was the +red-tile roof of an old mansion, half-lost in the foliage. +All around this old mansion I could make out a string +of small buildings or additions to the original chateau.</p> + +<p>I looked at White Pigeon and she looked at me.</p> + +<p>"Yes; that is the place!" she said.</p> + +<p>The sun's rays were growing warmer. I took off my coat +and tucked it through the handle of the basket. White +Pigeon took off her jacket to keep it company, and +toting the basket, slung on my cane between us, we +moved on up the gently winding way to the village of +By. Everybody was asleep at By, or else gone on a +journey. Soon we came to the old, massive, moss-covered +gateposts that marked the entrance to the mansion. A +<a name="II_Page_157"></a>chain was stretched across the entrance and we crawled +under. The driveway was partly overgrown with grass, +and the place seemed to be taking care of itself. Half +a dozen long-horned Bonnie Brier Bush cows were +grazing on the lawn, their calves with them; and evidently +these cows and calves were the only mowing-machines +employed. On this wide-stretching meadow +were various old trees; one elm I saw had fallen split +through the center—each part prostrate, yet growing +green.</p> + +<p>Close up about the house there was an irregular stone +wall and an ornamental iron gate with a pull-out +Brugglesmith bell at one side. We pulled the bell and +were answered by a big shaggy Saint Bernard that came +barking and bouncing around the corner. I thought at +first our time had come. But this giant of a dog only +approached within about ten feet, then lay down on +the grass and rolled over three times to show his goodwill. +He got up with a fine, cheery smile shown in the +wag of his tail, just as a little maid unlocked the gate.</p> + +<p>"Don't you know that dog?" asked White Pigeon.</p> + +<p>"Certainement—he is on the wall of your room."</p> + +<p>We were shown into a little reception-parlor, where we +were welcomed by a tall, handsome woman, about White +Pigeon's age.</p> + +<p>The woman kissed White Pigeon on +one cheek, and I afterwards asked White Pigeon why she +didn't turn to me the other, and she said I was a fool.</p> + +<p>Then the tall woman went to the door and called up +<a name="II_Page_158"></a>the stairway: "Antoine, Antoine, guess who it is? +It's White Pigeon!"</p> + +<p>A man came down the stairs three steps at a time, and +took both of White Pigeon's hands in his, after the +hearty manner of a gentleman of France. Then I was +introduced.</p> + +<p>Antoine looked at our lunch-basket with the funniest +look I ever saw, and asked what it was.</p> + +<p>"Lunch," said White Pigeon; "I can not tell a lie!"</p> + +<p>Antoine made wild gesticulations of displeasure, +denouncing us in pantomime.</p> + +<p>But White Pigeon explained that we only came on a +quiet picnic in search of ozone and had dropped in to +make a little call before we went on up to the forest. +But could we see the horses?</p> + +<p>Antoine would be most delighted to show Monsieur +Littlejourneys anything that was within his power. In +fact, everything hereabouts was the absolute property +of Monsieur Littlejourneys to do with as he pleased.</p> + +<p>He disappeared up the stairway to exchange his slippers +for shoes, and the tall woman went in another direction +for her hat. I whispered to White Pigeon, "Can't we +see the studio?"</p> + +<p>"Are we from Chicago, that we should seek to prowl +through a private house, when the mistress is away? +No; there are partly finished canvases up there that +are sacred."</p> + +<p>"Come this way," said Antoine. He led us out through +<a name="II_Page_159"></a>the library, then the dining-room and through the +kitchen.</p> + +<p>It is a very comfortable old place, with no extra +furniture—the French know better than to burden +themselves with things.</p> + +<p>The long line of brick stables seemed made up of a +beggarly array of empty stalls. We stopped at a paddock, +and Antoine opened the gate and said, "There +they are!"</p> + +<p>"What?"</p> + +<p>"The horses."</p> + +<p>"But these are broncos."</p> + +<p>"Yes; I believe that is what you call them. Monsieur +Bill of Buffalo, New York, sent them as a present to +Madame Rosalie when he was in Paris."</p> + +<p>There they were—two ewe-necked cayuses—one a +pinto with a wall-eye; the other a dun with a black line +down the back.</p> + +<p>I challenged Antoine to saddle them and we would +ride. The tall lady took it in dead earnest, and throwing +her arms around Antoine's neck begged him not to +commit suicide.</p> + +<p>"And the Percherons—where are they?"</p> + +<p>"Goodness! we have no Perches."</p> + +<p>"Those that served as models for the 'Horse Fair,' I +mean."</p> + +<p>White Pigeon took me gently by the sleeve, and turning +to the others apologized for my ignorance, explaining +<a name="II_Page_160"></a>that I did not know the "Marche aux Chevaux" was +painted over forty years ago, and that the models were +all Paris cart-horses.</p> + +<p>Antoine called up a little old man, who led out two +shaggy little cobs, and I was told that these were the +horses that Madame drove. A roomy, old-fashioned +basket phaeton was backed out; White Pigeon and I +stepped in to try it, and Antoine drew us once around +the stable-yard. This is the only carriage Madame uses. +There were doves, and chickens, and turkeys, and +rabbits; and these horses we had seen, with the cows +on the lawn, make up all the animals owned by the +greatest of living animal-painters.</p> + +<p>Years ago Rosa Bonheur had a stableful of horses and +a kennel of dogs and a park with deer. Many animals +were sent as presents. One man forwarded a lion, and +another a brace of tigers, but Madame made haste to +present them to the Zoological Garden at Paris, because +the folks at By would not venture out of their houses—a +report having been spread that the lions were loose.</p> + +<p>"An animal-painter no more wants to own the objects +he paints than a landscape-artist wishes a deed for the +mountain he is sketching," said Antoine.</p> + +<p>"Or to marry his model," interposed White Pigeon.</p> + +<p>"If you see your model too often, you will lose her," +added the Tall Lady.</p> + +<p>We bade our friends good-by and trudged on up the +hillside to the storied Forest of Fontainebleau. We sat +<a name="II_Page_161"></a>down on a log and watched the winding Seine stretching +away like a monstrous serpent, away down across the +meadow; just at our feet was the white village of By; +beyond was Thomeray, and off to the left rose the spires +of Fontainebleau.</p> + +<p>"And who is this Antoine and who is the Tall Lady?" +I asked, as White Pigeon began to unpack the basket.</p> + +<p>"It's quite a romance; are you sure you want to hear +it?"</p> + +<p>"I must hear it."</p> + +<p>And so between bites White Pigeon told me the story.</p> + +<p>The Tall Lady is a niece of Madame Rosalie's. She +was married to an army officer at Bordeaux when she +was sixteen years old. Her husband treated her shamefully; +he beat her and forced her to write begging letters +and to borrow money of her relatives, and then he would +take this money and waste it gambling and in drink. +In short, he was a Brute.</p> + +<p>Madame Rosalie accidentally heard of all this, and one +day went down to Bordeaux and took the Tall Lady +away from the Brute and told him she would kill him +if he followed.</p> + +<p>"Did she paint a picture of the Brute?"</p> + +<p>"Keep quiet, please!"</p> + +<p>She told him she would kill him if he followed, and +although she is usually very gentle I believe she would +have kept her word. Well, she brought the Tall Lady +with her to By, and this old woman and this young +<a name="II_Page_162"></a>woman loved each other very much.</p> + +<p>Now, Madame Rosalie had a butler and combination man +of business, by name of Jules Carmonne. He was a painter +of some ability and served Madame in many ways right faithfully. +Jules loved the Tall Lady, or said he did, but +she did not care for him. He was near fifty and asthmatic +and had watery eyes. He made things very +uncomfortable for the Tall Lady.</p> + +<p>One night Jules came to Madame Rosalie in great +indignation and said he could not consent to remain +longer on account of the way things were going on. +What was the trouble? Trouble enough, when the Tall +Lady was sneaking out of the house after decent folks +were in bed, to meet a strange man down in the evergreens! +Well I guess so!!</p> + +<p>How did he know?</p> + +<p>Ah, he had followed her. Moreover, he had concealed +himself in the evergreens and waited for them, to make +sure.</p> + +<p>Yes, and who was the man?</p> + +<p>A young rogue of a painter from Fontainebleau named +Antoine de Channeville.</p> + +<p>Madame Rosalie took Jules Carmonne at his word. She +said she was sorry he could not stay, but he might go +if he wished to, of course. And she paid him his salary +on the spot—with two months more to the end of the +year.</p> + +<p>The next day Madame Rosalie drove her team of +<a name="II_Page_163"></a>shaggy ponies down to Fontainebleau and called on the +young rogue of an artist. He came out bareheaded and +quaking to where she sat in the phaeton waiting. She +flecked the off pony twice and told him that as Carmonne +had left her she must have a man to help her. +Would he come? And she named as salary a sum about +five times what he was then making.</p> + +<p>Antoine de Channeville seized the wheel of the phaeton +for support, gasped several gasps, and said he would +come.</p> + +<p>He was getting barely enough to eat out of his work, +anyway, although he was a very worthy young fellow. +And he came.</p> + +<p>He and the Tall Lady were married about six months +after.</p> + +<p>"And about the Brute and—and the divorce!"</p> + +<p>"Gracious goodness! How do I know? I guess the Brute +died or something; anyway, Antoine and the Tall Lady +are man and wife, and are devoted lovers besides. They +have served Madame Rosalie most loyally for these +fifteen years. They say Madame Rosalie has made her +will and has left them the mansion and everything in +it for their ownest own, with a tidy sum besides to put +on interest."</p> + +<p>It was four o'clock when we got back to the railroad-station +at Fontainebleau. We missed the train we +expected to take, and had an hour to wait. White +Pigeon said she did not care so very much, and I'm +<a name="II_Page_164"></a>sure I didn't. So we sat down in the bright little +waiting-room, and White Pigeon told me many things +about Madame Rosalie and her early life that I had +never known before.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_165"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>Early in the century there lived in Bordeaux +a struggling artist (artists always struggle, +you know) by the name of Raymond Bonheur. +He found life a cruel thing, for bread +was high in price and short in weight, and no one seemed +to appreciate art except the folks who had no money +to buy. But the poor can love as well as the rich, and +Raymond married. In his nervous desire for success, +Raymond Bonheur said that if he could only have a +son he would teach him how to do it, and the son would +achieve the honors that the world withheld from the +father.</p> + +<p>So the days came and went, and a son was expected—a +firstborn—an heir. There wasn't anything to be heir +to except genius, but there was plenty of that. The heir +was to bear the name of the father—Raymond Bonheur.</p> + +<p>Prayers were offered and thanksgivings sung.</p> + +<p>The days were fulfilled. The child was born.</p> + +<p>The heir was a girl.</p> + +<p>Raymond Bonheur cursed wildly and tousled his hair +like a bouffe artist. He swore he had been tricked, +trapped, seduced, undone. He would have bought +strong drink, but he had no money, and credit, like +hope, was gone.</p> + +<p>The little mother cried.</p> + +<p>But the baby grew, although it wasn't a very big baby. +They named her Rosa, because the initial was the same +as Raymond, but they always called her Rosalie.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_166"></a></p> +<p>Then in a year another baby came, and that was a +boy. In two years another, but Raymond never forgave +his wife that first offense. He continued to struggle, +trying various styles of pictures and ever hoping he +would yet hit on what the public desired. Mr. Vanderbilt +had not yet made his famous remark about the public, +and how could Raymond plagiarize it in advance?</p> + +<p>At last he got money enough to get to Paris—ah, yes, +Paris, Paris, there talent is appreciated!</p> + +<p>In Paris another baby was born—it was looked upon as +a calamity. The poor little mother of the four little +shivering Bonheurs ceased to struggle. She lay quite +still, and they covered her face with a white sheet and +talked in whispers, and walked on tiptoe, for she +was dead.</p> + +<p>When an artist can not succeed, he begins to teach art—that +is, he shows others how. Raymond Bonheur put his +four children out among kinsmen in four different +places, and became drawing-master in a private school. +Rosa Bonheur was ten years old: a pug-nosed, square-faced +little girl in a linsey-woolsey dress, wooden shoon, +with a yellow braid hanging down her back tied with +a shoestring. She could draw—all children can draw—and +the first things children draw are animals.</p> + +<p>Her +father had taught her a little and laughed at her foolish +little lions and tigers, all duly labeled.</p> + +<p>When twelve years of age the good people with whom +she lived said she must learn dressmaking. She should +<a name="II_Page_167"></a>be an artist of the needle. But after some months she +rebelled and, making her way across the city to where +her father was, demanded that he should teach her +drawing. Raymond Bonheur hadn't much will—this +controversy proved that—the child mastered, and the +father, who really was an accomplished draftsman, +began giving daily lessons to the girl. Soon they worked +together in the Louvre, copying pictures.</p> + +<p>It was a queer thing to teach a girl art—there were no +women artists then. People laughed to see a little girl +with yellow braid mixing paints and helping her father +in the Louvre; others said it wasn't right.</p> + +<p>"Let's cut off the braid, and I'll wear boy's clothes +and be a boy," said funny little Rosalie.</p> + +<p>Next day, Raymond Bonheur had a close-cropped boy +in loose trousers and blue blouse to help him.</p> + +<p>The pictures they copied began to sell. Buyers said the +work was strong and true. Prosperity came that way, +and Raymond Bonheur got his four children together +and rented three rooms in a house at One Hundred +Fifty-seven Faubourg Saint Honore.</p> + +<p>Rosalie saw that her father had always tried to please +the public; she would please no one but herself. He had +tried many forms; she would stick to one. She would +paint animals and nothing else.</p> + +<p>When eighteen years old, she painted a picture of +rabbits, for the Salon. The next year she tried again. +She made the acquaintance of an honest old farmer at +<a name="II_Page_168"></a>Villiers and went to live in his household. She painted +pictures of all the livestock he possessed, from rabbits +to a Norman stallion. One of the pictures she then made +was that of a favorite Holland cow. A collector came +down from Paris and offered three hundred francs for +the picture.</p> + +<p>"Merciful Jesus!" said the pious farmer; "say nothing, +but get the money quick! The live cow herself isn't +worth half that!"</p> + +<p>The members of the Bonheur family married, one by +one, including the father. Rosa did not marry: she +painted. She discarded all teachers, all schools; she did +not listen to the suggestions of patrons, and even +refused to make pictures to order.</p> + +<p>And be it said to +her credit, she never has allowed a buyer to dictate the +subject. She followed her own ideas in everything; she +wore men's clothes, and does even unto this day.</p> + +<p>When she was twenty-five, the Salon awarded her a +gold medal. The Ministere des Beaux Arts paid her +three thousand francs for her "Labourge Nivernais."</p> + +<p>Raymond Bonheur grew ill in Eighteen Hundred +Forty-nine, but before he passed out he realized that his +daughter, then twenty-seven years old, was on a level +with the greatest masters, living or dead.</p> + +<p>She began "The Horse Fair" when twenty-eight. It +was the largest canvas ever attempted by an animal-painter. +It was exhibited at the Salon in Eighteen +Hundred Fifty-three, and all the gabble of jealous +<a name="II_Page_169"></a>competitors was lost in the glorious admiration it +excited. It became the rage of Paris. All the honors the +Salon could bestow were heaped upon the young woman, +and by special decision all her work henceforth was +declared exempt from examination by the Jury of +Admission. Rosa Bonheur, five feet four, weighing one +hundred twenty pounds, was bigger than the Salon.</p> + +<p>But success did not cause her to swerve a hair's breadth +from her manner of work or life. She refused all social +invitations, and worked away after her own method as +industriously as ever. When a picture was completed, +she set her price on it and it was sold.</p> + +<p>In Eighteen Hundred Sixty she bought this fine old +house at By, that she might work in quiet. Society tried +to follow her, and in Eighteen Hundred Sixty-four the +Emperor Napoleon and Empress Eugenie went to By, +and the Empress pinned to the blue blouse of Rosa Bonheur +the Cross of the Legion of Honor, the first time, I +believe, that the distinction was ever conferred on a +woman.</p> + +<p>And now at seventy-four she is still in love with life, +and while taking a woman's tender interest in all sweet +and gentle things, has yet an imagination that in its +strength and boldness is splendidly masculine.</p> + +<p>Rosa +Bonheur has received all the honors that man can give. +She is rich; no words of praise that tongue can utter can +add to her fame; and she is loved by all who know her. +<a name="II_Page_170"></a><a name="II_Page_171"></a></p> + + +<hr class="full" /> +<p><a name="MADAME_DE_STAEL"></a></p><h2>MADAME DE STAEL</h2> +<p><a name="II_Page_172"></a></p> +<div class="blkquot"><p>Far from gaining assurance in meeting Bonaparte +oftener, he intimidated me daily more and more. I +confusedly felt that no emotion of the heart could possibly +take effect upon him. He looks upon a human +being as a fact or as a thing, but not as a fellow-creature. +He does not hate any more than he loves; there is +nothing for him but himself; all other things are so +many ciphers. The force of his will lies in the imperturbable +calculation of his selfishness.<br /> +<span style='margin-left: 25em;'>—<i>Reflections</i></span></p></div> + +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_173"></a></p> +<p class="ctr"><a href="./images/ljv2-7.jpg"><img src="./images/ljv2-7_th.jpg" alt="MADAME DE STAEL" /></a></p><p class="ctr">MADAME DE STAEL</p> +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_174"></a><a name="II_Page_175"></a></p> + +<p>Fate was very kind to Madame De +Stael.</p> + +<p>She ran the gamut of life from highest +love to direst pain—from rosy +dawn to blackest night. Name if you +can another woman who touched +life at so many points! Home, +health, wealth, strength, honors, +affection, applause, motherhood, loss, danger, death, +defeat, sacrifice, humiliation, illness, banishment, imprisonment, +escape. Again comes hope—returning +strength, wealth, recognition, fame tempered by opposition, +home, a few friends, and kindly death—cool, all-enfolding +death.</p> + +<p>If Harriet Martineau showed poor judgment in choosing +her parents, we can lay no such charge to the account +of Madame De Stael.</p> + +<p>They called her "The Daughter of Necker," and all +through life she delighted in the title. The courtier who +addressed her thus received a sunny smile and a gentle +love-tap on his cheek for pay. A splendid woman is +usually the daughter of her father, just as strong men +have noble mothers.</p> + +<p>Jacques Necker was born in Geneva, and went up to +the city, like many another country boy, to make his +fortune. He carried with him to Paris innocence, health, +<a name="II_Page_176"></a>high hope, and twenty francs in silver. He found a place +as porter or "trotter" in a bank. Soon they made him +clerk.</p> + +<p>A letter came one day from a correspondent asking for +a large loan, and setting forth a complex financial +scheme in which the bank was invited to join. M. Vernet, +the head of the establishment, was away, and young +Necker took the matter in hand. He made a detailed +statement of the scheme, computed probable losses, +weighed the pros and cons, and when the employer +returned, the plan, all worked out, was on his desk, +with young Necker's advice that the loan be made.</p> + +<p>"You seem to know all about banking!" was the +sarcastic remark of M. Vernet.</p> + +<p>"I do," was the proud answer.</p> + +<p>"You know too much; I'll just put you back as porter."</p> + +<p>The Genevese accepted the reduction and went back +as porter without repining. A man of small sense would +have resigned his situation at once, just as men are ever +forsaking Fortune when she is about to smile; witness +Cato committing suicide on the very eve of success.</p> + +<p>There is always a demand for efficient men; the market +is never glutted; the cities are hungry for them—but the +trouble is, few men are efficient.</p> + +<p>"It was none of his business!" said M. Vernet to his +partner, trying to ease conscience with reasons.</p> + +<p>"Yes; but see how he accepted the inevitable!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! true, he has two qualities that are the property +<a name="II_Page_177"></a>only of strong men: confidence and resignation. I think—I +think I was hasty!"</p> + +<p>So young Necker was reinstated, and in six months was +cashier, in three years a partner.</p> + +<p>Not long after, he +married Susanna Curchod, a poor governess.</p> + +<p>But +Mademoiselle Curchod was rich in mental endowment: +refined, gentle, spiritual, she was a true mate to the +high-minded Necker. She was a Swiss, too, and if you +know how a young man and a young woman, countryborn, +in a strange city are attracted to each other, you +will better understand this particular situation.</p> + +<p>Some years before, Gibbon had loved and courted the +beautiful Mademoiselle Curchod in her quiet home in +the Jura Mountains. They became engaged. Gibbon +wrote home, breaking the happy news to his parents.</p> + +<p>"Has the beautiful Curchod of whom you sing, a large +dowry?" inquired the mother.</p> + +<p>"She has no dowry! I can not tell a lie," was the meek +answer. The mother came on and extinguished the +match in short order.</p> + +<p>Gibbon never married. But he frankly tells us all about +his love for Susanna Curchod, and relates how he +visited her, in her splendid Paris home. "She greeted +me without embarrassment," says Gibbon, resentfully; +"and in the evening Necker left us together in the +parlor, bade me good-night, and lighting a candle went +off to bed!"</p> + +<p>Gibbon, historian and philosopher, was made of +<a name="II_Page_178"></a>common clay (for authors are made of clay, like plain +mortals), and he could not quite forgive Madame Necker +for not being embarrassed on meeting her former lover, +neither could he forgive Necker for not being jealous.</p> + +<p>But that only daughter of the Neckers, Germaine, +pleased Gibbon—pleased him better than the mother, +and Gibbon extended his stay in Paris and called often.</p> + +<p>"She was a splendid creature," Gibbon relates; "only +seventeen, but a woman grown, physically and mentally; +not handsome, but dazzling, brilliant, emotional, +sensitive, daring!"</p> + +<p>Gibbon was a bit of a romanticist, as all historians are, +and he no doubt thought it would be a fine denouement to +life's play to capture the daughter of his old sweetheart, +and avenge himself on Fate and the unembarrassed +Madame Necker and the unpiqued husband, all at one +fell stroke—and she would not be dowerless either. +Ha, ha!</p> + +<p>But Gibbon forgot that he was past forty, short in +stature, and short of breath, and "miles around," as +Talleyrand put it.</p> + +<p>"I quite like you," said the daring daughter, as the +eloquent Gibbon sat by her side at a dinner.</p> + +<p>"Why shouldn't you like me—I came near being your +papa!"</p> + +<p>"I know, and would I have looked like you?"</p> + +<p>"Perhaps."</p> + +<p>"What a calamity!"</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_179"></a></p> +<p>Even then she possessed that same bubbling wit that was +hers years later when she sat at table with D'Alembert. +On one side of the great author was Madame Recamier, +famous for beauty (and later for a certain "Beauty-Cream"), +on the other the daughter of Necker.</p> + +<p>"How fortunate!" exclaimed D'Alembert with rapture; +"how fortunate I sit between Wit and Beauty!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, and without possessing either," said Wit.</p> + +<p>No mistake, the girl's intellect was too speedy even for +Gibbon. She fenced all 'round him and over him, and +he soon discovered that she was icily gracious to every +one, save her father alone. For him she seemed to outpour +all the lavish love of her splendid womanhood. It +was unlike the usual calm affection of father and daughter. +It was a great and absorbing love, of which even +the mother was jealous.</p> + +<p>"I can't just exactly make 'em out," said Gibbon, and +withdrew in good order.</p> + +<p>Before Necker was forty he had accumulated a fortune, +and retired from business to devote himself to literature +and the polite arts.</p> + +<p>"I have earned a rest," he said; "besides, I must +have leisure to educate my daughter."</p> + +<p>Men are constantly "retiring" from business, but +someway the expected Elysium of leisure forever eludes +us. Necker had written several good pamphlets and +showed the world that he had ability outside of money-making. +He was appointed Resident Minister of Geneva +<a name="II_Page_180"></a>at the Court of France. Soon after he became President +of the French East India Company, because there was +no one else with mind broad enough to fill the place. +His house was the gathering-place of many eminent +scholars and statesmen. Necker was quiet and reserved; +his wife coldly brilliant, cultured, dignified, religious. +The daughter made good every deficiency in both.</p> + +<p>She was tall, finely formed, but her features were rather +heavy, and in repose there was a languor in her manner +and a blankness in her face. This seeming dulness marks +all great actors, but the heaviness is only on the surface; +it often covers a sleeping volcano. On recognizing an +acquaintance, Germaine Necker's face would be illumined, +and her smile would light a room. She could +pronounce a man's name so he would be ready to throw +himself at her feet, or over a precipice for her. And she +could listen in a way that complimented; and by a sigh, +a nod, an exclamation, bring out the best—such +thoughts as a man never knew he had. She made +people surprise themselves with their own genius; thus +proving that to make a good impression means to make +the man pleased with himself. "Any man can be brilliant +with her," said a nettled competitor; "but if she +wishes, she can sink all women in a room into creeping +things."</p> + +<p>She knew how to compliment without flattering; her +cordiality warmed like wine, and her ready wit, repartee, +and ability to thaw all social ice and lead conversation +<a name="II_Page_181"></a>along any line, were accomplishments which perhaps +have never been equaled. The women who "entertain" +often only depress; they are so glowing that +everybody else feels himself punk. And these people +who are too clever are very numerous; they seem +inwardly to fear rivals, and are intent on working while +it is called the day.</p> + +<p>Over against these are the celebrities who sit in a +corner and smile knowingly when they are expected to +scintillate. And the individual who talks too much at +one time is often painfully silent at another—as if he +had made New-Year resolves. But the daughter of +Necker entered into conversation with candor and +abandon; she gave herself to others, and knew whether +they wished to talk or to listen. On occasion, she could +monopolize conversation until she seemed the only +person in the room; but all talent was brighter for the +added luster of her own. This simplicity, this utter +frankness, this complete absence of self-consciousness, +was like the flight of a bird that never doubts its power, +simply because it never thinks of it. Yet continual +power produces arrogance, and the soul unchecked +finally believes in its own omniscience.</p> + +<p>Of course such a matrimonial prize as the daughter of +Necker was sought for, even fought for. But the women +who can see clear through a man, like a Roentgen ray, +do not invite soft demonstration. They give passion a +chill. Love demands a little illusion; it must be clothed +<a name="II_Page_182"></a>in mystery. And although we find evidences that many +youths stood in the hallways and sighed, the daughter +of Necker never saw fit by a nod to bring them to her +feet. She was after bigger game—she desired the admiration +and approbation of archbishops, cardinals, +generals, statesmen, great authors.</p> + +<p>Germaine Necker had no conception of what love is.</p> + +<p>Many women never have. Had this fine young woman +met a man with intellect as clear, mind as vivid, and +heart as warm as her own, and had he pierced her +through with a wit as strong and keen as she herself +wielded, her pride would have been broken and she +might have paused. Then they might have looked into +each other's eyes and lost self there. And had she thus +known love it would have been a complete passion, for +the woman seemed capable of it.</p> + +<p>A better pen than mine has written, "A woman's love +is a dog's love." The dog that craves naught else but +the presence of his master, who is faithful to the one +and whines out his life on that master's grave, waiting +for the caress that never comes and the cheery voice +that is never heard—that's the way a woman loves! +A woman may admire, respect, revere and obey, but she +does not love until a passion seizes upon her that has +in it the abandon of Niagara. Do you remember how +Nancy Sikes crawls inch by inch to reach the hand of +Bill, and reaching it, tenderly caresses the coarse fingers +that a moment before clutched her throat, and dies +<a name="II_Page_183"></a>content? That's the love of woman! The prophet spoke +of something "passing the love of woman," but the +prophet was wrong—there's nothing does.</p> + +<p>So Germaine Necker, the gracious, the kindly, the +charming, did not love. However, she married—married +Baron De Stael, the Swedish Ambassador. He was +thirty-seven, she was twenty. De Stael was good-looking, +polite, educated. He always smiled at the right time, +said bright things in the right way, kept silence when +he should, and made no enemies because he agreed with +everybody about everything. Stipulations were made; +a long agreement was drawn up; it was signed by the +party of the first and duly executed by the party of the +second part; sealed, witnessed, sworn to, and the priest +was summoned.</p> + +<p>It was a happy marriage. The first three years of married +life were the happiest Madame De Stael ever knew, she +said long afterward.</p> + +<p>Possibly there are hasty people who imagine they detect +tincture of iron somewhere in these pages: these good +people will say, "Gracious me! why not?"</p> + +<p>And so I will at once admit that these respectable, +well-arranged, and carefully planned marriages are +often happy and peaceful.</p> + +<p>The couple may "raise" +a large family and slide through life and out of it without +a splash. I will also admit that love does not necessarily +imply happiness—more often 't is a pain, a wild +yearning, and a vague unrest; a haunting sense of +<a name="II_Page_184"></a>heart-hunger that drives a man into exile repeating +abstractedly the name "Beatrice! Beatrice!" +And so all the moral I will make now is simply this: +the individual who has not known an all-absorbing +love has not the spiritual vision that is a passport to +Paradise. He forever yammers between the worlds, fit +for neither Heaven nor Hell.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_185"></a></p> +<hr /> +<p>Necker retired from business that he might +enjoy peace; his daughter married for the +same reason. It was stipulated that she should +never be separated from her father. She who +stipulates is lost, so far as love goes—but no matter! +Married women in France are greater lions in society +than maidens can possibly hope to be. The marriage-certificate +serves at once as a license for brilliancy, +daring, splendor, and it is also a badge of respectability. +The marriage-certificate is a document that in all countries +is ever taken care of by the woman and never by +the man.</p> + +<p>And this document is especially useful in +France, as French dames know. Frenchmen are afraid +of an unmarried woman—she means danger, damages, +a midnight marriage and other awful things. An unmarried +woman in France can not hope to be a social leader; +and to be a social leader was the one ambition of +Madame De Stael.</p> + +<p>It was called the salon of Madame De Stael now. +Baron De Stael was known as the husband of Madame +De Stael. The salon of Madame Necker was only a +matter of reminiscence. The daughter of Necker was +greater than her father, and as for Madame Necker, +she was a mere figure in towering headdress, point lace +and diamonds. Talleyrand summed up the case when +he said, "She is one of those dear old things that have +to be tolerated."</p> + +<p>Madame De Stael had a taste for literature from early +<a name="II_Page_186"></a>womanhood. She wrote beautiful little essays and read +them aloud to her company, and her manuscripts had a +circulation like unto her father's bank-notes. She had +the faculty of absorbing beautiful thoughts and sentiments, +and no woman ever expressed them in a more +graceful way. People said she was the greatest woman +author of her day. "You mean of all time," corrected +Diderot. They called her "the High Priestess of +Letters," "the Minerva of Poetry," "Sappho Returned," +and all that. Her commendation meant success +and her indifference failure. She knew politics, too, and +her hands were on all wires. Did she wish to placate a +minister, she invited him to call, and once there he was +as putty in her hands. She skimmed the surface of all +languages, all arts, all history, but best of all she knew +the human heart.</p> + +<p>Of course there was a realm of knowledge she wist not +of—the initiates of which never ventured within her +scope. She had nothing for them—they kept away. But +the proud, the vain, the ambitious, the ennui-ridden, +the people-who-wish-to-be, and who are ever looking +for the strong man to give them help—these thronged +her parlors.</p> + +<p>And when you have named these you have named all +those who are foremost in commerce, politics, art, +education, philanthropy and religion. The world is run +by second-rate people. The best are speedily crucified, +or else never heard of until long after they are dead.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_187"></a></p> +<p>Madame De Stael, in Seventeen Hundred Eighty-eight, +was queen of the people who ran the world—-at least +the French part of it.</p> + +<p>But intellectual power, like physical strength, endures +but for a day. Giants who have a giant's strength and +use it like a giant must be put down. If you have intellectual +power, hide it!</p> + +<p>Do thy daily work in thine own little way and be +content. The personal touch repels as well as attracts. +Thy presence is a menace—thy existence an affront—beware! +They are weaving a net for thy feet, and hear +you not the echo of hammering, as of men building +a scaffold?</p> + +<p>Go read history! Thinkest thou that all men are mortal +save thee alone, and that what has befallen others can +not happen to thee?</p> + +<p>The Devil has no title to this property he now promises. +Fool! thou hast no more claim on Fate than they who +have gone before, and what has come to others in like +conditions must come to thee. God himself can not +stay it; it is so written in the stars. Power to lead men! +Pray that thy prayer shall ne'er be granted—'t is to be +carried to the topmost pinnacle of Fame's temple +tower, and there cast headlong upon the stones beneath. +Beware! beware!!</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_188"></a></p> +<hr /> +<p>Madame De Stael was of an intensely +religious nature throughout her entire life; +such characters swing between license and +asceticism. But the charge of atheism told +largely against her even among the so-called liberals, +for liberals are often very illiberal. Marie Antoinette +gathered her skirts close about her and looked at the +"Minerva of Letters" with suspicion in her big, open +eyes; cabinet officers forgot her requests to call, and +when a famous wit once coolly asked, "Who was that +Madame De Stael we used to read about?" people +roared with laughter.</p> + +<p>Necker, as Minister of Finance, had saved the State +from financial ruin; then had been deposed and banished; +then recalled. In September, Seventeen Hundred +Ninety, he was again compelled to flee. He escaped to +Switzerland, disguised as a pedler. The daughter wished +to accompany him, but this was impossible, for only a +week before she had given birth to her first child.</p> + +<p>But favor came back, and in the mad tumult of the +times the freedom of wit and sparkle of her salon +became a need to the poets and philosophers, if city +wits can be so called.</p> + +<p>Society shone as never before. In it was the good nature +of the mob. It was no time to sit quietly at home and +enjoy a book—men and women must "go somewhere," +they must "do something." The women adopted the +Greek costume and appeared in simple white robes +<a name="II_Page_189"></a>caught at the shoulders with miniature stilettos. Many +men wore crape on their arms in pretended memory of +friends who had been kissed by Madame Guillotine. +There was fever in the air, fever in the blood, and the +passions held high carnival. In solitude, danger depresses +all save the very strongest, but the mob (ever the symbol +of weakness) is made up of women—it is an effeminate +thing. It laughs hysterically at death and cries, "On +with the dance!" Women represent the opposite poles +of virtue.</p> + +<p>The fever continues: a "poverty party" is given by +Madame De Stael, where men dress in rags and +women wear tattered gowns that ill conceal their +charms. "We must get used to it," she said, and everybody +laughed. Soon, men in the streets wear red nightcaps, +women appear in nightgowns, rich men wear +wooden shoes, and young men in gangs of twelve parade +the avenues at night carrying heavy clubs, hurrahing +for this or that.</p> + +<p>Yes, society in Paris was never so gay.</p> + +<p>The salons were crowded, and politics was the theme. +When the discussion waxed too warm, some one would +start a hymn and all would chime in until the contestants +were drowned out and in token of submission +joined in the chorus.</p> + +<p>But Madame De Stael was very busy all these days. +Her house was filled with refugees, and she ran here and +there for passports and pardons, and beseeched ministers +<a name="II_Page_190"></a>and archbishops for interference or assistance or +amnesty or succor and all those things that great men +can give or bestow or effect or filch. And when her smiles +failed to win the wished-for signature, she still had tears +that would move a heart of brass.</p> + +<p>About this time Baron De Stael fades from our vision, +leaving with Madame three children.</p> + +<p>"It was never anything but a 'mariage de convenance' +anyway, what of it ?" and Madame bursts into tears +and throws herself into Farquar's arms.</p> + +<p>"Compose yourself, my dear—you are spoiling my +gown," says the Duchesse.</p> + +<p>"I stood him as long as I could," continued Madame.</p> + +<p>"You mean he stood you as long as he could."</p> + +<p>"You naughty thing!—why don't you sympathize with +me?"</p> + +<p>Then both women fall into a laughing fit that is interrupted +by the servant, who announces Benjamin +Constant.</p> + +<p>Constant came as near winning the love of Madame De +Stael as any man ever did. He was politician, scholar, +writer, orator, courtier. But with it all he was a boor, +for when he had won the favor of Madame De Stael he +wrote a long letter to Madame Charriere, with whom he +had lived for several years in the greatest intimacy, +giving reasons why he had forsaken her, and ending +with an ecstacy in praise of the Stael.</p> + +<p>If a man can do a thing more brutal than to humiliate +<a name="II_Page_191"></a>one woman at the expense of another, I do not know it. +And without entering any defense for the men who love +several women at one time, I wish to make a clear +distinction between the men who bully and brutalize +women for their own gratification and the men who find +their highest pleasure in pleasing women. The latter +may not be a paragon, yet as his desire is to give pleasure, +not to corral it, he is a totally different being from the +man who deceives, badgers, humiliates, and quarrels +with one who can not defend herself, in order that he +may find an excuse for leaving her.</p> + +<p>A good many of Constant's speeches were written by +Madame De Stael, and when they traveled together +through Germany he no doubt was a great help to her +in preparing the "De l'Allemagne."</p> + +<p>But there was a little man approaching from out the +mist of obscurity who was to play an important part in +the life of Madame De Stael. He had heard of her wide-reaching +influence, and such an influence he could not +afford to forego—it must be used to further his ends.</p> + +<p>Yet the First Consul did not call on her, and she did not +call on the First Consul. They played a waiting game, +"If he wishes to see me, he knows that I am home +Thursdays!" she said with a shrug.</p> + +<p>"Yes, but a man in his position reverses the usual order: +he does not make the first call!"</p> + +<p>"Evidently!" said Madame, and the subject dropped +with a dull thud.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_192"></a></p> +<p>Word came from somewhere that Baron De Stael was +seriously ill. The wife was thrown into a tumult of +emotion. She must go to him at once—a wife's duty was +to her husband first of all. She left everything, and +hastening to his bedside, there ministered to him +tenderly. But death claimed him. The widow returned +to Paris clothed in deep mourning. Crape was tied on +the door-knocker and the salon was closed.</p> + +<p>The First Consul sent condolences.</p> + +<p>"The First Consul is a joker," said Dannion solemnly, +and took snuff.</p> + +<p>In six weeks the salon was again opened. Not long after, +at a dinner, Napoleon and Madame De Stael sat side +by side. "Your father was a great man," said Napoleon.</p> + +<p>He had gotten in the first compliment when she had +planned otherwise. She intended to march her charms +in a phalanx upon him, but he would not have it so. +Her wit fell flat and her prettiest smile brought only +the remark, "If the wind veers north it may rain."</p> + +<p>They were rivals—that was the trouble. France was not +big enough for both.</p> + +<p>Madame De Stael's book about Germany had been duly +announced, puffed, printed. Ten thousand copies were +issued and—seized upon by Napoleon's agents and +burned.</p> + +<p>"The edition is exhausted," cried Madame, +as she smiled through her tears and searched for her +pocket-handkerchief.</p> + +<p>The trouble with the book was that nowhere in it was +<a name="II_Page_193"></a>Napoleon mentioned. Had Napoleon never noticed the +book, the author would have been woefully sorry. As it +was she was pleased, and when the last guest had gone +she and Benjamin Constant laughed, shook hands, and +ordered lunch.</p> + +<p>But it was not so funny when Fouche called, apologized, +coughed, and said the air in Paris was bad.</p> + +<p>So Madame De Stael had to go—it was "Ten Years of +Exile." In that book you can read all about it. She +retired to Coppet, and all the griefs, persecutions, disappointments +and heartaches were doubtless softened +by the inward thought of the distinction that was hers +in being the first woman banished by Napoleon and of +being the only woman he thoroughly feared.</p> + +<p>When it came Napoleon's turn to go and the departure +for Elba was at hand, it will be remembered he bade +good-by personally to those who had served him so +faithfully. It was an affecting scene when he kissed his +generals and saluted the swarthy grenadiers in the same +way. When told of it Madame picked a petal or two +from her bouquet and said, "You see, my dears, the +difference is this: while Judas kissed but one, the Little +Man kissed forty."</p> + +<p>Napoleon was scarcely out of France before Madame +was back in Paris with all her books and wit and beauty. +An ovation was given the daughter of Necker such as +Paris alone can give.</p> + +<p>But Napoleon did not stay at +Elba, at least not according to any accounts I have read.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_194"></a></p> +<p>When word came that he was marching on Paris, +Madame hastily packed up her manuscripts and started +in hot haste for Coppet.</p> + +<p>But when the eighty days had passed and the bugaboo +was safely on board the "Bellerophon," she came back +to the scenes she loved so well and to what for her was +the only heaven—Paris.</p> + +<p>She has been called a philosopher and a literary light. +But she was only socio-literary. Her written philosophy +does not represent the things she felt were true—simply +those things she thought it would be nice to say. She +cultivated literature, only that she might shine. Love, +wealth, health, husband, children—all were sacrificed +that she might lead society and win applause. No one +ever feared solitude more: she must have those about +her who would minister to her vanity and upon whom +she could shower her wit. As a type her life is valuable, +and in these pages that traverse the entire circle of +feminine virtues and foibles she surely must have a +place.</p> + +<p>In her last illness she was attended daily by those +faithful subjects who had all along recognized her +sovereignty—in Society she was Queen. She surely won +her heart's desire, for to that bed from which she was +no more to rise, courtiers came and kneeling kissed her +hand, and women by the score whom she had befriended +paid her the tribute of their tears.</p> + +<p>She died in Paris aged fifty-one.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_195"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>When you are in Switzerland and take the +little steamer that plies on Lake Leman from +Lausanne to Geneva, you will see on the +western shore a tiny village that clings close +around a chateau, like little oysters around the parent +shell. This is the village of Coppet that you behold, and +the central building that seems to be a part of the very +landscape is the Chateau De Necker. This was the home +of Madame De Stael and the place where so many +refugees sought safety.</p> + +<p>"Coppet is Hell in motion," said Napoleon. "The +woman who lives there has a petticoat full of arrows +that could hit a man were he seated on a rainbow. +She combines in her active head and strong heart +Rousseau and Mirabeau; and then shields herself +behind a shift and screams if you approach. To attract +attention to herself she calls, 'Help, help!'"</p> + +<p>The man who voiced these words was surely fit rival to +the chatelaine of this vine-covered place of peace that +lies smiling an ironical smile in the sunshine on yonder +hillside.</p> + +<p>Coppet bristles with history.</p> + +<p>Could Coppet speak it must tell of Voltaire and Rousseau, +who had knocked at its gates; of John Calvin; of +Montmorency; of Hautville (for whom Victor Hugo +named a chateau); of Fanny Burney and Madame +Recamier and Girardin (pupil of Rousseau); and +Lafayette and hosts of others who are to us but names, +<a name="II_Page_196"></a>but who in their day were greatest among all the sons +of men.</p> + +<p>Chief of all was the great Necker, who himself planned +and built the main edifice that his daughter "might +ever call it home." Little did he know that it would +serve as her prison, and that from here she would have +to steal away in disguise. But yet it was the place she +called home for full two decades. Here she wrote and +wept and laughed and sang: hating the place when here, +loving it when away. Here she came when De Stael had +died, and here she brought her children. Here she +received the caresses of Benjamin Constant, and here +she won the love of pale, handsome Rocco, and here, +"when past age," gave birth to his child. Here and in +Paris, in quick turn, the tragedy and comedy of her life +were played; and here she sleeps.</p> + +<p>In the tourist season there are many visitors at the +chateau. A grave old soldier, wearing on his breast the +Cross of the Legion of Honor, meets you at the lodge +and conducts you through the halls, the salon and the +library. There are many family portraits, and mementos +without number, to bring back the past that is gone +forever. Inscribed copies of books from Goethe and +Schiller and Schlegel and Byron are in the cases, and +on the walls are to be seen pictures of Necker, Rocco, +De Stael and Albert, the firstborn son, decapitated in a +duel by a swinging stroke from a German saber, on +account of a king and two aces held in his sleeve.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_197"></a></p> +<p>Beneath the old chateau dances a mountain brook, cold +from the Jura; in the great courtway is a fountain and +fish-pond, and all around are flowering plants and +stately palms. All is quiet and orderly. No children +play, no merry voices call, no glad laughter echoes +through these courts. Even the birds have ceased to +sing.</p> + +<p>The quaint chairs in the parlors are pushed back with +precision against the wall, and the funereal silence that +reigns supreme seems to say that death yesterday came, +and an hour ago all the inmates of the gloomy mansion, +save the old soldier, followed the hearse afar and have +not yet returned.</p> + +<p>We are conducted out through the garden, along gravel +walks, across the well-trimmed lawn; and before a high +iron gate, walled in on both sides with massive masonry, +the old soldier stops, and removes his cap. Standing +with heads uncovered, we are told that within rests the +dust of Madame De Stael, her parents, her children, +and her children's children—four generations in all.</p> + +<p>The steamer whistles at the wharf as if to bring us +back from dream and mold and death, and we hasten +away, walking needlessly fast, looking back furtively +to see if grim spectral shapes are following after. +None is seen, but we do not breathe freely until aboard +the steamer and two short whistles are heard, and +the order is given to cast off. We push off slowly +from the stone pier, and all is safe. +<a name="II_Page_198"></a><a name="II_Page_199"></a></p> + + +<hr class="full" /> +<p><a name="ELIZABETH_FRY"></a></p><h2>ELIZABETH FRY</h2> +<p><a name="II_Page_200"></a></p> +<div class="blkquot"><p>When thee builds a prison, thee had better build with +the thought ever in thy mind that thee and thy children +may occupy the cells.<br /> +<span style='margin-left: 4em;'>—<i>Report on Paris Prisons, Addressed to the King of France</i></span></p></div> + +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_201"></a></p> +<p class="ctr"><a href="./images/ljv2-8.jpg"><img src="./images/ljv2-8_th.jpg" alt="ELIZABETH FRY" /></a></p><p class="ctr">ELIZABETH FRY</p> +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_202"></a><a name="II_Page_203"></a></p> + +<p>The Mennonite, Dunkard, Shaker, +Oneida Communist, Mormon and +Quaker are all one people, varying +only according to environment.</p> + +<p>They are all Come-Outers.</p> + +<p>They turn to plain clothes, hard +work, religious thought, eschewing +the pomps and vanities of the world—all +for the same reasons. Scratch any one of them and +you will find the true type. The monk of the Middle +Ages was the same man, his peculiarity being an extreme +asceticism that caused him to count sex a mistake on the +part of God. And this same question has been a stumbling-block +for ages to the type we now have under the +glass. A man who gives the question of sex too much +attention is very apt either to have no wife at all or else +four or five. If a Franciscan friar of the olden time +happened to glance at a clothesline on which, gaily +waving in the wanton winds, was a smock-frock, he +wore peas in his sandals for a month and a day.</p> + +<p>The Shaker does not count women out because the +founder of the sect was a woman, but he is a complete +celibate and depends on Gentiles to populate the earth. +The Dunkard quotes Saint Paul and marries because he +must, but regards romantic love as a thing of which +Deity is jealous, and also a bit ashamed. The Oneida +<a name="II_Page_204"></a>Community clung to the same thought, and to obliterate +selfishness held women in common, tracing pedigree, +after the manner of ancient Sparta, through the female +line, because there was no other way. The Mormon +incidentally and accidentally adopted polygamy.</p> + +<p>The Quakers have for the best part looked with disfavor +on passionate love. In the worship of Deity they +separate women from men. But all oscillations are +equalized by swingings to the other side. The Quakers +have often discarded a distinctive marriage-ceremony, +thus slanting toward natural selection. And I might +tell you of how in one of the South American States +there is a band of Friends who have discarded the rite +entirely, making marriage a private and personal contract +between the man and the woman—a sacred matter +of conscience; and should the man and woman find after +a trial that their mating was a mistake, they are as free +to separate as they were to marry, and no obloquy is +attached in any event. Harriet Martineau, Quaker in +sympathy, although not in name, being an independent +fighter armed with a long squirrel-rifle of marvelous +range and accuracy, pleaded strongly and boldly for a +law that would make divorce as free and simple as +marriage. Harriet once called marriage a mouse-trap, +and thereby sent shivers of surprise and indignation up +a bishop's back.</p> + +<p>But there is one thing among all these quasi-ascetic +sects that has ever been in advance of the great mass of +<a name="II_Page_205"></a>humanity from which they are detached parts: they +have given woman her rights; whereas, the mass has +always prated, and does yet, mentioning it in statute +law, that the male has certain natural "rights," and the +women only such rights as are granted her by the males. +And the reason of this wrong-headed attitude on part +of the mob is plain. It rules by force, whereas the semi-ascetic +sects decry force, using only moral suasion, +falling back on the Christ doctrine of non-resistance. +This has given their women a chance to prove that +they have just as able minds as the men, if not better.</p> + +<p>That these non-resistants are the salt of the earth none +who know them can deny. It was the residents of the +monasteries in the Middle Ages who kept learning and +art from dying off the face of Europe. They built such +churches and performed such splendid work in art that +we are hushed into silence before the dignity of the +ruins of Melrose, Dryburgh and Furness. There are no +paupers among the Quakers, a "criminal class" is a +thing no Mennonite understands, no Dunkard is a +drunkard, the Oneida Communists were all well educated +and in dollars passing rich, while the Mormons +have accumulated wealth at the rate of over eleven +hundred dollars a man per year, which is more than +three times as good a record as can be shown by New +York or Pennsylvania. And further, until the Gentiles +bore down upon her, Utah had no use for either prisons, +asylums or almshouses. Until the Gentiles crowded into +<a name="II_Page_206"></a>Salt Lake City, there was no "tenderloin district," no +"dangerous class," no gambling "dives." Instead, +there was universal order, industry, sobriety. It is well +to recognize the fact that the quasi-ascetic, possessed +of a religious idea, persecuted to a point that holds him +to his work, is the best type of citizen the world has +ever known. Tobacco, strong drink, and opium alternately +lull and excite, soothe and elevate, but always +destroy; yet they do not destroy our ascetic, for he +knows them not. He does not deplete himself by drugs, +rivalry, strife or anger. He believes in co-operation, not +competition. He works and prays. He keeps a good +digestion, an even pulse, a clear conscience; and as +man's true wants are very few, our subject grows rich +and has not only ample supplies for himself, but is +enabled to minister to others. He is earth's good +Samaritan. It was Tolstoy and his daughter who started +soup-houses in Russia and kept famine at bay. Your +true monk never passed by on the other side; ah, no! +the business of the old-time priest was to do good. The +Quaker is his best descendant—he is the true philanthropist.</p> + +<p>If jeered, hooted and finally oppressed, these +protesters will form a clan or sect and adopt a distinctive +garb and speech. If persecuted, they will hold together, +as cattle on the prairies huddle against the storm. But +if left alone the Law of Reversion to Type catches the +second generation, and the young men and maidens +secrete millinery, just as birds do a brilliant plumage, +<a name="II_Page_207"></a>and the strange sect merges into and is lost in the mass. +The Jews did not say, Go to, we will be peculiar, but, +as Mr. Zangwill has stated, they have remained a +peculiar people simply because they have been proscribed.</p> + +<p>The successful monk, grown rich and feeling secure, +turns voluptuary and becomes the very thing that he +renounced in his monastic vows. Over-anxious bicyclists +run into the object they wish to avoid. We are +attracted to the thing we despise; and we despise it +because it attracts. A recognition of this principle will +make plain why so many temperance fanatics are +really drunkards trying hard to keep sober. In us all is +the germ of the thing we hate; we become like the thing +we hate; we are the thing we hate. Ex-Quakers in Philadelphia, +I am told, are very dressy people. But before a +woman becomes a genuine admitted non-Quaker, the +rough, gray woolen dress shades off by almost imperceptible +degrees into a dainty silken lilac, whose generous +folds have a most peculiar and seductive rustle; +the bonnet becomes smaller, and pertly assumes a +becoming ruche, from under which steal forth daring, +winsome ringlets; while at the neck, purest of cream-white +kerchiefs jealously conceal the charms that a +mere worldly woman might reveal. Then the demi-monde, +finding themselves neglected, bribe the dressmakers +and adopt the costume.</p> + +<p>Thus does civilization, +like the cyclone, move in spirals.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_208"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>In a sermon preached at the City Temple, +June Eighteenth, Eighteen Hundred Ninety-six, +Doctor Joseph Parker said: "There it +was—there! at Smithfield Market, a stone's +throw from here, that Ridley and Latimer were burned. +Over this spot the smoke of martyr fires hovered. And +I pray for a time when they will hover again. Aye, that +is what we need! the rack, the gallows, chains, dungeons, +fagots!"</p> + +<p>Yes, those are his words, and it was two days before +it came to me that Doctor Parker knew just what he +was talking about. Persecution can not stamp out +virtue, any more than man's effort can obliterate matter. +Man changes the form of things, but he does not +cancel their essence. And this is as true of the unseen +attributes of spirit as it is of the elements of matter. +Did the truths taught by Latimer and Ridley go out +with the flames that crackled about their limbs? Were +their names written for the last time in smoke? 'T were +vain to ask. The bishop who instigated their persecution +gave them certificates for immortality. But the +bishop did not know it—bishops who persecute know +not what they do.</p> + +<p>Let us guess the result if Jesus had been eminently +successful, gathering about him, with the years, the +strong and influential men of Jerusalem! Suppose he +had fallen asleep at last of old age, and, full of honors, +been carried to his own tomb, patterned after that of +<a name="II_Page_209"></a>Joseph of Arimathea, but richer far—what then? And +if Socrates had apologized and had not drunk of the +hemlock, how about his philosophy, and would Plato +have written the "Phædo"?</p> + +<p>No religion is pure except in its state of poverty and +persecution; the good things of earth are our corrupters. +All life is from the sun, but fruit too well loved of the +sun falls first and rots. The religion that is fostered by +the State and upheld by a standing army may be a +pretty good religion, but it is not the Christ religion, +call you it "Christianity" never so loudly.</p> + +<p>Martyr and persecutor are usually cut off the same +piece. They are the same type of man; and looking down +the centuries they seem to have shifted places easily. +As to which is persecutor and which is martyr is only +a question of transient power. They are constantly +teaching the trick to each other, just as scolding parents +have saucy children. They are both good people; their +sincerity can not be doubted. Marcus Aurelius, the +best emperor Rome ever had, persecuted the Christians; +while Caligula, Rome's worst emperor, didn't +know there were any Christians in his dominions, and +if he had known would not have cared.</p> + +<p>The persecutor and the martyr both belong to the cultus +known as "Muscular Christianity," the distinguishing +feature of which is a final appeal to force. We should, +however, respect it for the frankness of the name in +which it delights—Muscular Christianity being a totally +<a name="II_Page_210"></a>different thing from Christianity, which smitten turns +the other cheek.</p> + +<p>But the Quaker, best type of the non-resistant quasi-ascetic, +is the exception that proves the rule; he may +be persecuted, but he persecutes not again. He is the +best authenticated type living of primitive Christian. +That the religion of Jesus was a purely reactionary +movement, suggested by the smug complacency and +voluptuous condition of the times, most thinking men +agree. Where rich Pharisees adopt a standard of life +that can only be maintained by devouring widows' +houses and oppressing the orphan, the needs of the +hour bring to the front a man who will swing the pendulum +to the other side. When society plays tennis +with truth, and pitch-and-toss with all the expressions +of love and friendship, certain ones will confine their +speech to yea, yea, and nay, nay. When men utter loud +prayers on street corners, some one will suggest that +the better way to pray is to retire to your closet and +shut the door. When self-appointed rulers wear purple +and scarlet and make broad their phylacteries, some +one will suggest that honest men had better adopt a +simplicity of attire. When a whole nation grows mad +in its hot endeavor to become rich, and the Temple of +the Most High is cumbered by the seats of money-changers, +already in some Galilean village sits a youth, +conscious of his Divine kinship, plaiting a scourge of +cords.</p> + +<p>The gray garb of the Quaker is only a revulsion +<a name="II_Page_211"></a>from a flutter of ribbons and a towering headgear of +hues that shame the lily and rival the rainbow. Beau +Brummel, lifting his hat with great flourish to nobility +and standing hatless in the presence of illustrious nobodies, +finds his counterpart in William Penn, who was +born with his hat on and uncovers to no one. The height +of Brummel's hat finds place in the width of Penn's.</p> + +<p>Quakerism is a protest against an idle, vain, voluptuous +and selfish life. It is the natural recoil from insincerity, +vanity and gormandism which, growing glaringly +offensive, causes these certain men and women +to "come out" and stand firm for plain living and high +thinking. And were it not for this divine principle in +humanity that prompts individuals to separate from +the mass when sensuality threatens to hold supreme +sway, the race would be snuffed out in hopeless night. +These men who come out effect their mission, not by +making all men Come-Outers, but by imperceptibly +changing the complexion of the mass. They are the +true and literal saviors of mankind.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_212"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>Norwich has several things to recommend +it to the tourist, chief of which is the cathedral. +Great, massive, sullen structure—begun +in the Eleventh Century—it adheres more +closely to its Norman type than does any other building +in England.</p> + +<p>Within sound of the tolling bells of this great cathedral, +aye, almost within the shadow of its turrets, was born, +in Seventeen Hundred Eighty, Elizabeth Gurney. Her +line of ancestry traced directly back to the De Gournays +who came with William the Conqueror, and laid the +foundations of this church and of England's civilization. +To the sensitive, imaginative girl this sacred +temple, replete with history, fading off into storied +song and curious legend, meant much. She haunted its +solemn transepts, and followed with eager eyes the +carved bosses on the ceiling, to see if the cherubs pictured +there were really alive. She took children from +the street and conducted them thither, explaining that +it was her grandfather who laid the mortar between +the stones and reared the walls and placed the splendid +colored windows, on which reflections of real angels +were to be seen, and where Madonnas winked when +the wind was east. And the children listened with open +mouths and marveled much, and this encouraged the +pale little girl with the wondering eyes, and she led +them to the tomb of Sir William Boleyn, whose granddaughter, +Anne Boleyn, used often to come here and +<a name="II_Page_213"></a>garland with flowers the grave above which our toddlers +talked in whispers, and where, yesterday, I, too, +stood.</p> + +<p>And so Elizabeth grew in years and in stature and in +understanding; and although her parents were not members +of the Established Religion, yet a great cathedral +is greater than sect, and to her it was the true House +of Prayer. It was there that God listened to the prayers +of His children. She loved the place with an idolatrous +love and with all the splendid superstition of a child, +and thither she went to kneel and ask fulfilment of her +heart's desire. All the beauties of ancient and innocent +days moved radiant and luminous in the azure of her +mind. But time crept on and a woman's penetrating +comprehension came to her, and the dreams of youth +shifted off into the realities of maturity, and she saw +that many who came to pray were careless, frivolous +people, and that the vergers did their work without +more reverence than did the stablemen who cared for +her father's horses. And once when twilight was veiling +the choir, and all the worshipers had departed, she +saw a curate strike a match on the cloister-wall, to +light his pipe, and then with the rector laugh loudly, +because the bishop had forgotten and read his "Te +Deum Laudamus" before his "Gloria in Excelsis."</p> + +<p>By degrees it came to her that the lord bishop of this +holy place was in the employ of the State, and that the +State was master too of the army and the police and +<a name="II_Page_214"></a>the ships that sailed away to New Zealand, carrying +in their holds women and children, who never came +back, and men who, like the lord bishop, had forgotten +this and done that when they should have done the +other.</p> + +<p>Once, in the streets of Norwich she saw a dozen men +with fetters riveted to their legs, all fastened to one +clanking chain, breaking stone in the drizzle of a winter +rain. And the thought came to her that the rich ladies, +wrapped in furs, who rolled by in their carriages, going +to the cathedral to pray, were no more God's children +than these wretches breaking stone from the darkness +of a winter morning until darkness settled over the +earth again at night.</p> + +<p>She saw plainly the patent truth that, if some people +wore gaudy and costly raiment, others must dress in +rags; if some ate and drank more than they needed, +and wasted the good things of earth, others must go +hungry; if some never worked with their hands, others +must needs toil continuously.</p> + +<p>The Gurneys were nominally Friends, but they had +gradually slipped away from the directness of speech, +the plainness of dress, and the simplicity of the Quakers. +They were getting rich on government contracts—and +who wants to be ridiculous anyway? So, with consternation, +the father and mother heard the avowal of +Elizabeth to adopt the extreme customs of the Friends. +They sought to dissuade her. They pointed out the +<a name="II_Page_215"></a>uselessness of being singular, and the folly of adopting +a mode of life that makes you a laughing-stock. But +this eighteen-year-old girl stood firm. She had resolved +to live the Christ-life and devote her energies to lessening +the pains of earth. Life was too short for frivolity; +no one could afford to compromise with evil. She became +the friend of children; the champion of the unfortunate; +she sided with the weak; she was their friend +and comforter. Her life became a cry in favor of the +oppressed, a defense of the downtrodden, an exaltation +of self-devotion, a prayer for universal sympathy, +liberty and light. She pleaded for the vicious, recognizing +that all are sinners and that those who do unlawful +acts are no more sinners in the eyes of God than we +who think them so.</p> + +<p>The religious nature and sex-life are closely akin. The +woman possessing a high religious fervor is also capable +of a great and passionate love. But the Norwich Friends +did not believe in a passionate love, except as the work +of the devil. Yet this they knew, that marriage tames +a woman as nothing else can. They believed in religion, +of course—but not an absorbing, fanatical religion! +Elizabeth should get married—it would cure her mental +maladies: exaltation of spirit in a girl is a dangerous +thing anyway. Nothing subdues like marriage.</p> + +<p>It may not be generally known, but your religious +ascetic is a great matchmaker. In all religious communities, +especially rural communities, men who need +<a name="II_Page_216"></a>wives need not advertise—there are self-appointed +committees of old ladies who advise and look after +such matters closely. The immanence of sex becomes +vicarious, and that which once dwelt in the flesh is +now a thought: like men-about-town, whose vices +finally become simply mental, so do these old ladies +carry on courtships by power of attorney.</p> + +<p>And so the old ladies found a worthy Quaker man who +would make a good husband for Elizabeth. The man +was willing. He wrote a letter to her from his home in +London, addressing it to her father. The letter was +brief and businesslike. It described himself in modest +but accurate terms. He weighed ten stone and was five +feet eight inches high; he was a merchant with a goodly +income; and in disposition was all that was to be +desired—at least he said so. His pedigree was standard.</p> + +<p>The Gurneys looked up this Mr. Fry, merchant, +of London, and found all as stated. He checked O.K. +He was invited to visit at Norwich; he came, he saw, +and was conquered. He liked Elizabeth, and Elizabeth +liked him—she surely did or she would never have +married him.</p> + +<p>Elizabeth bore him twelve children. Mr. Fry was certainly +an excellent and amiable man. I find it recorded, +"He never in any way hampered his wife's philanthropic +work," and with this testimonial to the excellence +of Mr. Fry's character we will excuse him from +these pages and speak only of his wife.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_217"></a></p> +<p>Contrary to expectations, Elizabeth was not tamed by +marriage. She looked after her household with diligence; +but instead of confining her "social duties" to following +hotly after those in station above her, she sought +out those in the stratum beneath. Soon after reaching +London she began taking long walks alone, watching +the people, especially the beggars. The lowly and the +wretched interested her. She saw, girl though she was, +that beggardom and vice were twins.</p> + +<p>In one of her daily walks, she noticed on a certain +corner a frowsled woman holding a babe, and thrusting +out a grimy hand for alms, telling a woeful tale of a dead +soldier husband to each passer-by. Elizabeth stopped +and talked with the woman. As the day was cold, she +took off her mittens and gave them to the beggar, and +went her way. The next day she again saw the woman +on the same corner and again talked with her, asking +to see the baby held so closely within the tattered +shawl. An intuitive glance (mother herself or soon to +be) told her that this sickly babe was not the child of +the woman who held it. She asked questions that the +woman evaded. Pressed further, the beggar grew +abusive, and took refuge in curses, with dire threats +of violence. Mrs. Fry withdrew, and waiting for nightfall +followed the woman: down a winding alley, past +rows of rotting tenements, into a cellar below a ginshop. +There, in this one squalid room, she found a dozen +babies, all tied fast in cribs or chairs, starving, or dying +<a name="II_Page_218"></a>of inattention. The woman, taken by surprise, did not +grow violent this time: she fled, and Mrs. Fry, sending +for two women Friends, took charge of the sufferers.</p> + +<p>This sub-cellar nursery opened the eyes of Mrs. Fry +to the grim fact that England, professing to be Christian, +building costly churches, and maintaining an +immense army of paid priests, was essentially barbaric. +She set herself to the task of doing what she could +while life lasted to lessen the horror of ignorance and +sin.</p> + +<p>Newgate Prison then, as now, stood in the center of +the city. It was necessary to have it in a conspicuous +place so that all might see the result of wrongdoing +and be good. Along the front of the prison were strong +iron gratings, where the prisoners crowded up to talk +with their friends. Through these gratings the unhappy +wretches called to strangers for alms, and thrust out +long wooden spoons for contributions, that would +enable them to pay their fines. There was a woman's +department; but if the men's department was too full, +men and women were herded together.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fry worked for her sex, so of these I will speak. +Women who had children under seven years of age +took them to prison with them; every week babes +were born there, so that at one time, in the year Eighteen +Hundred Twenty-six, we find there were one hundred +ninety women and one hundred children in Newgate. +There was no bedding. No clothing was supplied, +<a name="II_Page_219"></a>and those who had no friends outside to supply them +clothing were naked or nearly so, and would have been +entirely were it not for that spark of divinity which +causes the most depraved of women to minister to +one another. Women hate only their successful rivals. +The lowest of women will assist one another when +there is a dire emergency.</p> + +<p>In this pen, awaiting trial, execution or transportation, +were girls of twelve to senile, helpless creatures of +eighty. All were thrust together. Hardened criminals, +besotted prostitutes, maidservants accused of stealing +thimbles, married women suspected of blasphemy, +pure-hearted, brave-natured girls who had run away +from brutal parents or more brutal husbands, insane +persons—all were herded together. All the keepers +were men. Patroling the walls were armed guards, +who were ordered to shoot all who tried to escape. +These guards were usually on good terms with the +women prisoners—hobnobbing at will. When the +mailed hand of government had once thrust these +women behind iron bars, and relieved virtuous society +of their presence, it seemed to think it had done its +duty. Inside, no crime was recognized save murder. +These women fought, overpowered the weak, stole +from and maltreated each other. Sometimes, certain +ones would combine for self-defense, forming factions. +Once, the Governor of the prison, bewigged, powdered, +lace-befrilled, ventured pompously into the women's +<a name="II_Page_220"></a>department without his usual armed guard; fifty hags +set upon him. In a twinkling his clothing was torn to +shreds too small for carpet-rags, and in two minutes +by the sand-glass, when he got back to the bars, lustily +calling for help, he was as naked as a cherub, even if +not as innocent.</p> + +<p>Visitors who ventured near to the grating were often +asked to shake hands, and if once a grip was gotten +upon them the man was drawn up close, while long, +sinewy fingers grabbed his watch, handkerchief, neckscarf +or hat—all was pulled into the den. Sharp nailmarks +on the poor fellow's face told of the scrimmage, +and all the time the guards on the walls and the spectators +roared with laughter. Oh, it was awfully funny!</p> + +<p>One woman whose shawl was snatched and sucked +into the maelstrom complained to the police, and was +told that folks inside of Newgate could not be arrested, +and that a good motto for outsiders was to keep away +from dangerous places.</p> + +<p>Every morning at nine a curate read prayers at the +prisoners. The curate stood well outside the grating; +while all the time from inside loud cries of advice were +given and sundry remarks tendered him concerning +his personal appearance. The frightful hilarity of the +mob saved these wretches from despair. But the curate +did his duty: he who has ears to hear let him hear. +Waiting in the harbor were ships loading their freight +of sin, crime and woe for Botany Bay; at Tyburn every +<a name="II_Page_221"></a>week women were hanged. Three hundred offenses +were punishable with death; but, as in the West, where +horse-stealing is the supreme offense, most of the hangings +were for smuggling, forgery or shoplifting. England +being a nation of shopkeepers could not forgive offenses +that might injure a haberdasher.</p> + +<p>Little Mrs. Fry, in the plainest of Quaker gray dress, +with bonnet to match, stood outside Newgate and +heard the curate read prayers. She resolved to ask the +Governor of the prison if she might herself perform +the office. The Governor was polite, but stated there +was no precedent for such an important move—he +must have time to consider. Mrs. Fry called again, and +permission was granted, with strict orders that she +must not attempt to proselyte, and, further, she had +better not get too near the grating.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fry gave the great man a bit of fright by quietly +explaining thus: "Sir, if thee kindly allows me to pray +with the women, I will go inside."</p> + +<p>The Governor asked her to say it again. She did so, +and a bright thought came to the great man: he would +grant her request, writing an order that she be allowed +to go inside the prison whenever she desired. It would +teach her a lesson and save him from further importunity.</p> + +<p>So little Mrs. Fry presented the order, and the gates +were swung open and the iron quickly snapped behind +her. She spoke to the women, addressing the one who +<a name="II_Page_222"></a>seemed to be leader as sister, and asked the others to +follow her back into the courtway away from the +sound of the street, so they could have prayers. They +followed dumbly. She knelt on the stone pavement +and prayed in silence. Then she arose and read to them +the One Hundred Seventh Psalm. Again she prayed, +asking the others to kneel with her. A dozen knelt. +She arose and went her way amid a hush of solemn +silence.</p> + +<p>Next day, when she came again, the ribaldry ceased +on her approach, and after the religious service she +remained inside the walls an hour conversing with +those who wished to talk with her, going to all the +children that were sick and ministering to them.</p> + +<p>In a week she called all together and proposed starting +a school for the children. The mothers entered into +the project gladly. A governess, imprisoned for theft, +was elected teacher. A cell-room was cleaned out, +whitewashed, and set apart for a schoolroom, with the +permission of the Governor, who granted the request, +explaining, however, that there was no precedent for +such a thing. The school prospered, and outside the +schoolroom door hungry-eyed women listened furtively +for scraps of knowledge that might be tossed overboard.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fry next organized classes for these older children, +gray-haired, bowed with sin—many of them. There +were twelve in each class, and they elected a monitor +<a name="II_Page_223"></a>from their numbers, agreeing to obey her. Mrs. Fry +brought cloth from her husband's store, and the women +were taught to sew. The Governor insisted that there +was no precedent for it, and the guards on the walls +said that every scrap of cloth would be stolen, but the +guards were wrong.</p> + +<p>The day was divided up into regular hours for work +and recreation. Other good Quaker women from outside +came in to help; and the taproom kept by a mercenary +guard was done away with, and an order established +that no spirituous liquors should be brought +into Newgate. The women agreed to keep away from +the grating on the street, except when personal friends +came; to cease begging; to quit gambling. They were +given pay for their labor. A woman was asked for as +turnkey, instead of a man. All guards were to be taken +from the walls that overlooked the women's department. +The women were to be given mats to sleep on, +and blankets to cover them when the weather was cold. +The Governor was astonished! He called a council of +the Lord Mayor and the Aldermen. They visited the +prison, and found for the first time that order had +come out of chaos at Newgate.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Fry's requests were granted, and this little woman +awoke one morning to find herself famous.</p> + +<p>From Newgate she turned her attention to other +prisons; she traveled throughout England, Scotland +and Ireland, visiting prisons and asylums. She became +<a name="II_Page_224"></a>well feared by those in authority, for her firm and gentle +glance went straight to every abuse. Often she was +airily turned away by some official clothed in a little +brief authority, but the man usually lived to know his +mistake.</p> + +<p>She was invited by the French Government to visit the +prisons of Paris and write a report, giving suggestions +as to what reforms should be made. She went to +Belgium, Holland and Germany, being received by +kings and queens and prime ministers—as costume, her +plain gray dress always sufficing. She treated royalty +and unfortunates alike—simply as equals. She kept +constantly in her mind the thought that all men are +sinners before God: there are no rich, no poor; no high, +no low; no bond, no free. Conditions are transient, and +boldly did she say to the King of France that he should +build prisons with the idea of reformation, not revenge, +and with the thought ever before him that he himself +or his children might occupy these cells—so vain are +human ambitions. To Sir Robert Peel and his Cabinet +she read the story concerning the gallows built by +Haman. "Thee must not shut out the sky from the +prisoner; thee must build no dark cells—thy children +may occupy them," she said.</p> + +<p>John Howard and others had sent a glimmering ray of +truth through the fog of ignorance concerning insanity. +The belief was growing that insane people were really +not possessed of devils after all. Yet still, the cell +<a name="II_Page_225"></a>system, strait jacket and handcuffs were in great demand. +In no asylum were prisoners allowed to eat at tables. +Food was given to each in tin basins, without spoons, +knives or forks. Glass dishes and china plates were +considered especially dangerous; they told of one man +who in an insane fit had cut his throat with a plate, and +of another who had swallowed a spoon.</p> + +<p>Visiting an asylum at Worcester, Mrs. Fry saw the +inmates receive their tin dishes, and, crouched on the +floor, eating like wild beasts. She asked the chief warden +for permission to try an experiment. He dubiously +granted it. With the help of several of the inmates she +arranged a long table, covered it with spotless linen +brought by herself, placed bouquets of wild flowers on +the table, and set it as she did at her own home. Then +she invited twenty of the patients to dinner. They came, +and a clergyman, who was an inmate, was asked to say +grace. All sat down, and the dinner passed off as quietly +and pleasantly as could be wished.</p> + +<p>And these were the reforms she strove for, and put into +practical execution everywhere. She asked that the +word asylum be dropped, and home or hospital used +instead. In visiting asylums, by her presence she said +to the troubled spirits, Peace, be still! For half a century +she toiled with an increasing energy and a never-flagging +animation. She passed out full of honors, beloved +as woman was never yet loved—loved by the unfortunate, +the deformed, the weak, the vicious. She worked +<a name="II_Page_226"></a>for a present good, here and now, believing that we can +reach the future only through the present. In penology +nothing has been added to her philosophy, and we have +as yet not nearly carried out her suggestions.</p> + +<p>Generation after generation will come and go, nations +will rise, grow old, and die, kings and rulers will be +forgotten, but so long as love kisses the white lips of +pain will men remember and revere the name of +Elizabeth Fry, Friend of Humanity.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_227"></a></p> + + +<hr class="full" /> +<p><a name="MARY_LAMB"></a></p><h2>MARY LAMB</h2> +<p><a name="II_Page_228"></a></p> +<div class="blkquot"><p>Her education in youth was not much attended to, and +she happily missed all the train of female garniture +which passeth by the name of accomplishments. She +was tumbled early, by accident or providence, into a +spacious closet of good old English reading, without +much selection or prohibition, and browsed at will upon +that fair and wholesome pasturage. Had I twenty girls +they should be brought up exactly in this fashion. I +know not whether their chance in wedlock might not +be diminished by it, but I can answer for it that it +maketh (if worse comes to worst) most incomparable +old maids.<br /> +<span style='margin-left: 10em;'>—<i>Essays of Elia</i></span></p></div> + +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_229"></a></p> +<p class="ctr"><a href="./images/ljv2-9.jpg"><img src="./images/ljv2-9_th.jpg" alt="MARY LAMB" /></a></p><p class="ctr">MARY LAMB</p> +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_230"></a><a name="II_Page_231"></a></p> + +<p>I sing the love of brother and sister. +For he who tells the tale of Charles +and Mary Lamb's life must tell of a +love that was an uplift to this +brother and sister in childhood, that +sustained them in the desolation of +disaster, and was a saving solace +even when every hope seemed gone +and reason veiled her face.</p> + +<p>This love caused the flowers of springtime to bloom for +them again and again, and attracted such a circle of +admirers that, as we read the records of their lives, set +forth in the letters they received and wrote, we forget +poverty, forget calamity, and behold only the radiant, +smiling faces of loving, trusting, trustful friends.</p> + +<p>The mother of Charles and Mary Lamb was a woman of +fine natural endowment, of spirit and of aspiration. She +married a man much older than herself. We know but +little about John Lamb; we know nothing of his ancestry. +Neither do we care to. He was not good enough to +attract, nor bad enough to be interesting. He called +himself a scrivener, but in fact he was a valet. He was +neutral salts; and I say this just after having read his +son's amiable mention of him under the guise of +"Lovel," and with the full knowledge also that "he +danced well, was a good judge of vintage, played the +<a name="II_Page_232"></a>harpsichord, and recited poetry on occasion."</p> + +<p>When +a woman of spirit stands up before a priest and makes +solemn promise to live with a man who plays the +harpsichord and is a good judge of vintage, and to love +until either he or she dies, she sows the seeds of death +and disorder. Of course, I know that men and women +who make promises before priests know not at the time +what they do; they find out afterwards.</p> + +<p>And so they were married, were John Lamb and Elizabeth +Field; and probably very soon thereafter Elizabeth +had a premonition that this union only held in store a +glittering blade of steel for her heart. For she grew ill +and dispirited, and John found companionship at the +alehouse, and came stumbling home asking what the +devil was the reason his wife couldn't meet him with +a smile and a kiss and a' that, as a dutiful wife should!</p> + +<p>Elizabeth began to live more and more within herself. +We often hear foolish men taunt women with inability +to keep secrets. But women who talk much often do +keep secrets—there are nooks in their hearts where the +sun never enters, and where those nearest them are +never allowed to look. More lives are blasted by secrecy +than by frankness—ay! a thousand times. Why should +such a thing as a secret ever exist? 'Tis preposterous, +and is proof positive of depravity. If you and I are to +live together, my life must be open as the ether and all +my thoughts be yours. If I keep back this and that, +you will find it out some day and suspect, with reason, +<a name="II_Page_233"></a>that I also keep back the other. Ananias and Sapphira +met death, not so much for simple untruthfulness as +for keeping something back.</p> + +<p>Elizabeth Lamb sought to protect herself against an +unappreciative mate by secrecy (perhaps she had to), +and the habit grew until she kept secrets as a business—she +kept foolish little secrets. Did she get a letter from +her aunt, she read it in suggestive silence and then put +it in her pocket. If visitors called she never mentioned +it, and when the children heard of it weeks afterward +they marveled.</p> + +<p>And so shy little Mary Lamb wondered what it was her +mother kept locked up in the bottom drawer of the +bureau, and Mary was told that children must not ask +questions—little girls should be seen and not heard.</p> + +<p>At night, Mary would dream of the things that were +in that drawer, and sometimes great, big, black things +would creep out through the keyhole and grow bigger +and bigger until they filled the room so full that you +couldn't breathe, and then little Mary would cry aloud +and scream, and her father would come with a strap +that was kept on a nail behind the kitchen-door and +teach her better than to wake everybody up in the +middle of the night.</p> + +<p>Yet Mary loved her mother, and sought in many ways +to meet her wishes, and all the time her mother kept +the bureau-drawer locked, and away somewhere on a +high shelf was hidden all tenderness—all the gentle, +<a name="II_Page_234"></a>loving words and the caresses which children crave.</p> + +<p>And little Mary's life seemed full of troubles, and the +world a grievous place where everybody misunderstands +everybody else; and at nighttime she would often hide +her face in the pillow and cry herself to sleep.</p> + +<p>But when she was ten years of age a great joy came into +her life—a baby brother came! And all the love in the +little girl's heart was poured out for the puny baby boy. +Babies are troublesome things, anyway, where folks are +awful poor and where there are no servants and the +mother is not so very strong. And so Mary became the +baby's own little foster-mother, and she carried him +about, and long before he could lisp a word she had told +him all the hopes and secrets of her heart, and he cooed +and laughed, and lying on the floor, kicked his heels in +the air and treated hope and love and ambition alike.</p> + +<p>I can not find that Mary ever went to school. She +stayed at home and sewed, did housework, and took +care of the baby. All her learning came by absorption. +When the boy was three years old she taught him his +letters, and did it so deftly and well that he used to +declare he could always read—and this is as it should be. +When seven years of age the boy was sent to the Blue-Coat +School. This was brought about through the influence +of Mr. Salt, for whom John Lamb worked. Mr. Salt +was a Bencher, and be it known a Bencher in England +is not exactly the same thing as a Bencher in America. +Mr. Salt took quite a notion to little Mary Lamb, and +<a name="II_Page_235"></a>once when she came to his office with her father's +dinner, the honorable Bencher chucked her under the +chin, said she was a fine little girl, and asked her if she +liked to read. And when she answered, "Oh, yes, sir!" +and then added, "If you please!" the Bencher laughed, +and told her she was welcome to take any book in his +library. And so we find she spent many happy hours in +the great man's library; and it was through her importunities +that Mr. Salt got banty Charles the scholarship +in Christ's Hospital School.</p> + +<p>Now the Blue-Coat boys are a curiosity to every sight-seer +in London—and have been for these hundred years +and more. Their long-tailed blue coats, buckle-shoes, +and absence of either hats or caps bring the Yankee up +with a halt. To conduct an American around to the +vicinity of Christ's Hospital and let him discover a +"Blue-Coat" for himself is a sensation. The costume +is exactly the same as that worn by Edward, "the Boy +King," who founded the school; and these youngsters, +like the birds, never grow old. You lean against the +high iron fence, and looking through the bars watch +the boys frolic and play, just as visitors looked in the +Eighteenth Century; and I've never been by Christ's +Hospital yet when curious people did not stand and +stare. And one thing the Blue-Coats seem to prove, +and that is that hats are quite superfluous.</p> + +<p>One worthy man from Jamestown, New York, was so +impressed by these hatless boys that he wrote a book +<a name="II_Page_236"></a>proving that the wearing of hats was what has kept the +race in bondage to ignorance all down the ages. By +statistics he proved that the Blue-Coats had attained +distinction quite out of ratio to their number, and cited +Coleridge, Leigh Hunt, Charles Lamb and many others +as proof. This man returned to Jamestown hatless, and +had he not caught cold and been carried off by pneumonia, +would have spread his hatless gospel, rendering +the name of Knox the Hatter infamous, and causing the +word "Derby" to be henceforth a byword and a hissing.</p> + +<p>When little Charles Lamb tucked the tails of his long +blue coat under his belt and played leap-frog in the +school-yard every morning at ten minutes after 'leven, +his sister, wan, yellow and dreamy, used to come and +watch him through these selfsame iron bars. She would +wave the corner of her rusty shawl in loving token, and +he would answer back and would have lifted his hat if +he had had one. When the bell rang and the boys went +pellmell into the entry-way, Charles would linger and +hold one hand above his head as the stone wall swallowed +him, and the sister knowing that all was well +would hasten back to her work in Little Queen Street, +hard by, to wait for the morrow when she could come +again.</p> + +<p>"Who is that girl always hanging 'round after you?" +asked a tall, handsome boy, called Ajax, of little +Charles Lamb.</p> + +<p>"Wh' why, don't you know—that, wh' why that's +<a name="II_Page_237"></a>my sister Mary!"</p> + +<p>"How should I know when you +have never introduced me!" loftily replied Ajax.</p> + +<p>And so the next day, at ten minutes after 'leven, +Charles and the mighty Ajax came down to the fence, +and Charles had to call to Mary not to run away, and +Charles introduced Ajax to Mary and they shook hands +through the fence. And the next week Ajax, who was +known in private life as Samuel Taylor Coleridge, +called at the house in Little Queen Street where the +Lambs lived, and they all had gin and water, and the +elder Lamb played the harpsichord, a secondhand one +that had been presented by Mr. Salt, and recited poetry, +and Coleridge talked the elder Lamb under the table +and argued the entire party into silence. Coleridge was +only seventeen then, but a man grown, and already took +snuff like a courtier, tapping the lid of the box meditatively +and flashing a conundrum the while on the +admiring company.</p> + +<p>Mary kept about as close run of the Blue-Coat School +as if she had been a Blue-Coat herself. Still, she felt +it her duty to keep one lesson in advance of her brother, +just to know that he was progressing well.</p> + +<p>He continued to go to school until he was fourteen, +when he was set to work in the South Sea Company's +office, because his income was needed to keep the +family. Mary was educating the boy with the help of +Mr. Salt's library, for a boy as fine as Charles must be +educated, you know. By and by the bubble burst, and +<a name="II_Page_238"></a>young Lamb was transferred to the East India Company's +office, and being promoted was making nearly a +hundred pounds a year.</p> + +<p>And Mary sewed and borrowed books and toiled +incessantly, but was ill at times. People said her head +was not just right—she was overworked and nervous +or something! The father had lost his place on account +of too much gin and water, especially gin; the mother +was almost helpless from paralysis, and in the family +was an aged maiden aunt to be cared for. The only +regular income was the salary of Charles.</p> + +<p>There they lived in their poverty and lowliness, hoping +for better things!</p> + +<p>Charles was working away over the ledgers, and used to +come home fagged and weary, and Coleridge was far +away, and there was no boy to educate now, and only +sick and foolish and quibbling people on whom to +strike fire. The demnition grind did its work for Mary +Lamb as surely as it is today doing it for countless +farmers' wives in Iowa and Illinois.</p> + +<p>Thus ran the years away.</p> + +<p>Mary Lamb, aged thirty-two, gentle, intelligent and +wondrous kind, in sudden frenzy seized a knife from the +table and with one thrust sank the blade into her +mother's heart. Charles Lamb, in an adjoining room, +hearing the commotion, entered quickly and taking the +knife from his sister's hand, put his arm about her and +tenderly led her away.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_239"></a></p> +<p>Returning in a few moments, the mother was dead.</p> + +<p>Women often make a shrill outcry at sight of a +mouse; men curse roundly when large, buzzing, blue-bottle +flies disturb their after-dinner nap; but let +occasion come and the stuff of which heroes are made is in +us all. I think well of my kind.</p> + +<p>Charles Lamb made no outcry, he shed no tears, he +spoke no word of reproach. He met each detail of that +terrible issue as coolly, calmly and surely as if he had +been making entries in his journal. No man ever loved +his mother more, but she was dead now—she was dead. +He closed the staring eyes, composed the stiffening +limbs, kept curious sightseers at bay, and all the time +thought of what he could do to protect the living—she +who had wrought this ruin.</p> + +<p>Charles was twenty-one—a boy in feeling and temperament, +a frolicsome, heedless boy. In an hour he had +become a man.</p> + +<p>It requires a subtler pen than mine to trace the psychology +of this tragedy; but let me say this much, it had +its birth in love, in unrequited love; and the outcome +of it was an increase in love.</p> + +<p>O God! how wonderful are Thy works! Thou makest +the rotting log to nourish banks of violets, and from +the stagnant pool at Thy word springs forth the lotus +that covers all with fragrance and beauty!</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_240"></a></p> +<hr /> +<p>Coleridge in his youth was brilliant—no +one disputes that. He dazzled Charles and +Mary Lamb from the very first. Even when a +Blue-Coat he could turn a pretty quatrain, +and when he went away to Cambridge and once in a +long while wrote a letter down to "My Own C.L.," +it was a feast for the sister, too. Mary was different +from other girls: she didn't "have company," she was +too honest and serious and earnest for society—her +ideals too high. Coleridge—handsome, witty, philosophic +Coleridge—was her ideal. She loved him from +afar.</p> + +<p>How vain it is to ponder in our minds the what-might-have-been! +Yet how can we help wondering what would +have been the result had Coleridge wedded Mary Lamb! +In many ways it seems it would have been an ideal +mating, for Mary Lamb's mental dowry made good +Coleridge's every deficiency, and his merits equalized +all that she lacked. He was sprightly, headstrong, +erratic, emotional; she was equally keen-witted, but a +conservative in her cast of mind. That she was capable +of a great and passionate love there is no doubt, and he +might have been. Mary Lamb would have been his +anchor to win'ard, but as it was he drifted straight +on to the rocks. Her mental troubles came from a lack +of responsibility—a rusting away of unused powers in a +dull, monotonous round of commonplace. Had her +heart found its home I can not conceive of her in any +<a name="II_Page_241"></a>other light than as a splendid, earnest woman—sane, +well-poised, and doing a work that only the strong can +do. Coleridge has left on record the statement that she +was the only woman he ever met who had a "logical +mind"—that is to say, the only woman who ever +understood him when he talked his best.</p> + +<p>Coleridge made progress at the Blue-Coat School: he +became "Deputy Grecian," or head scholar. This +secured him a scholarship at Cambridge, and thither +he went in search of honors. But his revolutionary and +Unitarian principles did not serve him in good stead, +and he was placed under the ban.</p> + +<p>At the same time a youth by the name of Robert +Southey was having a like experience at Oxford. Other +youths had tried in days agone to shake Cambridge +and Oxford out of their conservatism, and the result +was that the embryo revolutionists speedily found +themselves warned off the campus. So through sympathy +Coleridge and Southey met. Coleridge also +brought along a young philosopher and poet, who had +also been a Blue-Coat, by the name of Lovell.</p> + +<p>These three young men talked philosophy, and came to +the conclusion that the world was wrong. They said +society was founded on a false hypothesis—they would +better things. And so they planned packing up and +away to America to found an Ideal Community on the +banks of the Susquehanna. But hold! a society without +women is founded on a false hypothesis—that's so—<a name="II_Page_242"></a>what +to do? Now in America there are no women but +Indian squaws.</p> + +<p>But resource did not fail them—Southey thought of the +Fricker family, a mile out on the Bristol road. There +were three fine, strong, intelligent girls—what better +than to marry 'em? The world should be peopled from +the best. The girls were consulted and found willing to +reorganize society on the communal basis, and so the +three poets married the three sisters—more properly, +each of the three poets married a sister. "Thank God," +said Lamb, "that there were not four of those Fricker +girls, or I, too, would have been bagged, and the world +peopled from the best!"</p> + +<p>Southey got the only prize out of the hazard; Lovell's +wife was so-so, and Coleridge drew a blank, or thought +he did, which was the same thing; for as a man thinketh +so is she. The thought of a lifetime on the banks of the +Susquehanna with a woman who was simply pink and +good, and who was never roused into animation even by +his wildest poetic bursts, took all ambition out of him.</p> + +<p>Funds were low and the emigration scheme was temporarily +pigeonholed. After a short time Coleridge +declared his mind was getting mildewed and packed off +to London for mental oxygen and a little visit, leaving +his wife in Southey's charge.</p> + +<p>He was gone two years.</p> + +<p>Lovell soon followed suit, and Southey had three +sisters in his household, all with babies.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_243"></a></p> +<p>In the meantime we find Southey installed at "Greta," +just outside of the interesting town of Keswick, where +the water comes down at Lodore. Southey was a general: +he knew that knowledge consists in having a clerk who +can find the thing. He laid out research work and literary +schemes enough for several lifetimes, and the three +sisters were hard at it. It was a little community of +their own—all working for Southey, and glad of it. +Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy lived at Grasmere, +thirteen miles away, and they used to visit back and +forth. When you go to Keswick you should tramp that +thirteen miles—the man who hasn't tramped from +Keswick to Grasmere has dropped something out of his +life. In merry jest, tipped with acid, some one called +them "The Lake Poets," as if there were poets and +lake poets. And Lamb was spoken of as "a Lake Poet +by grace." Literary London grinned, as we do when +some one speaks of the Sweet Singer of Michigan or the +Chicago Muse. But the term of contempt stuck and, +like the words Methodist, Quaker and Philistine, soon +ceased to be a term of reproach and became something +of which to be proud.</p> + +<p>There is a lead-pencil factory at Keswick, established +in the year Eighteen Hundred. Pencils are made there +today exactly as they were made then, and when you +see the factory you are willing to believe it. All visitors +at Keswick go to the pencil-factory and buy pencils, +such as Southey used, and get their names stamped on +<a name="II_Page_244"></a>each pencil while they wait, without extra charge. On +the wall is a silhouette picture of Southey, showing a +needlessly large nose, and the gentlemanly old proprietor +will tell you that Dorothy Wordsworth made +the picture; and then he will show you a letter written +by Charles Lamb, framed under glass, wherein C.L. +says all pencils are fairish good, but no pencils are so +good as Keswick pencils.</p> + +<p>For a while, when times were hard, Coleridge's wife +worked here making pencils, while her archangel +husband (a little damaged) went with Wordsworth to +study metaphysics at Gottingen. When Coleridge came +back and heard what his wife had done, he reproved +her—gently but firmly. Mrs. Ajax in a pencil-factory +wearing a check apron with a bib!—huh!!</p> + +<p>Southey had concluded that if Coleridge and Lovell +were good samples of socialism he would stick to individualism. +So he joined the Church of England, became +a Monarchist, sang the praises of royalty, got a pension, +became Poet Laureate, and rich—passing rich.</p> + +<p>"Wh-wh-when he secured for himself the services of +three good women he made a wise move," said C.L.</p> + +<p>And all the time Coleridge and Lamb were in correspondence: +and when Coleridge was in London he +kept close run of the Lambs. The father and old aunt +had passed out, and Charles and Mary lived together +in rooms. They seemed to have moved very often—their +record followed them. When the other tenants +<a name="II_Page_245"></a>heard that "she's the one that killed her mother," +they ceased to let their children play in the hallways, +and the landlord apologized, coughed, and raised the +rent. Poor Charles saw the point and did not argue it. +He looked for other lodgings and having found 'em +went home and said to Mary, "It's too noisy here. +Sister—I can't stand it—we'll have to go!"</p> + +<p>Charles was a literary man now: a bookkeeper by day +and a literary man by night. He wrote to please his +sister, and all his jokes were for her. There is a genuine +vein of pathos in all true humor, but think of the fear +and the love and the tenderness that are concealed in +Charles Lamb's work that was designed only to fight +off dread calamity! And Mary copied and read and +revised for her brother, and he told it all to her before +he wrote it, and together they discussed it in detail. +Charles studied mathematics, just to keep his genius +under, he declared. Mary smiled and said it wasn't +necessary.</p> + +<p>Coleridge used to drop in, and the Stoddarts, Hazlitts, +Godwin and Lovell, too. Then Southey was up in +London and he called, and so did Wordsworth and +Dorothy, for Coleridge had spread Lamb's fame. And +Dorothy and Mary kissed each other and held hands +under the table, and when Dorothy went back to Grasmere +she wrote many beautiful letters to Mary and +urged her to come and visit her—yes, come to Grasmere +and live. The one point they held in common was +<a name="II_Page_246"></a>a love for Coleridge; and as he belonged to neither there +was no room for jealousy. The Fricker girls were all +safely married, but Charles and Mary could not think +of going—they needs must hide in a big city. "I hate +your damned throstles and larks and bobolinks," said +C.L., in feigned contempt. "I sing the praises of the +'Salutation and the Cat' and a snug fourth-floor back."</p> + +<p>They could not leave London, for over them ever +hung that black cloud of a mind diseased.</p> + +<p>"I can do nothing—think nothing. Mary has another +of her bad spells—we saw it coming, and I took her +away to a place of safety," writes Charles to Coleridge.</p> + +<p>One writer tells of seeing Charles and Mary walking +across Hampstead Heath, hand in hand, both crying. +They were on the way to the asylum.</p> + +<p>Fortunately these "illnesses" gave warning and +Charles would ask his employer leave for a "holiday," +and stay at home trying by gentle mirth and work to +divert the dread visitor of unreason.</p> + +<p>After each illness, in a few weeks the sister would be +restored to her own, very weak and her mind a blank +as to what had gone before. And so she never remembered +that supreme calamity. She knew the deed had +been done, but Heaven had absolved her gentle spirit +from all participation in it. She often talked of her +mother, wrote of her, quoted her, and that they should +sometime be again united was her firm faith.</p> + +<p>The "Tales from Shakespeare" was written at the +<a name="II_Page_247"></a>suggestion of Godwin, seconded by Charles. The idea +that she herself could write seemed never to have +occurred to Mary, until Charles swore with a needless +oath that all the ideas he ever had she supplied.</p> + +<p>"Charles, dear, you've been drinking again!" said +Mary. But the "Tales" sold and sold well; fame came +that way and more money than the simple, plain, +homekeeping bodies needed. So they started a pension-roll +for sundry old ladies, and to themselves played high +and mighty patron, and figured and talked and joked +over the blue teacups as to what they should do with +their money—five hundred pounds a year! Goodness +gracious, if the Bank of England gets in a pinch advise +C.L., at Thirty-four Southampton Buildings, third +floor, second turning to the left but one.</p> + +<p>A Mrs. Reynolds was one of the pensioners, but no one +knew it but Mrs. Reynolds, and she never told. She +was a Lady of the Old School, and used often to dine +with the Lambs and get her snuffbox filled. Her husband +had been a ship-captain or something, and when +the tea was strong she would take snuff and tell the +visitors about him and swear she had ever been true +to his memory, though God knows all good-looking +and clever widows are sorely tried in this scurvy world!</p> + +<p>Mrs. Reynolds met Thomas Hood at a "Saturday +Evening" at the Lambs', and he was so taken with her +that he has told us "she looked like an elderly wax doll +in half-mourning, and when she spoke it was as if by +<a name="II_Page_248"></a>an artificial process; she always kept up the gurgle +and buzz until run down."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Reynolds' sole claim to literary distinction was the +fact that she had known Goldsmith and he had presented +her with an inscribed copy of "The Deserted +Village."</p> + +<p>But we all have a tender place in our hearts for the +elderly wax doll because the Lambs were so gentle and +patient with her, and once a year went to Highgate +and put a shilling vase of flowers over the grave of the +Captain to whose memory she was ever true.</p> + +<p>These friendless old souls used to meet and mix at the +Lambs' with those whose names are now deathless. +You can not write the history of English Letters and +leave the Lambs out. They were the loved and loving +friends of Southey, Wordsworth, Coleridge, De Quincey, +Jeffrey and Godwin. They won the recognition of all +who prize the far-reaching intellect—the subtle imagination. +The pathos and tenderness of their lives entwine +us with tendrils that hold our hearts in thrall.</p> + +<p>They adopted a little girl, a beautiful little girl by the +name of Emma Isola. And never was there child that +was a greater joy to parents than was Emma Isola to +Charles and Mary. The wonder is they did not spoil +her with admiration, and by laughing at all her foolish +little pranks. Mary set herself the task of educating +this little girl, and formed a class the better to do it—a +class of three: Emma Isola, William Hazlitt's son and +<a name="II_Page_249"></a>Mary Victoria Novello. I met Mary Victoria once; she's +over eighty years of age now. Her form is a little bent, +but her eye is bright and her smile is the smile of youth. +Folks call her Mary Cowden-Clarke.</p> + +<p>And I want you to remember, dearie, that it was Mary +Lamb who introduced the other Mary to Shakespeare, +by reading to her the manuscript of the "Tales." And +further, that it was the success of the "Tales" that +fired Mary Cowden-Clarke with an ambition also to +do a great Shakespearian work. There may be a question +about the propriety of calling the "Tales" a great +work—their simplicity seems to forbid it—but the term +is all right when applied to that splendid life-achievement, +the "Concordance," of which Mary Lamb was +the grandmother.</p> + +<p>Emma Isola married Edward Moxon, and the Moxon +home was the home of Mary Lamb whenever she wished +to make it so, to the day of her death. The Moxons did +good by stealth, and were glad they never awoke and +found it fame.</p> + +<p>"What shall I do when Mary leaves me, never to +return?" once said Charles to Manning. But Mary +lived for full twenty years after Charles had gone, and +lived only in loving memory of him who had devoted +his life to her. She seemed to exist just to talk of him +and to garland the grave in the little old churchyard +at Edmonton, where he sleeps. Wordsworth says, "A +grave is a tranquillizing object: resignation in time +<a name="II_Page_250"></a>springs up from it as naturally as wild flowers bespread +the turf." Her work was to look after the "pensioners" +and carry out the wishes of "my brother Charles."</p> + +<p>But the pensioners were laid away to rest, one after the +other, and the gentle Mary, grown old and feeble, +became a pensioner, too, but thanks to that divine +humanity that is found in English hearts, she never +knew it. To the last, she looked after "the worthy +poor," and carried flowers once a year to the grave of +the gallant Captain Reynolds at Highgate, and never +tired of sounding the praises of Charles and excusing +the foibles of Coleridge. She lived only in the past, and +its loving memories were more than a ballast 'gainst the +ills of the present.</p> + +<p>And so she went down into the valley and entered the +great shadow, telling in cheerful, broken musings of a +brother's love.</p> + +<p>And then she was carried to the churchyard at Edmonton. +There she rests in the grave with her brother. In +life they were never separated, and in death they are +not divided.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_251"></a></p> + + +<hr class="full" /> +<p><a name="JANE_AUSTEN"></a></p><h2>JANE AUSTEN</h2> +<p><a name="II_Page_252"></a></p> +<div class="blkquot"><p>Delaford is a nice place I can tell you; exactly what I +call a nice, old-fashioned place, full of comforts, quite +shut in with great garden-walls that are covered with +fruit-trees, and such a mulberry-tree in the corner. +Then there is a dovecote, some delightful fish-ponds, +and a very pretty canal, and everything, in short, that +one could wish for; and moreover it's close to the church +and only a quarter of a mile from the turnpike road.<br /> +<span style='margin-left: 10em;'>—<i>Sense and Sensibility</i></span></p></div> + +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_253"></a></p> +<p class="ctr"><a href="./images/ljv2-10.jpg"><img src="./images/ljv2-10_th.jpg" alt="JANE AUSTEN" /></a></p><p class="ctr">JANE AUSTEN</p> +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_254"></a><a name="II_Page_255"></a></p> + +<p>It was at Cambridge, England, I +met him—a fine, intelligent clergyman +he was, too.</p> + +<p>"He's not a 'Varsity man," said +my new acquaintance, speaking of +Doctor Joseph Parker, the world's +greatest preacher. "If he were, he +wouldn't do all these preposterous +things, you know."</p> + +<p>"He's a little like Henry Irving," I ventured apologetically.</p> + +<p>"True, and what absurd mannerisms—did you ever +see the like! Yes, one's from Yorkshire and the other's +from Cornwall, and both are Philistines."</p> + +<p>He laughed at his little joke and so did I, for I always +try to be polite.</p> + +<p>So I went my way, and as I strolled it came to me that +my clerical friend was right—a university course might +have taken all the individuality out of these strong men +and made of their genius a purely neutral decoction. +And when I thought further and considered how much +learning has done to banish wisdom, it was a satisfaction +to remember that Shakespeare at Oxford did +nothing beyond making the acquaintance of an inn-keeper's +wife.</p> + +<p>It hardly seems possible that a Harvard degree would +<a name="II_Page_256"></a>have made a stronger man of Abraham Lincoln; or that +Edison, whose brain has wrought greater changes than +that of any other man of the century, was the loser by +not being versed in physics as taught at Yale.</p> + +<p>The Law of Compensation never rests, and the men +who are taught too much from books are not taught by +Deity. Most education in the past has failed to awaken +in its subject a degree of intellectual consciousness. It +is the education that the Jesuits served out to the +Indian. It made him peaceable, but took all dignity out +of him. From a noble red man he descended into a dirty +Injun, who signed away his heritage for rum.</p> + +<p>The world's plan of education has mostly been priestly—we +have striven to inculcate trust and reverence. We +have cited authorities and quoted precedents and given +examples: it was a matter of memory; while all the +time the whole spiritual acreage was left untilled.</p> + +<p>A race educated in this way never advances, save as +it is jolted out of its notions by men with either a sublime +ignorance of, or an indifference to, what has been +done and said. These men are always called barbarians +by their contemporaries: they are jeered and hooted. +They supply much mirth by their eccentricities. After +they are dead the world sometimes canonizes them and +carves on their tombs the word "Savior."</p> + +<p>Do I then plead the cause of ignorance? Well, yes, +rather so. A little ignorance is not a dangerous thing. +A man who reads too much—who accumulates too +<a name="II_Page_257"></a>many facts-gets his mind filled to the point of saturation; +matters then crystallize and his head becomes a +solid thing that refuses to let anything either in or out. +In his soul there is no guest-chamber. His only hope +for progress lies in another incarnation.</p> + +<p>And so a certain ignorance seems a necessary equipment +for the doing of a great work. To live in a big city +and know what others are doing and saying; to meet +the learned and powerful, and hear their sermons and +lectures; to view the unending shelves of vast libraries is +to be discouraged at the start. And thus we find that +genius is essentially rural—a country product. Salons, +soirees, theaters, concerts, lectures, libraries, produce +a fine mediocrity that smiles at the right time and bows +when 't is proper, but it is well to bear in mind that +George Eliot, Elizabeth Barrett, Charlotte Bronte and +Jane Austen were all country girls, with little companionship, +nourished on picked-up classics, having a +healthy ignorance of what the world was saying and +doing.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_258"></a></p> +<hr /> +<p>It is over a hundred years since Jane Austen +lived. But when you tramp that five miles +from Overton, where the railroad-station is, +to Steventon, where she was born, it doesn't +seem like it. Rural England does not change much. +Great fleecy clouds roll lazily across the blue, overhead, +and the hedgerows are full of twittering birds that you +hear but seldom see; and the pastures contain mild-faced +cows that look at you with wide-open eyes over +the stone walls; and in the towering elm-trees that +sway their branches in the breeze crows hold a noisy +caucus. And it comes to you that the clouds and the +blue sky and the hedgerows and the birds and the cows +and the crows are all just as Jane Austen knew them—no +change. These stone walls stood here then, and so +did the low slate-roofed barns and the whitewashed +cottages where the roses clamber over the doors.</p> + +<p>I paused in front of one of these snug, homely, handsome, +pretty little cottages and looked at the two exact +rows of flowers that lined the little walk leading from +gate to cottage-door. The pathway was made from +coal-ashes and the flowerbeds were marked off with +pieces of broken crockery set on edge. 'T was an absent-minded, +impolite thing to do—to stand leaning on a +gate and critically examine the landscape-gardening, +evidently an overworked woman's gardening, at that.</p> + +<p>As I leaned there the door opened and a little woman +with sleeves rolled up appeared. I mumbled an apology, +<a name="II_Page_259"></a>but before I could articulate it, she held out a pair of +scissors and said, "Perhaps, sir, you'd like to clip some +of the flowers—the roses over the door are best!"</p> + +<p>Three children hung to her skirts, peeking, round faces +from behind, and quite accidentally disclosing a very +neat ankle.</p> + +<p>I took the scissors and clipped three splendid Jacqueminots +and said it was a beautiful day. She agreed with +me and added that she was just finishing her churning +and if I'd wait a minute until the butter came, she'd +give me a drink of buttermilk.</p> + +<p>I waited without urging and got the buttermilk, and +as the children had come out from hiding I was minded +to give them a penny apiece. Two coppers were all I +could muster, so I gave the two boys each a penny and +the little girl a shilling. The mother protested that she +had no change and that a bob was too much for a little +girl like that, but I assumed a Big-Bonanza air and +explained that I was from California where the smallest +change is a dollar.</p> + +<p>"Go thank the gentleman, Jane."</p> + +<p>"That's right, Jane Austen, come here and thank me!"</p> + +<p>"How did you know her name was Jane Austen—Jane +Austen Humphreys?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't know—I only guessed."</p> + +<p>Then little Mrs. Humphreys ceased patting the butter +and told me that she named her baby girl for Jane +Austen, who used to live near here a long time ago. +<a name="II_Page_260"></a>Jane Austen was one of the greatest writers that ever +lived—the Rector said so. The Reverend George Austen +preached at Steventon for years and years, and I +should go and see the church—the same church where +he preached and where Jane Austen used to go. And +anything I wanted to know about Jane Austen's books +the Rector could tell, for he was a wonderful learned +man was the Rector—"Kiss the gentleman, Jane."</p> + +<p>So I kissed Jane Austen's round, rosy cheek and stroked +the tousled heads of the boys by way of blessing, and +started for Steventon to interview the Rector who was +very wise.</p> + +<p>And the clergyman who teaches his people the history +of their neighborhood, and tells them of the excellent +men and women who once lived thereabouts, is both +wise and good. And the present Rector at Steventon +is both—I'm sure of that.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_261"></a></p> +<hr /> +<p>It was a very happy family that lived in the +Rectory at Steventon from Seventeen Hundred +Seventy-five to Eighteen Hundred One. +There were five boys and two girls, and the +younger girl's name was Jane. Between her and James, +the oldest boy, lay a period of twelve years of three +hundred and sixty-five days each, not to mention leap-years.</p> + +<p>The boys were sent away to be educated, and when +they came home at holiday time they brought presents +for the mother and the girls, and there was great +rejoicing.</p> + +<p>James was sent to Oxford. The girls were not sent away +to be educated—it was thought hardly worth while +then to educate women, and some folks still hold to +that belief. When the boys came home, they were made +to stand by the door-jamb, and a mark was placed on +the casing, with a date, which showed how much they +had grown. And they were catechized as to their knowledge, +and cross-questioned and their books inspected; +and so we find one of the sisters saying, once, that she +knew all the things her brothers knew, and besides that +she knew all the things she knew herself.</p> + +<p>There was plenty of books in the library, and the girls +made use of them. They would read to their father +"because his eyesight was bad," but I can not help +thinking this a clever ruse on the part of the good +Rector.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_262"></a></p> +<p>I do not find that there were any secrets in that household +or that either Mr. or Mrs. Austen ever said that +children should be seen and not heard. It was a little +republic of letters—all their own. Thrown in on themselves +for not many of the yeomanry thereabouts +could read, there was developed a fine spirit of comradeship +among parents and children, brothers and +sisters, servants and visitors, that is a joy to contemplate. +Before the days of railroads, a "visitor" was +more of an institution than he is now. He stayed longer +and was more welcome; and the news he brought from +distant parts was eagerly asked for. Nowadays we +know all about everything, almost before it happens, +for yellow journalism is so alert that it discounts +futurity.</p> + +<p>In the Austen household had lived and died a son of +Warren Hastings. The lad had so won the love of the +Austens that they even spoke of him as their own; and +this bond also linked them to the great outside world +of statecraft. The things the elders discussed were the +properties, too, of the children.</p> + +<p>Then once a year the Bishop came—came in knee-breeches, +hobnailed shoes, and shovel hat, and the +little church was decked with greens. The Bishop came +from Paradise, little Jane used to think, and once, to +be polite, she asked him how all the folks were in +Heaven. Then the other children giggled and the +Bishop spilt a whole cup of tea down the front of his +<a name="II_Page_263"></a>best coat, and coughed and choked until he was very +red in the face.</p> + +<p>When Jane was ten years old there came to live at the +Rectory a daughter of Mrs. Austen's sister. She came +to them direct from France. Her name was Madame +Fenillade. She was a widow and only twenty-two. +Once, when little Jane overheard one of the brothers +say that Monsieur Fenillade had kissed Mademoiselle +Guillotine, she asked what he meant and they would +not tell her.</p> + +<p>Now Madame spoke French with grace and fluency, +and the girls thought it queer that there should be two +languages—English and French—so they picked up a +few words of French, too, and at the table would +gravely say "Merci, Papa," and "S'il vous plait, +Mamma." Then Mr. Austen proposed that at table no +one should speak anything but French. So Madame +told them what to call the sugar and the salt and the +bread, and no one called anything except by its French +name. In two weeks each of the whole dozen persons +who sat at that board, as well as the girl who waited +on table, had a bill-of-fare working capital of French. +In six months they could converse with ease.</p> + +<p>And science with all its ingenuity has not yet pointed +out a better way for acquiring a new language than +the plan the Austens adopted at Steventon Rectory. +We call it the "Berlitz Method" now.</p> + +<p>Madame Fenillade's widowhood rested lightly upon +<a name="II_Page_264"></a>her, and she became quite the life of the whole household.</p> + +<p>One of the Austen boys fell in love with the French +widow; and surely it would be a very stupid country +boy that wouldn't love a French widow like that!</p> + +<p>And they were married and lived happily ever afterward.</p> + +<p>But before Madame married and moved away she +taught the girls charades, and then little plays, and a +theatrical performance was given in the barn.</p> + +<p>Then a play could not be found that just suited, so +Jane wrote one and Cassandra helped, and Madame +criticized and the Reverend Mr. Austen suggested a +few changes. Then it was all rewritten. And this was +the first attempt at writing for the public by Jane +Austen.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_265"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>Jane Austen wrote four great novels, +"Pride and Prejudice" was begun when +she was twenty and finished a year later. +The old father started a course of novel-reading +on his own account in order to fit his mind to +pass judgment on his daughter's work. He was sure it +was good, but feared that love had blinded his eyes, +and he wanted to make sure. After six months' comparison +he wrote to a publisher explaining that he had +the manuscript of a great novel that would be parted +with for a consideration. He assured the publisher that +the novel was as excellent as any Miss Burney, Miss +Edgeworth, or any one else ever wrote.</p> + +<p>Now publishers get letters like that by every mail, and +when Mr. Austen received his reply it was so antarctic +in sentiment that the manuscript was stored away in the +garret, where it lay for just eleven years before it found +a publisher. But in the meantime Miss Austen had +written three other novels—not with much hope that +any one would publish them, but to please her father +and the few intimate friends who read and sighed and +smiled in quiet.</p> + +<p>The year she was thirty years of age her father died—died +with no thought that the world would yet endorse +his own loving estimate of his daughter's worth.</p> + +<p>After the father's death financial troubles came, and +something had to be done to fight off possible hungry +wolves. The manuscript was hunted out, dusted, gone +<a name="II_Page_266"></a>over, and submitted to publishers. They sniffed at it and +sent it back. Finally a man was found who was bold +enough to read. He liked it, but wouldn't admit the +fact. Yet he decided to print it. He did so. The reading +world liked it and said so, although not very loudly. +Slowly the work made head, and small-sized London +drafts were occasionally sent by publishers to Miss +Austen with apologies because the amounts were not +larger.</p> + +<p>Now, in reference to writing books it may not be amiss +to explain that no one ever said, "Now then, I'll +write a story!" and sitting down at table took up pen +and dipping it in ink, wrote. Stories don't come that +way. Stories take possession of one—incident after +incident—and you write in order to get rid of 'em—with +a few other reasons mixed in, for motives, like +silver, are always found mixed. Children play at keeping +house: and men and women who have loved think +of the things that have happened, then imagine all the +things that might have happened, and from thinking +it all over to writing it out is but a step. You begin one +chapter and write it this forenoon; and do all you may +to banish the plot, the next chapter is all in your head +before sundown. Next morning you write chapter number +two, to unload it, and so the story spins itself out +into a book. All this if you live in the country and have +time to think and are not broken in upon by too much +work and worry—save the worry of the ever-restless +<a name="II_Page_267"></a>mind. Whether the story is good or not depends upon +what you leave out.</p> + +<p>The sculptor produces the beautiful statue by chipping +away such parts of the marble block as are not needed. +Really happy people do not write stories—they accumulate +adipose tissue and die at the top through fatty +degeneration of the cerebrum. A certain disappointment +in life, a dissatisfaction with environment, is +necessary to stir the imagination to a creative point. +If things are all to your taste you sit back and enjoy +them. You forget the flight of time, the march of the +seasons, your future life, family, country—all, just as +Antony did in Egypt. A deadly, languorous satisfaction +comes over you. Pain, disappointment, unrest or a joy +that hurts, are the things that prick the mind into +activity.</p> + +<p>Jane Austen lived in a little village. She felt the narrowness +of her life—the inability of those beyond her own +household to match her thoughts and emotions. Love +came that way—a short heart-rest, a being understood, +were hers. The gates of Paradise swung ajar and she +caught a glimpse of the glories within, and sighed and +clasped her hands and bowed her head in a prayer of +thankfulness.</p> + +<p>When she arose from her knees the gates were closed; +the way was dark; she was alone—alone in a little +quibbling, carping village, where tired folks worked +and gossiped, ate, drank, slept. Her home was pleasant, +<a name="II_Page_268"></a>to be sure, but man is a citizen of the world, not of a +house.</p> + +<p>Jane Austen began to write—to write about these +village people. Jane was tall, and twenty—not very +handsome, but better, she was good-looking. She looked +good because she was. She was pious, but not too pious. +She used to go calling among the parishioners, visiting +the sick, the lowly, the troubled. Then when Great +Folks came down from London to "the Hall," she +went with the Rector to call on them too, for the Rector +was servant to all—his business was to minister: he was +a Minister. And the Reverend George Austen was a +bit proud of his younger daughter. She was just as tall +as he, and dignified and gentle: and the clergyman +chuckled quietly to himself to see how she was the +equal in grace and intellect of any Fine Lady from +London town.</p> + +<p>And although the good Rector prayed, "From all +vanity and pride of spirit, good Lord, deliver us," it +never occurred to him that he was vain of his tall +daughter Jane, and I'm glad it didn't. There is no +more crazy bumblebee gets into a mortal's bonnet than +the buzzing thought that God is jealous of the affection +we have for our loved ones. If we are ever damned, it +will be because we have too little love for our fellows, +not too much.</p> + +<p>But, egad! brother, it's no small delight to be sixty +and a little stooped and a trifle rheumatic, and have +<a name="II_Page_269"></a>your own blessed daughter, sweet and stately, comb +your thinning gray locks, help you on with your overcoat, +find your cane, and go trooping with you, hand +in hand, down the lane on merciful errand bent. It's +a temptation to grow old and feign sciatica; and if you +could only know that, some day, like old King Lear, +upon your withered cheek would fall Cordelia's tears, +the thought would be a solace.</p> + +<p>So Jane Austen began to write stories about the simple +folks she knew. She wrote in the family sitting-room at +a little mahogany desk that she could shut up quickly +if prying neighbors came in to tell their woes and ask +questions about all those sheets of paper! And all she +wrote she read to her father and to her sister Cassandra. +And they talked it all over together and laughed and +cried and joked over it. The kind old minister thought +it a good mental drill for his girls to write and express +their feelings. The two girls collaborated—that is to +say, one wrote and the other looked on. Neither girl +had been "educated," except what their father taught +them. But to be born into a bookish family, and inherit +the hospitable mind and the receptive heart, is better +than to be sent to Harvard Annex. Preachers, like +other folks, sometimes assume a virtue when they +have it not. But George Austen didn't pretend—he +was. And that's the better plan, for no man can deceive +his children—they take his exact measurement, whether +others ever do or not—and the only way to win and +<a name="II_Page_270"></a>hold the love of a child (or a grown-up) is to be frank +and simple and honest. I've tried both schemes.</p> + +<p>I can not find that George Austen ever claimed he was +only a worm of the dust, or pretended to be more or +less than he was, or to assume a knowledge that he did +not possess. He used to say: "My dears, I really do +not know. But let's keep the windows open and light +may yet come."</p> + +<p>It was a busy family of plain, average people—not very +rich, and not very poor. There were difficulties to meet, +and troubles to share, and joys to divide.</p> + +<p>Jane Austen was born in Seventeen Hundred Seventy-five; +"Jane Eyre" in Eighteen Hundred Sixteen—one +year before Jane Austen died.</p> + +<p>Charlotte Bronte knew all about Jane Austen, and her +example fired Charlotte's ambition. Both were daughters +of country clergymen. Charlotte lived in the North +of England on the wild and treeless moors, where the +searching winds rattled the panes and black-faced +sheep bleated piteously. Jane Austen lived in the rich +quiet of a prosperous farming country, where bees +made honey and larks nested. The Reverend Patrick +Bronte disciplined his children: George Austen loved +his. In Steventon there is no "Black Bull"; only a little +dehorned inn, kept by a woman who breeds canaries, +and will sell you a warranted singer for five shillings, +with no charge for the cage. At Steventon no red-haired +Yorkshiremen offer to give fight or challenge you to a +<a name="II_Page_271"></a>drinking-bout.</p> + +<p>The opposites of things are alike, and +that is why the world ties Jane Eyre and Jane Austen +in one bundle. Their methods of work were totally +different: their effects gotten in different ways. Charlotte +Bronte fascinates by startling situations and +highly colored lights that dance and glow, leading you +on in a mad chase. There's pain, unrest, tragedy in the +air. The pulse always is rapid and the temperature high.</p> + +<p>It is not so with Jane Austen. She is an artist in her +gentleness, and the world is today recognizing this +more and more. The stage now works its spells by her +methods—without rant, cant or fustian—and as the +years go by this must be so more and more, for mankind's +face is turned toward truth.</p> + +<p>To weave your spell out of commonplace events and +brew a love-potion from every-day materials is high +art. When Kipling takes three average soldiers of the +line, ignorant, lying, swearing, smoking, dog-fighting +soldiers, who can even run on occasion, and by telling +of them holds a world in thrall—that's art! In these +soldiers three we recognize something very much akin +to ourselves, for the thing that holds no relationship +to us does not interest us—we can not leave the personal +equation out. This fact is made plain in "The +Black Riders," where the devils dancing in Tophet +look up and espying Steve Crane address him thus: +"Brother!"</p> + +<p>Jane Austen's characters are all plain, every-day folks. +<a name="II_Page_272"></a>The work is always quiet. There are no entangling +situations, no mysteries, no surprises.</p> + +<p>Now, to present a situation, an emotion, so it will +catch and hold the attention of others, is largely a +knack—you practise on the thing until you do it well. +This one thing I do. But the man who does this thing +is not intrinsically any greater than those who appreciate +it—in fact, they are all made of the same kind of +stuff. Kipling himself is quite a commonplace person. +He is neither handsome nor magnetic. He is plain and +manly and would fit in anywhere. If there was a trunk +to be carried upstairs, or an ox to get out of a pit, you'd +call on Kipling if he chanced that way, and he'd give +you a lift as a matter of course, and then go on whistling +with hands in his pockets. His art is a knack practised +to a point that gives facility.</p> + +<p>Jane Austen was a commonplace person. She swept, +sewed, worked, and did the duty that lay nearest her. +She wrote because she liked to, and because it gave +pleasure to others. She wrote as well as she could. She +had no thought of immortality, or that she was writing +for the ages—no more than Shakespeare had. She never +anticipated that Southey, Coleridge, Lamb, Guizot +and Macaulay would hail her as a marvel of insight, +nor did she suspect that a woman as great as George +Eliot would declare her work flawless.</p> + +<p>But today strong men recognize her books as rarely +excellent, because they show the divinity in all things, +<a name="II_Page_273"></a>keep close to the ground, gently inculcate the firm belief +that simple people are as necessary as great ones, that +small things are not necessarily unimportant, and that +nothing is really insignificant. It all rings true.</p> + +<p>And so I sing the praises of the average woman—the +woman who does her work, who is willing to be unknown, +who is modest and unaffected, who tries to +lessen the pains of earth, and to add to its happiness. +She is the true guardian angel of mankind!</p> + +<p>No book published in Jane Austen's lifetime bore her +name on the title-page; she was never lionized by society; +she was never two hundred miles from home; she +died when forty-two years of age, and it was sixty years +before a biography was attempted or asked for. She +sleeps in the cathedral at Winchester, and not so very +long ago a visitor, on asking the verger to see her grave, +was conducted thither, and the verger asked: "Was +she anybody in particular? So many folks ask where +she's buried, you know!"</p> + +<p>But this is changed now, for when the verger took me +to her grave and we stood by that plain black marble +slab, he spoke intelligently of her life and work. And +many visitors now go to the cathedral, only because it +is the resting-place of Jane Austen, who lived a beautiful, +helpful life and produced great art, yet knew it not. +<a name="II_Page_274"></a><a name="II_Page_275"></a></p> + + +<hr class="full" /> +<p><a name="EMPRESS_JOSEPHINE"></a></p><h2>EMPRESS JOSEPHINE</h2> +<p><a name="II_Page_276"></a></p> +<div class="blkquot"><p>You have met General Bonaparte in my house. Well—he +it is who would supply a father's place to the orphans +of Alexander de Beauharnais, and a husband's to his +widow. I admire the General's courage, the extent of +his information, for on all subjects he talks equally well, +and the quickness of his judgment, which enables him +to seize the thoughts of others almost before they are +expressed; but, I confess it, I shrink from the despotism +he seems desirous of exercising over all who approach +him. His searching glance has something singular and +inexplicable, which imposes even on our Directors; +judge if it may not intimidate a woman. Even—what +ought to please me—the force of a passion, described +with an energy that leaves not a doubt of his sincerity, +is precisely the cause which arrests the consent I am +often on the point of pronouncing.<br /> +<span style='margin-left: 21em;'>—<i>Letters of Josephine</i></span></p></div> + +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_277"></a></p> +<p class="ctr"><a href="./images/ljv2-11.jpg"><img src="./images/ljv2-11_th.jpg" alt="EMPRESS JOSEPHINE" /></a></p><p class="ctr">EMPRESS JOSEPHINE</p> +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_278"></a><a name="II_Page_279"></a></p> + +<p>It was a great life, dearie, a great life! +Charles Lamb used to study mathematics +to subdue his genius, and +I'll have to tinge truth with gray +in order to keep this little sketch +from appearing like a red Ruritania +romance.</p> + +<p>Josephine was born on an island in +the Caribbean Sea, a long way from France. The Little +Man was an islander, too. They started for France +about the same time, from different directions—each, +of course, totally unaware that the other lived. They +started on the order of that joker, Fate, in order to +scramble Continental politics, and make omelet of the +world's pretensions.</p> + +<p>Josephine's father was Captain Tascher. Do you know +who Captain Tascher was? Very well, there is satisfaction +then in knowing that no one else does either. +He seems to have had no ancestors; and he left no +successor save Josephine.</p> + +<p>We know a little less of Josephine's mother than we do +of her father. She was the daughter of a Frenchman +whom the world had plucked of both money and courage, +and he moved to the West Indies to vegetate and +brood on the vanity of earthly ambitions. Young +Captain Tascher married the planter's daughter in the +<a name="II_Page_280"></a>year Seventeen Hundred Sixty-two. The next year a +daughter was born, and they called her name Josephine.</p> + +<p>Not long after her birth, Captain Tascher thought to +mend his prospects by moving to one of the neighboring +islands. His wife went with him, but they left the baby +girl in the hands of a good old aunt, until they could +corral fortune and make things secure, for this world at +least.</p> + +<p>They never came back, for they died and were buried.</p> + +<p>Josephine never had any recollection of her parents. +But the aunt was gentle and kindly, and life was simple +and cheap. There was plenty to eat, and no clothing to +speak of was required, for the Equator was only a +stone's throw away; in fact, it was in sight of the house, +as Josephine herself has said.</p> + +<p>There was a Catholic church near, but no school. Yet +Josephine learned to read and write. She sang with the +negroes and danced and swam and played leap-frog. +When she was nine years old, her aunt told her she must +not play leap-frog any more, but she should learn to +embroider and to play the harp and read poetry. Then +she would grow up and be a fine lady.</p> + +<p>And Josephine thought it a bit hard, but said she would +try.</p> + +<p>She was tall and slender, but not very handsome. Her +complexion was rather yellow, her hands bony. But the +years brought grace, and even if her features were not +pretty she had one thing that was better, a gentle voice. +<a name="II_Page_281"></a>So far as I know, no one ever gave her lessons in voice +culture either. Perhaps the voice is the true index of the +soul. Josephine's voice was low, sweet, and so finely +modulated that when she spoke others would pause to +listen—not to the words, just to the voice.</p> + +<p>Occasionally, visitors came to the island and were +received at the old rambling mansion where Josephine's +aunt lived. From them the girl learned about the great, +outside world with its politics and society and strife +and rivalry; and when the visitor went away Josephine +had gotten from him all he knew. So the young woman +became wise without school and learned without books. +A year after the memorable year of Seventeen Hundred +Seventy-six, there came to the island, Vicomte +Alexander Beauharnais. He had come direct from +America, where he had fought on the side of the Colonies +against the British. He was full of Republican +principles. Paradoxically, he was also rich and idle and +somewhat of an adventurer.</p> + +<p>He called at the old aunt's, Madame Renaudin's, and +called often. He fell violently in love with Josephine. I +say violently, for that was the kind of man he was. He +was thirty, she was fifteen. His voice was rough and +guttural, so I do not think he had much inward grace. +Josephine's fine instincts rebelled at thought of accepting +his proffered affection. She explained that she +was betrothed to another, a neighboring youth of +about her own age, whose thoughts and feelings matched +<a name="II_Page_282"></a>hers.</p> + +<p>Beauharnais said that was nothing to him, and +appealed to the old folks, displaying his title, submitting +an inventory of his estate; and the old folks agreed to +look into the matter. They did so and explained to +Josephine that she should not longer hold out against +the wishes of those who had done so much for her.</p> + +<p>And so Josephine relented and they were married, +although it can not truthfully be said that they lived +happily ever afterward. They started for France, on +their wedding-tour. In six weeks they arrived in Paris. +Returned soldiers and famed travelers are eagerly +welcomed by society; especially is this so when the +traveler brings a Creole wife from the Equator. The +couple supplied a new thrill, and society in Paris is +always eager for a new thrill.</p> + +<p>Vicomte Beauharnais and his wife became quite the +rage. It was expected that the Creole lady would be +beautiful but dull; instead, she was not so very beautiful, +but very clever. She dropped into all the graceful ways +of polite society intuitively.</p> + +<p>In a year, domestic life slightly interfered with society's +claims—a son was born. They called his name Eugene.</p> + +<p>Two more years and a daughter was born. They called +her name Hortense.</p> + +<p>Josephine was only twenty, but the tropics and social +experience and maternity had given ripeness to her life. +She became thoughtful and inclined rather to stay at +home with her babies than chase fashion's butterflies.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_283"></a></p> +<p>Beauharnais chased fashion's butterflies, and caught +them, too, for he came home late and quarreled with +his wife—a sure sign.</p> + +<p>He drank a little, gamed more, sought excitement, and +talked politics needlessly loud in underground cafes.</p> + +<p>Men who are woefully lax in their marriage relations are +very apt to regard their wives with suspicion. If Beauharnais +had been weighed in the balances he would have +been found wanton. He instituted proceedings against +Josephine for divorce.</p> + +<p>And Josephine packed up a few scanty effects and +taking her two children started for her old home in the +West Indies. It took all the money she had to pay +passage.</p> + +<p>It was the old, old story—a few years of gay life in the +great city, then cruelty too great for endurance, tears, +shut white lips, a firm resolve—and back to the old +farm where homely, loyal hearts await, and outstretched +arms welcome the sorrowful, yet glad return.</p> + +<p>Beauharnais failed to get his divorce. The court said +"no cause for action." He awoke, stared stupidly about, +felt the need of sympathy in his hour of undoing, and +looked for—Josephine.</p> + +<p>She was gone.</p> + +<p>He tried absinthe, gambling, hot dissipation; but he +could not forget. He had sent away his granary and +storehouse; his wand of wealth and heart's desire. Two +ways opened for peace, only two: a loaded pistol—or +<a name="II_Page_284"></a>get her back.</p> + +<p>First he would try to get her back, and +the pistol should be held in reserve in case of failure.</p> + +<p>Josephine forgave and came back; for a good woman +forgives to seventy times seven.</p> + +<p>Beauharnais met her with all the tenderness a lover +could command. The ceremony of marriage was again +sacredly solemnized. They retired to the country and +with their two children lived three of the happiest +months Josephine ever knew; at least Josephine said so, +and the fact that she made the same remark about +several other occasions is no reason for doubting her +sincerity. Then they moved back to Paris.</p> + +<p>Beauharnais sobered his ambitions, and kept good +hours. He was a soldier in the employ of the king, but +his sympathies were with the people. He was a Republican +with a Royalist bias, but some said he was a +Royalist with a Republican bias.</p> + +<p>Josephine looked after her household, educated her +children, did much charitable work, and knew what +was going on in the State.</p> + +<p>But those were troublous times. Murder was in the +air and revolution was rife. That mob of a hundred +thousand women had tramped out to Versailles and +brought the king back to Paris. He had been beheaded, +and Marie Antoinette had followed him. The people +were in power and Beauharnais had labored to temper +their wrath with reason. He had even been Chairman +of the Third Convention. He called himself Citizen. +<a name="II_Page_285"></a>But the fact that he was of noble birth was remembered, +and in September of Seventeen Hundred Ninety-three, +three men called at his house. When Josephine looked +out of the window, she saw by the wan light of the moon +a file of soldiers standing stiff and motionless.</p> + +<p>She knew the time had come. They marched Citizen +Beauharnais to the Luxembourg.</p> + +<p>In a few feverish months, they came back for his wife. +Her they placed in the nunnery of the Carmelites—that +prison where, but a few months before, a mob relieved +the keepers of their vigils by killing all their charges.</p> + +<p>Robespierre was supreme. Now, Robespierre had come +into power by undoing Danton. Danton had helped +lug in the Revolution, but when he touched a match +to the hay he did not really mean to start a conflagration, +only a bonfire.</p> + +<p>He tried to dampen the blaze, and Robespierre said he +was a traitor and led him to the guillotine. Robespierre +worked the guillotine until the bearings grew hot. Still, +the people who rode in the death-tumbrel did not seem +so very miserable. Despair pushed far enough completes +the circle and becomes peace—a peace like unto security. +It is the last stage: hope is gone, but the comforting +thought of heroic death and an eternal sleep takes its +place.</p> + +<p>When Josephine at the nunnery of the Carmelites +received from the Luxembourg prison a package containing +a generous lock of her husband's hair, she knew +<a name="II_Page_286"></a>it had been purchased from the executioner.</p> + +<p>Now the +prison of the Carmelites was unfortunately rather +crowded. In fact, it was full to the roof-tile. Five ladies +were obliged to occupy one little cell. One of these +ladies in the cell with Josephine was Madame Fontenay. +Now Madame Fontenay was fondly loved by Citizen +Tallien, who was a member of the Assembly over which +Citizen Robespierre presided. Citizen Tallien did not +explain his love for Madame to the public, because +Madame chanced to be the wife of another. So how +could Robespierre know that when he imprisoned +Madame he was touching the tenderest tie that bound +his friend Tallien to earth?</p> + +<p>Robespierre sent word to the prison of the Carmelites +that Madame Fontenay and Madame Beauharnais +should prepare for death—they were guilty of plotting +against the people.</p> + +<p>Now, Tallien came daily to the prison of the Carmelites, +not to visit of course, but to see that the prisoners were +properly restrained. A cabbage-stalk was thrown out +of a cell-window, and Tallien found in the stalk a note +from his ladylove to this effect: "I am to die in two +days; to save me you must overthrow Robespierre."</p> + +<p>The next day there was trouble when the Convention +met. Tallien got the platform and denounced Robespierre +in a Cassius voice as a traitor—the arch-enemy of +the people—a plotter for self. To emphasize his remarks +he brandished a glittering dagger. Other orations +<a name="II_Page_287"></a>followed in like vein. All orders that Robespierre had +given out were abrogated by acclamation. Two days +and Robespierre was made to take a dose of the medicine +he had so often prescribed for others. He was +beheaded by Samson, his own servant, July Fifteenth, +Seventeen Hundred Ninety-four.</p> + +<p>Immediately all "suspects" imprisoned on his instigation were released.</p> + +<p>Madame Fontenay and the widow Beauharnais were +free. Soon after this Madame Fontenay became +Madame Tallien. Josephine got her children back from +the country, but her property was gone and she was in +sore straits. But she had friends, yet none so loyal and +helpful as Citizen Tallien and his wife. Their home was +hers. And it was there she met a man by the name of +Barras, and there too she met a man who was a friend +of Barras; by name, Bonaparte—Napoleon Bonaparte. +Bonaparte was twenty-six. He was five feet two inches +high and weighed one hundred twenty pounds. He was +beardless and looked like a boy, and at that time his +face was illumined by an eruption.</p> + +<p>Out of employment and waiting for something to turn +up, he yet had a very self-satisfied manner.</p> + +<p>His peculiar way of listening to conversation—absorbing +everything and giving nothing out—made one +uncomfortable. Josephine, seven years his senior, did +not like the youth. She had had a wider experience and +been better brought up than he, and she let him know +it, but he did not seem especially abashed.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_288"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>Exactly what the French Revolution was, +no one has yet told us. Read "Carlyle" +backward or forward and it is grand: it puts +your head in a whirl of heroic intoxication, +but it does not explain the Revolution.</p> + +<p>Suspicion, hate, tyranny, fear, mawkish sentimentality, +mad desire, were in the air. One leader was deposed +because he did nothing, and his successor was carried +to the guillotine because he did too much. Convention +after convention was dissolved and re-formed.</p> + +<p>On the Fourth of October, Seventeen Hundred Ninety-five, +there was a howl and a roar and a shriek from +forty thousand citizens of Paris.</p> + +<p>No one knew just +what they wanted—the forty thousand did not +explain. Perhaps it was nothing—only the leaders +who wanted power. They demanded that the Convention +should be dissolved: certain men must be +put out and others put in.</p> + +<p>The Convention convened and all the members felt +to see if their heads were in proper place—tomorrow +they might not be. The room was crowded to suffocation. +Spectators filled the windows, perched on the +gallery-railing, climbed and clung on the projecting +parts of columns.</p> + +<p>High up on one of these columns +sat the young man Bonaparte, silent, unmoved, still +waiting for something to turn up.</p> + +<p>The Convention must protect itself, and the call was +for Barras. Barras had once successfully parleyed with +<a name="II_Page_289"></a>insurrection—he must do so again. Barras turned +bluish-white, for he knew that to deal with this mob +successfully a man must be blind and deaf to pity. He +struggled to his feet—he looked about helplessly—the +Convention silently waited to catch the words of its +savior.</p> + +<p>High up on a column Barras spied the lithe form of the +artillery major, whom he had seen, with face of bronze, +deal out grape and canister at Toulon. Barras raised his +hand and pointing to the young officer cried, "There, +there is the man who can save you!"</p> + +<p>The Convention nominated the little man by acclamation +as commander of the city's forces. He slid down +from his perch, took half an hour to ascertain whether +the soldiers were on the side of the mob or against it—for +it was usually a toss-up—and decided to accept the +command. Next day the mob surrounded the Tuileries +in the name of Liberty, Fraternity and Equality. The +Terrorists entreated the soldiers to throw down their +arms, then they reviled and cajoled and cursed and +sang, and the women as usual were in the vanguard. +Paris recognized the divine right of insurrection. Who +dare shoot into such a throng!</p> + +<p>The young artillery major dare. He gave the word and +red death mowed wide swaths, and the balls spat against +the walls and sang through the windows of the Church +of Saint Roche where the mob was centered. Again and +again he fired. It began at four by the clock, and at six +<a name="II_Page_290"></a>all good people, and bad, had retired to their homes, +and Paris was law-abiding. The Convention named +Napoleon, General of the Interior, and the French Revolution +became from that moment a thing that was.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_291"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>Of course, no one in Paris was so much talked +of as the young artillery officer. Josephine +was a bit proud that she had met him, and +possibly a little sorry that she had treated +him so coldly. He only wished to be polite!</p> + +<p>Josephine was an honest woman, but still, she was a +woman. She desired to be well thought of, and to be well +thought of by men in power. Her son Eugene was +fifteen, and she had ambitions for him; and to this end +she saw the need of keeping in touch with the Powers. +Josephine was a politician and a diplomat, for all women +are diplomats. She arrayed Eugene in his Sunday-best +and told him to go to the General of the Interior and +explain that his name was Eugene Beauharnais, that +his father was the martyred patriot, General Beauharnais, +and that this beloved father's sword was in the +archives over which Providence had placed the General +of the Interior. Furthermore, the son should request +that the sword of his father be given him so that it +might be used in defense of France if need be.</p> + +<p>And it was so done.</p> + +<p>The whole thing was needlessly melodramatic, and +Napoleon laughed. The poetry of war was to him a joke. +But he stroked the youth's curls, asked after his mother, +and ordered his secretary to go fetch that sword.</p> + +<p>So the boy carried the sword home and was very happy, +and his mother was very happy and proud of him, and +she kissed him on both cheeks and kissed the sword +<a name="II_Page_292"></a>and thought of the erring, yet generous man who once +had carried it. Then she thought it would be but proper +for her to go and thank the man who had given the +sword back; for had he not stroked her boy's curls +and told him he was a fine young fellow, and asked +after his mother!</p> + +<p>So the next day she went to call on the man who had so +graciously given the sword back. She was kept waiting +a little while in the anteroom, for Napoleon always kept +people waiting—it was a good scheme. When admitted +to the presence, the General of the Interior, in simple +corporal's dress, did not remember her. Neither did he +remember about giving the sword back—at least he +said so. He was always a trifler with women, though; +and it was so delicious to have this tearful widow +remove her veil and explain—for gadzooks! had she not +several times allowed the mercury to drop to zero for +his benefit?</p> + +<p>And so she explained, and gradually it all came back to +him—very slowly and after cross-questioning—and +then he was so glad to see her. When she went away, +he accompanied her to the outer door, bareheaded, and +as they walked down the long hallway she noted the +fact that he was not so tall as she by three inches. He +shook hands with her as they parted, and said he would +call on her when he had gotten a bit over the rush.</p> + +<p>Josephine went home in a glow. She did not like the +man—he had humiliated her by making her explain +<a name="II_Page_293"></a>who she was, and his manner, too, was offensively +familiar. And yet he was a power, there was no denying +that, and to know men of power is a satisfaction to +any woman. He was twenty years younger than Beauharnais, +the mourned—twenty years! Then Beauharnais +was tall and had a splendid beard and wore a dangling +sword. Beauharnais was of noble birth, educated, +experienced, but he was dead; and here was a beardless +boy being called the Chief Citizen of France. Well, +well, well!</p> + +<p>She was both pleased and hurt—hurt to think she had +been humbled, and pleased to think such attentions had +been paid her. In a few days the young general called +on the widow to crave forgiveness for not having +recognized her when she had called on him. It was very +stupid in him, very! She forgave him.</p> + +<p>He complimented Eugene in terse, lavish terms, and +when he went away kissed Hortense, who was thirteen +and thought herself too big to be kissed by a strange +man. But Napoleon said they all seemed just like old +friends. And seeming like old friends he called often.</p> + +<p>Josephine knew Paris and Parisian society thoroughly. +Fifteen years of close contact in success and defeat with +statesmen, soldiers, diplomats, artists and literati had +taught her much. It is probable that she was the most +gifted woman in Paris. Now, Napoleon learned by +induction as Josephine had, and as all women do, and +as genius must, for life is short—only dullards spend +<a name="II_Page_294"></a>eight years at Oxford. He absorbed Josephine as the +devilfish does its prey. And to get every thought and +feeling that a good woman possesses you must win her +completest love. In this close contact she gives up all—unlike +Sapphira—holding nothing back.</p> + +<p>Among educated people, people of breeding and culture, +Napoleon felt ill at ease. With this woman at his side +he would be at home anywhere. And feeling at once that +he could win her only by honorable marriage he decided +to marry her.</p> + +<p>He was ambitious. Has that been +remarked before? Well, one can not always be original—still +I think the facts bear out the statement.</p> + +<p>Josephine was ambitious, too, but some way in this +partnership she felt that she would bring more capital +into the concern than he, and she hesitated.</p> + +<p>But power had given dignity to the Little Man; his face +had taken on the cold beauty of marble. Success was +better than sarsaparilla. Josephine was aware of his +growing power, and his persistency was irresistible; and +so one evening when he dropped in for a moment, her +manner told all. He just took her in his arms, and kissing +her very tenderly whispered, "My dear, together we +will win," and went his way. When he wished to be, +Napoleon was the ideal lover; he was master of that +fine forbearance, flavored with a dash of audacity, that +women so appreciate. He never wore love to a frazzle, +nor caressed the object of his affections into fidgets; +neither did he let her starve, although at times she +<a name="II_Page_295"></a>might go hungry.</p> + +<p>However, the fact remains that +Josephine married the man to get rid of him; but +that's a thing women are constantly doing.</p> + +<p>The ceremony was performed by a Justice of the Peace, +March Ninth, Seventeen Hundred Ninety-six. It was +just five months since the bride had called to thank the +groom for giving back her husband's sword, and fifteen +months after this husband's death. Napoleon was +twenty-seven; Josephine was thirty-three, but the +bridegroom swore he was twenty-eight and the lady +twenty-nine. As a fabricator he wins our admiration.</p> + +<p>Twelve days after the marriage, Napoleon set out for +Italy as Commander-in-Chief of the army. To trace the +brilliant campaign of that year, when the tricolor of +France was carried from the Bay of Biscay to the +Adriatic Sea, is not my business. Suffice it to say that it +placed the name of Bonaparte among the foremost +names of military leaders of all time. But amid the +restless movement of grim war and the glamour of success +he never for a day forgot his Josephine. His letters +breathe a youthful lover's affection, and all the fond +desires of his heart were hers. Through her he also +knew the pulse and temperature of Paris—its form and +pressure.</p> + +<p>It was a year before they saw each other. She came on +to Milan and met him there. They settled in Montebello, +at a beautiful country seat, six miles from the city. +From there he conducted negotiations for peace—and +<a name="II_Page_296"></a>she presided over the gay social circles of the ancient +capital. "I gain provinces; you win hearts," said +Napoleon. It was a very Napoleonic remark.</p> + +<p>Napoleon had already had Eugene with him, and +together they had seen the glory of battle. Now Hortense +was sent for, and they were made Napoleon's +children by adoption. These were days of glowing sunshine +and success and warm affection.</p> + +<p>And so Napoleon with his family returned to France +amid bursts of applause, proclaimed everywhere the +Savior of the State, its Protector, and all that. Civil +troubles had all vanished in the smoke of war with +foreign enemies. Prosperity was everywhere, the fruits +of conquest had satisfied all, and the discontented class +had been drawn off into the army and killed or else was +now cheerfully boozy with success.</p> + +<p>Napoleon made allies of all powers he could not easily +undo, and proffered his support—biding his time. +Across the English Channel he looked and stared with +envious eyes. Josephine had tasted success and known +defeat. Napoleon had only tasted success. She begged +that he would rest content and hold secure that which +he had gained. Success in its very nature must be +limited, she said. He laughed and would not hear of it. +For the first time she felt her influence over him was +waning. She had given her all; he greedily absorbed, +and now had come to believe in his own omniscience. +He told her that on a pinch he could get along without +<a name="II_Page_297"></a>her—within himself he held all power. Then he kissed +her hand in mock gallantry and led her to the door, as +he would be alone.</p> + +<p>When Napoleon started on the Egyptian campaign, +Josephine begged to go with him; other women went, +dozens of them. They seemed to look upon it as a picnic +party. But Napoleon, insisting that absence makes the +heart grow fonder, said his wife should remain behind.</p> + +<p>Josephine was too good and great for the wife of such a +man. She saw through him. She understood him, and +only honest men are willing to be understood. He was +tired of her, for she no longer ministered to his vanity. +He had captured her, and now he was done with her. +Besides that, she sided with the peace party, and this +was intolerable. Still he did not beat her with a stick; +he treated her most graciously, and installing her at +beautiful Malmaison, provided her everything to make +her happy. And if "things" could make one happy, +she would have been.</p> + +<p>And as for the Egyptian campaign, it surely was a +picnic party, or it was until things got so serious that +frolic was supplanted by fear. You can't frolic with your +hair on end like quills upon the fretful porcupine. +Napoleon did not write to his wife. He frolicked. +Occasionally his secretary sent her a formal letter of +instruction, and when she at last wrote him asking an +explanation for such strange silence, the Little Man +answered her with accusations of infidelity.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_298"></a></p> +<p>Josephine decided to secure a divorce, and there is +pretty good proof that papers were prepared; and had +the affair been carried along, the courts would have at +once allowed the separation on statutory grounds. +However, the papers were destroyed, and Josephine +decided to live it out. But Napoleon had heard of these +proposed divorce proceedings and was furious. When +he came back, it was with the intention of immediate +legal separation—in any event separation.</p> + +<p>He came back and held out haughtily for three days, +addressing her as "Madame," and refusing so much as +to shake hands. After the three days he sued for peace +and cried it out on his knees with his head in her lap. +It was not genuine humility, only the humility that +follows debauch. Napoleon had many kind impulses, +but his mood was selfish indifference to the rights or +wishes of others. He did not hold hate, yet the thought +of divorce from Josephine was palliated in his own +mind by the thought that she had first suggested it. +"I took her at her word," he once said to Bertram, as if +the thing were pricking him.</p> + +<p>And so matters moved on. There was war, and rumors +of war, alway; but the vanquished paid the expenses. +It was thought best that France should be ruled by +three consuls. Three men were elected, with Napoleon +as First Consul. The First Consul bought off the Second +and Third Consuls and replaced them with two wooden +men from the Tenth Ward.</p> + +<p>Josephine worked for the +<a name="II_Page_299"></a>glory of France and for her husband: she was diplomat +and adviser. She placated enemies and made friends.</p> + +<p>France prospered, and in the wars the foreigner usually +not only paid the bills, but a goodly tribute beside. +Nothing is so good as war to make peace at home. An +insurrectionist at home makes a splendid soldier abroad. +Napoleon's battles were won by the "dangerous class." +As the First Consul was Emperor in fact, the wires were +pulled, and he was made so in name. His wife was made +Empress: it must be so, as a breath of disapproval +might ruin the whole scheme. Josephine was beloved by +the people, and the people must know that she was +honored by her husband. With a woman's intuition, +Josephine saw the end—power grows until it topples. +She pleaded, begged—it was of no avail—the tide swept +her with it, but whither, whither? she kept asking.</p> + +<p>Meantime Hortense had been married to Louis, brother +of Napoleon. In due time Napoleon found himself a +grandfather. He both liked it and didn't. He considered +himself a youth and took a pride in being occasionally +mistaken for a recruit, and here some newspaper had +called him "granddaddy," and people had laughed! +He was not even a father, except by law—not Nature—and +that's no father at all, for Nature does not recognize +law. He joked with Josephine about it, and she +turned pale.</p> + +<p>There is no subject on which men so deceive themselves +as concerning their motives for doing certain +<a name="II_Page_300"></a>things. On no subject do mortals so deceive themselves +as their motives for marriage. Their acts may be all +right, but the reasons they give for doing them never +are. Napoleon desired a new wife, because he wished a +son to found a dynasty.</p> + +<p>"You have Eugene!" said Josephine.</p> + +<p>"He's my son by proxy," said Napoleon, with a weary smile.</p> + +<p>All motives, like ores, are found mixed, and counting the +whole at one hundred, Napoleon's desire for a son after +the flesh should stand as ten—other reasons ninety. All +men wish to be thought young. Napoleon was forty, +and his wife was forty-seven. Talleyrand had spoken +of them as Old Mr. and Mrs. Bonaparte.</p> + +<p>A man of forty is only a giddy youth, according to his +own estimate. Girls of twenty are his playfellows. A +man of sixty, with a wife forty, and babies coming, is +not old—bless me! But suppose his wife is nearly +seventy—what then! Napoleon must have a young +wife. Then by marrying Marie Louise, Austria could be +held as friend: it was very necessary to do this. Austria +must be secured as an ally at any cost—even at the cost +of Josephine. It was painful, but must be done for the +good of France. The State should stand first in the mind +of every loyal, honest man: all else is secondary.</p> + +<p>So Josephine was divorced, but was provided with an +annuity that was preposterous in its lavish proportions. +It amounted to over half a million dollars a year. +I once knew a man who, on getting home from the club +<a name="II_Page_301"></a>at two o'clock in the morning, was reproached by his +wife for his shocking condition. He promptly threw the +lady over the banisters. Next day he purchased her a +diamond necklace at the cost of a year's salary, but she +could not wear it out in society for a month on account +of her black eye.</p> + +<p>Napoleon divorced Josephine that he might be the +father of a line of kings. When he abdicated in Eighteen +Hundred Fifteen, he declared his son, the child of Marie +Louise, "Napoleon the Second, Emperor of France," +and the world laughed. The son died before he had +fairly reached manhood's estate. Napoleon the Third, +son of Hortense, Queen of Holland, the grandson of +Josephine, reigned long and well as Emperor of France. +The Prince Imperial—a noble youth—great-grandson +of Josephine, was killed in Africa while fighting the +battle of the nation that undid Napoleon.</p> + +<p>Josephine was a parent of kings: Napoleon was not.</p> + +<p>When Bonaparte was banished to Elba, and Marie +Louise was nowhere to be seen, Josephine wrote to him +words of consolation, offering to share his exile.</p> + +<p>She died not long after—on the Second of June, +Eighteen Hundred Fourteen.</p> + +<p>After viewing that gaudy tomb at the Invalides, and +thinking of the treasure in tears and broken hearts +that it took to build it, it will rest you to go to the simple +village church at Ruel, a half-hour's ride from the Arc de +Triomphe, where sleeps Josephine, Empress of France. +<a name="II_Page_302"></a><a name="II_Page_303"></a></p> + + +<hr class="full" /> +<p><a name="MARY_W_SHELLEY"></a></p><h2>MARY W. SHELLEY</h2> +<p><a name="II_Page_304"></a></p> +<div class="blkquot"><p>Shelley, beloved! the year has a new name from any +thou knowest. When Spring arrives, leaves that you +never saw will shadow the ground, and flowers you never +beheld will star it, and the grass will be of another +growth. Thy name is added to the list which makes the +earth bold in her age, and proud of what has been. Time, +with slow, but unwearied feet, guides her to the goal +that thou hast reached; and I, her unhappy child, am +advanced still nearer the hour when my earthly dress +shall repose near thine, beneath the tomb of Cestius.<br /> +<span style='margin-left: 15em;'>—<i>Journal of Mary Shelley</i></span></p></div> + +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_305"></a></p> +<p class="ctr"><a href="./images/ljv2-12.jpg"><img src="./images/ljv2-12_th.jpg" alt="MARY SHELLEY" /></a></p><p class="ctr">MARY SHELLEY</p> +<p><br /><a name="II_Page_306"></a><a name="II_Page_307"></a></p> + +<p>When Emerson borrowed from Wordsworth +that fine phrase about plain +living and high thinking, no one was +more astonished than he that Whitman +and Thoreau should take him +at his word. He was decidedly +curious about their experiment. But +he kept a safe distance between +himself and the shirt-sleeved Walt; and as for Henry +Thoreau—bless me! Emerson regarded him only as a +fine savage, and told him so. Of course, Emerson loved +solitude, but it was the solitude of a library or an +orchard, and not the solitude of plain or wilderness. +Emerson looked upon Beautiful Truth as an honored +guest. He adored her, but it was with the adoration of +the intellect. He never got her tag in jolly chase of +comradery; nor did he converse with her, soft and low, +when only the moon peeked out from behind the silvery +clouds, and the nightingale listened. He never laid himself +open to damages. And when he threw a bit of a +bomb into Harvard Divinity School it was the shrewdest +bid for fame that ever preacher made.</p> + +<p>I said "shrewd"—that's the word.</p> + +<p>Emerson had the instincts of Connecticut—that peculiar +development of men who have eked out existence on +a rocky soil, banking their houses against grim Winter +<a name="II_Page_308"></a>or grimmer savage foes. With this Yankee shrewdness +went a subtle and sweeping imagination, and a fine +appreciation of the excellent things that men have said +and done. But he was never so foolish as to imitate the +heroic—he, simply admired it from afar. He advised +others to work their poetry up into life, but he did not +do so himself. He never cast the bantling on the rocks, +nor caused him to be suckled with the she-wolf's teat. +He admired "abolition" from a distance. When he +went away from home it was always with a return +ticket. He has summed up Friendship in an essay as no +other man ever has, and yet there was a self-protective +aloofness in his friendship that made icicles gather, as +George William Curtis has explained.</p> + +<p>In no relation of his life was there a complete abandon. +His "Essay on Self-Reliance" is beef, iron and wine, +and "Works and Days" is a tonic for tired men; and +yet I know that, in spite of all his pretty talk about +living near Nature's heart, he never ventured into the +woods outside of hallooing distance from the house. +He could neither ride a horse, shoot, nor sail a boat—and +being well aware of it, never tried. All his farming +was done by proxy; and when he writes to Carlyle late +in life, explaining how he is worth forty thousand dollars, +well secured by first mortgages, he makes clear one-half +of his ambition.</p> + +<p>And yet, I call him master, and will match my admiration +for him 'gainst that of any other, six nights and +<a name="II_Page_309"></a>days together. But I summon him here only to contrast +his character with that of another—another who, like +himself, was twice married.</p> + +<p>In his "Essay on Love" Emerson reveals just an +average sophomore insight; and in his work I do not +find a mention or a trace of influence exercised by either +of the two women he wedded, nor by any other woman. +Shelley was what he was through the influence of the +two women he married.</p> + +<p>Shelley wrecked the life of one of these women. She +found surcease of sorrow in death; and when her body +was found in the Serpentine he had a premonition that +the hungry waves were waiting for him, too. But before +her death and through her death, she pressed home to +him the bitterest sorrow that man can ever know: the +combined knowledge that he has mortally injured a +human soul and the sense of helplessness to minister +to its needs. Harriet Westbrook said to Shelley, drink +ye all of it. And could he speak now he would say that +the bitterness of the potion was a formative influence as +potent as that of the gentle ministrations of Mary +Wollstonecraft, who broke over his head the precious +vase of her heart's love and wiped his feet with the +hairs of her head.</p> + +<p>In the poetic sweetness, gentleness, lovableness and +beauty of their natures, Emerson and Shelley were very +similar. In a like environment they would have done +the same things. A pioneer ancestry with its struggle +<a name="II_Page_310"></a>for material existence would have given Shelley caution; +and a noble patronymic, fostered by the State, lax in +its discipline, would have made Emerson toss discretion +to the winds.</p> + +<p>Emerson and Shelley were both apostles of the good, +the true and the beautiful. One of them rests at Sleepy +Hollow, his grave marked by a great rough-hewn +boulder, while overhead the winds sigh a requiem +through the pines. The ashes of the other were laid +beneath the moss-grown wall of the Eternal City, and +the creeping vines and flowers, as if jealous of the white, +carven marble, snuggle close over the spot with their +leaves and petals.</p> + +<p>Yet both of these men achieved immortality, for their +thoughts live again in the thoughts of the race, and their +hopes and their aspirations mingle and are one with the +men and women of earth who think and feel and dream.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_311"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>It was Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin who +awoke in Shelley such a burst of song that +men yet listen to its cadence. It was she who +gave his soul wings: her gentle spirit blending +with his made music that has enriched the world. +Without her he was fast beating out his life against the +bars of unkind condition, but together they worked and +sang. All his lines were recited to her, all were weighed +in the critical balances of her woman's judgment. She +it was who first wrote it out, and then gave it back. +Together they revised; and after he had passed on, she +it was who collected the scattered leaves, added the +final word, and gave us the book we call "Shelley's +Poems." Perhaps we might call all poetry the child of +parents, but with Shelley's poems this is literally true. +Mary Shelley delighted in the name Wollstonecraft. It +was her mother's name; and was not Mary Wollstonecraft +the foremost intellectual woman of her day—a +woman of purpose, forceful yet gentle, appreciative, +kind?</p> + +<p>Mary Wollstonecraft was born in Seventeen Hundred +Fifty-nine; and tiring of the dull monotony of a country +town went up to London when yet a child and fought +the world alone. By her own efforts she grew learned; +she had all science, all philosophy, all history at her +fingers' ends. She became able to speak several languages, +and by her pen an income was secured that was +not only sufficient for herself, but ministered to the +<a name="II_Page_312"></a>needs of an aged father and mother and sisters as well.</p> + +<p>Mary Wollstonecraft wrote one great book (which is +all any one can write): "A Vindication of the Rights of +Woman." It sums up all that has since been written on +the subject. Like an essay by Herbert Spencer, it +views the matter from every side, anticipates every +objection—exhausts the subject. The literary style of +Mary Wollstonecraft's book is Johnsonese, but its +thought forms the base of all that has come after. It is +the great-great-grandmother of all woman's clubs and +these thousand efforts that women are now putting +forth along economic, artistic and social lines. But we +have nearly lost sight of Mary Wollstonecraft. Can +you name me, please, your father's grandmother? Aye, +I thought not; then tell me the name of the man who +is now Treasurer of the United States!</p> + +<p>And so you see we do not know much about other +people, after all. But Mary Wollstonecraft pushed the +question of woman's freedom to its farthest limit; I +told you that she exhausted the subject. She prophesied +a day when woman would have economic freedom—that +is, be allowed to work at any craft or trade for +which her genius fitted her and receive a proper recompense. +Woman would also have social freedom: the +right to come and go alone—the privilege of walking +upon the street without the company of a man—the +right to study and observe. Next, woman would have +political freedom: the right to record her choice in +<a name="II_Page_313"></a>matters of lawmaking. And last, she would yet have +sex freedom: the right to bestow her love without +prying police and blundering law interfering in the +delicate relations of married life.</p> + +<p>To make herself understood. Mary Wollstonecraft +explained that society was tainted with the thought +that sex was unclean; but she held high the ideal that +this would yet pass away, and that the idea of holding +one's mate by statute law would become abhorrent to +all good men and women. She declared that the assumption +that law could join a man and a woman in holy +wedlock was preposterous, and that the caging of one +person by another for a lifetime was essentially barbaric. +Only the love that is free and spontaneous and that +holds its own by the purity, the sweetness, the tenderness +and the gentleness of its life is divine. And further, +she declared it her belief that when a man had found +his true mate such a union would be for life—it could +not be otherwise. And the man holding his mate by the +excellence that was in him, instead of by the aid of the +law, would be placed, loverlike, on his good behavior, +and be a stronger and manlier being. Such a union, +freed from the petty, spying and tyrannical restraints +of present usage, must come ere the race could far +advance.</p> + +<p>Mary Wollstonecraft's book created a sensation. It was +widely read and hotly denounced. A few upheld it: +among these was William Godwin. But the air was so +<a name="II_Page_314"></a>full of taunt and threat that Miss Wollstonecraft +thought best to leave England for a time. She journeyed +to Paris, and there wrote and translated for certain +English publishers. In Paris she met Gilbert Imlay, an +American, seemingly of very much the same temperament +as herself. She was thirty-six, he was somewhat +younger. They began housekeeping on the ideal basis. +In a year a daughter was born to them. When this baby +was three months old, Imlay disappeared, leaving Mary +penniless and friendless.</p> + +<p>It was a terrible blow to this trusting and gentle woman. +But after a good cry or two, philosophy came to her +rescue and she decided that to be deserted by a man +who did not love her was really not so bad as to be +tied to him for life. She earned a little money and in a +short time started back for England with her babe and +scanty luggage—sorrowful, yet brave and unsubdued. +She might have left her babe behind, but she scorned +the thought. She would be honest and conceal nothing. +Right must win.</p> + +<p>Now, I am told that an unmarried woman with a babe +at her breast is not received in England into the best +society. The tale of Mary's misfortune had preceded +her, and literary London laughed a hoarse, guttural +guffaw, and society tittered to think how this woman +who had written so smartly had tried some of her own +medicine and found it bitter. Publishers no longer +wanted her work, old friends failed to recognize her, +<a name="II_Page_315"></a>and one man to whom she applied for work brought a +rebuke upon his head, that lasted him for years.</p> + +<p>Godwin, philosopher, idealist, enthusiast and reformer, +who made it his rule to seek out those in trouble, found +her and told a needless lie by declaring he had been +commissioned by a certain nameless publisher to get +her to write certain articles about this and that. Then +he emptied his pockets of all the small change he had, +as an advance payment, and he hadn't very much, +and started out to find the publisher who would buy the +prospective "hot stuff." Fortunately he succeeded.</p> + +<p>After a few weeks, Mr. Godwin, bachelor, aged forty, +found himself very much in love with Mary Wollstonecraft +and her baby. Her absolute purity of purpose, her +frankness, honesty and high ideals surpassed anything +he had ever dreamed of finding incarnated in woman. +He became her sincere lover; and she, the discarded, +the forsaken, reciprocated; for it seems that the tendrils +of affection, ruthlessly uprooted, cling to the first object +that presents itself.</p> + +<p>And so they were married; yes, these two who had so +generously repudiated the marriage-tie were married +March Twenty-ninth, Seventeen Hundred Ninety-seven, +at Old Saint Pancras Church, for they had +come to the sane conclusion that to affront society +was not wise.</p> + +<p>On August Thirtieth, in the year Seventeen Hundred +Ninety-seven, was born to them a daughter. Then the +<a name="II_Page_316"></a>mother died—died did brave Mary Wollstonecraft, and +left behind a girl baby one week old. And it was this +baby, grown to womanhood, who became Mary Wollstonecraft +Shelley.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_317"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>William Godwin wrote one great book: +"Political Justice." It is a work so high and +noble in its outlook that only a Utopia could +ever realize its ideals. When men are everywhere +willing to give to other men all the rights they +demand for themselves, and co-operation takes the +place of competition, then will Godwin's philosophy be +not too great and good for daily food. Among the many +who read his book and thought they saw in it the portent +of a diviner day was one Percy Bysshe Shelley.</p> + +<p>And so it came to pass that about the year Eighteen +Hundred Thirteen, this Percy Bysshe Shelley called +on Godwin, who was living in a rusty, musty tenement +in Somerstown. The young man was twenty: tall and +slender, with as handsome a face as was ever given to +mortal. The face was pale as marble: the features almost +feminine in their delicacy: thin lips, straight nose, good +teeth, abundant, curling hair, and eyes so dreamy and +sorrowful that women on the street would often turn +and follow the "angel soul garbed in human form."</p> + +<p>This man Shelley was sick at heart, bereft, perplexed, in +sore straits, and to whom should he turn for advice in +this time of undoing but to Godwin, the philosopher! +Besides, Godwin had been the husband of Mary Wollstonecraft, +and the splendid precepts of these two had +nourished into being all the latent excellence of the youth. +Yes, he would go to Godwin, the Plato of England!</p> + +<p>And so he went to Godwin.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_318"></a></p> +<p>Now, this young man Shelley was of noble blood. His +grandfather was Sir Bysshe Shelley, Bart., and worth +near three hundred thousand pounds, all of which +would some day come to our pale-faced youth. But the +youth was a republican—he believed in the brotherhood +of man. He longed to benefit his fellows, to lift +them out of the bondage of fear, and sin, and ignorance. +After reading Hume, and Godwin, and Wollstonecraft, +he had decided that Christianity as defined by the +Church of England was a failure: it was only an organized +fetish, kept in place by the State, and devoid of +all that thrills to noble thinking and noble doing.</p> + +<p>And so young Shelley at Oxford had written a pamphlet +to this end, explaining the matter to the world.</p> + +<p>A copy being sent to the headmaster of the school, +young Shelley was hustled off the premises in short +order, and a note was sent to his father requesting that +the lad be well flogged and kept several goodly leagues +from Oxford.</p> + +<p>Shelley the elder was furious that his son should so +disgrace the family name, and demanded he should +write another pamphlet supporting the Church of +England and recanting all the heresy he had uttered. +Young Percy replied that conscience would not admit +of his doing this. The father said conscience be blanked: +and further used almost the same words that were used +by Professor Jowett some years later to a certain +skeptical youth.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_319"></a></p> +<p>Professor Jowett sent for the youth and said, "Young +man, I am told that you say you can not find God. Is +this true?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir," said the youth.</p> + +<p>"Well, you will please find Him before eight o'clock +tonight or get out of this college."</p> + +<p>Shelley was not allowed to return home, and moreover +his financial allowance was cut off entirely.</p> + +<p>And so he wandered up to London and chewed the cud +of bitter fancy, resolved to starve before he would +abate one jot or tittle of what he thought was truth. +And he might have starved had not his sisters sent him +scanty sums of money from time to time. The messenger +who carried the money to him was a young girl by the +name of Harriet Westbrook, round and smooth and +pink and sixteen. Percy was nineteen. Harriet was the +daughter of an innkeeper and did not get along very +well at home. She told Percy about it, and of course she +knew his troubles, and so they talked about it over the +gate, and mutually condoled with each other.</p> + +<p>Soon after this Harriet had a fresh quarrel with her +folks; and with the tears yet on her pretty lashes ran +straight to Shelley's lodging and throwing herself into +his arms proposed that they cease to fight unkind Fate, +and run away together and be happy ever afterward.</p> + +<p>And so they ran away.</p> + +<p>Shelley's father instanced this as another proof of +depravity and said, "Let 'em go!" The couple went +<a name="II_Page_320"></a>to Scotland. In a few months they came back from +Scotland, because no one can really be happy away +from home. Besides they were out of money—and +neither one had ever earned any money—and as the +Westbrooks were willing to forgive, even if the Shelleys +were not, they came back. But the Westbrooks were +only willing to forgive in consideration of Percy and +Harriet being properly married by a clergyman of the +Church of England. Now, Shelley had not wavered in +his Godwin-Wollstonecraft theories, but he was chivalrous +and Harriet was tearful, and so he gracefully +waived all private considerations and they were duly +married. It was a quiet wedding.</p> + +<p>In a short time a baby was born.</p> + +<p>Harriet was amiable, being healthy and having very +moderate sensibilities. She had no opinion on any subject, +and in no degree sympathized with Shelley's wild +aspirations. She thought a title would be nice, and +urged that her husband make peace by renouncing his +"infidelity." Literature was silly business anyway, and +folks should do as other folks did. If they didn't, lawks-a-daisy! +there was trouble!!</p> + +<p>And so, with income cut off, banished from home, from +school, out of employment, with a wife who had no +sympathy with him—who could not understand him—whose +pitiful weakness stung him and wrung him, he +thought of Godwin, the philosopher: for at the last +philosophy is the cure for all our ills.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_321"></a></p> +<p>Godwin was glad to see Shelley—Godwin was glad to +see any one. Godwin was fifty-five, bald, had a Socratic +forehead, was smooth-cheeked, shabby and genteel. +Yes, Godwin was the author of "Political Justice"—but +that was written quite a while before, twenty years!</p> + +<p>One of the girls was sent out for a quart of half-and-half, +and the pale visitor cast his eyes around this +family room, which served for dining-room, library and +parlor. Godwin had married again—Shelley had heard +that, but he was a bit shocked to find that the great +man who was once mate to Mary Wollstonecraft had +married a shrew. The sound of her high-pitched voice +convinced the visitor at once that she was a very +commonplace person.</p> + +<p>There were three girls and a boy in the room, busy at +sewing or reading. None of them was introduced, but +the air of the place was Bohemian, and the conversation +soon became general. All talked except one of the girls: +she sat reading, and several times when the young man +glanced over her way she was looking at him. Shelley +stayed an hour, spending a very pleasant time, but as +he had no opportunity of stating his case to the philosopher +he made an engagement to call again.</p> + +<p>As he groped his way downstairs and walked homewards +he mused. The widow Clairmont, whom Godwin +had married, was a worldling, that was sure; her daughter +Jane was good-looking and clever, but both she and +Charles, the boy, were the children of their mother—he +<a name="II_Page_322"></a>had picked them out intuitively. The little young +woman with brown eyes and merry ways was Fanny +Godwin, the first child of Mary Wollstonecraft and +adopted daughter of Godwin. The tall slender girl who +was so very quiet was the daughter of Godwin and +Mary Wollstonecraft.</p> + +<p>"Ye gods, what a pedigree!" said Shelley.</p> + +<p>The young man called again, and after explaining his +situation was advised to go back home and make peace +with his wife and father at any cost of personal intellectual +qualms. Philosophy was all right; but life was +one thing and philosophy another. Live with Harriet +as he had vowed to do—love was a good deal glamour, +anyway; write poetry, of course, if he felt like it, but +keep it to himself. The world was not to be moved by +enthusiastic youth. Godwin had tried it—he had been +an enthusiastic youth himself, and that was why he +now lived in Somerstown instead of Piccadilly. Move +in the line of least resistance.</p> + +<p>Shelley went away shocked and stunned. Going by Old +Saint Pancras Church he turned back to step in a +moment and recover his scattered senses. He walked +through the cool, dim, old building, out into the churchyard, +where toppling moss-covered gray slabs marked +the resting-places of the sleeping dead. All seemed so +cool and quiet and calm there! The dead are at rest: they +have no vexatious problems.</p> + +<p>A few people were moving about, carelessly reading the +<a name="II_Page_323"></a>inscriptions. The young man unconsciously followed +their example; he passed slowly along one of the walks, +scanning the stones. His eye fell upon the word "Wollstonecraft," +marked on a plain little slate slab. He +paused and, leaning over removed his hat and read, +and then glancing just beyond, saw seated on the grass—the +tall girl. She held a book in her hands, but she +was looking at him very soberly. Their eyes met, and +they smiled just a little. The young man sat down on +the turf on the other side of the grave from the girl, +and they talked of the woman by whose dust they +watched: and the young man found that the tall girl +was an Ancestor-Worshiper and a mystic, and moreover +had a flight of soul that held him in awe. Besides, in +form and feature, she was rarely beautiful. She was +quiet, but she could talk.</p> + +<p>The next day, as Percy Shelley strolled through the +churchyard of Old Saint Pancras, the tall girl was there +again with her book, in the same place.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_324"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>When Shelley made that first call at the Godwins +he was twenty. The three girls he met +were fifteen, sixteen and seventeen, respectively. +Mary being the youngest in years, but +the most mature, she would have easily passed for the +oldest. Now, all three of these girls were dazzled by the +beauty and grace and intellect of the strange, pale-faced +visitor.</p> + +<p>He came to the house again and again during the next +few months. All the girls loved him violently, for that's +the way girls under eighteen often love. Mr. Godwin +soon discovered the fact that all his girls loved Shelley. +They lost appetite, and were alternately in chills of fear +and fevers of ecstacy. Mr. Godwin, being a kind man +and a good, took occasion to explain to them that +Mr. Shelley was a married man, and although it was +true he did not live on good terms with his wife, yet +she was his lawful wife, and marriage was a sacred +obligation: of course, pure philosophy or poetic justice +took a different view, but in society the marriage-tie +must not be held lightly. In short, Shelley was married +and that was all there was about it.</p> + +<p>Shelley still continued to call, coming via Saint Pancras +Church. In a few months, Mary confided to Jane that +she and Shelley were about to elope, and Jane must +make peace and explain matters after they were gone.</p> + +<p>Jane cried and declared she would go, too—she would +go or die: she would go as servant, scullion—anything, +<a name="II_Page_325"></a>but go she would. Shelley was consulted, and to prevent +tragedy consented to Jane going as maid to Mary, his +well-beloved.</p> + +<p>So the trinity eloped. It being Shelley's second elopement, +he took the matter a little more coolly than did +the girls, who had never eloped before. Having reached +Dover, and while waiting at a hotel for the boat, the +landlord suddenly appeared and breathlessly explained +to Shelley, "A fat woman has just arrived and swears +that you have run away with her girls!"</p> + +<p>It was Mrs. Godwin.</p> + +<p>The party got out by the back way and hired a +small boat to take them to Calais. They embarked in +a storm, and after beating about all night, came in +sight of France the next morning as the sun arose.</p> + +<p>Godwin was very much grieved and shocked to think +that Shelley had broken in upon established order and +done this thing. But Shelley had read Godwin's book +and simply taken the philosopher at his word: "The +impulses of the human heart are just and right; they +are greater than law, and must be respected."</p> + +<p>The runaways seemed to have had a jolly time in +France as long as their money lasted. They bought a +mule to carry their luggage, and walked. Jane's feet +blistered, however, and they seated her upon the luggage +upon the mule, and as the author of "Queen Mab" +led the patient beast, Mary with a switch followed +behind. After some days Shelley sprained his ankle, +<a name="II_Page_326"></a>and then it was his turn to ride while Mary led the +mule and Jane trudged after.</p> + +<p>Thus they journeyed for six weeks, writing poetry, +discussing philosophy; loving, wild, free and careless, +until they came to Switzerland. One morning they +counted their money and found they had just enough +to take them to England.</p> + +<p>Arriving in London the Godwins were not inclined to +take them back, and society in general looked upon +them with complete disfavor.</p> + +<p>Shelley's father was now fully convinced of his son's +depravity, but doled out enough money to prevent +actual starvation. Shelley began to perceive that any +man who sets himself against the established order—the +order that the world has been thousands of years +in building up—will be ground into the dust. The old +world may be wrong, but it can not be righted in a day, +and so long as a man chooses to live in society he must +conform, in the main, to society usages. These old ways +that have done good service all the years can not be +replaced by the instantaneous process. If changed at +all they must change as man changes, and man must +change first. It is man that must be reformed, not +custom.</p> + +<p>Shelley and Mary Godwin were mates if ever such +existed. In a year Mary had developed from a child +into splendid womanhood—a beautiful, superior, earnest +woman. By her own efforts, of course aided by +<a name="II_Page_327"></a>Shelley (for they were partners in everything), she +became versed in the classics and delved deeply into +the literature of a time long past. Unlike her mother, +Mary Shelley could do no great work alone. The sensitiveness +and the delicacy of her nature precluded that +self-reliant egoism which can create. She wrote one +book, "Frankenstein," which in point of prophetic +and allegorical suggestion stamps the work as classic: +but it was written under the immediate spell of Shelley's +presence. Shelley also could not work alone, and without +her the world's disfavor must have whipped him +into insanity and death.</p> + +<p>As it was they sought peace in love and Italy, living +near Lord Byron in great intimacy, and befriended by +him in many ways.</p> + +<p>But peace was not for Shelley. Calamity was at the +door. He could never forget how he had lifted Harriet +Westbrook into a position for which she was not fitted +and then left her to flounder alone. And when word +came that Harriet had drowned herself, his cup of woe +was full. Shortly before this, Fanny Godwin had gone +away with great deliberation, leaving an empty laudanum-bottle +to tell the tale.</p> + +<p>On December Thirtieth, Eighteen Hundred Sixteen, +Shelley and Mary Godwin were married at Saint +Mildred's Church, London. Both had now fully concluded +with Godwin that man owes a duty to the +unborn and to society, and that to place one's self +<a name="II_Page_328"></a>in opposition to custom is at least very bad policy. +But although Shelley had made society tardy amends, +society would not forgive; and in a long legal fight to +obtain possession of his children, Ianthe and Charles, +of whom Harriet was the mother, the Court of Chancery +decided against Shelley, on the grounds that he was +"an unfit person, being an atheist and a republican."</p> + +<p>About this time was born little Allegra, "the Dawn," +child of Lord Byron and Jane Clairmont. Then afterwards +came bickerings with Byron and threats of a +duel and all that.</p> + +<p>Finally there was a struggle between Byron and Miss +Clairmont for the child: but death solved the issue and +the beautiful little girl passed beyond the reach of either.</p> + +<p>And so we find Shelley's heart wrung by the sorrows +of others and by his own; and when Mary and he laid +away in death their bright boy William and their baby +girl Clara, the Fates seemed to have done their worst. +But man seems to have a certain capacity for pain, and +beyond this even God can not go.</p> + +<p>Shelley struggled on and with Mary's help continued +to write.</p> + +<p>Another babe was born and the world grew brighter. +They were now on the shores of the Mediterranean +with a little group of enthusiasts who thought and felt +as they did. For the first time they realized that, after +all, they were a part of the world, and linked to the +human race—not set off alone, despised, forsaken.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_329"></a></p> +<p>Then to join their little community were coming Leigh +Hunt and his wife—Leigh Hunt, who had lain in prison +for the right of free thought and free speech. What a joy +to greet and welcome such a man to their home!</p> + +<p>And so Shelley, blithe and joyous, sailed away to meet +his friend. But Shelley never came back to his wife and +baby boy. A few days after, the waves cast his body up +on the beach, and you know the rest—how the faithful +Trelawney and Byron made the funeral-pyre and reduced +the body to ashes.</p> + +<p>Mary was twenty-six years old then. She continued to +live—to live only in the memory of her Shelley and +with the firm thought in her mind that they would be +united again. She seemed to exist but to care for her +boy, and to do as best she could the work that Shelley +had left undone.</p> + +<p>The boy grew into a fine youth, and was as devoted to +his mother as she was to him. The title of the estate +with all its vast wealth descended to him, and together +she lived out her days, tenderly cared for to the last, +dying in her son's arms, aged fifty-four.</p> + +<p>She has told us that the first sixteen years of her life +were spent in waiting for her Shelley, eight years she +lived with him in divinest companionship, and twenty-eight +years she waited and worked to prepare herself +to rejoin him.</p> +<p><a name="II_Page_330"></a></p> +<hr /> + +<p>SO HERE ENDETH "LITTLE JOURNEYS TO THE HOMES +OF FAMOUS WOMEN," BEING VOLUME TWO OF THE +SERIES, AS WRITTEN BY ELBERT HUBBARD: EDITED +AND ARRANGED BY FRED BANN; BORDERS AND +INITIALS BY ROYCROFT ARTISTS AND PRODUCED BY +THE ROYCROFTERS, AT THEIR SHOPS, WHICH ARE IN +EAST AURORA, ERIE COUNTY, NEW YORK, MCMXXII</p> + +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13778 ***</div> +</body> +</html> |