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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature
+and Science, Vol. XXVI., December, 1880., by Various
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XXVI., December, 1880.
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: June 24, 2005 [EBook #16124]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LIPPINCOTT'S MAGAZINE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Janet Blenkinship and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1880, by J.B.
+LIPPINCOTT & Co., in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at
+Washington.
+
+
+LIPPINCOTT'S MAGAZINE
+
+OF
+
+_POPULAR LITERATURE AND SCIENCE_.
+
+DECEMBER, 1880.
+
+
+
+
+AN HISTORICAL ROCKY-MOUNTAIN OUTPOST.
+
+[Illustration: GOING TO THE JUDGE'S.]
+
+
+The day might have graced the month of June, so balmy was the air, so
+warmly shone the sun from a cloudless sky. But the snow-covered
+mountain-range whose base we were skirting, the leafless cottonwoods
+fringing the Fontaine qui Bouille and the sombre plains that stretched
+away to the eastern horizon told a different story. It was on one of
+those days elsewhere so rare, but so common in Colorado, when a summer
+sky smiles upon a wintry landscape, that we entered a town in whose
+history are to be found greater contrasts than even those afforded by
+earth and sky. Today Pueblo is a thriving and aggressive city, peopled
+with its quota of that great pioneer army which is carrying civilization
+over the length and breadth of our land. Three hundred and forty years
+ago, as legend hath it, Coronado here stopped his northward march, and
+on the spot where Pueblo now stands established the farthermost outpost
+of New Spain.
+
+The average traveller who journeys westward from the Missouri River
+imagines that he is coming to a new country. "The New West" is a
+favorite term with the agents of land--companies and the writers of
+alluring railway-guides. These enterprising advocates sometimes indulge
+in flights of rhetoric that scorn the trammels of grammar and
+dictionary. Witness the following impassioned utterances concerning the
+lands of a certain Western railroad: "They comprise a section of country
+whose possibilities are simply _infinitesimal_, and whose developments
+will be revealed in glorious realization through the horoscope of the
+near future." This verbal architect builded wiser than he knew, for what
+more fitting word could the imagination suggest wherewith to crown the
+possibilities of alkali wastes and barren, sun-scorched plains?
+
+A considerable part of the New West of to-day was explored by the
+Spaniards more than three centuries ago. Before the English had landed
+at Plymouth Rock or made a settlement at Jamestown they had penetrated
+to the Rocky Mountains and given to peak and river their characteristic
+names. Southern Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona have been the theatres
+wherein were enacted deeds of daring and bravery perhaps unsurpassed by
+any people and any age; and that, too, centuries before they became a
+part of our American Union. The whole country is strewn over with the
+ruins of a civilization in comparison with which our own of to-day seems
+feeble. And he who journeys across the Plains till he reaches the Sangre
+del Cristo Mountains or the blue Sierra Mojadas enters a land made
+famous by the exploits of Coronado, De Vaca and perhaps of the great
+Montezuma himself.
+
+In the year 1540, Francisco Vasquez de Coronado was sent by the Spanish
+viceroy of Mexico to explore the regions to the north. Those
+mountain-peaks, dim and shadowy in the distance and seeming to recede as
+they were approached, had ever been an alluring sight to the
+gold-seeking Spaniards. But the coveted treasure did not reveal itself
+to their cursory search; and though they doubtless pushed as far north
+as the Arkansas River, they returned to the capital from what they
+considered an unsuccessful expedition. The way was opened, however, and
+in 1595 the Spaniards came to what is now the Territory of New Mexico
+and founded the city of Santa Fé. They had found, for the most part, a
+settled country, the inhabitants living in densely-populated villages,
+or _pueblos_, and evincing a rather high degree of civilization. Their
+dwellings of mud bricks, or _adobes_, were all built upon a single plan,
+and consisted of a square or rectangular fort-like structure enclosing
+an open space. Herds of sheep and goats grazed upon the hillsides, while
+the bottom-lands were planted with corn and barley. Thus lived and
+flourished the Pueblo Indians, a race the origin of which lies in
+obscurity, but connected with which are many legends of absorbing
+interest. All their traditions point to Montezuma as the founder and
+leader of their race, and likewise to their descent from the Aztecs. But
+their glory departed with the coming of Cortez, and their Spanish
+conquerors treated them as an inferior race. Revolting against their
+oppressors in 1680, they were reconquered thirteen years later, though
+subsequently allowed greater liberty. By the treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo
+in 1848 they became citizens of the United States. From one extreme of
+government to another has drifted this remnant of a stately race, till
+now at last it finds itself safely sheltered in the arms of our great
+republic.
+
+Such is the romantic history of a portion of our so-called "New West;"
+but it was with a view of ascertaining some facts concerning occurrences
+of more recent date, as well as of seeing some of the actors therein,
+that we paid a visit to Pueblo. We found it a rather odd mixture of the
+old and the new, the adobe and the "dug-out" looking across the street
+upon the imposing structure of brick or the often gaudily-painted frame
+cottage. It looked as though it might have been indulging in a Rip Van
+Winkle sleep, except that the duration might have been a century or two.
+High _mesas_ with gracefully rounded and convoluted sides almost
+entirely surround it, and rising above their floor-like tops, and in
+fine contrast with their sombre brown tints, appear the blue outlines of
+the distant mountains. Pike's Peak, fifty miles to the north, and the
+Spanish Peaks, the Wawatoyas, ninety to the south, are sublime objects
+of which the eye never grows weary; while the Sierra Mojadas bank up the
+western horizon with a frowning mountain-wall. A notch in the distant
+range, forty miles to the north-west, indicates the place where the
+Arkansas River breaks through the barriers that would impede its seaward
+course, forming perhaps the grandest cañon to be found in all this
+mighty mountain-wilderness. Truly a striking picture was that on which
+Coronado and his mail-clad warriors gazed.
+
+[Illustration: GENERAL VIEW OF PUEBLO, COLORADO, LOOKING
+NORTH-WEST--PIKE'S PEAK IN THE DISTANCE.]
+
+A motley throng compose the inhabitants of Pueblo. The dark-hued
+Mexican, his round face shaded by the inevitable _sombrero_, figures
+conspicuously. But if you value his favor and your future peace of mind
+have a care how you allude to his nationality. He is a Spaniard, you
+should know--a pure Castilian whose ancestor was some old hidalgo with
+as long an array of names and titles as has the Czar of All the Russias
+himself. Though he now lives in a forsaken-looking adobe hut with dirt
+floor and roof of sticks and turf that serves only to defile the
+raindrops that trickle through its many gaps--though his sallow wife
+and ill-favored children huddle round him or cook the scanty meal upon
+the mud oven in a corner of the room--he is yet a Spaniard, and glories
+in it. The tall, raw-boned man, straight as a young cottonwood, whose
+long black hair floats out from beneath his hat as he rides into town
+from his ranch down the river, may be a half-breed who has figured in a
+score of Indian fights, and enjoys the proud distinction of having
+killed his man. There is the hungry-looking prospector, waiting with
+ill-disguised impatience till he can "cross the Range" and follow again,
+as he has done year after year, the exciting chase after the
+ever-receding mirage--the visions of fabulous wealth always going to be,
+but never quite, attained. The time-honored symbol of Hope must, we
+think, give place to a more forcible representation furnished by the
+peculiar genius of our times; for is not our modern Rocky-Mountain
+prospector the complete embodiment of that sublime grace? His is a hope
+that even reverses the proverb, for no amount of deferring is able to
+make him heartsick, but rather seems to spur him on to more earnest
+endeavor. Has he toiled the summer long, endured every privation,
+encountered inconceivable perils, only to find himself at its close
+poorer than when he began? Reluctantly he leaves the mountain-side where
+the drifting snows have begun to gather, but seemingly as light-hearted
+as when he came, for his unshaken hope bridges the winter and feeds upon
+the limitless possibilities of the future. Full of wonderful stories are
+these same hope-sustained prospectors--tales that are bright with the
+glitter of silver and gold. Not a single one of them who has not
+discovered "leads" of wonderful richness or "placers" where the sands
+were yellow with gold; but by some mischance the prize always slipped
+out of his grasp, and left him poor in all but hope. And in truth so
+fascinating becomes the occupation that men who in other respects seem
+cool and phlegmatic will desert an almost assured success to join the
+horde rushing toward some unexplored district, impelled by the
+ever-flying rumors of untold wealth just brought to light. The golden
+goal this season is the great Gunnison Country; and soon trains of
+_burros_, packed with pick and shovel, tent and provisions, will be
+climbing the Range.
+
+Pueblo has likewise its business-men, its men of to-day, who manage its
+banks, who buy and sell and get gain as they might do in any
+well-ordered city, though, truth to tell, there are very few of them who
+do not sooner or later catch the prevailing infection--a part of whose
+assets is not represented by some "prospect" away up in the mountains or
+frisking about the Plains in herds of cattle and sheep. But perhaps the
+most curiously-original character in all the town is Judge Allen A.
+Bradford, of whose wonderful memory the following good story is told:
+Years ago he, with a party of officers, was at the house of Colonel
+Boone, down the river. While engaged in playing "pitch-trump," of which
+the judge was very fond--and in fact the only game of cards with which
+he was acquainted--a messenger rushed in announcing that a lady had
+fallen from her horse and was doubtless much injured. The players left
+their cards and ran to render assistance, and the game thus broken up
+was not resumed. Some two years later the same parties found themselves
+together again, and "pitch-trump" was proposed. To the astonishment of
+all, the judge informed them how the score stood when they had so
+hurriedly left the game, and with the utmost gravity insisted that it be
+continued from that point!
+
+On a bright sunny morning we sought out the judge's office, only to
+learn that he had not yet for the day exchanged the pleasures of rural
+life across the Fontaine for less romantic devotions at the shrine of
+the stern goddess. Later we were informed, upon what seemed credible
+authority, that upon the morning in question he was intending to sow
+oats. Though cold March still claimed the calendar, and hence such
+action on the part of the judge might seem like forcing the season, yet
+reflections upon his advanced years caused us to suppress the rising
+thought that perhaps some allusions to _wild_ oats might have been
+intended. Hence we looked forward to a rare treat--judicial dignity
+unbending itself in pastoral pursuits, as in the case of some Roman
+magistrate. "A little better'n a mile" was the answer to our
+interrogatory as to how far the judge's ranch might be from town; but
+having upon many former occasions taken the dimensions of a Colorado
+mile, we declined the suggestion to walk and sought some mode of
+conveyance. There chanced to be one right at hand, standing patiently by
+the wayside and presided over by an ancient colored gentleman. The coach
+had been a fine one in its day, but that was long since past, and now
+its dashboard, bent out at an angle of forty-five degrees, the faded
+trimmings and the rusty, stately occupant of the box formed a complete
+and harmonious picture of past grandeur seldom seen in the Far West. Two
+dubious-looking bronchos, a bay and a white, completed this unique
+equipage, in which we climbed the _mesa_ and then descended into the
+valley of the Fontaine. The sable driver was disposed to be
+communicative, and ventured various opinions upon current topics. He had
+been through the war, and came West fourteen years ago.
+
+"You have had quite an adventurous life," we remarked.
+
+"Why, sah," he returned, "if the history ob my life was wrote up it
+would be wuth ten thousand dollars."
+
+While regarding the valuation as somewhat high, we yet regretted our
+inability to profit by this unexpected though promising
+business-opportunity, and soon our attention was diverted by a glimpse
+of the judge's adobe, and that person himself standing by his carriage
+and awaiting our by no means rapid approach. He was about to go to town,
+and the oats were being sown by an individual of the same nationality as
+our driver, to whom the latter addressed such encouraging remarks as
+"Git right 'long dere now and sow dat oats. Don't stand roostin' on de
+fence all day, like as you had the consumshing. You look powerful weak.
+Guess mebbe I'd better come over dere and show you how."
+
+[Illustration: THE JUDGE.]
+
+Judge Bradford's career has been a chequered one, and it has fallen to
+his lot to dispense justice in places and under circumstances as
+various as could well be imagined. Born in Maine in 1815, he has lived
+successively in Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska and Colorado, and held almost
+every position open to the profession of the law. From the supreme
+bench of Colorado he was twice called to represent the Territory as
+delegate to Congress. In 1852, when he was judge of the Sixth Judicial
+District of Iowa, his eccentricities of character seem to have reached
+their full development. He exhibited that supreme disregard for dress
+and the various social amenities which not infrequently betray the
+superior mind. Never were his clothes known to fit, being invariably
+too large or too small, too short or too long. As to his hair, the
+external evidences were of a character to disprove the rumor that he
+had a brush and comb, while the stubby beard frequently remained
+undisturbed upon the judicial chin for several weeks at a time. The
+atrocious story is even told that once upon a time, when half shaven,
+he chanced to pick up a newspaper, became absorbed in its contents,
+forgot to complete his task, and went to court in this most absurdly
+unsymmetrical condition. But, despite these personal eccentricities, a
+more honest or capable judge has rarely been called upon to vindicate
+the majesty of the law. Upon the bench none could detect a flaw in his
+assumption of that dignity so intimately associated in all minds with
+the judiciary, but, the ermine once laid aside for the day, he was as
+jolly and mirthful as any of his frontier companions. Judge Bradford
+was no advocate, but by the action of a phenomenal memory his large
+head was stored so full of law as to emphasize, to those who knew him,
+the curious disproportion between its size and that of his legs and
+feet. These latter were of such peculiarly modest dimensions as to call
+to mind Goldsmith's well-known lines, though in this case we must, of
+necessity, picture admiring frontiersmen standing round while
+
+                   Still the wonder grew
+    That two small feet could carry all he knew.
+
+The judge's mind is of the encyclopædical type, and facts and dates are
+his especial "strong holt." But his countenance fails to ratify the
+inward structure when, pausing from a recital, he gazes upon your
+reception of the knowledge conveyed with a kindly smile--a most innocent
+smile that acts as a strong disposer to belief. Whether it has been a
+simple tale of the early days enlivened with recollections of
+pitch-trump and other social joys, or whether the performances of savage
+Indians and treacherous half-breeds send a chill through the listener,
+it is all the same: at its close the judge's amiable features wear the
+same belief-compelling smile. Under its influence we sit for hours while
+our entertainer ranges through the stores of his memory, pulling out
+much that is dust-covered and ancient, but quickly renovated for our use
+by his ready imagination and occasional wit. With a feeling akin to
+reverence we listen--a reverence due to one who had turned his face
+toward the Rocky Mountains before Colorado had a name, who had made the
+perilous journey across the great Plains behind a bull-team, and who
+has since been associated with everything concerned in the welfare and
+progress of what has now become this great Centennial State, toward
+which all eyes are turning. Not without its dark days to him has passed
+this pioneer life, and none were more filled with discouragement than
+those during which he represented the Territory in Congress. He
+describes the position as one of peculiar difficulty--on one hand the
+clamors of a people for aid and recognition in their rapid development
+of the country, while on the other, to meet them, he found himself a
+mere beggar at the doors of Congressional mercy and grace, voteless and
+hence powerless. Truly, in the light of his experience, the office of
+Territorial delegate is no sinecure.
+
+No one has more closely observed the course of events in the Far West
+than Judge Bradford, and his opinions on some disputed points are very
+decided and equally clear. Many have wondered that Pueblo, which had the
+advantage of first settlement, had long been a rendezvous of trappers
+and frontier traders, and lay upon the only road to the then so-called
+Pike's Peak mines, that _viâ_ the Arkansas Cañon--that this outpost,
+situated thus at the very gateway of the Far West, should have remained
+comparatively unimportant, while Denver grew with such astonishing
+rapidity. But, in the judge's opinion, it was the war of the rebellion
+that turned the scale in favor of the Queen City. The first emigrants
+had come through Missouri and up the Arkansas, their natural route, and
+as naturally conducting to Pueblo. But when Missouri and South-eastern
+Kansas became the scenes of guerrilla warfare the emigrant who would
+safely convey himself and family across the prairies must seek a more
+northern parallel. Hence, Pueblo received a check from which it is only
+now recovering, and Denver an impetus whose ultimate limits no man can
+foresee.
+
+Many strange things were done in the olden time. When the Plains Indians
+had gathered together their forces for the purpose of persistently
+harassing the settlement, the Mountain Utes, then the allies of the
+whites, offered their services to help repel the common enemy. Petitions
+went up to the governor and Legislature to accept the proffered
+services, but they were steadily refused. Our long-headed judge gives
+the reason: The administration was under the control of men who were
+feeding Uncle Sam's troops with corn at thirteen cents per pound, and
+other staples in proportion, and the Indian volunteers promised a too
+speedy ending of such a profitable warfare.
+
+Thus eventfully has passed the life of Judge Bradford. During his
+threescore-and-five years he has moved almost across a continent, never
+content unless he was on the frontier. Long may he live to ride in his
+light coverless wagon in the smile of bright Colorado sunshine, honored
+by all who know him, and affording his friends the enjoyment of his rare
+good presence!
+
+[Illustration: OLD ADOBE FORT.]
+
+Thirty years ago this whole Rocky-Mountain region, now appropriated by
+an enterprising and progressive people, contained, besides the native
+Indians and the Mexicans in the south, only a few trappers and frontier
+traders, most of them in the employ of the American Fur Company. These
+were the fearless and intrepid pioneers who so far from fleeing danger
+seemed rather to court it. Accounts of their adventures--now a struggle
+with a wounded bear, again the threatened perils of starvation when lost
+in some mountain-fastness--have long simultaneously terrified and
+fascinated both young and old. We all have pictured their dress--the
+coat or cloak, often an odd combination of several varieties of skins
+pieced together, with fur side in; breeches sometimes of the same
+material, but oftener of coarse duck or corduroy; and the slouched hat,
+under whose broad brim whatever of the face that was not concealed by a
+shaggy, unkempt beard shone out red from exposure to sun and weather.
+The American Fur Company had dotted the country with forts, which served
+the double purpose of storehouses for the valuables collected and of
+places where the employés could barricade themselves against the
+too-often troublesome savages. For such a purpose, though not actually
+by the Fur Company, was built the old adobe fort the ruins of which are
+still to be seen on the banks of the Arkansas at Pueblo. How old it may
+have been no one seems to know, but certain it is that for long years,
+and in the earliest times, it was a favorite rendezvous. Here was
+always to be found a jolly good party to pass away the long winter
+evenings with song and story. Here Kit Carson often stopped to rest from
+his many perilous expeditions, enjoying, together with Fremont and other
+noted Rocky-Mountain explorers, the hospitalities of the old fort. Many
+times were its soft walls indented by the arrows of besieging Indians,
+but its bloodiest tragedy was enacted in 1854, when the Utes surprised
+the sleeping company and savagely massacred all.
+
+While these events were transpiring at the old fort a party of Mexicans
+had journeyed from the south, crossed the Arkansas River and formed a
+settlement on the east side of the Fontaine. A characteristically
+squalid and miserable place it was, with the dwellings--they scarce
+deserved the name of houses--built in the side of the bluffs very much
+as animals might burrow in the ground. Part dug-out and part adobe were
+those wretched habitations, and the shed-like parts which projected from
+the hill were composed of all conceivable and inconceivable kinds of
+rubbish. Sticks, stones, bits of old iron, worn-out mattings and
+gunny-sacks entered more or less into the construction of these dens,
+all stuck together with the inevitable adobe mud. The settlement
+extended some distance along the side of the bluff, and the sloping
+plain in front was dignified as the _plaza_. Perhaps the dark-hued
+immigrants expected a large town to spring from these unpromising
+beginnings, and their plaza to take on eventually all the importance
+which a place so named ever deserves in the Spanish and Mexican mind.
+But the Pike's Peak excitement, originating in 1852 with the finding of
+gold by a party of Cherokee Indians, and reaching its culmination in
+1859, brought a far different class of people to our Rocky-Mountain
+outpost, and a civilization was inaugurated which speedily compelled the
+ancient Mexican methods to go by the board. Thus, Fontaine was soon
+absorbed by the rising town of Pueblo, though the ancient dug-outs still
+picturesquely dot the hillside, inhabited by much the same idle and
+vagabond class from which the prosperous ranchman soon learns to guard
+his hen-roost.
+
+The growth of any of our Far Western towns presents a curious study. In
+these latter days it frequently requires but a few months, or even
+weeks, to give some new one a fair start upon its prosperous way.
+Sometimes a mineral vein, sometimes the temporary "end of the track" of
+a lengthening railway, forms the nucleus, and around it are first seen
+the tents of the advance-guard. Before many weeks have elapsed some
+enterprising individual has succeeded, in the face of infinite toil and
+expense, in bringing a sawmill into camp. Soon it is buzzing away on the
+neighboring hillside, and the rough pine boards and slabs are growing
+into houses of all curious sizes and shapes, irregularly lining the main
+street. Delightfully free from conventionality are matters in these new
+towns. Former notions of things go for naught. Values are in a
+highly-disturbed state, and you will probably be charged more for the
+privilege of sleeping somewhere on the floor than for all the refined
+elegancies of the Fifth Avenue. The board-walks along the street, where
+they exist at all, plainly typify this absence of a well-defined dead
+level or zero-point in the popular sentiment; for the various sections
+are built each upon the same eccentric plan that obtains in the
+corresponding house. The result is an irregular succession of steps
+equally irregular, with enough literal jumping-off places to relieve any
+possible monotony attending the promenade. If the growth of the town
+seems to continue satisfactory, its houses--at least those in or near
+its central portions--begin gradually to pass through the next stage in
+their development. During this interesting period, which might be called
+their chrysalid state, they are twisted and turned, sometimes sawn
+asunder, parts lopped off here and applied elsewhere, and all those
+radical changes made which would utterly destroy anything possessed of
+protean possibilities inferior to those of the common Western frame
+house. But, as a final result of this treatment and some small additions
+of new material, at last emerges the shapely and often artistic
+cottage, resplendent in paint, and bearing small resemblance to the
+slab-built barn which forms its framework. If the sometime camp becomes
+a city--if Auraria grows into a Denver and Fontaine develops into
+Pueblo--the frame houses will sooner or later share a common fate, that
+of being mounted on wheels or rollers for a journey suburbward, to make
+room for the substantial blocks of brick or stone. By this curious
+process of evolution do most of our Western towns rapidly acquire more
+or less of a metropolitan appearance.
+
+[Illustration: MEXICAN INTERIOR.]
+
+Pueblo, while not a representative Western town in these respects, yet
+in its early days presented some curious combinations, most of them
+growing out of the heterogeneous human mixture that attempted to form a
+settlement. The famous Green-Russell party, on its way from Georgia to
+the Pike's Peak country, had passed through Missouri and Kansas in 1858,
+and there found an element ripe for any daring and adventurous deeds in
+unknown lands. Many of the border desperadoes, then engaged in that
+hard-fought prelude to the civil war, found it desirable and expedient
+to leave a place where their violent deeds became too well known; and
+these, together with others who hoped to find in a new country relief
+from the anarchy which reigned at home, fell into the wake of the
+pioneers. Pueblo received its full share of Kansas outlaws about this
+time, and, what with those it already contained, even a modicum of peace
+seemed out of the question. Here, for instance, was found living with
+the Mexicans by the plaza a quarrelsome fellow named Juan Trujillo,
+better known by the sobriquet of Juan Chiquito or "Little John," which
+his diminutive stature had earned for him. This worthy is represented as
+a constant disturber of the peace, and he met the tragic fate which his
+reckless life had invited. From being a trusted friend he had incurred
+the enmitv of a noted character named Charley Antobees, than whom,
+perhaps, no one has had a more varied frontier experience. Coming to the
+Rocky Mountains in 1836 in the employ of the American Fur Company, he
+has since served as hunter, trapper, Indian-fighter, guide to several
+United States exploring expeditions, and spy in the Mexican war as well
+as in the war of the rebellion. Antobees still lives on the outskirts of
+Pueblo, and his scarred and bronzed face, framed by flowing locks of
+jet-black hair, is familiar to all. The frame that has endured so much
+is now bent, and health is at last broken, and about a year since an
+effort was made by Judge Bradford and others to secure him a pension.
+But twenty years back he was in his full vigor and able to maintain his
+own against all odds. Whether or not it is true we cannot say, but
+certain it is that he is credited with causing the death of Juan
+Chiquito. An Indian called "Chickey" actually did the deed, lying in
+ambush for his victim. Perhaps few were sorry at the Mexican's sudden
+taking off, and in a country where Judge Lynch alone executes the laws
+the whole transaction was no doubt regarded as eminently proper.
+
+Among those who came to Pueblo with the influx of 1858 were two brothers
+from Ohio, Josiah and Stephen Smith. Stalwart young men were these, of a
+different type from the Kansans and Missourians, yet not of the sort to
+be imposed upon. They were crack rifle-shots, and even then held decided
+opinions on the Indian question--opinions which subsequent experiences
+have served to emphasize, but not change. And what with constant
+troubles with the savages, as well as with the scarcely less intractable
+Kansans, their first years in the Far West could not be called
+altogether pleasant. Many a time have their lives been in danger from
+bands of outlaw immigrants, who, dissatisfied with not finding gold
+lying about as they had expected, sought to revenge themselves upon the
+settlers, whom they considered in fault for having led the way. Their
+personal bravery went far toward bringing to a close this reign of
+terror and transforming the lawless settlement into a permanent and
+prosperous town. Still in the prime of life, they look back with
+pleasure over their most hazardous experiences, for time has softened
+the dangers and cast over them the glow of romance. And while none are
+more familiar with everything concerning the early history of Pueblo, it
+is equally true that none are more ready to gratify an appreciative
+listener, and the writer is indebted for much that follows to their
+inimitable recitals.
+
+About the first work of any note undertaken in connection with the new
+town was the building of a bridge across the Arkansas. This was
+accomplished in 1860, when a charter was obtained from Kansas and a
+structure of six spans thrown across the river. It was a toll-bridge,
+and every crossing team put at least one dollar into the pockets of its
+owners. But trouble soon overtook the management. While one of the
+proprietors was in New Mexico, building a mill for Maxwell upon his
+famous estate, the other was so unfortunate as to kill three men, and
+was obliged, as Steph Smith felicitously expressed it, to "skip out."
+Thus the bridge passed into other hands, where it remained till it was
+partly washed away in 1863. The following little matter of history
+connected with its palmy days will be best given in the narrator's own
+words: "We had a blacksmith who misused his wife. The citizens took him
+down to the bridge, tied a rope around his body and threw him into the
+river. They kept up their lick until they nearly drowned the poor cuss,
+then whispered to him to be good to his wife or his time would be short.
+He took the hint, used his wife well, and everything was lovely. That
+was the first cold-water cure in Pueblo, and I ain't sure but the last."
+This incident serves to illustrate the inherent character of American
+gallantry, for, however wild or in most respects uncivilized men may
+appear to become under the influence of frontier life, instances are
+rare in which women are not treated with all the honor and respect due
+them. Indeed, I have sometimes thought that the general sentiment
+concerning woman is more refined and reverential among the bronzed
+pioneers at the outposts than under the influence of a higher
+civilization.
+
+The Arkansas, ever changing its winding course after the manner of
+prairie-rivers, has long since shifted its bed some distance to the
+south, leaving only a portion of the old bridge to span what in high
+water becomes an arm of the river, but which ordinarily serves to convey
+the water from a neighboring mill. We lean upon its guard-rail while
+fancy is busy with the past. We picture the prairie-schooners winding
+around the mesas and through the gap: soon they have come to the grove
+by the river-bank; the horses are picketed and the camp-fire is blazing;
+brown children play in the sand while their parents lie stretched out in
+the shadow of the wagons. They left civilization on the banks of the
+Missouri more than a month ago, and their eyes are still turned toward
+those grand old mountain-ranges in the west over which the declining sun
+is now pouring its transfiguring sheen. The brightness dazzles the eyes,
+and the Mexican who rides by on a scarce manageable broncho with nose
+high in air might be old Juan Chiquito bent upon some murderous errand.
+But no: the rider has stopped the animal, and is soliciting the peaceful
+offices of a blacksmith, whose curious little shop, bearing the
+suggestive name of "Ute," is seen near the bridge. Here bronchos, mules
+and burros are fitted with massive shoes by this frontier Vulcan and
+sent rejoicing upon their winding and rocky ways. Our sleepy gaze
+follows along Santa Fé Avenue, and the eye sees little that is
+suggestive of a modern Western town. But soon comes noisily along a
+one-horse street-car, which asserts its just claims to popular notice in
+consequence of its composing a full half of a system scarce a fortnight
+old by filling the air with direful screeches as each curve is
+laboriously described. And later, when the magnificent overland train,
+twenty-six hours from Kansas City, steams proudly up to the station,
+fancy can no longer be indulged. The old has become new. The great
+Plains have been bridged, and the outposts of but a decade ago become
+the suburbs of to-day.
+
+[Illustration: OLD BRIDGE.]
+
+Doubtless Old Si Smith now and then indulges in reveries somewhat
+similar, but his retrospections would be of a minute and personal
+character. To warm up the average frontiersman, however--and Old Si is
+no exception--into a style at once luminous and emphatic and embellished
+with all the richness of the border dialect, it is only necessary to
+suggest the Indian topic. However phlegmatically he may reel off his
+yarns, glowing though they be with exciting adventure, it is the
+red-skins that cause his eyes to flash and his rhetoric to become fervid
+and impressive. To him the Indian is the embodiment of all that is
+supremely vile, and hence merits his unmitigated hatred. Killing
+Indians is his most delightful occupation, and the next in order is
+talking about it. His contempt for government methods is unbounded, and
+the popular Eastern sentiment he holds in almost equal esteem. The Smith
+brothers have had a varied experience in frontier affairs, in which the
+Indian has played a prominent part. They hold the Western views, but
+with less prejudice than is generally found. They argue the case with a
+degree of fairness, and many of their opinions and deductions are novel
+and equally just. Said Stephen Smith to the writer: "We've got this
+thing reduced right down to vulgar fractions, and the Utes have got to
+go. The mineral lands are worth more to us than the Indians are"--this
+with a suggestive shrug--"and if the government don't remove them from
+the reserves, why, we'll have to do it ourselves. There's a great fuss
+been made about the whites going on the Indian reserves; and what did it
+all amount to? Maybe fifty or sixty prospectors, all told, have got over
+the lines, dug a few holes and hurt nobody. But I suppose the Indians
+always stay where they ought to! I guess not. Some of them are off their
+reserves half the time, and they go off to murder and kill. Do they ever
+get punished for that? Not much, except when folks do it on their own
+account. But let a white man get found on the Indian reserves and
+there's a great howl. I want a rule that will work both ways, and I
+don't give much for a government that isn't able to protect me on the
+Indian reserves the same as anywhere else. Some years ago Indian
+troubles were reported at Washington, and Sherman was sent out to
+investigate. Of course they heard he was coming, and all were on their
+good behavior. They knew where their blankets and ponies and provisions
+came from. Consequently, Sherman reported everything peaceful: he hadn't
+seen anybody killed. That's about the kind of information they get in
+the East on the Indian question.
+
+"Misused? Yes, the Indians have been misused, badly misused. I know
+that. But who have _they_ misused? This whole country is covered with
+ruins, and they all go to show that it has been inhabited by a
+highly-civilized race of people. And what has become of them? I believe
+the Indians cleaned them out long years ago; and now their turn has
+come. I find it's a law of Nature"--and here the narrator's tone grew
+more reverent as if touching upon a higher theme--"that the weak go to
+the wall. It's a hard law, but I don't see any way out of it. The old
+Aztecs had to go under, and the Indians will have to follow suit."
+
+Whatever humanitarians and archæologists may conclude concerning these
+opinions, they are nevertheless extensively held in the Far West. The
+frontiersman, who sees the Indian only in his native savagery, who has
+found it necessary to employ a considerable part of his time in keeping
+out of range of poisoned arrows, and who must needs be always upon the
+alert lest his family fall a prey to Indian treachery, cannot be
+expected to hold any ultra-humanitarian views upon the subject. He has
+not been brought in contact with the several partially-civilized tribes,
+in whose advancement many see possibilities for the whole race. He
+cannot understand why the government allows the Indians to roam over
+enormous tracts of land, rich in minerals they will never extract and
+containing agricultural possibilities they will never seek to realize.
+His plan would be to have only the same governmental care exercised over
+the red man as is now enjoyed by the white, and then look to the law of
+the survival of the fittest to furnish a solution of the problem. The
+case seems so clear and the arguments so potent that he looks for some
+outside reasons for their failure, and very naturally thinks he
+discovers them in governmental quarters. "There's too many people living
+off this Indian business for it to be wound up yet a while." Thus does a
+representative man at the outposts express the sentiment of no
+inconsiderable class.
+
+Next to the Indian himself, the frontiersman holds in slight esteem the
+soldiers who are sent for the protection of the border. The objects of
+his supreme hatred still often merit his good opinion for their bravery
+and fighting qualities, but upon raw Eastern recruits and West-Point
+fledglings he looks with mild disdain. Having learned the Indian methods
+by many hard knocks, he doubtless fails to exercise proper charity
+toward those whose experiences have been less extended; and added to
+this may be a lurking jealousy--which, however, would be stoutly
+disclaimed--because the blue uniform is gaining honors and experience
+more easily and under conditions more favorable than were possible with
+him in the early days. "They be about the greenest set!" said an old
+Indian-fighter to whom this subject was broached, "and the sight of an
+Injun jest about scares 'em to death at first. I never saw any of 'em
+_I_ was afraid of if I only had any sort of a show. Why, back in '59 I
+undertook to take a young man back to the States, and we started off in
+a buggy--a _buggy_, do you mind. When we got down the Arkansas a piece
+we heard the red-skins was pretty thick, but we went right on, except
+keeping more of a lookout, you know. But along in the afternoon we saw
+fifteen or twenty coming for us, and we got ready to give 'em a
+reception. We had a hard chase, but at last they got pretty sick of
+the way I handled my rifle, and concluded to let us alone for a while.
+They kept watch of us, though, and meant to get square with us that
+night. Well, we travelled till dark, stopped just long enough to build
+a big fire, and then lit out. When those Injuns came for us that night
+we were some other place, and they lost their grip on that little
+scalping-bee. They didn't trouble us any more, that's sure. And when we
+got to the next post there were nigh a hundred teams, six stages and
+two companies of soldiers, all shivering for fear of the Injuns. It
+rather took the wind out of 'em to see us come in with that buggy, and
+they didn't want to believe we had come through. But, like the man's
+mother-in-law, we were _there_, and they couldn't get out of it. And,
+sir, maybe you won't believe me, but those soldiers offered me
+_seventy-five dollars_ to go back with them! That's the sort of an
+outfit the government sends to protect us!"
+
+[Illustration: SANTA FÉ AVENUE, PUEBLO, COLORADO.]
+
+We have had frequent occasion since our frontier experiences began to
+ponder the untrammelled opulence of this Western word, _outfit_. From
+the Mississippi to the Pacific its expansive possibilities are
+momentarily being tested. There is nothing that lives, breathes or
+grows, nothing known to the arts or investigated by the
+sciences--nothing, in short, coming within the range of the Western
+perception--that cannot with more or less appropriateness be termed an
+"outfit." A dismal broncho turned adrift in mid-winter to browse on the
+short stubble of the Plains is an "outfit," and so likewise is the
+dashing equipage that includes a shining phaeton and richly-caparisoned
+span. Perhaps by no single method can so comprehensive an idea of the
+term in question be obtained in a short time, and the proper qualifying
+adjectives correctly determined, as by simply preparing for a
+camping-expedition. The horse-trader with whom you have negotiated for a
+pair of horses or mules congratulates you upon the acquisition of a
+"boss outfit." When your wagon has been purchased and the mules are duly
+harnessed in place, you are further induced to believe that you have a
+"way-up outfit," though, obviously, this should now be understood to
+possess a dual significance which did not before obtain, since the wagon
+represents a component part. The hardware clerk displays a tent and
+recommends a fly as forming a desirable addition to an even otherwise
+"swell outfit." The grocer provides you with what he modestly terms a
+"first-class outfit," albeit his cans of fruits, vegetables and meats
+are for the delectation of the inner man. Frying-pans and dutch-ovens,
+camp-stools and trout-scales, receive the same designation. And now
+comes the crowning triumph of this versatile term, as well as a happy
+illustration of what might be called its agglutinative and assimilating
+powers; for when horses and wagon have received their load of tent and
+equipments, and father, mother and the babies have filled up every
+available space, this whole establishment, this _omnium gatherum_ of
+outfits, becomes neither more nor less than an "outfit."
+
+The last five years have witnessed a wonderful material progress in the
+Far West. The mineral wealth discovered in Colorado and New Mexico has
+caused a great westward-flowing tide to set in. The nation seems to be
+possessed of a desire to reclaim the waste places and to explore the
+unknown. Cities that were founded by "fifty-niners," and after a decade
+seemed to reach the limits of their growth, have started on a new
+career. And for none of these does the outlook seem brighter than in the
+case of the city of Pueblo, the old outpost whose early history we have
+attempted to sketch. Its growth has all along been a gradual one, and
+its improvements have kept pace with this healthy advance. Its public
+schools, like those of all Far Western towns which the writer has
+visited are model institutions and an honor to the commonwealth. A
+handsome brick court-house, situated on high ground, is an ornament to
+the city, and differs widely from that in which Judge Bradford held
+court eighteen years ago--the first held in the Territory, and that,
+too, under military protection. Pueblo's wealth is largely derived from
+the stock-raising business, the surrounding country being well adapted
+to cattle and sheep. The _rancheros_ ride the Plains the year round, and
+the cattle flourish upon the food which Nature provides--in the summer
+the fresh grass, and in the winter the same converted into hay which has
+been cured upon the ground. An important railway-centre is Pueblo, and
+iron highways radiate from it to the four cardinal points. These
+advantages of location should procure it a large share of the flood of
+prosperity that is sweeping over the State. But enterprises are now in
+progress which cannot fail to add materially to its importance as a
+factor in the development of the country. On the highest lift of the
+mesa south of the town, and in a most commanding position, it has been
+decided to locate a blast-furnace which shall have no neighbor within a
+radius of five hundred miles. With iron ore of finest quality easily
+accessible in the neighboring mountains, and coal-fields of unlimited
+extent likewise within easy reach, the production of iron in the Rocky
+Mountains has only waited for the growth of a demand. This the
+advancement and prosperity of the State have now well assured. Many
+kindred industries will spring up around the furnace, the Bessemer
+steel-works and the rail-mills that are now projected; and a few years
+will suffice to transform the level mesa, upon which for untold
+centuries the cactus and the yucca-lily have bloomed undisturbed, into a
+thriving manufacturing city whose pulse shall be the throb of steam
+through iron arms. The onlooking mountains, that have seen strange
+sights about this old outpost, are to see a still stranger--the
+ushering-in of a new civilization which now begins its march into the
+land of the Aztecs.
+
+Perhaps these thoughts were occupying our minds as we climbed the
+bluffs for a visit to this incipient Pittsburg. The equipage did no
+credit to the financial status of the iron company, as it consisted of
+a superannuated express-wagon drawn by a dyspeptic white horse which
+the boy who officiated as driver found no difficulty in restraining.
+Two gentlemen in charge of the constructions, their visitor and two
+kegs of nails comprised this precious load. The day was cloudless and
+fine, albeit a Colorado "zephyr" was blowing, and the party, with
+perhaps the single exception of the horse, felt in fine spirits. The
+jolly superintendent, who both in face and mien reminded one of the
+typical German nobleman, was overflowing with story, joke and witty
+repartee. The site of the works was reached in the course of time.
+Excavations were in progress for the blast-furnace and accessory
+buildings, and developed a strange formation. The entire mesa seems
+built up of boulders packed together with a sort of alkali clay, dry
+and hard as stone, and looking, as our _distingué_ guide remarked, as
+though not a drop of water had penetrated five feet from the surface
+since the time of the Flood. Two blast-furnaces, each with a capacity
+of five hundred tons, will be speedily built, to be followed by
+rail-mills, a Bessemer steel-plant and all the accessories of vast
+iron-and steel-works. With the patronage of several thousand miles of
+railway already assured, and its duplication in the near future
+apparently beyond doubt, the success of this daring frontier enterprise
+seems far removed from the domain of conjecture.
+
+[Illustration: OLD SI SMITH.]
+
+All this was glowingly set forth by the courtly superintendent, who,
+though but three months in the country, is already at heart a Coloradan.
+That there are some things about frontier life which he likes better
+than others he is free to admit. Among the few matters he would have
+otherwise he gives the first place to the tough "range" or "snow-fed"
+beef upon which the dwellers in this favored land must needs subsist. "I
+heard a story once," said he, "about a young man, a tenderfoot, who,
+after long wondering what made the beef so fearfully tough, at length
+arrived at the solution, as he thought, and that quite by accident. He
+was riding out with a friend, an old resident, when they chanced to come
+upon a bunch of cattle. The young man's attention seemed to be
+attracted, and as the idea began to dawn upon him he faced his
+companion, and, pointing to an animal which bore the brand "B.C. 45,"
+savagely exclaimed, 'Look there! How can you expect those antediluvians
+to be anything but tough? Why don't you kill your cattle before they get
+two or three times as old as Methuselah?'"
+
+We took a long ride that afternoon under a peerless sky, with blue
+mountain-ranges on one hand, whose ridges, covered with snow, seemed
+like folds of satin, and on the other the great billowy Plains, bare and
+brown and smooth as a carpet. The white horse, relieved of the kegs of
+nails, really performed prodigies of travel, all the more appreciated
+because unexpected. A stone-quarry for which we were searching was not
+found, but a teamster was, who, while everything solemnly stood still
+and waited, and amid the agonies of an indescribable stutter, finally
+managed to enlighten us somewhat as to its whereabouts. These adventures
+served to put us in excellent humor, so that when the road was found
+barricaded by a barbed wire fence, it only served to give one of the
+party an opportunity to air his views upon the subject--to argue, in
+fact, that the barbed wire fence had been an important factor in
+building up the agricultural greatness of the West. "For what
+inducements," he exclaims, "does the top rail of such a fence offer to
+the contemplative farmer? None, sir! His traditional laziness has been
+broken up, and great material prosperity is the result."
+
+Whatever causes have operated to produce the effect, certain it is that
+the West is eminently prosperous to-day. Everywhere are seen growth,
+enterprise and an aggressiveness that stops at no obstacles. Immigration
+is pouring into Colorado alone at the rate of several thousands per
+week. The government lands are being rapidly taken up, and the stable
+industries of stock-raising and farming correspondingly extended.
+Manufacturing, too, is acquiring a foothold, and many of the necessaries
+of life, which now must be obtained in the East, will soon be produced
+at home. The mountains are revealing untold treasures of silver and
+gold, and the possibilities which may lie hid in the yet unexplored
+regions act as a stimulus to crowds of hopeful prospectors. But while
+Colorado is receiving her full share of the influx, a tide seems to be
+setting in toward the old empire of the Aztecs, and flowing through the
+natural gateway, our old Rocky-Mountain outpost. It is beginning to be
+found out that the legends of fabulous wealth which have come down to us
+from the olden time have much of truth in them, and mines that were
+worked successively by Franciscan monks, Pueblo Indians, Jesuit priests
+and Mexicans, and had suffered filling up and obliteration with every
+change of proprietorship, are now being reopened; and that, too, under a
+new dispensation which will ensure prosperity to the enterprise.
+Spaniard and priest have long since abandoned their claim to the rich
+possessions, and their doubtful sway, ever upon the verge of revolution
+and offering no incentive to enterprise, has given place to one of a
+different character. Under the protection of beneficent and fostering
+laws this oldest portion of our Union may now be expected to reveal its
+wealth of resources to energy and intelligent labor. And it may
+confidently be predicted that American enterprise will not halt till it
+has built up the waste places of our land, and in this case literally
+made the desert to blossom as the rose. Thus gloriously does our new
+civilization reclaim the errors of the past, building upon ancient ruins
+the enlightened institutions of to-day, and grafting fresh vigor upon
+effete races and nationalities. And now, at last, the Spanish Peaks,
+those mighty ancient sentinels whose twin spires, like eyes, have
+watched the slow rise and fall of stately but tottering dynasties in the
+long ago, are to look out upon a different scene--a new race come in the
+might of its freedom and with almost the glory of a conquering host to
+redeem a waiting land from the outcome of centuries of avaricious and
+bigoted misrule, and even from the thraldom of decay.
+
+GEORGE REX BUCKMAN.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+LOST.
+
+
+  I.
+
+  I lost my treasures one by one,
+    Those joys the world holds dear;
+  Smiling I said, "To-morrow's sun
+    Will bring us better cheer."
+  For faith and love were one. Glad faith!
+  All loss is naught save loss of faith.
+
+  II.
+
+  My truant joys come trooping back,
+    And trooping friends no less;
+  But tears fall fast to meet the lack
+    Of dearer happiness.
+  For faith and love are two. Sad faith!
+  'Tis loss indeed, the loss of faith.
+
+MARY B. DODGE.
+
+
+
+
+ADAM AND EVE.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI.
+
+
+From the day on which Adam knew that the date of Jerrem's trial was
+fixed all the hope which the sight of Eve had rekindled was again
+completely extinguished, and, refusing every attempt at consolation, he
+threw himself into an abyss of despair a hundred-fold more dark and
+bitter than before. The thought that he, captain and leader as he had
+been, should stand in court confronted by his comrades and neighbors
+(for Adam, ignorant of the disasters which had overtaken them, believed
+half Polperro to be on their way to London), and there swear away
+Jerrem's life and turn informer, was something too terrible to be dwelt
+on with even outward tranquillity, and, abandoning everything which had
+hitherto sustained him, he gave himself up to all the terrors of remorse
+and despair. It was in vain for Reuben to reason or for Eve to plead: so
+long as they could suggest no means by which this dreaded ordeal could
+be averted Adam was deaf to all hope of consolation. There was but one
+subject which interested him, and only on one subject could he be got to
+speak, and that was the chances there still remained of Jerrem's life
+being spared; and to furnish him with some food for this hope, Eve began
+to loiter at the gates, talk to the warders and the turnkeys, and mingle
+with the many groups who on some business or pretext were always
+assembled about the yard or stood idling in the various passages with
+which the prison was intersected.
+
+One morning it came to her mind, How would it be for Adam to escape, and
+so not be there to prove the accusation he had made of Jerrem having
+shot the man? With scarce more thought than she had bestowed on many
+another passing suggestion which seemed for the moment practical and
+solid, but as she turned it round lost shape and floated into air, Eve
+made the suggestion, and to her surprise found it seized on by Adam as
+an inspiration. Why, he'd risk _all_ so that he escaped being set face
+to face with Jerrem and his former mates. Adam had but to be assured the
+strain would not be more than Eve's strength could bear before he had
+adopted with joy her bare suggestion, clothed it with possibility, and
+by it seemed to regain all his past energy. Could he but get away and
+Jerrem's life be spared, all hope of happiness would not be over. In
+some of those distant lands to which people were then beginning to go
+life might begin afresh. And as his thoughts found utterance in speech
+he held out his hand to Eve, and in it she laid her own; and Adam needed
+nothing more to tell him that whither he went there Eve too would go.
+There was no need for vows and protestations now between these two, for,
+though to each the other's heart lay bare, a word of love scarce ever
+crossed their lips. Life seemed too sad and time too precious to be
+whiled away in pleasant speeches, and often when together, burdened by
+the weight of all they had to say, yet could not talk about, the two
+would sit for hours and neither speak a word. But with this proposition
+of escape a new channel was given to them, and as they discussed their
+different plans the dreadful shadow which at times had hung between them
+was rolled away and lifted out of sight.
+
+Inspired by the prospect of action, of doing something, Adam roused
+himself to master all the difficulties: his old foresight and caution
+began to revive, and the project, which had on one day looked like a
+desperate extremity, grew by the end of a week into a well-arranged plan
+whose success seemed more than possible. Filled with anxiety for Eve,
+Reuben gave no hearty sanction to the experiment: besides which, he felt
+certain that now neither Adam's absence nor presence would in any way
+affect Jerrem's fate; added to which, if the matter was detected it
+might go hard with Adam himself. But his arguments proved nothing to
+Eve, who, confident of success, only demanded from him the promise of
+secrecy; after which, she thought, as some questions might be put to
+him, the less he knew the less he would have to conceal.
+
+Although a prisoner, inasmuch as liberty was denied to him, Adam was in
+no way subjected to that strict surveillance to which those who had
+broken the law were supposed to be submitted. It was of his own free
+will that he disregarded the various privileges which lay open to him:
+others in his place would have frequented the passages, hung about the
+yards and grown familiar with the tap, where spirits were openly bought
+and sold. Money could do much in those days of lax discipline, and the
+man who could pay and could give need have very few wants unsatisfied.
+But Adam's only desire was to be left undisturbed and alone; and as this
+entailed no undue amount of trouble after their first curiosity had been
+satisfied, it was not thought necessary to deny him this privilege. From
+constantly going in and out, most of the officials inside the prison
+knew Eve, while to but very few was Adam's face familiar; and it was on
+this fact, aided by the knowledge that through favor of a gratuity
+friends were frequently permitted to outstay their usual hour, that most
+of their hopes rested. Each day she came Eve brought some portion of the
+disguise which was to be adopted; and then, having learnt from Reuben
+that the Mary Jane had arrived and was lying at the wharf unloading, not
+knowing what better to do, they decided that she should go to Captain
+Triggs and ask him, in case Adam could get away, whether he would let
+him come on board his vessel and give him shelter there below.
+
+"Wa-al, no," said Triggs, "I woan't do that, 'cos they as I'se got here
+might smell un out; but I'll tell 'ee what: I knaws a chap as has in
+many ways bin beholden to me 'fore now, and I reckon if I gives un the
+cue he'll do the job for 'ee."
+
+"But do you think he's to be trusted?" Eve asked.
+
+"Wa-al, that rests on how small a part you'm foaced to tell un of,"
+said Triggs, "and how much you makes it warth his while. I'm blamed if
+I'd go bail for un myself, but that won't be no odds agen' Adam's goin':
+'tis just the place for he. 'T 'ud niver do to car'y a pitch-pot down
+and set un in the midst o' they who couldn't bide his stink."
+
+"And the crew?" said Eve, wincing under Captain Triggs's figurative
+language.
+
+"Awh, the crew's right enuf--a set o' gashly, smudge-faced raskils
+that's near half Maltee and t' other Lascar Injuns. Any jail-bird that
+flies their way 'ull find they's all of a feather. But here," he added,
+puzzled by the event: "how's this that you'm still mixed up with Adam
+so? I thought 'twas all 'long o' you and Reuben May that the Lottery's
+landin' got blowed about?"
+
+Eve shook her head. "Be sure," she said, "'twas never in me to do Adam
+any harm."
+
+"And you'm goin' to stick to un now through thick and thin? 'Twill niver
+do for un, ye knaw, to set his foot on Cornish ground agen."
+
+"He knows that," said Eve; "and if he gets away we shall be married and
+go across the seas to some new part, where no one can tell what brought
+us from our home."
+
+Triggs gave a significant nod. "Lord!" he exclaimed, "but that's a poor
+lookout for such a bowerly maid as you be! Wouldn't it be better for 'ee
+to stick by yer friends 'bout here than--"
+
+"I haven't got any friends," interrupted Eve promptly, "excepting it's
+Adam and Joan and Uncle Zebedee."
+
+"Ah, poor old Zebedee!" sighed Triggs: "'tis all dickey with he. The day
+I started I see Sammy Tucker to Fowey, and he was tellin' that th' ole
+chap was gone reg'lar tottlin'-like, and can't tell thickee fra that;
+and as for Joan Hocken, he says you wouldn't knaw her for the same. And
+they's tooked poor foolish Jonathan, as is more mazed than iver, to live
+with 'em; and Mrs. Tucker, as used to haggle with everybody so, tends on
+'em all hand and foot, and her's given up praichin' 'bout religion and
+that, and 's turned quite neighborly, and, so long as her can save her
+daughter, thinks nothin's too hot nor too heavy."
+
+"Dear Joan!" sighed Eve: "she's started by the coach on her way up here
+now."
+
+"Whether she hath or no!" exclaimed Triggs in surprise. "Then take my
+word they's heerd that Jerrem's to be hanged, and Joan's comin' up to be
+all ready to hand for 't."
+
+"No, not that," groaned Eve, for at the mere mention of the word the
+vague dread seemed to shape itself into a certainty. "Oh, Captain
+Triggs, don't say that if Adam gets off you don't think Jerrem's life
+will be spared."
+
+"Wa-al, my poor maid, us must hope so," said the compassionate captain;
+"but 'tis the warst o' they doin's that sooner or later th' endin, of
+'em must come. 'Twould never do to let 'em prosper allays," he added
+with impressive certainty, "or where 'ud be the use o' parsons praichin'
+up 'bout heaven and hell? Why, now, us likes good liquor cheap to Fowey;
+and wance 'pon a time us had it too, but that ha'n't bin for twenty
+year. Our day's gone by, and so 'ull theirs be now; and th' excise 'ull
+come, and revenoos 'ull settle down, and folks be foaced to take to
+lousterin' for the bit o' bread they ates, and live quiet and paceable,
+as good neighbors should. So try and take heart; and if so be that Adam
+can give they Bailey chaps the go-by, tell un to come 'longs here, and
+us 'ull be odds with any o' they that happens to be follerin' to his
+heels."
+
+Charmed with this friendly promise, Eve said "Good-bye," leaving the
+captain puzzled with speculations on women and the many curious
+contradictions which seem to influence their actions; while, the hour
+being now too late to return to the prison, she took her way to her own
+room, thinking it best to begin the preparations which in case of Adam's
+escape and any sudden departure it would be necessary to have completed.
+
+Perhaps it was her interview with Captain Triggs, the sight of the wharf
+and the ships, which took her thoughts back and made them bridge the
+gulf which divided her past life from her present self. Could the girl
+she saw in that shadowy past--headstrong, confident, impatient of
+suffering and unsympathetic with sorrow--be this same Eve who walked
+along with all hope and thought of self merged in another's happiness
+and welfare? Where was the vanity, where were the tricks and coquetries,
+passports to that ideal existence after which in the old days she had so
+thirsted? Trampled out of sight and choked beneath the fair blossoms of
+a higher life, which, as in many a human nature, had needed sorrow,
+humiliation and a great watering of tears before there could spring
+forth the flowers for a fruit which should one day ripen into great
+perfection.
+
+No wonder, then, that she should be shaken by a doubt of her own
+identity; and having reached her room she paused upon the threshold and
+looked around as if to satisfy herself by all those silent witnesses
+which made it truth. There was the chair in which she had so often sat
+plying her needle with such tardy grace while her impatient thoughts did
+battle with the humdrum, narrow life she led. How she had beat against
+the fate which seemed to promise naught but that dull round of
+commonplace events in which her early years had passed away! How as a
+gall and fret had come the thought of Reuben's proffered love, because
+it shadowed forth the level of respectable routine, the life she then
+most dreaded! To be courted and sought after, to call forth love,
+jealousy and despair, to be looked up to, thought well of, praised,
+admired,--these were the delights she had craved and these the longings
+she had had granted. And a sigh from the depths of that chastened heart
+rendered the bitter tribute paid by all to satiated vanity and outlived
+desire. The dingy walls, the ill-assorted furniture (her mother's pride
+in which had sometimes vexed her, sometimes made her laugh) now looked
+like childhood's friends, whose faces stamp themselves upon our inmost
+hearts. The light no longer seemed obscure, the room no longer gloomy,
+for each thing in it now was flooded by the tender light of
+memory--that wondrous gift to man which those who only sail along life's
+summer sea can never know in all the heights and depths revealed to
+storm-tossed hearts.
+
+"What! you've come back?" a voice said in her ear; and looking round Eve
+saw it was Reuben, who had entered unperceived. "There's nothing fresh
+gone wrong?" he asked.
+
+"No, nothing;" but the sad smile she tried to give him welcome with was
+so akin to tears that Reuben's face assumed a look of doubt. "'Tis only
+that I'm thinking how I'm changed from what I was," said Eve. "Why, once
+I couldn't bear this room and all the things about it; but now--Oh,
+Reuben, my heart seems like to break because perhaps 'twill soon now
+come to saying good-bye to all of it for ever."
+
+Reuben winced: "You're fixed to go, then?"
+
+"Yes, where Adam goes I shall go too: don't you think I should? What
+else is left for me to do?"
+
+"You feel, then, you'd be happy--off with him--away from all
+and--everybody else?"
+
+"Happy! Should I be happy to know he'd gone alone--happy to know I'd
+driven him away to some place where I wouldn't go myself?" and Eve
+paused, shaking her head before she added, "If he can make another start
+in life--try and begin again--"
+
+"You ought to help him to it," said Reuben promptly: "that's very plain
+to see. Oh, Eve, do you mind the times when you and me have talked of
+what we'd like to do--how, never satisfied with what went on around, we
+wanted to be altogether such as some of those we'd heard and read about?
+The way seems almost opened up to you, but what shall I do when all this
+is over and you are gone away? I can't go back and stick to trade again,
+working for nothing more but putting victuals in myself."
+
+For a moment Eve did not speak: then, with a sudden movement, she
+turned, saying to Reuben, "There's something that before our lives are
+at any moment parted I've wanted to say to you, Reuben. 'Tis that until
+now, this time while we've been all together here, I've never known what
+your worth is--what you would be to any one who'd got the heart to value
+what you'd give. Of late it has often seemed that I should think but
+very small of one who'd had the chance of your liking and yet didn't
+know the proper value of such goodness."
+
+Reuben gave a look of disavowal, and Eve continued, adding with a little
+hesitation, "You mustn't think it strange in me for saying this. I
+couldn't tell you if you didn't know how everything lies between Adam
+and myself; but ever since this trouble's come about all my thoughts
+seem changed, and people look quite different now to what they did
+before; and, most of all, I've learnt to know the friend I've got, and
+always had, in you, Reuben."
+
+Reuben did not answer for a moment. He seemed struggling to keep back
+something he was yet prompted to speak of. "Eve," he said at length,
+"don't think that I've not made mistakes, and great ones too. When first
+I fought to battle down my leaning toward you, why was it? Not because
+of doubting that 'twould ever be returned, but 'cos I held myself too
+good a chap in all my thoughts and ways to be taken up with such a
+butterfly concern as I took you to be. I'd never have believed then that
+you'd have acted as I've seen you act. I thought that love with you
+meant who could give you the finest clothes to wear and let you rule the
+roast the easiest; but you have shown me that you are made of better
+woman's stuff than that. And, after all, a man thinks better of himself
+for mounting high than stooping to pick up what can be had for asking
+any day."
+
+"No, no, Reuben: your good opinion is more than I deserve," said Eve,
+her memory stinging her with past recollections. "If you want to see a
+dear, kind-hearted, unselfish girl, wait until Joan comes. I do so hope
+that you will take to her! I think you will, after what you've been to
+Jerrem and to Adam. I want you and Joan to like each other."
+
+"I don't think there's much fear of that," said Reuben. "Jerrem's spoke
+so freely about Joan that I seem to know her before ever having seen
+her. Let me see: her mind was at one time set on Adam, wasn't it?"
+
+"I think that she was very fond of Adam," said Eve, coloring: "and, so
+far as that goes, I don't know that there is any difference now. I'm
+sure she'd lay her life down if it would do him good."
+
+"Poor soul!" sighed Reuben, drawn by a friendly feeling to sympathize
+with Joan's unlucky love. "Her cup's been full, and no mistake, of
+late."
+
+"Did Jerrem seem to feel it much that Uncle Zebedee 'd been took so
+strange?" asked Eve.
+
+"I didn't tell him more than I could help," said Reuben. "As much as
+possible I made it out to him that for the old man to come to London
+wouldn't be safe, and the fear of that seemed to pacify him at once."
+
+"I haven't spoken of it to Adam yet," said Eve. "He hasn't asked about
+his coming, so I thought I'd leave the telling till another time. His
+mind seems set on nothing but getting off, and by it setting Jerrem
+free."
+
+But Reuben made no rejoinder to the questioning tone of Eve's words, and
+after a few minutes' pause he waived the subject by reverting to the
+description which Eve had given of Joan, so that, in case he had to meet
+her alone, he might recognize her without difficulty. Eve repeated the
+description, dwelling with loving preciseness on the various features
+and points by which Joan might be known; and then Reuben, having some
+work to do, got up to say good-bye.
+
+"Good-bye," said Eve, holding out her hand--"good-bye. Every time I say
+it now I seem to wonder if 'tis to be good-bye indeed."
+
+"Why, no: in any way, you'd wait until the trial was over?"
+
+"Yes, I forgot: of course we should."
+
+"Well, then, do you think I'd let you go without a word? Ah, Eve, no!
+Whatever others are, nobody's yet pushed you from your place, nor ever
+will so long as my life lasts."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVII
+
+
+At length the dreaded day was over, the trial was at an end, and, in
+spite of every effort made, Jerrem condemned to die. The hopes raised by
+the knowledge of Adam's escape seemed crowned with success when, to the
+court's dismay, it was announced that the prisoner's accuser could not
+be produced: he had mysteriously disappeared the evening before, and in
+spite of a most vigorous search was nowhere to be found. But, with minds
+already resolved to make this hardened smuggler's fate a warning and
+example to all such as should henceforth dare the law, one of the
+cutter's crew, wrought upon by the fear lest Jerrem should escape and
+baffle the vengeance they had vowed to take, was got to swear that
+Jerrem was the man who fired the fatal shot; and though it was shown
+that the night was dark and recognition next to impossible, this
+evidence was held conclusive to prove the crime, and nothing now
+remained but to condemn the culprit. The judge's words came slowly
+forth, making the stoutest there shrink back and let that arrow from the
+bow of death glance by and set its mark on him upon whose face the crowd
+now turned to gaze.
+
+"Can it be that he is stunned? or is he hardened?"
+
+For Jerrem stands all unmoved and calm while, dulled by the sound of
+rushing waters, the words the judge has said come booming back and back
+again. A sickly tremor creeps through every limb and makes it nerveless;
+a sense of growing weight presses the flesh down as a burden on the
+fainting spirit; one instant a thousand faces, crowding close, keep out
+the air; the next, they have all receded out of sight back into misty
+space, and he is left alone, with all around faded and grown confused
+and all beneath him slipping and giving way. Suddenly a sound rouses him
+back to life: a voice has smote his ear and cleaved his inmost soul; and
+lifting his head his eyes are met by sight of Joan, who with a piercing
+shriek has fallen back, deathlike and pale, in Reuben's outstretched
+arms.
+
+Then Jerrem knows that hope is past and he must die, and in one flash
+his fate, in all its misery and shame, stands out before him, and
+reeling he totters, to sink down senseless and be carried off to that
+dismal cell allotted to those condemned to death; while Reuben, as best
+he can, manages to get Joan out of court and into the open air, where
+she gradually comes back to life again and is able to listen to such
+poor comfort as Reuben's sad heart can find to give her. For by reason
+of those eventful circumstances which serve to cement friendships by
+suddenly overthrowing the barriers time must otherwise gradually wear
+away, Reuben May and Joan Hocken have (in the week which has intervened
+between her arrival and this day of trial) become more intimate and
+thoroughly acquainted than if in an ordinary way they had known each
+other for years. A stranger in a large city, with not one familiar face
+to greet her, who does not know the terrible feeling of desolation which
+made poor Joan hurry through the crowded streets, shrinking away from
+their bustle and throng toward Reuben, the one person she had to turn to
+for sympathy, advice, assistance and consolation? With that spirit of
+perfect trust which her own large heart gave her the certain assurance
+of receiving, Joan placed implicit reliance in all Reuben said and did;
+and seeing this, and receiving an inward satisfaction from the sight,
+Reuben involuntarily slipped into a familiarity of speech and manner
+very opposed to the stiff reserve he usually maintained toward
+strangers.
+
+Ten days were given before the day on which Jerrem was to die, and
+during this time, through the various interests raised in his behalf, no
+restriction was put upon the intercourse between him and his friends; so
+that, abandoning everything for the poor soul's welfare, Reuben, Joan
+and Jerrem spent hour after hour in the closest intercourse. Happily, in
+times of great extremity the power of realizing our exact situation is
+mostly denied to us; and in the case of Joan and Jerrem, although
+surrounded by the terrors and within the outposts of that dreaded end,
+it was nothing unfrequent to hear a sudden peal of laughter, which often
+would have as sudden an end in a great burst of tears.
+
+To point to hopes and joys beyond the grave when every thought is
+centred and fixed on this life's interests and keen anxieties is but a
+fruitless, vain endeavor; and Reuben had to try and rest contented in
+the assurance of Jerrem's perfect forgiveness and good-will to all who
+had shown him any malice or ill-feeling--to draw some satisfaction from
+the unselfish love he showed to Joan and the deep gratitude he now
+expressed to Uncle Zebedee.
+
+What would become of them? he often asked when some word of Joan's
+revealed the altered aspect of their affairs; and then, overcome by the
+helplessness of their forlorn condition, he would entreat Reuben to
+stand by them--not to forget Joan, not to forsake her. And Reuben,
+strangely moved by sight of this poor giddy nature's overwrought
+emotion, would try to calm him with the ready assurance that while he
+lived Joan should never want a friend, and, touched by his words, the
+two would clasp his hands together, telling each other of all the
+kindness he had showed them, praying God would pay him back in blessings
+for his goodness. Nor were theirs the only lips which spoke of gratitude
+to Reuben May: his name had now become familiar to many who through his
+means were kept from being ignorant of the sad fate which awaited their
+boon companion, their prime favorite, the once madcap, rollicking
+Jerrem--the last one, as Joan often told Reuben, whom any in Polperro
+would have fixed on for evil to pursue or misfortune to overtake, and
+about whom all declared there must have been "a hitch in the block
+somewheres, as Fate never intended that ill-luck should pitch upon
+Jerrem." The repetition of their astonishment, their indignation and
+their sympathy afforded the poor fellow the most visible satisfaction,
+harassed as he was becoming by one dread which entirely swallowed up the
+thought and fear of death. This ghastly terror was the then usual
+consignment of a body after death to the surgeons for dissection; and
+the uncontrollable trepidation which would take possession of him each
+time this hideous recollection forced itself upon him, although
+unaccountable to Reuben, was most painful for him to witness. What
+difference could it make what became of one's body after death? Reuben
+would ask himself, puzzled to fathom that wonderful tenderness which
+some natures feel for the flesh which embodies their attractions. But
+Jerrem had felt a passing love for his own dear body: vanity of it had
+been his ruling passion, its comeliness his great glory--so much so that
+even now a positive satisfaction would have been his could he have
+pictured himself outstretched and lifeless, with lookers-on moved to
+compassion by the dead grace of his winsome face and slender limbs.
+Joan, too, was caught by the same infection. Not to lie whole and decent
+in one's coffin! Oh, it was an indignity too terrible for contemplation;
+and every time they were away from Jerrem she would beset Reuben with
+entreaties and questions as to what could be done to avoid the
+catastrophe.
+
+The one plan he knew of had been tried--and tried, too, with repeated
+success--and this was the engaging of a superior force to wrest the body
+from the surgeon's crew, a set of sturdy miscreants with whom to do
+battle a considerable mob was needed; but, with money grown very scarce
+and time so short, the thing could not be managed, and Reuben tried to
+tell Joan of its impossibility while they two were walking to a place in
+which it had been agreed they should find some one with a message from
+Eve, who, together with Adam, was in hiding on board the vessel Captain
+Triggs had spoken of. But instead of the messenger Eve herself arrived,
+having ventured this much with the hope of hearing something that would
+lessen Adam's despair and grief at learning the fate of Jerrem.
+
+"Ah, poor sawl!" sighed Joan as Eve ended her dismal account of Adam's
+sad condition: "'tis only what I feared to hear of. But tell un, Eve, to
+lay it to his heart that Jerrem's forgived un every bit, and don't know
+what it is to hold a grudge to Adam; and if I speak of un, he says,
+'Why, doan't I know it ain't through he, but 'cos o' my own headstrong
+ways and they sneaks o' revenoo-chaps?' who falsely swored away his
+blessed life."
+
+"Does he seem to dread it much?" asked Eve, the sickly fears which
+filled her heart echoed in each whispered word.
+
+"Not _that_ he don't," said Joan, lifting her hand significantly to her
+throat: "'tis after. Oh, Eve," she gasped, "ain't it too awful to think
+of their cuttin' up his poor dead body into bits? Call theyselves
+doctors!" she burst out--"the gashly lot! I'll never let wan o' their
+name come nighst to me agen."
+
+"Oh, Reuben," gasped Eve, "is it so? Can nothing be done?"
+
+Reuben shook his head.
+
+"Nothing now," said Joan--"for want o' money, too, mostly, Eve; and the
+guineas I've a-wasted! Oh, how the sight o' every one rises and chinks
+in judgment 'gainst my ears!"
+
+"If we'd got the money," said Reuben soothingly, "there isn't time. All
+should be settled by to-morrow night; and if some one this minute
+brought the wherewithal I haven't one 'pon whom I dare to lay my hand to
+ask to undertake the job."
+
+"Then 'tis no use harpin' 'pon it any more," said Joan; while Eve gave a
+sigh, concurring in what she said, both of them knowing well that if
+Reuben gave it up the thing must be hopeless indeed.
+
+Here was another stab for Adam's wounded senses, and with a heavy heart
+and step Eve took her way back to him, while Reuben and Joan continued
+to thread the streets which took them by a circuitous road home to
+Knight's Passage.
+
+But no sooner had Eve told Adam of this fresh burden laid on poor Jerrem
+than a new hope seemed to animate him. Something was still to be done:
+there yet remained an atonement which, though it cost him his life, he
+could strive to make to Jerrem. Throwing aside the fear of detection
+which had hitherto kept him skulking within the little vessel, he set
+off that night to find the Mary Jane, and, regardless of the terrible
+shame which had filled him at the bare thought of confronting Triggs or
+any of his crew, he cast himself upon their mercy, beseeching them as
+men, and Cornishmen, to do this much for their brother-sailor in his sad
+need and last extremity; and his appeal and the nature of it had so
+touched these quickly-stirred hearts that, forgetful of the contempt and
+scorn with which, in the light of an informer, they had hitherto viewed
+Adam, they had one and all sworn to aid him to their utmost strength,
+and to bring to the rescue certain others of whom they knew, by whose
+help and assistance success would be more probable. Therefore it was
+that, two days before the morning of his sentenced death, Eve was able
+to put into Reuben's hand a scrap of paper on which was written Adam's
+vow to Jerrem that, though his own life paid the forfeit for it,
+Jerrem's body should be rescued and saved.
+
+Present as Jerrem's fears had been to Reuben's eyes and to his mind,
+until he saw the transport of agitated joy which this assurance gave to
+Jerrem he had never grasped a tithe of the terrible dread which during
+the last few days had taken such complete hold of the poor fellow's
+inmost thoughts. Now, as he read again and again the words which Adam
+had written, a torrent of tears burst forth from his eyes: in an ecstasy
+of relief he caught Joan to his heart, wrung Reuben's hand, and from
+that moment began to gradually compose himself into a state of greater
+ease and seeming tranquillity. Confident, through the unbroken trust of
+years, that Adam's promise, once given, might be implicitly relied on,
+Jerrem needed no further assurance than these few written words to
+satisfy him that every human effort would be made on his behalf; and the
+knowledge of this, and that old comrades would be near, waiting to unite
+their strength for his body's rescue, was in itself a balm and
+consolation. He grew quite loquacious about the crestfallen authorities,
+the surprise of the crowd and the disappointment of the ruffianly mob
+deprived of their certain prey; while the two who listened sat with a
+tightening grip upon their hearts, for when these things should come to
+be the life of him who spoke them would have passed away, and the
+immortal soul have flown from out that perishable husk on which his
+last vain thoughts were still being centred.
+
+Poor Joan! The time had yet to come when she would spend herself with
+many a sad regret and sharp upbraiding that this and that had not been
+said and done; but now, her spirit swallowed up in desolation and sunk
+beneath the burden of despair, she sat all silent close by Jerrem's
+side, covering his hands with many a mute caress, yet never daring to
+lift up her eyes to look into his face without a burst of grief sweeping
+across to shake her like a reed. Jerrem could eat and drink, but Joan's
+lips never tasted food. A fever seemed to burn within and fill her with
+its restless torment: the beatings of her throbbing heart turned her
+first hot, then cold, as each pulse said the time to part was hurrying
+to its end.
+
+By Jerrem's wish, Joan was not told that on the morning of his death to
+Reuben alone admittance to him had been granted: therefore when the eve
+of that morrow came, and the time to say farewell actually arrived, the
+girl was spared the knowledge that this parting was more than the shadow
+of that last good-bye which so soon would have to be said for ever.
+Still, the sudden change in Jerrem's face pierced her afresh and broke
+down that last barrier of control over a grief she could subdue no
+longer. In vain the turnkeys warned them that time was up and Joan must
+go. Reuben entreated too that they should say good-bye: the two but
+clung together in more desperate necessity, until Reuben, seeing that
+further force would be required, stepped forward, and stretching out his
+hand found it caught at by Jerrem and held at once with Joan's, while in
+words from which all strength of tone seemed to die away Jerrem
+whispered, "Reuben, if ever it could come to pass that when I'm gone you
+and she might find it some day in your minds to stand
+together--_one_--say 'twas the thing he wished for most before he went."
+Then, with a feeble effort to push her into Reuben's arms, he caught her
+back, and straining her close to his heart again cried out, "Oh, Joan,
+but death comes bitter when it means good-bye to such as you!" Another
+cry, a closer strain, then Jerrem's arms relax; his hold gives way, and
+Joan falls staggering back; the door is opened--shut; the struggle is
+past, and ere their sad voices can come echoing back Jerrem and Joan
+have looked their last in life.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVIII.
+
+
+When Reuben found that to be a witness of Jerrem's death Joan must take
+her stand among the lawless mob who made holiday of such sad scenes as
+this, his decision was that the idea was untenable. Jerrem too had a
+strong desire that Joan should not see him die; and although his
+avoidance of anything that directly touched upon that dreaded moment had
+kept him from openly naming his wishes, the hints dropped satisfied
+Reuben that the knowledge of her absence would be a matter of relief to
+him. But how get Joan to listen to his scruples when her whole mind was
+set on keeping by Jerrem's side until hope was past and life was over?
+
+"Couldn't 'ee get her to take sommat that her wouldn't sleep off till
+'twas late?" Jerrem had said after Reuben had told him that the next
+morning he must come alone; and the suggestion made was seized on at
+once by Reuben, who, under pretence of getting something to steady her
+shaken nerves, procured from the apothecary near a simple draught, which
+Joan in good faith swallowed. And then, Reuben having promised in case
+she fell asleep to awaken her at the appointed hour, the poor soul, worn
+out by sorrow and fatigue, threw herself down, dressed as she was, upon
+the bed, and soon was in a heavy sleep, from which she did not rouse
+until well into the following day, when some one moving in the room made
+her start up. For a moment she seemed dazed: then, rubbing her eyes as
+if to clear away those happy visions which had come to her in sleep, she
+gazed about until Reuben, who had at first drawn back, came forward to
+speak to her. "Why, Reuben," she cried, "how's this? Have I been
+dreamin', or what? The daylight's come, and, see, the sun!"
+
+And here she stopped, her parched mouth half unclosed, as fears came
+crowding thick upon her mind, choking her further utterance. One look at
+Reuben's face had told the tale; and though she did not speak again, the
+ashen hue that overspread and drove all color from her cheeks proclaimed
+to him that she had guessed the truth.
+
+"'Twas best, my dear," he said, "that you should sleep while he went to
+his rest."
+
+But the unlooked-for shock had been too great a strain on body and mind,
+alike overtaxed and weak, and, falling back, Joan lay for hours as one
+unconscious and devoid of life. And Reuben sat silent by her side,
+paying no heed as hour by hour went by, till night had come and all
+around was dark: then some one came softly up the stairs and crept into
+the room, and Eve's whispered "Reuben!" broke the spell.
+
+Yes, all had gone well. The body, rescued and safe, was now placed
+within a house near to the churchyard in which Eve's mother lay: there
+it was to be buried. And there, the next day, the commonplace event of
+one among many funerals being over, the four thus linked by fate were
+brought together, and Adam and Joan again stood face to face. Heightened
+by the disguise which in order to avoid detection he was obliged to
+adopt, the alteration in Adam was so complete that Joan stood aghast
+before this seeming stranger, while a fresh smart came into Adam's open
+wounds as he gazed upon the changed face of the once comely Joan.
+
+A terrible barrier--such as, until felt, they had never dreaded--seemed
+to have sprung up to separate and divide these two. Involuntarily they
+shrank at each other's touch and quailed beneath each other's gaze,
+while each turned with a feeling of relief to him and to her who now
+constituted their individual refuge and support. Yes, strange as it
+seemed to Adam and unaccountable to Joan, _she_ clung to Reuben, _he_ to
+Eve, before whom each could be natural and unrestrained, while between
+their present selves a great gulf had opened out which naught but time
+or distance could bridge over.
+
+So Adam went back to his hiding-place, Reuben to his shop, and Joan and
+Eve to the old home in Knight's Passage, as much lost amid the crowd of
+thronged London as if they had already taken refuge in that far-off land
+which had now become the goal of Adam's thoughts and keen desires. Eve,
+too, fearing some fresh disaster, was equally anxious for their
+departure, and most of Reuben's spare time was swallowed up in making
+the necessary arrangements. A passage in his name for himself and his
+wife was secured in a ship about to start. At the last moment this
+passage was to be transferred to Adam and Eve, whose marriage would take
+place a day or two before the vessel sailed. The transactions on which
+the successful fulfilment of these various events depended were mostly
+conducted by Reuben, aided by the counsels of Mr. Osborne and the
+assistance of Captain Triggs, whose good-fellowship, no longer withheld,
+made him a valuable coadjutor.
+
+Fortunately, Triggs's vessel, through some detention of its cargo, had
+remained in London for an unusually long time, and now, when it did
+sail, Joan was to take passage in it back to Polperro.
+
+"Awh, Reuben, my dear," sighed Joan one evening as, Eve having gone to
+see Adam, the two walked out toward the little spot where Jerrem lay,
+and as they went discussed Joan's near departure, "I wish to goodness
+you'd pack up yer alls and come 'longs to Polperro home with me: 't 'ud
+be ever so much better than stayin' to this gashly London, where there
+ain't a blow o' air that's fresh to draw your breath in."
+
+"Why, nonsense!" said Reuben: "you wouldn't have me if I'd come."
+
+"How not have 'ee?" exclaimed Joan. "Why, if so be I thought you'd come
+I'd never stir from where I be until I got the promise of it."
+
+"But there wouldn't be nothin' for me to do," said Reuben.
+
+"Why, iss there would--oceans," returned Joan. "Laws! I knaws clocks by
+scores as hasn't gone for twenty year and more. Us has got two
+ourselves, that wan won't strike and t' other you can't make tick."
+
+Reuben smiled: then, growing more serious, he said, "But do you know,
+Joan, that yours isn't the first head it's entered into about going down
+home with you? I've had a mind toward it myself many times of late."
+
+"Why, then, do come to wance," said Joan excitedly; "for so long as they
+leaves me the house there'll be a home with me and Uncle Zebedee, and
+I'll go bail for the welcome you'll get gived 'ee there."
+
+Reuben was silent, and Joan, attributing this to some hesitation over
+the plan, threw further weight into her argument by saying, "There's the
+chapel too, Reuben. Only to think o' the sight o' good you could do
+praichin' to 'em and that! for, though it didn't seem to make no odds
+before, I reckons there's not a few that wants, like me, to be told o'
+some place where they treats folks better than they does down here
+below."
+
+"Joan," said Reuben after a pause, speaking out of his own thoughts and
+paying no heed to the words she had been saying, "you know all about Eve
+and me, don't you?"
+
+Joan nodded her head.
+
+"How I've felt about her, so that I believe the hold she's got on me no
+one on earth will ever push her off from."
+
+"Awh, poor sawl!" sighed Joan compassionately: "I've often had a feelin'
+for what you'd to bear, and for this reason too--that I knaws myself
+what 'tis to be ousted from the heart you'm cravin' to call yer own."
+
+"Why, yes, of course," said Reuben briskly: "you were set down for Adam
+once, weren't you?"
+
+"Awh, and there's they to Polperro--mother amongst 'em, too--who'll tell
+'ee now that if Eve had never shawed her face inside the place Adam 'ud
+ha' had me, after all. But there! all that's past and gone long ago."
+
+There was another pause, which Reuben broke by saying suddenly, "Joan,
+should you take it very out of place if I was to ask you whether after a
+bit you could marry me? I dare say now such a thought never entered
+your head before."
+
+"Well, iss it has," said Joan; 'and o' late, ever since that blessed
+dear spoke they words he did, I've often fell to wonderin' if so be 't
+'ud ever come to pass. Not, mind, that I should ha' bin put out if 't
+had so happened that you'd never axed me, like, but still I thought
+sometimes as how you might, and then agen I says, 'Why should he,
+though?'"
+
+"There's many a reason why _I_ should ask _you_, Joan," said Reuben,
+smiling at her unconscious frankness, "though very few why you should
+consent to take a man whose love another woman has flung away."
+
+"Awh, so far as that goes, the both of us is takin' what's another's
+orts, you knaw," smiled Joan.
+
+"Then is it agreed?" asked Reuben, stretching out his hand.
+
+"Iss, so far as I goes 'tis, with all my heart." Then as she took his
+hand a change came to her April face, and looking at him through her
+swimming eyes she said, "And very grateful too I'm to 'ee, Reuben, for I
+don't knaw by neither another wan who'd take up with a poor heart-broke
+maid like me, and they she's looked to all her life disgraced by others
+and theyselves."
+
+Reuben pressed the hand that Joan had given to him, and drawing it
+through his arm the two walked on in silence, pondering over the
+unlooked-for ending to the strange events they both had lately passed
+through. Joan's heart was full of a contentment which made her think,
+"How pleased Adam will be! and won't mother be glad! and Uncle Zebedee
+'ull have somebody to look to now and keep poor Jonathan straight and
+put things a bit in order;" while Reuben, bewildered by the thoughts
+which crowded to his mind, semed unable to disentangle them. Could it be
+possible that he, Reuben May, was going down to live at Polperro, a
+place whose very name he had once taught himself to abominate?--that he
+could be willingly casting his lot amid a people whom he had but lately
+branded as thieves, outcasts, reprobates? Involuntarily his eyes turned
+toward Joan, and a nimbus in which perfect charity was intertwined with
+great love and singleness of heart seemed to float about her head and
+shed its radiance on her face; and its sight was to Reuben as the first
+touch of love, for he was smitten with a sense of his own unworthiness,
+and, though he did not speak, he asked that a like spirit to that which
+filled Joan might rest upon himself.
+
+That evening Eve was told the news which Joan and Reuben had to tell,
+and as she listened the mixed emotions which swelled within her
+perplexed her not a little, for even while feeling that the two wishes
+she most desired--Joan cared for and Reuben made happy--were thus
+fulfilled, her heart seemed weighted with a fresh disaster: another
+wrench had come to part her from that life soon to be nothing but a
+lesson and a memory. And Adam, when he was told, although the words he
+said were honest words and true, and truly he did rejoice, there yet
+within him lay a sadness born of regret at rendering up that love so
+freely given to him, now to be garnered for another's use; and
+henceforth every word that Reuben spoke, each promise that he gave,
+though all drawn forth by Adam's own requests, stuck every one a
+separate thorn within his heart, sore with the thought of being an
+outcast from the birthplace that he loved and cut off from those whose
+faces now he yearned to look upon.
+
+No vision opened up to Adam's view the prosperous life the future held
+in store--no still small voice then whispered in his ear that out of
+this sorrow was to come the grace which made success sit well on him and
+Eve; and though, as years went by and intercourse became more rare,
+their now keen interest in Polperro and its people was swallowed up amid
+the many claims a busy life laid on them both, each noble action done,
+each good deed wrought, by Adam, and by Eve too, bore on it the unseen
+impress of that sore chastening through which they now were passing.
+
+Out of the savings which from time to time Adam had placed with Mr.
+Macey enough was found to pay the passage-money out and keep them from
+being pushed by any pressing want on landing.
+
+Already, at the nearest church, Adam and Eve had been married, and
+nothing now remained but to get on board the vessel, which had already
+dropped down the river and was to sail the following morning, Triggs had
+volunteered to put them and their possessions safely on board, and
+Reuben and Joan, with Eve's small personal belongings, were to meet them
+at the steps, close by which the Mary Jane's boat would be found
+waiting. The time had come when Adam could lay aside his disguise and
+appear in much the same trim he usually did when at Polperro.
+
+Joan was the first to spy him drawing near, and holding out both her
+hands to greet the welcome change she cried, "Thank the Lord for lettin'
+me see un his ownself wance more!--Awh, Adam! awh, my dear! 't seems as
+if I could spake to 'ee now and know 'ee for the same agen.--Look to un,
+Reuben! you don't wonder now what made us all so proud of un at home."
+
+Reuben smiled, but Adam shook his head: the desolation of this sad
+farewell robbed him of every other power but that of draining to the
+dregs its bitterness. During the whole of that long day Eve and he had
+hardly said one word, each racked with thoughts to which no speech gave
+utterance. Mechanically each asked about the things the other one had
+brought, and seemed to find relief in feigning much anxiety about their
+safety, until Triggs, fearing they might outstay their time, gave them a
+hint it would not do to linger long; and, with a view to their
+leavetaking being unconstrained, he volunteered to take the few
+remaining things down to the boat and stow them safely away, adding that
+when they should hear his whistle given it would be the signal that they
+must start without delay.
+
+The spot they had fixed on for the starting-place was one but little
+used and well removed from all the bustle of a more frequented landing.
+A waterman lounged here and there, but seeing the party was another's
+fare vouchsafed to them no further interest. The ragged mud-imps stayed
+their noisy pranks to scrutinize the country build of Triggs's boat,
+leaving the four, unnoticed, to stand apart and see each in the other's
+face the reflection of that misery which filled his own.
+
+Parting for ever! no hopes, no expectations, no looking forward, nothing
+to whisper "We shall meet again"! "Good-bye for ever" was written on
+each face and echoed in each heart. Words could not soothe that
+suffering which turned this common sorrow into an individual torture,
+which each must bear unaided and alone; and so they stood silent and
+with outward calm, knowing that on that brink of woe the quiver of an
+eye might overthrow their all but lost control.
+
+The sun was sinking fast; the gathering mists of eventide were rising to
+shadow all around; the toil of day was drawing to its close; labor was
+past, repose was near at hand; its spirit seemed to hover around and
+breathe its calm upon those worn, tried souls. Suddenly a shrill whistle
+sounds upon their ears and breaks the spell: the women start and throw
+their arms around each other's necks. Adam stretches his hand out, and
+Reuben grasps it in his own.
+
+"Reuben, good-bye. God deal with you as you shall deal with those you're
+going among!"
+
+"Adam, be true to her, and I'll be true to those you leave behind."
+
+"Joan!" and Adam's voice sounds hard and strained, and then a choking
+comes into his throat, and, though he wants to tell her what he feels,
+to ask her to forgive all he has made her suffer, he cannot speak a
+word. Vainly he strives, but not a sound will come; and these two, whose
+lives, so grown together, are now to be rent asunder, stand stricken and
+dumb, looking from out their eyes that last farewell which their poor
+quivering lips refuse to utter.
+
+"God bless and keep you, Eve!" Reuben's voice is saying as, taking her
+hands within his own, he holds them to his heart and for a moment lets
+them rest there.--"Oh, friends," he says, "there is a land where
+partings never come: upon that shore may we four meet again!"
+
+Then for a moment all their hands are clasped and held as in a vice, and
+then they turn, and two are gone and two are left behind.
+
+And now the two on land stand with their eyes strained on the boat,
+which slowly fades away into the vapory mist which lies beyond: then
+Reuben turns and takes Joan by the hand, and silently the two go back
+together, while Adam and Eve draw near the ship which is to take them
+to that far-off shore to which Hope's torch, rekindled, now is pointing.
+
+Good-bye is said to Triggs, the boat pushes off, and the two left
+standing side by side watch it away until it seems a speck, which
+suddenly is swallowed up and disappears from sight. Then Adam puts his
+arm round Eve, and as they draw closer together from out their lips come
+sighing forth the whispered words, "Fare-well! farewell!"
+
+_The Author of "Dorothy Fox"_.
+
+
+
+
+OUR GRANDFATHERS' TEMPLES.
+
+
+If on the fourteenth day of May, 1607, when the Rev. Robert Hunt
+celebrated the first sacramental service of the Church of England on
+American soil, there had suddenly sprung up at Jamestown the pillars and
+arches of a fully-equipped cathedral, whose stones had remained to tell
+us of the days when they first enshrined the worship of the earliest
+colonists, our most ancient Christian church would still be less than
+three hundred years old--a hopelessly modern structure in comparison
+with many an abbey and cathedral of England and the Continent.
+
+[Illustration: THE OLD SOUTH, BOSTON.]
+
+In a comparative sense, we look in vain for old churches in a new
+country, for in our architecture, if nowhere else, we are still a land
+of yesterday, where age seems venerable only when we refuse to look
+beyond the ocean, and where even a short two hundred years have taken
+away the larger share of such perishable ecclesiastical monuments as we
+once had. Our grandfathers' temples, whether they stood on the banks of
+the James River or on the colder shores of Massachusetts Bay, were built
+cheaply for a scanty population: their material was usually wood,
+sometimes unshapen logs, and their sites, chosen before the people and
+the country had become fitted to each other, were afterward often needed
+for other uses. So long as London tears down historic churches, even in
+the present days of fashionable devotion to the old and the quaint, and
+so long as the Rome of 1880 is still in danger from vandal hands, we
+need only be surprised that the list of existing American churches of
+former days is so long and so honorable as it is. If we have no York
+Minster or St. Alban's Abbey or Canterbury Cathedral, we may still turn
+to an Old South, a St. Paul's and a Christ Church. It is something,
+after all, to be able to count our most famous old churches on the
+fingers of both hands, and then to enumerate by tens those other temples
+whose legacy from bygone times is scarcely less rich.
+
+[Illustration: KING'S CHAPEL, BOSTON, IN 1872.]
+
+The American churches of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were
+plain structures, unpretending without and unadorned within; and this
+for other reasons than the poverty of the community, the lack of the
+best building-materials, and the absence both of architects and of
+artistic tastes. It was a simple ritual which most of them were to
+house, and the absence of an ornate service demanded the absence of
+ornamentation, which would be meaningless because it would symbolize
+nothing. The influence of the Puritans in Massachusetts, the Baptists in
+Rhode Island, the Dutch Reformed in New York, the Lutherans and
+Presbyterians in the Middle and Southern colonies, and the Friends in
+Pennsylvania, whatever their denominational differences, was a unit in
+favor of the utmost simplicity consistent with decency and order; and
+though there was a difference between Congregational churches like the
+Old South in Boston and the Friends' meeting-houses in Philadelphia, the
+difference was far less marked than that existing between the new and
+old buildings of the Old South society, which the modern tourist may
+compare at his leisure in the Boston of to-day. Even the Episcopalians
+shared, or deferred to, the prevailing spirit of the time: they put no
+cross upon their Christ Church in Cambridge, nearly a hundred and thirty
+years after the settlement of the place, lest they should offend the
+tastes of their neighbors. The Methodists, the "Christians," the
+Swedenborgians, the Unitarians and the Universalists were not yet, and
+the Moravians were a small and little-understood body in Eastern
+Pennsylvania.
+
+[Illustration: KING'S CHAPEL BOSTON, IN 1872.]
+
+Nearly all the colonists, of whatever name, brought from Europe a
+conscientious love of religious simplicity and unpretentiousness: for
+the most part, the English-speaking settlers were dissenters from the
+Church which owned all the splendid architectural monuments of the
+country whence they came; and it was not strange that out of their
+religious thought grew churches that symbolized the sturdy qualities of
+a faith which, right or wrong, had to endure exile and poverty and
+privation--privation not only from social wealth, but from the rich
+store of ecclesiastical traditions which had accumulated for centuries
+in cathedral choirs and abbey cloisters.
+
+[Illustration: CHRIST CHURCH, BOSTON.]
+
+Therefore, the typical New England meeting-house of the seventeenth and
+eighteenth centuries may perhaps be taken as the best original example
+of what America has to show in the way of church-building. To be sure,
+its cost was modest, its material was perishable wood, its architectural
+design was often a curious medley of old ideas and new uses, and even
+its few ornaments were likely to be devoid of the beauty their designers
+fancied that they possessed. But it was, at any rate, an honest
+embodiment of a sincere idea--the idea of "freedom to worship God;" and
+it was adapted to the uses which it was designed to serve. It stood upon
+a hill, a square box with square windows cut in its sides--grim without
+and grim within, save as the mellowing seasons toned down its ruder
+aspects, and green grass and waving boughs framed it as if it were a
+picture. Within, the high pulpit, surmounted by a sounding-board,
+towered over the square-backed pews, facing a congregation kept orderly
+by stern tithing-man and sterner tradition. There was at first neither
+organ nor stove nor clock. The shivering congregation warmed itself as
+best it might by the aid of foot-stoves; the parson timed his sermon by
+an hour-glass; and in the singing-seats the fiddle and the bass--viol
+formed the sole link (and an unconscious one) between the simple
+song-service of the Puritan meeting-house and the orchestral
+accompaniments to the high masses of European cathedrals. The men still
+sat at the end of the pew--a custom which had grown up in the days when
+they went to the meeting-house gun in hand, not knowing when they should
+be hastily summoned forth to fight the Indians. In the earliest days the
+drum was the martial summons to worship, but soon European bells sent
+forth their milder call. Behind the meeting-houses were the horse-sheds
+for the use of distant comers--a species of ecclesiastical edifice still
+adorning the greater number of American country churches, and not likely
+to disappear for many a year to come.
+
+In the elder day there was no such difference as now between city and
+country churches, for the limitations of money and material bore upon
+both more evenly. But with growing wealth and the choice of permanent
+locations for building came brick and stone; English architects received
+orders; and the prevailing revival led by Sir Christopher Wren and his
+followers dotted the Northern colonies with more pretentious churches,
+boasting spires not wholly unlike those which were then piercing London
+skies. With costlier churches of permanent material there came also the
+English fashion of burial in churchyards and chancel-vaults, and mural
+tablets and horizontal tombstones were laid into the mortar which has
+been permitted, in not a few cases, to preserve them for our own eyes.
+
+[Illustration: ST. MICHAEL'S, MARBLEHEAD, MASSACHUSETTS.]
+
+But our oldest churches, as a rule, have been made more notable by the
+political events with which they have been associated than by the
+honorable interments that have taken place beneath their shadow. Their
+connection with the living has endeared them to our memories more than
+their relations to the dead. Not because it is Boston's Westminster
+Abbey or Temple Church has the Old South been permitted to come down to
+us as the best example of the Congregational meeting-houses of the
+eighteenth century, but because of the Revolutionary episodes of which
+it was the scene, and which are commemorated in the stone tablet upon
+its front. The Old South Church, built in 1729, belonged to the common
+class of brick structures which replaced wooden ones; for, like
+Solomon's temple, its predecessor had been built of cedar sixty years
+before. The convenient location of the Old South and the capaciousness
+of its interior brought to it the colonial meetings which preceded the
+Revolution, and especially that famous gathering of December 13, 1773,
+whence marched the disguised patriots to destroy the taxed tea in Boston
+harbor. The convenient access and spacious audience-room of the old
+church also led to its occupancy as a riding-school for British cavalry
+in 1775. Even now, in the quiet days following the recent excitement
+attending its escape from fire and from sale and demolition, the ancient
+church still finds occasional use as a place for lectures and public
+gatherings. Its chequered days within the past decade have at least
+served to make its appearance and its part in colonial history more
+familiar to us, and have done something to save other churches from the
+destruction which might have overtaken them.
+
+As the Old South stands as the brick-and-mortar enshrinement of the best
+Puritan thought of the eighteenth century, so King's Chapel in Boston,
+built twenty-five years later, represents the statelier social customs
+and the more conservative political opinions of the early New England
+Episcopalians. Its predecessor, of wood, was the first building of the
+Church of England in New England. The present King's Chapel, with its
+sombre granite walls and its gently-lighted interior, suggests to the
+mind an impression of independence of time rather than of age. One reads
+on the walls, to be sure, such high-sounding old names as Vassall and
+Shirley and Abthorp, and on a tomb in the old graveyard near by one sees
+the inscriptions commemorating Governor John Winthrop of Massachusetts
+and his son John, governor of Connecticut. But King's Chapel seems the
+home of churchly peace and gracious content; so that, as we sit within
+its quaint three-sided pews, it is hard to remember the stormy scenes in
+which it has had part. Its Tory congregation, almost to a man, fled from
+its walls when the British general, Gage, evacuated Boston; the sterner
+worshippers of the Old South occupied its Anglican pews for a time; and
+later it was the scene of a theological movement which caused, in 1785,
+the first Episcopal church in New England--or rather its remnant--to
+become the first Unitarian society in America.
+
+In Salem street, Boston, left almost alone at the extreme north end of
+the city, is Christ Church, built in 1723. Its tower contains the oldest
+chime of bells in America, and from it, according to some antiquarians,
+was hung the lantern which on April 18, 1775, announced to the waiting
+Paul Revere, and through him to the Middlesex patriots in all the
+surrounding country, that General Gage had despatched eight hundred men
+to seize and destroy the military stores gathered at Concord by the
+Massachusetts Committees of Safety and Supplies. Thus opened the
+Revolutionary war, for the battles at Lexington and Concord took place
+only the next day.
+
+The white-spired building at the corner of Park and Tremont streets,
+Boston, known as the Park Street Church, is hardly so old as its
+extended fame would lead one to suppose, for it dates no farther back
+than the first quarter of the present century. Its position as the
+central point of the great theological controversies of 1820 in the
+Congregational churches of Eastern Massachusetts has made it almost as
+familiar as the "Saybrook Platform." The meeting-house was built at the
+time when the greater part of the Boston churches were modifying their
+creeds, and when the Old South itself would have changed its
+denominational relations but for the vote of a State official, cast to
+break a tie. Its inelegance and rawness are excused in part by its
+evident solidity and sincerity of appearance. In its shadow rest
+Faneuil, Revere, Samuel Adams and John Hancock.
+
+Boston has other churches which, like the Park Street, are neither
+ancient nor modern, the Hollis Street Church and the First Church in
+Roxbury being good examples. New England has hardly a better specimen of
+the old-fashioned meeting-house on a hill than this old weather-beaten
+wooden First Church in Roxbury, the home of a parish to which John
+Eliot, the apostle to the Indians, once ministered. Another quaint
+memorial of the old colonial days survives in the current name,
+"Meeting-house Hill," of a part of the annexed Dorchester district of
+Boston.
+
+[Ilustration: ST. PAUL'S CHAPEL, NEW YORK.]
+
+St. Paul's Church, on Boston Common, was the first attempt of the
+Episcopalians of the city, after the loss of King's Chapel,
+to build a temple of imposing appearance. Controversies theological and
+architectural rose with its walls, and young Edward Everett, if report
+is to be credited, was the author of a tract, still in circulation, in
+which its design and its principles formed the text for a criticism on
+the religion to whose furtherance it was devoted. Standing as it does
+next the United States court-house, the uses of the two buildings seem
+to have been confused in the builders' minds; for there is something
+ecclesiastical in the appearance of the hall of justice, which was
+originally a Masonic temple, and something judicial in the face of the
+church.
+
+In Cambridge, three miles from Boston, the eighteenth-century
+Episcopalians not only possessed a church, but also displayed to
+unwilling eyes a veritable "Bishop's Palace"--the stately house of the
+Rev. East Apthorp, "missionary to New England" and reputed candidate for
+the bishopric of that region. Mr. Apthorp was rich and influential, but
+his social and ecclesiastical lot was not an easy one, and he soon
+returned to England discouraged, leaving his "palace" to come down to
+the view of our own eyes, which find in it nothing more dangerous to
+republican institutions than is to be discovered in a hundred other of
+the three-story wooden houses which used so to abound in Massachusetts.
+Christ Church, Cambridge, in which the bishop _in posse_ used to
+minister, and which stands opposite Harvard College, was designed by the
+architect of King's Chapel, and has always been praised for a certain
+shapely beauty of proportion. For the last twenty years it has boasted
+the only chime of bells in Cambridge, whose quiet shades of a Sunday
+evening have been sweetly stirred by the music struck from them by the
+hands of a worthy successor of the mediæval bell-ringers, to whom bells
+are books, and who can tell the story of every ounce of bell-metal
+within twenty miles of his tower. It was of this church, with its
+Unitarian neighbor just across the ancient churchyard where so many old
+Harvard and colonial worthies sleep, that Holmes wrote:
+
+  Like sentinel and nun, they keep
+    Their vigil on the green:
+  One seems to guard, and one to weep,
+    The dead that lie between.
+
+The suburbs of Boston are not poor in churches of the eighteenth, or
+even of the seventeenth, century. The oldest church in New England--the
+oldest, indeed, in the Northern States--still standing in Salem, was
+built in 1634, and its low walls and tiny-paned windows have shaken
+under the eloquence of Roger Williams. It has not been used for
+religious purposes since 1672. In Newburyport is one of the American
+churches, once many but now few, in which George Whitefield preached,
+and beneath it the great preacher lies buried. A curious little reminder
+of St. Paul's, London, is found here in the shape of a whispering
+gallery. Another landmark is the venerable meeting-house of the
+Unitarian society in Hingham, popularly known as the "Old Ship." Built
+in 1681, it was a Congregational place of worship for nearly a century
+and a half. Its sturdiness and rude beauty form a striking illustration
+of the lasting quality of good, sound wooden beams as material for the
+sanctuary. Preparations have already been undertaken for celebrating the
+second centennial of the ancient building. Nearly as old, and still more
+picturesque with its quaint roof, its venerable hanging chandelier of
+brass, its sober old reredos and its age-hallowed communion-service, is
+St. Michael's, Marblehead, built in 1714, where faithful rectors have
+endeavored to reach six generations of the fishermen and aristocracy of
+the rocky old port. The antiquarian who has seen these old temples and
+asks for others on the New England coast will turn with scarcely less
+interest to St. John's, Portsmouth; the forsaken Trinity Church,
+Wickford, Rhode Island, built in 1706; or Trinity, Newport, where Bishop
+Berkeley used to preach. In Newport, indeed, one may also speculate
+beneath the Old Mill on the fanciful theory that the curious little
+structure was a baptistery long before the days of Columbus--the most
+ancient Christian temple on this side the sea.
+
+It is not uncommon to find comparatively new American churches to which
+their surroundings or their sober material or their quiet architecture
+have given a somewhat exaggerated appearance of age. Such is the case
+with the curious row of three churches--the North and Centre
+Congregational and Trinity Episcopalstanding side by side on the New
+Haven green in a fashion unknown elsewhere in our own country. Any one
+of these three churches looks quite as old as that shapely memorial of
+pre-Revolutionary days, St. Paul's Chapel, New York, built in 1766 in
+the prevailing fashion of the London churches. As with St. Paul's, there
+was also no marked appearance of antiquity in the North Dutch Church,
+New York, removed in recent years. The poor old Middle Dutch Church in
+the same city, with its ignoble modern additions and its swarm of busy
+tenants, would have looked old if it could have done so, but for modern
+New Yorkers it has no more venerable memory, in its disfigurement and
+disguise, than that furnished by its use, for a time, as the city
+post-office.
+
+[Illustration: OLD SWEDES' CHURCH, PHILADELPHIA.]
+
+New York is poor in old buildings, and especially poor in old churches.
+Besides St. Paul's, the comparatively modern St. John's Chapel and the
+John Street Methodist Church, it really has nothing to show to the
+tourist in search of ancient places of worship. The vicinity can boast a
+few colonial temples--the quaint old Dutch church at Tarrytown, dear to
+the readers of Irving; the Tennent Church on the battle-ground of
+Monmouth, New Jersey, with its blood-stains of wounded British soldiers;
+and a charmingly plain little Friends' meeting-house, no bigger than a
+small parlor, near Squan, New Jersey, being the most strikingly
+attractive. In Newark one notes the deep-set windows and solid stone
+walls of the old First Presbyterian Church, and the quiet plainness of
+Trinity Episcopal Church, which looks like Boston's King's Chapel, with
+the addition of a white wooden spire.
+
+Philadelphia is richer than any other American city in buildings of the
+seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. On the older streets it is a
+frequent sight to see quaint little houses of imported English brick
+modestly laid in alternate red and black, curiously like the latest
+modern fashion. The ample room for growth possessed by this
+widespreading city has saved many an ancient house for present use as
+dwelling or store. One is not surprised, therefore, to find on the old
+streets near the Delaware three churches of weather-stained brick which
+seem trying to make the piety of an elder age useful to the worshippers
+of to-day. All three of these churches--Gloria Dei, Christ and St.
+Peter's--now have their chief work among the poor people whom one always
+finds in a business quarter near the river-front, but each attracts, by
+its old-time associations and its modern missionary spirit, a goodly
+circle of attendants from the western parts of the city. Gloria Dei
+Church, the oldest of the three, was built in 1700 by Swedish Lutherans
+on the spot where the Swedish predecessors of the Friends had located
+their fortified log church twenty-three years earlier. Its bell and
+communion-service and some of its ornamental woodwork were presented by
+the king of Sweden. It is surrounded by the usual graveyard, in which
+lies Alexander Wilson, the lover and biographer of birds, who asked to
+be buried here, in a "silent, shady place, where the birds will be apt
+to come and sing over my grave." The Old Swedes' Church retained its
+Lutheran connection until recent years, when it became an Episcopal
+parish.
+
+Christ Church and St. Peter's were formerly united in one parochial
+government, and to the two parishes ministered William White, the first
+Church-of-England minister in Pennsylvania, the friend and pastor of
+Washington, the chaplain of Congress and one of the first two bishops of
+the American Church. The present structure of Christ Church was begun in
+1727, but not finished for some years. The parish is older, dating from
+1695. Queen Anne gave it a communion-service in 1708. In 1754 came from
+England its still-used chime of bells, which were laboriously
+transferred during the Revolution to Allentown, Pennsylvania, lest they
+should fall into British hands and be melted up for cannon. At Christ
+Church a pew was regularly occupied by Washington during his frequent
+residence in Philadelphia; and here have been seated Patrick Henry,
+Benjamin Franklin, James Madison and many another patriot, besides
+Cornwallis, Howe, André and others on the English side. Around and
+beneath the church are many graves covered by weather-worn stones, and
+on the walls of the interior there are a number of mural tablets.
+
+St. Peter's Church was begun in 1758, and completed three years later.
+In quiet graciousness of appearance it is like another Christ Church,
+and its interior arrangements are still more quaint, the chancel being
+at the eastern end of the church, while the pulpit and lectern are at
+the western. In the adjoining churchyard is a monument to Commodore
+Decatur.
+
+One cannot find in all America sweeter and quainter memorials of a
+gentle past--memorials still consecrated to the gracious work of the
+present--than the churches and other denominational houses in the old
+Moravian towns of Pennsylvania. At Bethlehem, as one stands in the
+little three-sided court on Church street and looks up at the heavy
+walls, the tiny dormer windows and the odd-shaped belfry which mark the
+"Single Sisters' House" and its wings, one may well fancy one's self, as
+a travelled visitor has said, in Quebec or Upper Austria. Still more
+quaint and quiet is Willow Square, behind this curious house, where,
+beneath drooping willow-boughs, one finds one's self beside the door of
+the old German chapel, with the little dead-house, the boys' school and
+the great and comparatively modern Moravian church near by. Through
+Willow Square leads the path to the burying-ground, where lie, beneath
+tall trees, long rows of neatly-kept graves, each covered with a plain
+flat stone, the men and the women lying on either side of the broad
+central path. Several of the ancient Moravian buildings date from the
+middle of the last century. The Widows' House stands, opposite the
+Single Sisters' Range, and across the street from the large church is
+the Moravian Seminary for Young Ladies, established in 1749, and by far
+the oldest girls' school in the United States.
+
+It was in 1778 that the Single Sisters gave to Pulaski that banner of
+crimson, silk which is commemorated in Longfellow's well-known "Hymn of
+the Moravian Nuns at Bethlehem." The poem, however, written in the
+author's early youth, and preserved for its rare beauty of language and
+fine choice of subject, rather than for its historical accuracy, has
+done much to perpetuate a wrong idea of the Moravian spirit and ritual.
+Mr. Longfellow writes in his first stanza
+
+      When the dying flame of day
+      Through the chancel shot its ray,
+      Far the glimmering tapers shed
+      Faint light on the cowled head,
+      And the censer burning swung,
+      When before the altar hung
+      That proud banner, which, with care,
+      Had been consecrated there;
+  And the nuns' sweet hymn was heard the while,
+  Sung low in the dim, mysterious aisle.
+
+But the Moravians know nothing of chancels, tapers, cowled heads,
+censers, altars or nuns. Their faith has always been the simplest
+Protestantism, their churches are precisely such as Methodists or
+Baptists use, and their ritual is plainer than that of the most
+"evangelical" Episcopal parish. Their "single sisters' houses," "widows'
+houses" and "single brethren's houses"--the last long disused--are
+simply arrangements for social convenience or co-operative housekeeping.
+Mr. Longfellow's poetic description applies to the Moravian ceremonial
+no more accurately than to a Congregational prayer-meeting or a
+Methodist "love-feast."
+
+[Illustration: THE MORAVIAN CEMETERY, BETHLEHEM, PENNSYLVANIA.]
+
+Beside the deep and silent waters of the James River in Virginia,
+undisturbed by any sound save the flight of birds and the rustle of
+leaves, stands all that is left of the first church building erected by
+Englishmen in America. A good part of the tower remains, the arched
+doorways being still intact, and it seems a pitiable misfortune that the
+honestly-laid bricks of the venerable building could not have come down
+to our day. But, as it is, this ancient square block of brick forms our
+one pre-eminent American ruin. Nothing could be a more solemn monument
+of the past than the lonely tower, surrounded by thick branches and
+underbrush and looking down upon the few crumbling gravestones still
+left at its base. Jamestown, long abandoned as a village, has now become
+an island, the action of the waters having at last denied it the
+remaining solace of connection with the mainland of the Old Dominion,
+of whose broad acres it was once the chief town and the seat of
+government--the forerunner of all that came to America at the hands of
+English settlers.
+
+In the slumberous old city of Williamsburg, three miles from Jamestown,
+stands the Bruton parish church, two hundred and two years old, and
+still the home of a parish of sixty communicants. Built of brick, with
+small-paned windows and wooden tower, its walls have listened to the
+eloquence of the learned presidents of the neighboring William and Mary
+College, and its floor has been honored by the stately tread of many a
+colonial governor, member of the legislature or Revolutionary patriot;
+for Williamsburg was the capital and centre of Virginia until the end of
+the eighteenth century, and shared whatever Virginia possessed of
+political or personal renown. Washington, of course, was more than once
+an attendant at Bruton Church, and so were Jefferson and Patrick Henry
+and an honorable host. In the church and in the chapel of William and
+Mary College--which the ambitious colonists used to think a little
+Westminster Abbey--was the religious home of a good share of what was
+stateliest or most honorable in the early colonial life of the South.
+
+Other old churches still dot the Virginia soil--St. John's, Richmond;
+Pohick Church, Westmoreland county; Christ Church, Lancaster county; St.
+Anne's, Isle of Wight county. Their antiquities, and those of other
+ancient sanctuaries of the Old Dominion, have been painstakingly set
+forth by Bishop Meade and other zealous chroniclers, and their
+attractiveness is increased, in most cases--as at Jamestown--by the
+loneliness of their surroundings. Another old church, left in the midst
+of sweet country sights and gentle country sounds, is St. James's, Goose
+Creek, South Carolina. St. Michael's and St. Philip's at Charleston in
+the same State have heard the roar of hostile cannon, but have come
+forth unscathed. The demolished Brattle Street Church in Boston was not
+the only one of our sacred edifices to be wounded by cannonballs, for
+the exigences of the fight more than once, during the Revolution and
+the civil war, brought flame and destruction within the altar-rails of
+churches North and South.
+
+The growth of the Roman Catholic Church in America has been so recent
+that it can show but few historical landmarks. The time-honored
+cathedral at St. Augustine, Florida, and the magnificent ruin of the San
+José Mission near San Antonio, Texas, and one or two weather-stained
+little chapels in the North-west, are nearly all the churches that bring
+to us the story of the priestly work of the Roman ecclesiastics during
+the colonial days.
+
+We have no State Church, and the different Presidents have made a wide
+variety of choice in selecting their places of worship in Washington.
+St. John's, just opposite the White House, has been the convenient
+Sunday home of some of them: others have followed their convictions in
+Methodist, Presbyterian, Unitarian and other churches. But the city of
+Washington is itself too young to be able to boast any very ancient
+associations in its churches, and few of its temples have been permitted
+to record the names of famous occupants during a series of years. Our
+whole country, indeed, is a land of many denominations and a somewhat
+wandering population; and older cities than Washington have found one
+church famous for one event in its history, and another for another,
+rather than, in any single building, a series of notable occurrences
+running through the centuries. The nearest approach to the record of a
+succession of worthies occupying the same church-seats year after year
+is to be found in the chronicles of our oldest college-chapels, as, for
+instance, at Dartmouth, where the building containing the still-used
+chapel dates from 1786. But though poverty and custom unite in making
+our colleges conservative, their growth in numbers demands, from time to
+time, new and more generous accommodations for public worship; and so
+the little buildings of an earlier day are either torn down or kept for
+other and more ignoble uses, like Holden Chapel at Harvard. This quaint
+little structure was built in 1744, and is now used for
+recitation-rooms, but at one period in its career it served as the
+workshop of the college carpenter.
+
+[Illustration: RUINS OF THE OLD CHURCH-TOWER, JAMESTOWN, VIRGINIA.]
+
+In the years since our grandfathers built their places of worship we
+have seen strange changes in American church buildings--changes in
+material, location and adaptation to ritual uses. We have had a revival
+of pagan temple-building in wood and stucco; we have seen Gothic
+cathedrals copied for the simplest Protestant uses, until humorists have
+suggested that congregations might find it cheaper to change their
+religion than their unsuitable new churches; we have ranged from four
+plain brick walls to vast and costly piles of marble or greenstone; we
+have constructed great audience-rooms for Sunday school uses alone, and
+have equipped the sanctuary with all culinary attachments; we have built
+parish-houses whose comfort the best-kept mediæval monk might envy, and
+we have put up evangelistic tabernacles only to find the most noted
+evangelists preferring to work in regular church edifices rather than in
+places of easy resort by the thoughtless crowd of wonder-seekers. But
+not all these doings have been foolish or mistaken: some of them have
+been most hopeful signs, and the next century will find excellent work
+in the church-building of our day. The Gothic and Queen Anne revivals,
+at their best, have promoted even more than the old-time honesty in the
+use of sound and sincere building-material; and not a few of our newer
+churches prove that our ecclesiastical architects have something more to
+show than experiments in fanciful "revivals" that are such only in name.
+We shall continue to do well so long as we worthily perpetuate the best
+material lesson taught by our grandfathers' temples--the lesson of
+downright honesty of construction and of a union between the spirit of
+worship and its local habitation.
+
+CHARLES F. RICHARDSON.
+
+
+
+WILL DEMOCRACY TOLERATE A PERMANENT CLASS OF NATIONAL OFFICE-HOLDERS?
+
+
+It is no doubt a public misfortune that so much of that thoughtful
+patriotism which, both on account of its culture and its independence,
+must always be valuable to the country, should have been wasted, for
+some time past, upon what are apparently narrow and unpractical, if not
+radically unsound, propositions of reform in the civil service. There is
+unquestionably need of reform in that direction: it would be too much to
+presume that in the generally imperfect state of man his methods of
+civil government would attain perfection; but it must be questioned
+whether the subject has been approached from the right direction and
+upon the side of the popular sympathy and understanding. At this time
+propositions of civil-service reform have not even the recognition, much
+less the comprehension, of the mass of the people. Their importance,
+their limitations, their possibilities, have never been demonstrated: no
+commanding intellectual authority has ever taken up the subject and
+worked it out before the eyes of the people as a problem of our national
+politics. It remains a question of the closet, a merely speculative
+proposition as to the science of government.
+
+What, then, are the metes and bounds of this reform? How much is
+demanded? How much is practicable?
+
+Not attempting a full answer to all of these questions, and intending no
+dogmatic treatment of any, let us give them a brief consideration from
+the point of view afforded by the democratic system upon which the whole
+political fabric of the United States is established. We are to look at
+_our_ civil-service reform from that side. Whatever in it may be
+feasible, that much must be a work in accord with the popular feeling.
+It may be set down at the outset, as the first principle of the problem,
+that any practicable plan of organizing the public service of the United
+States must not only be founded upon the general consent of the people,
+but must also have, in its actual operation, their continual, easy and
+direct participation. Any scheme, no matter by what thoughtful patriot
+suggested, no matter upon what model shaped, no matter from what
+experience of other countries deduced, which does not possess these
+essential features can never be worth the serious attention of any one
+who expects to accomplish practical and enduring results.
+
+(Possibly this may seem dogmatic, to begin with; but if we agree to
+treat the question as one in democratic politics, the principle stated
+becomes perfectly apparent.)
+
+It must be fair, then, and for the purposes of this article not
+premature, to point out that the measure which is especially known as
+"civil-service reform," and which has been occasionally recognized in
+the party platforms along with other generalities, is one whose essence
+is _the creation of a permanent office-holding class_. Substantially,
+this is what it amounts to. A man looking forward to a place in the
+public service is to regard it as a life occupation, the same as if he
+should study for a professional career or learn a mechanical trade. Once
+in office, after a "competitive examination" or otherwise, he will
+expect to stay in: he will hold, as the Federal judges do, by a
+life-tenure, "during good behavior." This is now substantially the
+system of Great Britain, which, in the judgment of Mr. Dorman B. Eaton,
+is so much better than our own as to actually reduce the rate of
+criminality in that country, and which, he declares, only political
+baseness can prevent us from imitating. A change of administration
+there, Mr. Eaton adds, only affects a few scores of persons occupying
+the highest positions: the great mass of the officials live and die in
+their places, indifferent to the fluctuation of parliamentary
+majorities or the rise and fall of ministries.
+
+We must ask ourselves does this system accord with American democracy?
+
+A little more than half a century has passed since John Quincy Adams,
+unquestionably the best trained and most experienced American
+administrator who ever sat in the Presidency, undertook to establish in
+the United States almost precisely the same system as that which Great
+Britain now has. Admission to the places was not, it is true, by means
+of competitive examination, but the feature--the essential feature--of
+permanent tenure was present in his plan. Mr. Adams took the government
+from Mr. Monroe without considering any change needful: his Cabinet
+advisers even included three of those who had been in the Cabinet of his
+predecessor, and these he retained to the end, though at least one of
+the three, he thought, had ceased to be either friendly or faithful to
+him. Retaining the old officers, and reappointing them if their
+commissions expired, selecting new ones, in the comparatively rare cases
+of death, resignation or ascertained delinquency, upon considerations
+chiefly relating to their personal capabilities for the vacant places,
+Mr. Adams was patiently and faithfully engaged during the four years of
+his Presidency in establishing almost the precise reform of the national
+service which has been in recent times so strenuously urged upon us as
+the one great need of the nation--the administrative purification which,
+if effectually performed, would prove that our system of government was
+fit to continue in existence. Mr. Adams's plan did, indeed, seem
+excellent. It commanded the respect of honest but busy citizens absorbed
+in their private affairs and desirous that the government might be
+fixed, once for all, in settled grooves, so that its functions would
+proceed like the steady progress of the seasons. It was an attempt to
+run the government, as has been sometimes said, "on business
+principles." The President was to proceed, and did proceed, as if he had
+in charge some great estate which he was to manage and direct as a
+faithful and exact trustee. This, no one can deny, had the superficial
+look of most admirable administration.
+
+But President Adams had left out of account largely what we are
+compelled to sedulously consider--public opinion. He had acquired most
+of his experience abroad, and his principal service at home, as
+Secretary of State, had been in a remarkably quiet time, when party
+movements were neither ebbing nor flowing, so that he had forgotten how
+strong and vigorous the democratic feeling was amongst the population of
+these States. This is a forgetfulness to which all men are liable who
+long occupy official position, and who seldom have to submit themselves
+to that severe and rude competitive examination which the plan of
+popular elections establishes. Unfortunately for him, he was not
+responsible to a court of chancery for the management of his trust, but
+to a tribunal composed of a multitude of judges. His accounts were to be
+passed upon not by one learned and conservative auditor guided by
+familiar precedents and rules of law, but a great, tumultuous popular
+assembly, which would approve or disapprove by a majority vote. When,
+therefore, it appeared to the people that he was forming a body of
+permanent office-holders--was recruiting a civil army to occupy in
+perpetuity the offices which they, the mass, had created and were taxed
+to pay for--the fierce, and in many respects scandalous, partisan
+assault which Jackson represented, if he did not direct, gathered
+overwhelming force. It seemed to the popular view that a narrow, an
+exclusive, an aristocratic system was being formed. The President
+appeared to be, while honestly and carefully preserving their trust from
+waste or loss, committing it to a control independent of them--an
+official body which, having a permanent tenure, would be altogether
+indifferent to their varying desires. Such a scheme of government was
+therefore no more than an attempt to stand the pyramid on its apex: Mr.
+Adams's administration, supported chiefly by those whose aspirations
+were for an honest and capable bureaucracy, and who could not or would
+not face the rude questionings of democracy, ended with his first four
+years, and went out in such a whirlwind of partisan opposition as
+brought in, by reaction, the infamous "spoils system" that at the end of
+half a century we are but partially recovered from.
+
+To designate more particularly the great fact which had been disregarded
+in this notable experiment of fifty years ago, and which is apparently
+not sufficiently considered in the measures of reform that have been
+more recently pressed upon us, we may declare that the government of the
+United States is, as yet, the direct outcome of what may be called _the
+political activity of the people_. Whether or not, having read history,
+we must anticipate a time here when the many, weary of preserving their
+own liberties, will resign their power to a few, it is certain that no
+such inclination yet appears. The government is the product of the
+public mind and will when these are moved with reference to the subject.
+It is created freshly at short intervals, and the manner of the creation
+is seldom languid or careless, but usually earnest, intense and heated.
+Upon this point there has no doubt been much misapprehension. As it has
+happened--perhaps rather oddly--that those of our thoughtful patriots
+whose warnings and appeals have reached public notice have had their
+experiences mostly in city life, surrounded by the peculiar conditions
+which exist there, the conclusions they have drawn in some respects are
+applicable only to their own surroundings. They have discovered persons
+who had forgotten or did not believe that liberty could be bought only
+with the one currency of eternal vigilance, and coupled with these
+others who were too busy to attend to the active processes by which the
+government is from time to time renewed; and they have concluded, with
+fatal inaccuracy of judgment, that this exceptional disposition of a
+small number of persons was a type of the whole population. Nothing
+could be more absurdly untrue. Outside of a very limited circle no such
+political fatigue exists. The people generally are deeply interested in
+public affairs and willing to attend to their own public duties. Their
+concern in regard to measures, methods and candidates is seldom laid
+aside. The _political activity_ to which we have called attention thus
+at some length is earnest, persistent and exacting.
+
+It will be useful for the reformer of the civil service to give some
+study to the manifestations of this activity. He will find it one of the
+most marked and characteristic features in the life of the American
+people. If he will take the pains to examine the civil organization of
+the country, he will find that its roots run to every stratum of
+society. The number of persons interested in politics, not as a
+speculative subject, but as a practical and personal one, is wonderfully
+great. Thus, in most of the States there exists that modification of the
+ancient Saxon system of local action by "hundreds"--the township
+organization. This alone carries a healthy political movement into the
+farthest nook and corner of the body politic: every citizen of common
+sense may well be consulted in this primary activity, and every
+household may be interested in the question whether its results are good
+or bad. But besides this, simple and slightly compensated as are the
+positions belonging to the township, there are in every community many
+willing to fill them. To be a supervisor of the roads,[1] to be township
+constable and collector of the taxes, to audit the township accounts, to
+be a member of the school board, to be a justice of the peace, is an
+inclination--it may be a desire--entertained by many citizens; and if
+the ambition may seem to be a narrow one, its modesty does not make it
+unworthy or discreditable. But these men alone, active in the politics
+of townships, form a surprising array. If we consider that in
+Pennsylvania there are sixty-seven counties, with an average of say
+forty townships in each, here are twenty-six hundred and eighty
+townships, having each not less than ten officials, and making nearly
+twenty-seven thousand persons actually on duty at one time in a single
+State in this fundamental branch of the service. And if we estimate that
+besides those who are in office at least two persons are inclined and
+willing, if not actually desirous, to occupy the place now filled by
+each one--a very moderate calculation--we multiply twenty-six thousand
+eight hundred by three, and have over eighty thousand persons whose minds
+are quick and active in local politics on this one account. But we may
+proceed further. There are the cities and boroughs, their official
+business more complex and laborious, and in most cases receiving much
+higher compensation. The competition for these is in many instances very
+great: in the case of large cities we need not waste words in
+elaborating the fact. It is difficult to estimate the number of persons
+to whom the municipal corporations give place and pay compensation in
+the State of Pennsylvania, but five thousand is not an extravagant
+surmise, while it would be equally reasonable to presume that for each
+place occupied at least three others would be willing to fill it, so
+that on this account we may make a total of twenty thousand. But there
+are also the county offices. Besides the judicial positions, altogether
+honorable, held by long terms of election and receiving liberal
+compensation, there are in each county an average of fifteen other
+officials, making in the State, in round numbers, one thousand. These,
+again, may be multiplied by four: there are certainly three waiting
+aspirants for each place. But ascend now to the State system, with its
+several executive departments, the legislature, the charitable and penal
+institutions and the appointments in the gift of the governor. Great and
+small, these may reach one thousand (the Legislature alone, with its
+officers and employés, accounts for over three hundred), and certainly
+there are at least five persons looking toward each of the several
+places.
+
+Upon such an estimate, then, of the political activities of one State we
+have such a showing as this:
+
+Citizens politically active as to townships,           80,000
+Citizens politically active as to cities and boroughs, 20,000
+Citizens politically active as to counties,             4,000
+Citizens politically active as to the State,            5,000
+                  Making a total of                   109,000
+
+Some allowance should be made, no doubt, for persons whose inclinations
+for position cover all the different fields--who may be said to be
+watching several holes. But we have not considered how many citizens of
+Pennsylvania are inclined to national positions--the Presidency, seats
+in Congress or some of the numerous places in the general service of the
+Federal government. These two classes, it is probable, would offset each
+other.
+
+Subtracting, however, the odd thousands from the total stated, we may
+fix at one hundred thousand the number of citizens in the one State who,
+by reason of occupying some position of public duty or of being inclined
+to fill one, are actively interested in the subject of politics. This is
+almost exactly one-seventh of the whole number of voters in the State:
+it presents the fact that in every group of seven citizens there is one,
+presumably of more than the average in capacity and intelligence, whose
+mind is quick and sensitive to every question affecting political
+organization. We are brought thus to the same point which we reached by
+an observation of the township system--the fact that every part of
+society is permeated by the general political circulation. It is like
+the human organism: nerves and blood-vessels extend, with size and
+capacity proportioned for their work, to the most remote extremity, and
+the whole is alive.
+
+Let us, however, guard strictly, at this point, against a possible
+misconception. It is not to be understood that these one hundred
+thousand citizens are simply "office-seekers," using the ordinary and
+offensive sense of the term. The activity in affairs which we describe
+is distinct from a sordid desire to grab the emoluments of office. The
+vast majority of the places, including all those in the
+townships--which, with the aspirants to them, make four-fifths of the
+whole--are either without any pay at all or have an amount so small as
+to be beneath our consideration. But a small part of the offices which
+we have enumerated carry emoluments sufficient to furnish a living for
+the most economical incumbent. The inspiration of the political
+interest evidenced by this one-seventh part of the citizenship is not an
+unworthy one at all: on the contrary, it is that essential democratic
+inclination without which our form of government must quickly stagnate.
+It would be foolish to say that no selfish motive enters into this
+tremendous manifestation of energy and effort (until humanity assumes a
+higher form the moving power of the mercenary principle must be very
+great), but it is fair and it is accurate to ascribe to the men in
+affairs a much loftier and more honorable impulse--the aspiration to
+share in the conduct of their own government, the unwillingness to be
+ignored or excluded in the administration of what is universally
+denominated a common trust. That they enjoy, if they do not covet, such
+pecuniary advantage as their places bring is reasonable, but it is true,
+to their credit, that they do appreciate more than this the honor that
+attaches to the public station and the pleasure which may be experienced
+in the discharge of its conspicuous duties.
+
+Let us presume that even this imperfect study of the political
+activities of a single State may present some conception of the
+tremendous force and energy that go to the making, year by year, of the
+various branches of our government. Certainly, any student of this field
+may accept with respect the admonition that there is no languor, no
+fatigue, no feeling of genteel disgust with politics, in what has thus
+been presented him. If, then, his plan of reorganization for the civil
+service is intended to be set up without consulting the popular
+inclination, or possibly even in opposition to it, he may well stand
+hesitant as to his likelihood of success. The question may confront him
+at once: Is the organization of a permanent official class in the
+administration of the general government likely to accord with the
+desires of the people? And we may add, Is it consistent with the general
+character of our form of government? Is it not attended by conclusive
+objections?
+
+It is not the purpose of this article to attempt answering these
+questions fully. We do not propose to throw ourselves across the path
+of those undoubtedly sincere, and probably wise, students of this
+subject who have arrived at the positive conclusion that to establish a
+permanent tenure for the great body of the national office-holders, and
+to appoint to vacancies among them upon the tests of a competitive or
+other examination, is the panacea for all our public disorders, the
+regenerative process which will lift our whole system into a higher and
+purer atmosphere. We do not say that these gentlemen may not be right,
+but we are willing to examine the subject.
+
+Upon viewing, then, the tremendous popular activity in local and State
+affairs--and we must reflect that there is "more politics to the square
+foot" in some of the newer States than there is in Pennsylvania--the
+inquiry is natural whether this stops short of all national politics.
+Certainly it does not. The offices in the general government, though
+their importance and their influence are usually overestimated, are a
+great object of attention with the whole country. The vehement
+democratic movement toward them that marked the time of Jackson is still
+apparent, though it proceeds with diminished force and is regulated and
+tempered by the strong protest which has been made against the scandals
+of the "spoils system," and against the theory that government by
+parties must be a continual struggle for plunder. It is noticeable that
+no administration has ever really attempted the formation of an
+irremovable body of officials. No party has ever yet explicitly declared
+itself in favor of such a policy. No actual leader of any party, bearing
+the responsibility of its success or failure in the elections, has ever
+yet sincerely and persistently advocated the measure. None wish to
+undertake so tremendous a task. He would indeed be a powerful orator who
+could carry a popular gathering with him in favor of the proposition
+that hereafter the holding of office was to be made more exclusive--that
+the people were to put away from themselves, by a renunciation of their
+own powers, the expectancy of occupying a great part of the public
+places. Rare as may be the persuasive ability of the true stump-orator,
+and serene as his confidence may be in his powers, there would be but
+few volunteers to enter a campaign upon such a platform as that. It
+would be a forlorn hope indeed.
+
+The view of the people undoubtedly is (1) that the public places are
+common property; (2) that any one may aspire to fill them; and (3) that
+the elevation to them is properly the direct or nearly direct result of
+election. The elective principle is democratic. It has been, since the
+beginning of the government, steadily consuming all other methods of
+making public officers. In most States the appointing power of the
+governor, which years ago was usually large, has been stripped to the
+uttermost. It is thirty years in Pennsylvania since even the judiciary
+became elective by the people. And in those States--of which Delaware
+furnishes an example--where most of the county officers are still the
+appointees of the governor, the tendency to control his action by a
+display of the popular wish--such an array of petitions, etc. as amounts
+to a polling of votes--is unmistakable. The governor is moved,
+obviously, by the people. And if to some this general tendency toward
+the elective idea seems dangerous, it must be answered that it is not
+really so if the people are in fact capable of self-government.
+Conceding this as the foundation of our system, we cannot, at this point
+and that, expect to interpose a guardianship over their expression.
+
+To the permanency of tenure it is that we have given, and expect will
+generally be given, most attention. This is the essence of the proposed
+"reform." The manner of selecting new appointees is of no great
+consequence if the vacancies are to occur so seldom as must be the case
+where incumbents hold for life. Whether the new recruits come in upon
+the certificates of a board of examiners, such as the British
+Civil-Service Commission, or upon the scrutiny of the Executive and his
+advisers, as now, is a consideration of minor importance. It is the idea
+of an official class, an order of office-holders, which appears to throw
+itself across the path of the democratic activity which we have
+attempted to describe. This is the point of conflict--if any. We might,
+it is true, take many measures to ensure the colorless and harmless
+character of the system. Up to a recent time the government clerks in
+England were deprived of the suffrage, in order that they might be
+perfectly indifferent to politics. It is probable that in time our own
+officials would lose the ordinary instincts of a democratic citizenship,
+and would regard with coldness, if not contempt, the activities that
+lead to a renewal of the government. But however smoothly they might
+move in the pursuance of their clerical routine, however faultless they
+might become in their round of prescribed duties, would they not still
+obstruct the public purpose? Would not even this emasculate order of
+placemen, standing apart a sacrificed though favored class, still
+present themselves as unpardonable offenders? When it should be
+discovered that they claimed the possession in perpetuity of the offices
+in the national government, and had organized themselves as a standing
+army of placemen, can it be believed that they would not be swept aside
+by the same iconoclastic onset which ended the Adams administration?
+
+We do not pause here to represent the apparent inconsistency of desiring
+to de-citizenize a large number of intelligent members of the community,
+or the risk of creating a class in the republic forbidden to take any
+active interest in the renewals of its organization, or the impolicy of
+diminishing the force and courage of the popular will in its grapple
+with the problem of self-government; but all these comments may suggest
+themselves.
+
+Popular expectancy, it may fairly be declared, follows all the stations
+of public life with a jealous if not an eager eye. There is abundant
+evidence of this in the county and township systems. Taking, for
+example, the administration of county affairs in any of the States, it
+will be found that the officers, by a rule that seems generally
+satisfactory, hold during short terms, and are seldom re-elected
+immediately to the same place. The rule is rotation--giving a large
+number of persons their "turn"--and changes are regularly made. A man
+disappointed this year for a particular place waits until the time comes
+to fill it again, and in many counties, other things being about equal,
+the fact that he has waited patiently and now presents the oldest claim
+governs the selection. The antipathy to one who seeks to hold on to his
+place beyond the ordinary term--the dislike for a grabber who desires
+more than is usually assigned--is a perfectly well-known feature in
+politics. The county system of Pennsylvania will afford abundant proof
+of the statements here made: the terms of the officers, who are all
+elective, do not average more than four years, even including such
+court-officials as the clerks and prothonotaries, whose duties are in
+some particulars technical and difficult, requiring an acquaintance with
+the forms of legal procedure. But it is further true that in the States
+where county officers are appointed by the governor no protracted tenure
+results. On the contrary, the pressure upon him of the public
+expectation seldom permits the reappointment of an officer whose
+commission is expiring.
+
+With this rule of change, primary as its application is, and within the
+direct comprehension and control of the people, there does not appear to
+be any general discontent. It is accepted, so far as we can discover, as
+a just and proper system by which an equality of claims upon the common
+favor is maintained. It is reasonable to presume, therefore, that
+amongst a people fairly acquainted with their own business, and
+possessing a fair education both of the schools and of experience in
+life, many persons in every community are competent to serve as its
+officials. At any rate, in the midst of these usages we discover no
+demand that the terms of office be made permanent, and that the
+place-holders be put beyond the reach of a removal. There is no apparent
+realization that such a "reform" is demanded; and if it be difficult, as
+has been stated, to awaken popular enthusiasm in behalf of a permanent
+tenure in the national civil service, there seems to be nothing in the
+rules of primary politics to help smooth the way.
+
+It may be asked now whether it is not almost certainly true that some
+sound principle lies in the methods which an intelligent community,
+unrestrained by ancient conventional ideas or repressive systems of law,
+applies to its own political organization. Is not this instinctive
+democratic plan an essential principle of a government founded upon
+equal rights? _Is it not a law of Change which characterizes the civil
+service of a democracy, and not a law of Permanence?_
+
+We can hardly doubt that the facts which have been stated concerning the
+disposition of the people toward the offices in their government are
+capable of a philosophical explanation; and as they proceed with evident
+freedom and naturalness from the very bosom of communities accustomed to
+independent thought and action, the conclusion is irresistible that this
+is the temper and the tendency of a free government. Startling as it may
+be to propose change rather than permanency in the civil service, that
+may prove to be best adapted to our wants. Consciously or not, such a
+rule has been established by the people themselves; and while it has
+scarcely found a formal presentation, much less had careful examination
+and argument, there can be little doubt that such a principle,
+substantially as we have described, lies close to the hearts of the
+people. The right of election, the idea that public officers should be
+elective, and the expectation that there will be a rotation of duties
+and honors, are popular principles which are unmistakable.
+
+Apart from the consideration that whatever is fundamental in popular
+government, whatever tends to the preservation of individual freedom and
+equality of rights, must be a safe principle, there could be much said
+from the most practical stand-point in favor of rotation in office. All
+human experience proves the usefulness of change. Rest is the next thing
+to rust. In physics things without motion are usually things without
+life; and in government it is the bureaus least disturbed by change that
+are most stagnated and most circumlocutory. The apparent misfortune of
+having men experienced in public affairs make way, at intervals, for
+others of less experience is itself greatly exaggerated. There are facts
+so important in compensation that the assumed evil becomes one of very
+moderate proportions. For it will be seen upon careful observation that
+no important function of the government, not even in the national
+service, calls for a character or qualification--sometimes, but rarely,
+for any sort of special or technical skill--which is not being
+continually formed and trained either in the movements of private life
+and business experience or in the political schools which are furnished
+by the State, the county and the township. The functions of the
+government are substantially the guardianship of the same interests for
+which the State, the county, the township and the individual exercise
+concern. Government has lost its mystery: even diplomacy has somewhat
+changed from lying and chicanery to common-sense dealing. The qualities
+that are required in the government--industry, economy, integrity,
+knowledge of men and affairs--are precisely those which are of value to
+every individual citizen, and which are taught day by day everywhere--to
+the lads in school and college and to the men in their occupations of
+life. Such qualities a community fit to govern itself must abundantly
+possess. There is nothing occult in the science of government. The
+administration in behalf of the people of the organization which they
+have ordered is nothing foreign to their own knowledge. They have ceased
+to consider themselves unfit for self-rule: they no longer think of
+calling in from other worlds a different order of beings to govern them.
+
+We may accept without fear principles which seem startling, but which
+are proved to be rooted in democratic ground, so long as we have faith
+in the democratic system itself. There is no road open for the doubter
+and questioner of popular rights but that which leads back to abandoned
+ground. We may proceed, then, with an attempt to explain the philosophy
+of the rule of Change. Shall it not be stated thus:
+
+_That, due regard being had to the preservation of simplicity and
+economy--forbidding thus the needless increase of offices and
+expenses--it is then true that the active participation by the largest
+number of persons in the practical administration of their own
+government is an object highly to be desired in every democratic
+republic._
+
+The government must be the highest school of affairs. Shall it be
+declared that to study there and to have its diploma is not desirable
+for all? Is it not perfectly evident that the more who can learn to
+actually discharge the duties belonging to their own social
+organization, the better for them and the better for it?
+
+All these propositions necessarily imply the existence of an intelligent
+and patriotic people, at least of such a majority. So always does every
+plan of popular government. Whatever of disappointment presents itself
+to the author of any scheme of "reform," upon finding that he has
+constructed a system which is ridden down by the political activity of
+the people, he must blame the plan upon which our fabric is built. If he
+is chagrined to find that his _imperium in imperio_ is not practicable,
+and that nothing can make here a power stronger than the source of
+power, he must solace his hurt feelings with the reflection that the
+system was never adapted to his contrivance, and that our fathers, when
+in the beginning they resolved to establish a government by the people,
+gave consent thereby to all the apparent risks and inconveniences of
+having the people continually minding their own affairs.
+
+With a just comprehension of the democratic forces that give motion and
+life to the governmental system of the United States, and of the manner
+in which they affect the public service in all its departments, the wise
+advocate of reform must approach his work. His patriotism and
+thoughtfulness are both necessary. To proceed against the democratic law
+is not practicable: to establish a new system which is inconsistent with
+the abundant vitality and conscious strength of that already established
+is a futile proposition indeed.
+
+
+
+
+THE PRICE OF SAFETY.
+
+
+Thirty-three years ago--that is, shortly before Christmas, 1847--I went
+over to Paris to pass a few weeks with my family. The great railway
+schemes of the two previous years in England had broken down a good many
+men in our office--draughtsmen, surveyors and so on. I wonder if the
+present public recollects those days, when the _Times_ brought out
+double supplements to accommodate the advertisements of railroads, when
+King Hudson was as much a potentate as Queen Victoria, when Brunel and
+Stephenson were autocrats, and when everybody saw a sudden chance of
+getting rich by shares or damages? Those days were the beginning of that
+period of prosperity of which the recent "hard times" were the reaction.
+_Then_ twenty guineas a night for office-work was sometimes paid to
+youngsters not yet out of their teens. In the great offices the young
+men worked all day and the alternate nights to get plans ready for
+Parliament, sustained by strong coffee always on the tap, till some of
+them went mad with the excitement and the strain.
+
+I had worked hard both in the field and office during the closing months
+of 1847, but I broke down at last, and was sent to recover my health
+under the care of my family. That family consisted of my father--a
+half-pay English officer--my mother and three sisters, then living _au
+troisième_ in the Rue Neuve de Berri, not far from the newly-erected
+Russian church, and the windows of the _appartement_ commanded a side
+view down the Champs Élysées. I only needed rest and recreation, both of
+which my adoring family eagerly provided me. My sisters were three
+lively, simple-hearted, honest English girls, who had a large
+acquaintance in Paris, and took great pride and pleasure in introducing
+to it their only brother. We were not only invited to our embassy and on
+visiting terms with all the English Colony (that colony whose annals at
+that period are written in _The Adventures of Philip_, and to which
+Thackeray's mother and nearest relatives, like ourselves, belonged), but
+we were, in virtue of some American connections, admitted to the
+American embassy on the footing of semi-Americans.
+
+We enjoyed our American friends greatly. I formed the opinion then,
+which I retain now, that cultivated Americans, the top-skimming of the
+social cream, are some of the most charming people to be met with in
+cultivated society. To all that constitutes "nice people" everywhere
+they join a _soupçon_ of wild flavor which gives them individuality.
+They are to society what their own wild turkeys and canvasbacks are to
+the _menu_.
+
+One of my sisters, Amy, the eldest, had been ill that winter, and was
+not equal to joining in the gayeties that the others enjoyed. Her
+principal amusement was walking in the Gardens of Monceaux, a private
+domain of King Louis Philippe in the Batignolles, a quiet, humdrum spot,
+where she could set her foot upon green turf and gravel. The streets of
+Paris, the Boulevards, and the Champs Élysées were too attractive to a
+pleasure-seeker like myself to allow me to content myself with the pale
+attractions of Monceaux, but I went there with my sister once or twice,
+because French etiquette forbade her walking even in these quiet
+garden-paths alone.
+
+One day it was proposed by her that we should go again. I could not, in
+common humanity, refuse, and so consented. Poor Amy "put on her things,"
+as our girls called it, and we descended to the porte-cochère, intending
+to engage the first passing citadine. As we stepped into the street,
+however, a gay carriage with high-stepping gray horses, a chasseur with
+knife and feathers, and a coachman in a modest livery on a hammer-cloth
+resplendent with yellow fringes and embroideries, drew up at our door: a
+pretty hand was laid upon the portière and a voice cried, "Amy! Amy! I
+was coming for you."
+
+"My brother--Miss Leare," said Amy.
+
+Miss Leare bowed to me gracefully and motioned to her chasseur to open
+the carriage-door. "Get in," she said. "_I_ have the carriage for two
+hours: what shall we do with it? Mamma is at the dentist's.--Amy, I
+thought you would enjoy a drive, and so I came for you."
+
+I helped Amy in, and was making my bow when Miss Leare stopped me. "Come
+too," she said cordially: "Amy's brother surely need not be taboo. Shall
+we drive to the Bois?"
+
+"I was going to Monceaux," said Amy. "Would it be quite the thing for us
+to drive alone to the Bois?"
+
+"Oh-h-h!" said Miss Leare, prolonging her breath upon the
+vocative.--"You see," she added, turning to me, "I am so unprepared by
+previous training that I shall never become _au fait_ in French
+proprieties. Indeed, I hold them in great reverence, but they seem to be
+for ever hedging me in; nor can I understand the meaning of half of
+them. In America I was guided by plain right and wrong.--Why shall we
+not outrage etiquette, Amy, by 'going alone,' as you call it, to
+Monceaux? Is it that the place is so stiff and solemn and out of the way
+that we may walk there without a chaperon? I should have thought
+seclusion made a place more dangerous, allowing that there be any danger
+at all.--In America, Mr. Farquhar, your escort would be enough for us,
+and the fact that Amy is your sister would give a sort of double
+security to your protection."
+
+"Oh, dear Miss Leare--" began Amy.
+
+"Hermie, Amy--Hermione, which is English and American for Tasso's
+Erminia.--Do you like my name, Mr. Farquhar? We have strange names in
+America, English people are pleased to say.--Victor!" she went on,
+calling to the chasseur without pausing for any reply, "stop at some
+place where they sell candy. Mr. Farquhar will get out and buy us some."
+
+Obediently to her order, we stopped at a confectioner's. I was directed
+to put my hand into the carriage-pocket, where I should find some
+"loose change," kept there for candy and the hurdy-gurdy boys. Then I
+was directed to go into the "store" and choose a pound of all sorts of
+"mixed candy."
+
+I had not more than made myself intelligible to a young person behind
+the counter when the carriage-door was opened and both the girls came
+in, Miss Hermione declaring that she knew I should be embarrassed by the
+multitude of "sweeties," and that I should need their experience to know
+what I was about.
+
+With dawdling, laughing and good-comradeship we chose our bonbons, and
+getting back into the barouche we proceeded to crunch them as we drove
+on to Monceaux. It was like being children over again, with a slight
+sense of being out of bounds. I had never seen confectionery eaten
+wholesale in that fashion. Such bonbons were expensive, too. Trained in
+the personal economy of English middle-class life, it would never have
+occurred to me to buy several francs' worth of sugar-plums and to eat
+them by the handful. But as the fair American sat before me, smiling,
+laughing, petting Amy and saying fascinating impertinences to myself, I
+thought I had never seen so bewitching a creature. Her frame, though
+_svelte_ and admirably proportioned, gave me an idea of vigor and
+strength not commonly associated at that time with the girls of America.
+Her complexion, too, was healthy: she was not so highly colored as an
+English country girl, but her skin was bright and clear. Her face was a
+perfect oval, her hair glossy and dark, her eyes expressive hazel. Her
+points were all good: her ears, her hands, her feet, her upper lip and
+nostrils showed blood, and the daintiness and taste of her rich dress
+seemed to denote her good taste and fine breeding. My sisters, could not
+tie their bonnet-strings as she tied hers, nor were their dresses
+anything like hers in freshness, fit or daintiness of trimming.
+
+We alighted at last at old Monceaux, and walked about its solemn alleys.
+Sometimes Miss Leare talked sense, and talked it well. Those were
+exciting days in Paris. It was February, 1848, and a great crisis was
+nearer at hand in politics than we suspected; besides which there had
+been several events in private life which had increased the general
+excitement of the period--notably the murder of Marshal Sebastiani's
+daughter, the poor duchesse de Praslin. Hermione could talk of these
+things with great spirit, but sometimes relapsed into her grown-up
+childishness. She talked, too, with animation of the freedom and
+happiness of her American girlhood. My sister Amy had always taken life
+_au grand sérieux_; Ellen was a little too prompt to flirt with officers
+and gay young men, and needed repression; Lætitia went in for
+book-learning, and measured every one by what she called their
+"educational opportunities." My sisters were as different as possible
+from this butterfly creature, who seemed to sip interest and amusement
+out of everything.
+
+At the end of two hours we drove back to Mrs. Leare's hôtel, which was
+opposite our own apartment in the Rue Neuve de Berri, the hôtel that a
+few weeks later was occupied by Prince Jerome. Here Hermione insisted
+upon our coming in while the carriage drove to the dentist's for her
+mother.
+
+The reception-rooms in Mrs. Leare's hôtel were very showy. They were
+filled with buhl and knick-knacks gathered on all parts of the
+Continent, and lavishly displayed, not always in good keeping. A little
+sister, Claribel, came running up to us when we entered, and clung
+fondly to Hermione, who sat down at the Erard grand piano and sang to
+us, without suggestion, a gay little French song. She was taking
+lessons, Amy afterward told me, of the master most in vogue in Paris and
+of all others the most expensive. Amy, who could sing well herself,
+disparaged Hermione's voice to me, and sighed as she thought of the
+waste of those inestimable lessons.
+
+Then Miss Hermione lifted the top of an ormolu box on the chimney-piece
+of a boudoir and showed Amy and me, under the rose as it were, some
+cigarettes, with a laugh. "Mamma's," she said: "she has a _faiblesse_
+that way."
+
+"Oh, Hermione! you don't?" cried Amy.
+
+"No, _I_ don't," said Hermione more gravely.
+
+I was so amused by her, so fascinated, so completely at my ease with
+her, that I could have stayed on without taking note of time had not Amy
+remembered that it was our dinner-hour. We took our leave, and met Mrs.
+Leare on the staircase ascending to her apartment. She greeted Amy with
+as much effusion as was compatible with her ideas of fashion, and said
+she was "right glad" to hear we had been passing the morning with
+Hermione.
+
+"I wish you would come very often. I like her to see English girls: you
+do her so much good, Amy.--Mr. Farquhar, we shall hope to see you often
+too. I have a little reception here every Sunday evening."
+
+With that she continued her course up stairs, and we descended to the
+porte-cochère.
+
+She was a faded woman, "dressed to death," as Amy phrased it, and none
+of my people had a good word for her.
+
+"The Leares are rolling in riches, I believe," remarked my father, "and
+an American who is rich has no hereditary obligations to absorb his
+wealth, so that it becomes all 'spending-money,' as Miss Hermione says.
+The head of the family--King Leare I call him--stays at home in some
+sort of a counting-room in New York and makes money, giving Mrs. Leare
+and Miss Hermione _carte blanche_ to spend it on any follies they
+please. I never heard anything exactly wrong concerning Mrs. Leare, but
+she does not seem to me the woman to be trusted with that very nice
+young daughter. I feel great pity for Miss Leare."
+
+"Miss Leare has plenty of sense and character," said my mother: "I do
+not think her mother's queer surroundings seem to affect her in any way.
+She moves among the Frenchmen, Poles and Italians of her mother's court
+like that lady Shakespeare--or was it Spenser?--wrote about among the
+fauns and satyrs. With all her American freedom she avoids improprieties
+by instinct. I have no fears for her future if she marries the right
+man."
+
+"Indeed, mamma," said Amy, "I wish she would keep more strictly within
+the limit of the proprieties. She makes me nervous all the time we are
+together."
+
+"My dear, you never heard her breathe a really unbecoming word or saw
+her do an immodest thing?" said my mother interrogatively.
+
+"Oh no, of course not," said Amy.
+
+"They say Mrs. Leare wants to marry her to that Neapolitan marquis who
+is so often there," put in Ellen. "_On dit_, she will have a _dot_ of
+two millions of francs, or, as they call it, half a million of dollars."
+
+"Such a rumor," I broke in, rather annoyed by this turn in the
+conversation, "may well buy her the right to be a marchioness if she
+will."
+
+"Indeed it won't, then," said Ellen sharply, "for she thinks Americans
+should not 'fix' themselves permanently abroad. She says she means to
+marry one of her own folks, as she calls her countrymen."
+
+"She knows an infinite variety of things, and has had all kinds of
+masters," sighed Lætitia: "she speaks all the languages in Europe. I
+believe Americans have a peculiar facility for pronunciation, like the
+Russians, and she learned at her school in America philosophy, rhetoric,
+logic, Latin, algebra, chemistry."
+
+"I wonder she should be so sweet a woman," said my father. "She seems a
+good girl--I never took her for a learned one--but her mother is a fool,
+and I should think her father must be that or worse. I wonder what he
+can be like? It seems to an Englishman so strange that a man should stay
+at home alone for years, and suffer his wife and family to travel all
+over the Continent without protection."
+
+Though my father, mother and sisters declined the Sunday invitation of
+Mrs. Leare, I went to her reception. The guests were nearly all
+Italians, Poles, Spaniards or Frenchmen. There was no Englishman
+present, but myself, and only one or two Americans. I felt at once how
+out of place my mother, the country matron, and my father, _ce
+respectable viellard,_ would have been in such a circle. But Mrs.
+Leare's guests were not the _jeunesse dorée_ nor the dubious nobility I
+had expected to meet in her _salon_. The Frenchmen among them were all
+men whose names were familiar in French political circles--men of
+revolutionary tendencies and of advanced opinions. I afterward
+discovered they had taken advantage of Mrs. Leare's desire to be the
+head of a salon to use her rooms as a convenient rendezvous. It was safe
+ground on which to simmer their revolutionary cauldron. It was seething
+and bubbling that night, although neither the Leares nor myself were
+aware of what was brewing. The talk was all about the Banquets,
+especially the impending reform banquet in the Rue Chaillot. The
+gentlemen present were not exactly conspirators: they were for the most
+part political reformers, who, being cut off from the usual modes of
+expressing themselves through a recognized parliamentary opposition or
+by the medium of petition, had devised a system of political banquets,
+some fifty of which had already been held in the departments, and they
+were now engaged in getting one up in Paris in the Twelfth
+arrondissement.
+
+At that time, in a population of thirty-five millions, there were but a
+quarter of a million of French voters, and as in France all places (from
+that of a railroad guard to a seat on the bench) were disposed of by the
+government, it was very easy for ministers to control the legislature. A
+reform, really needed in the franchise, was the object proposed to
+themselves by the original heads of the Revolution of 1848, though when
+they had set their ball in motion they could neither control it nor keep
+up with it as it rolled downward.
+
+The prevalent idea in Mrs. Leare's salon was that the banquet of the Rue
+Chaillot would go off quietly, that the prefect of police would protest,
+and that the affair would then pass into the law-courts, where it would
+remain until all interest in the subject had passed away. One was
+sensible, however, that there was a general feeling of excitement in the
+atmosphere. Paris swarmed with troops, evidently under stricter
+discipline than usual. People looked into each other's faces
+interrogatively and read the daily papers with an anxious air.
+
+Though I did not at the time fully appreciate what I saw, I was struck
+by the business-like character of the men about me. The guests, I
+thought, took very little notice of the lady of the house. I did not
+then suspect that they were using her hospitality for their own
+purposes, and that they felt secure in her total incapacity to
+understand what they were doing. She, meantime, intent on filling her
+reception-rooms with celebrities and titled persons, was charmed to have
+collected so many distinguished men around her.
+
+Hermione appeared bewildered, uncomfortable and restless, like a
+spectator on the edge of a great crowd. "There are too many strangers
+here to-night," she said: "mamma and I do not know one half of them.
+They have been brought here by their friends. To have a salon is mamma's
+ambition, but this is not my idea of it. I feel as if we were out of
+place among these men, who talk to each other and hardly notice us at
+all."
+
+We sat together and exchanged our thoughts in whispers. It was one of
+those crowds that create a solitude for lovers. Not that we talked
+sentiment or that we were lovers. We conversed about the excitements of
+the day--of the Leste affair, in which the king and the king's ministry
+were accused of protecting dishonesty; of the Beauvallon and
+D'Equivilley duel and the Praslin murder, in connection with both of
+which the royal family and the ministry were popularly accused of
+protecting criminals--and at last the conversation strayed away from
+France to Hermione's own girlhood. She told me of her happy country home
+in Maryland with her grandmother, and sighed. I asked her if she was
+going to the English ball to be given on Wednesday night at the
+beautiful Jardin d'Hiver in the Champs Élysées.
+
+"I suppose so," she replied, "but I don't care for large assemblies: I
+feel afraid of the men I meet. I wish your mother could chaperon me: it
+would be much nicer to be with her than with my own. Mamma understands
+nothing about looking after me; she wants to have a good time herself,
+and I am only in her way. Do you know, Mr. Farquhar, I have a theory
+that when women have missed anything they ought to have enjoyed in early
+life, they always want to go back and pick it up. Mamma had no pleasures
+in her youth, no attentions, no gayety. If I am to be chaperoned, I like
+the real thing. If I were at home in Maryland, where my father came
+from, I should need no one to protect me: _you_ could take me to the
+ball."
+
+"I, Miss Hermione?"
+
+"Yes, you. You would call for me, and wait till I was ready to come
+down. Then you and I would go _alone_," she added, enjoying my look of
+incredulity. "It is the custom: no harm could come of it," she added.
+"We would walk to our ball."
+
+"No harm in the case that you have supposed, but in some other cases--"
+
+"You suppose a good deal," she interrupted. "You suppose a girl without
+self-respect or good sense, and perhaps a man without honor. Here, of
+course, things cannot be like that. Society seems founded upon different
+ideas from those prevalent with us about men and women. _Here_, I admit,
+a girl finds comfort and protection and ease of mind in a good chaperon.
+Yet it seemed strange to me to put on leading-strings when I came out
+here: I had been used to take care of myself for so many years."
+
+"Why, Miss Leare," I said, laughing, "you cannot have been many years in
+society."
+
+"I am twenty," she said frankly, "and we came to Europe about three
+years ago. But before that time I had been in company a good deal. Not
+in the city, for I was not 'out,' but in the hotels at Newport, at the
+Springs and in the country. In America one has but to do what one knows
+is kind and right, and no one will think evil: here one may do, without
+suspecting it, so many compromising things."
+
+"Does the instinct that you speak of to be kind and right always guide
+the young American lady?"
+
+"I suppose so--so far as I know. It _must_. She walks by it, and sets
+her feet down firmly. Here I feel all the time as if I were walking
+among traps blindfolded."
+
+The ball of the Jardin d'Hiver in the Champs Élysées was a superb
+success. The immense glass-house was fitted up for dancing, and all went
+merry as a marriage-bell, with a crater about to open under our feet, as
+at the duchess of Richmond's ball at Brussels.
+
+Miss Leare was there, but quiet and dignified. There was not the
+smallest touch of vulgarity about her. The coarse readiness to accept
+publicity which distinguishes the underbred woman, whether in England or
+America, the desire to show off a foreign emancipation from what appear
+ridiculous French rules, were not in her.
+
+Yet she might have amused herself as she liked with complete impunity,
+for Mrs. Leare appeared to leave her entirely alone. I danced with her
+as often as she would permit me, and my heart was no longer in my own
+possession when I put-her into her carriage about dawn.
+
+Two or three days after I called, but the ladies were not in, so that
+except at church at the Hôtel Marboeuf on Sunday morning I saw nothing
+of Miss Hermione. Monday, February 21st, was sunny and bright. The
+public excitement was such that an unusual number of working-men were
+keeping their St. Crispin. The soldiers, however, were confined to their
+quarters: not a uniform was to be seen abroad. Our night had been
+disturbed by the continuous rumble of carts and carriages.
+
+"Is it a fine day for the banquet?" I heard Amy say as our maid opened
+her windows on Tuesday morning.
+
+"There is to be no banquet," was the answer. "_Voyez done_ the
+proclamation posted on the door of the barrack at the corner of the Rue
+Chaillot."
+
+I sprang from my bed and looked out of my window. A strange change had
+taken place in the teeming little caserne at the corner. Instead of the
+usual groups of well-behaved boy-soldiers in rough uniforms, the barrack
+looked deserted, and its lower windows had been closed up to their top
+panes with bags of hay and mattresses. Not a soldier, not even a sentry,
+was to be seen.
+
+I dressed myself and went out to collect news. The carts that had
+disturbed us during the night had been not only employed in removing all
+preparations for the banquet, but in taking every loose paving-stone out
+of the way. I found the Place de la Madeleine full of people, all
+looking up at the house of Odillon Barrot, asking "What next?" and "What
+shall we do?" Odillon Barrot was the hero of the moment--literally _of
+the moment_. In forty-eight hours from that time his name had faded from
+the page of history. In the Place de la Concorde there was more
+excitement, for threats were being made to cross the bridge and to
+insult the Chambers. The Pont de l'Institut, notwithstanding the efforts
+of the garde municipale or mounted police, was greatly crowded. A party
+of dragoons, on sorrel ponies barely fourteen hands high, rode up and
+began to clear the bridge, but gently and gradually. The crowd was
+retiring as fast as its numbers would permit, when some of the municipal
+guard rode through the ranks of the dragoons and set themselves, with
+ill-judged roughness, to accelerate the operation. The crowd grew angry,
+and stones began to be thrown at the guard and soldiers.
+
+Growing anxious for the women I had left in the Rue Neuve de Berri, I
+returned home by side-streets. A crowd had collected on the Champs
+Élysées about thirty yards from the corner of our street, and was
+forming a barricade. All were shouting, all gesticulating. Citadines at
+full speed were driving out of reach of requisition; horses were going
+off disencumbered of their vehicles; the driver of a remise was seated
+astride his animal, the long flaps of his driving-coat covering it from
+neck to tail; a noble elm was being hewn down by hatchets and even
+common knives. An omnibus, the remise, a few barrels and dining-tables,
+a dozen yards of _pave_ torn up by eager hands, a sentry-box, some
+benches and the tree, formed the barricade. _Gamins_ and _blouses_
+worked at it. The respectables looked on and did not trouble the
+workers. Suddenly there was a general stampede among them. A squadron of
+about fifty dragoons charged up the Champs Élysées. One old
+peasant-woman in a scanty yellow-and-black skirt, which she twitched
+above her knees, led the retreat. But soon they stopped and turned
+again, while the dragoons rode slowly back, breathing their horses.
+Nobody was angry, for nobody had been hurt, but they were frightened
+enough.
+
+At this moment, stealing from a porte-cochère where she had taken refuge
+during the fright and _sauve gui peut_, came a figure wrapped in dark
+drapery. Could it be possible? Hermione Leare! In a moment I was at her
+side. She was very pale and breathless, and she was glad to take my arm.
+"What brings you here?" I whispered.
+
+"Our servants have all run away: they think mamma is compromised.
+Victor, our chasseur, broke open mamma's secretary and took his wages.
+She is almost beside herself. She wanted to send a letter to the post,
+and as it is steamer-day I thought papa had better know that thus far
+nothing has happened to us. There was nobody to take the letter: I said
+I would put it in the box in the Rue Ponthieu."
+
+"And did you post it?"
+
+"No: I could not get to the Rue Ponthieu. They were firing down the
+street, and now I dare not."
+
+"Trust it to me, Miss Leare, and promise me to send for me if you have
+any more such errands. You must never run such risks again."
+
+"I have to be the man of the family," she answered, almost with an
+apologetic air.
+
+"Do not say that again. I shall come over three times a day while this
+thing lasts to see if you have any commissions."
+
+She smiled and pressed my hand as she turned into her own porte-cochère.
+Frightened servants and their friends were in the porter's lodge, who
+gazed after her with exclamations as she went up the common stair.
+
+The remainder of that day passed with very little fighting. Up to that
+time it had been a riot apropos of a change of ministry, but in the
+night the secret societies met and flung aside the previous question.
+
+When we awoke on Wednesday morning, February 23d, we were struck by the
+strange quiet of the streets. No provisions entered Paris through the
+barrier, no vehicles nor venders of small wares. The absolute silence,
+save when "Mourir pour la Patrie" sounded hoarsely in the distance, was
+as strange as it was unexpected. I had always connected an insurrection
+with noise. It was rumored that Guizot the Unpopular had been dismissed,
+and that Count Mole, a man of half measures, had been called to the
+king's councils. The affair looked to me as if it were going to die out
+for want of fuel. But I was mistaken: the blouses, who had not had one
+gun to a hundred the day before, had been all night arming themselves by
+domiciliary requisitions. The national guard was not believed to be
+firm.
+
+The night before, an hour after I had parted with Miss Hermione, I had
+made an attempt to see her and Mrs. Leare, without any success. Not even
+bribery would induce the concierge to let me in. His orders were
+peremptory: "_Pas un seul, monsieur, personne_"--madame received nobody.
+
+Early on Wednesday morning I again presented myself: the ladies were not
+visible. Later in the day I called again, and was again refused. But
+several times Amy had seen Hermione at a window, and they had made signs
+across the street to one another. I began to understand that Mrs. Leare
+was overwhelmed by the responsibility she had incurred in opening her
+salon to men whom she now perceived to have been conspirators, and that
+she was obstinately determined not to compromise herself further by
+giving admittance to any one.
+
+Our bonne had been able to ascertain from the concierge of the Leare
+house that madame was hysterical, and could hardly be controlled by
+mademoiselle.
+
+I was in the streets till five o'clock on Wednesday, when, concluding
+all was over, I came home, intending to make another effort to see the
+Leares, and if possible to take Miss Hermione, with Ellen and Lætitia,
+to view the debris of the two days' fight--to let them get their first
+glimpse of real war in the Place de la Concorde, where a regiment was
+littering down its horses for the night, and a peep into the closed
+gardens of the Tuileries.
+
+When I got up to our rooms I found my sisters at a window overlooking
+the courtyard of Mrs. Leare's hotel, and they all cried out with one
+voice, "Mrs. Leare's carriage is just ready to drive away."
+
+I looked. A travelling-equipage stood in the courtyard. On it the
+concierge was hoisting trunks, and into it was being heaped a
+promiscuous variety of knick-knackery and wearing apparel. A country
+postilion--who, but for his dirt, would have looked more like a
+character in a comedy than a real live, serviceable post-boy--was
+standing in carpet slippers (having divested himself of his boots of
+office) harnessing three undersized gray Normandy mares to an elegant
+travelling-carriage.
+
+Hermione herself, Claribel her little sister, Mrs. Leare and the old
+colored nurse got quickly in. Mrs. Leare was in tears, with her head
+muffled in a yard or two of green _barège_, then the distinctive mark of
+a travelling American woman. The child's-nurse had long gold ear-drops
+and a head-dress of red bandanna. There was not a man of any kind with
+them except the postilion. The concierge opened the gates of the
+courtyard.
+
+"Stop! stop!" I cried, and rushed down our own staircase and out of our
+front door.
+
+As I ran past their entrance a woman put a paper into my hand. I had no
+time to glance at it, for the carriage had already turned into the Rue
+Ponthieu. For some distance I ran after it, encountering at every step
+excited groups of people, some of whom seemed to me in search of
+mischief, while some had apparently come out to gather news. There were
+no other carriages in the streets, and that alone enabled me to track
+the one I was in chase of, for everybody I met had noticed which way it
+had turned. It wound its way most deviously through by-streets to avoid
+those in which paving-stones had been torn up or barricades been formed,
+and the postilion made all possible speed, fearing the carriage might be
+seized and detached from his horses. But the day's work was finished and
+the disorders of the night were not begun.
+
+Forced at last to slacken my speed and to take breath, I glanced at the
+paper that I still held in my hand. It contained a few words from
+Hermione: "Thank you for all the kindness you have tried to show us,
+dear sir. My mother has heard that all the English in Paris are to be
+massacred at midnight by the mob, and directs me to give you notice,
+which is the reason I address this note to you and not to Amy. Mamma is
+afraid of being mistaken for an Englishwoman. We have secured
+post-horses and are setting out for Argenteuil, where we shall take the
+railway. Again, thank you: your kindness will not be forgotten by H.
+LEARE."
+
+This note reassured me. I no longer endeavored to overtake the carriage,
+but I pushed my way as fast as possible beyond the nearest barrier. Once
+outside the wall of Paris, I was in the Banlieu, that zone of rascality
+whose inhabitants are all suspected by the police and live under the
+ban. Of course on such a gala-day of lawlessness this hive was all
+astir. At a village I passed through I tried to hire a conveyance to
+Argenteuil. I also tried to get some railway information, but nobody
+could tell me anything and all were ravenous for news. I secured,
+however, without losing too much time, a seat with a stout young
+country-man who drove a little country cart with a powerful gray horse,
+and was going in the direction I wanted to travel.
+
+"What will be the result of this affair?" I said to him when he had got
+his beast into a steady trot.
+
+He shrugged his shoulders. A French workingman has a far larger
+vocabulary at his command than the English laborer. "Bon Dieu!" he
+exclaimed: "who knows what will come of it? A land without a master is
+no civilized land. We shall fall back into barbarism. What there is
+certain is, that we shall all be ruined."
+
+At length, to my great relief, we saw a carriage before us; and we drove
+into the railway-station at the same moment as the Leares.
+
+Before the ladies could alight I was beside the window of their
+carriage.
+
+"You here, Mr. Farquhar?" cried Hermione. "How good of you! You cannot
+guess the relief. Help me to get them out, these helpless ones."
+
+We lifted Mrs. Leare on to the platform of the railway, weeping and
+trembling. The old colored nurse could not speak French, and seemed to
+think her only duty was to hold the hand of little Claribel and to stand
+where her young mistress placed her. All looked to Hermione. She carried
+a canvas bag of five-franc pieces and paid right and left. I tried to
+interfere, as she was giving the postilion an exorbitant sum.
+
+"No, hush!" she whispered: "we can afford to pay, but in our situation
+we cannot afford to dispute."
+
+She then deputed me to see after the "baggage," as she called the
+luggage of the party, and went with her mother into the glass cage that
+the French call a _salle d'attente_ at a railway-station.
+
+We had come from the seat of war, and every one crowded around us asking
+for news. I had little to tell, but replied that I believed the affair
+was nearly over. I did not foresee that two hours later a procession
+roaring "Mourir pour la Patrie" under the windows of the Hôtel des
+Affaires Étrangères would be fired into by accident, and that the
+_émeute_ of February, 1848, would be converted into a revolution.
+
+It was nine o'clock in the evening. The lamps were lighted in the
+station. The night was cloudy, but far off on the horizon we could see a
+gleam of radiance, marking the locality of the great city.
+
+After an hour of very anxious waiting, during which Mrs. Leare was
+beside herself with nervous agitation, the locked doors of our prison
+were flung open and we were permitted to seat ourselves in a
+railway-carriage.
+
+Hermione's tender devotion to her mother, the old servant and the child
+was beautiful to witness. Now that Mrs. Leare was helpless on her
+daughter's hands, they seemed to have found their natural relations.
+Hermione said few words to me, but a glance now and then thanked me for
+being with them. The train started. For about three miles all went on
+well, although we travelled cautiously, fearing obstructions. Suddenly
+the speed of our train was checked, and there was a cry of consternation
+as we rounded a sharp curve. The bridge over the Seine at its third bend
+was ablaze before us!
+
+All the men upon the train sprang out upon the track as soon as the
+carriage-doors were opened, and in a few moments we were surrounded by
+ruffians refusing to let us go on.
+
+"Back the train!" cried the railroad official in charge.
+
+No, they were not willing to let us go back to Paris. Conspirators
+against the people might be making their escape. They had set fire to
+the bridge, they said, to prevent the train from passing over. It must
+remain where it was. If we passengers desired to return to Paris, we
+must walk there.
+
+"Walk?" I exclaimed: "it is ten miles! Women--delicate
+ladies--children!"
+
+My remonstrance was drowned in the confusion. Suddenly the party of
+women under my charge stood at my elbow: Mrs. Leare was leaning on
+Hermione's arm; Mammy Christine and Claribel cowered close and held her
+by her drapery.
+
+"Make no remonstrances," she said in a low voice: "let us not excite
+attention. An Englishman never knows when not to complain: an American
+accepts his fate more quietly. These people mean to sack the train. We
+had better get away as soon as possible."
+
+"But how?" I cried.
+
+"I can walk. We must find some means of transporting mamma, Mammy Chris
+and Clary."
+
+As Hermione said this she turned to an official and questioned him upon
+the subject. He thought that there was a little cart and horse which
+might be hired at a neighboring cottage.
+
+"Let us go and see about it, Mr. Farquhar," said Hermione.
+
+"I will."
+
+"No: I put greater trust in my own powers of persuasion.--Mammy dear,
+take good care of mamma: we shall be back directly."
+
+Her _we_ was very sweet to me, and I shared her mistrust of my French
+and my diplomacy.
+
+The glare of the burning bridge lighted our steps: the air was full of
+falling flakes of fire. The cottage was a quarter of a mile off.
+Hermione refused my arm, but, holding her skirts daintily, stepped
+bravely at my side. She exhibited no bashfulness, no excitement, no
+confusion, no fear: she was simply bent on business. We reached the
+peasant's farmyard. He and his family were outside the house. We like to
+say a Frenchman has no word for _home_. But the conclusion that the man
+of Anglo-Saxon birth deduces from this lack in his vocabulary is false:
+no man cares more for the domicile that shelters him. Hermione made her
+request with sweet persuasiveness. I saw at once it would have been
+refused if I had made it, but to her they made excuses. The old horse,
+they said, was very old, the old cart was broken.
+
+"Let me look at it," said Hermione. At this they led us into an
+outhouse, where she assisted me to make a careful inspection. I might
+have rejected the old trap at once, but she offered a few suggestions,
+which she told me in an aside were the fruit of her experiences in
+Maryland and Virginia, and the cart was pronounced safe enough to be
+driven slowly with a light load.
+
+A half-grown son of the house was put in charge of it. Hermione
+suggested he should bring the family clothes-line in case of a
+breakdown, and prevailed upon the farmer's wife to put in plenty of
+fresh straw, a blanket and a pillow. She made a bargain, less
+extravagant than I expected, with the peasant proprietor, promising,
+however, a very handsome _pourboire_ to his son in the event of our good
+fortune. The farmer stipulated, in his turn, that cart, horse and lad
+were not to pass the barrier, that the boy should walk at the horse's
+head, and that the cart was to contain only two women and little
+Claribel.
+
+It was harnessed up immediately. Hermione and I followed it on foot back
+to the little band of travellers waiting beside the railway.
+
+"Can we not get some of your trunks out?" I said to her.
+
+"No," she answered: "leave them to their fate. I dare not overload the
+cart, and I doubt whether those men with hungry eyes would let us take
+them. Mamma," she whispered, "has her diamonds."
+
+"You will get into the cart, Miss Leare?" I said as I saw her motioning
+to the old colored woman to take the place beside her mother.
+
+"No indeed," she replied: "our contract stipulated only for mamma, Mammy
+and Clary: Mammy is crippled with rheumatism. If you have no objection I
+will walk with you."
+
+"Objection? No. But it is ten miles."
+
+"A long stretch," she said with a half sigh, "but I am young, strong,
+and excitement counts for something: besides, there is no remedy. We
+must consider them."
+
+There had been about fifteen other persons on the train. A dozen of
+these, finding we were going to walk back to Paris, proposed to join us.
+The night was growing dark, and we pushed on. There was no woman afoot
+but Hermione. "Madame" they called her, evidently taking her for my
+wife, but by no word or smile did she notice the blunder. After a while
+she accepted my arm, drawing up her skirts by means of loops or pins. We
+had one lantern among us, and from time to time its glare permitted me
+to see her dainty feet growing heavy with mud and travel.
+
+It was not what could be called a lovers' walk, tramping in the dark
+through mud and water, on a French country road, at a cart's tail, and
+hardly a word was exchanged between us; yet had it not been for fears
+about her safety it would have been the most delightful expedition I had
+ever known.
+
+From time to time Mrs. Leare and the old nurse in the cart complained of
+their bones. Hermione was always ready with encouragement, but she said
+little else to any one. She appeared to be reserving all her energies to
+assist her physical endurance and to strengthen her for her task of
+taking care of the others.
+
+I had always seen my sisters and other girls protected, sheltered, cared
+for: it gave me a sharp pang to see this beautiful and dainty creature
+totally unthought of by those dependent on her. Nor did Mrs. Leare seem
+to feel any anxiety about my comradeship with her daughter. I could
+fully appreciate Hermione's remark about her chaperonage being very
+unsatisfactory.
+
+Every now and then we passed through villages along whose straggling
+streets the population was aswarm, eager for news and wondering at our
+muddy procession. In one of the villages I suggested stopping, but Mrs.
+Leare was now as frantic to get home again as she had been to get away.
+She said, and truly, that it had been a wild plan to start from
+Paris--that if she had seen me and had heard that I thought the émeute
+was at an end and that the report about the English was untrue, she
+should never have left her apartment. She had been frightened out of her
+senses by some men _en blouse_ who had made their way into her rooms and
+had carried off her pistol and a little Turkish dagger. Victor's theft
+of his own wages had upset her. She had insisted upon setting out.
+Hermione had got post-horses somehow: Hermione ought never to have let
+her come away.
+
+About three in the morning we reached a larger village than we had
+hitherto passed. The inhabitants had been apprised of the events in the
+Rue Neuve des Capucines before the ministry of the Affaires Étrangères,
+and the revolutionary element had increased in audacity. A crowd of
+turbulent-looking working-men dressed in blouses, armed with muskets,
+old sabres and all kinds of miscellaneous weapons, stopped our way. Some
+seized the head of the old horse, some gathered round the cart and
+lifted lanterns into the faces of the ladies. The French workman is a
+much more athletic man than the French soldier. I own to a sensation of
+deadly terror for a moment when I saw the ladies in the midst of a
+lawless rabble whose brawny arms were bared as if prepared for butchery
+of any kind. Far off, too, a low rattle of distant musketry warned us
+that the tumult in Paris was renewed.
+
+"Mourir pour la Patrie" appeared to come from every throat, and many of
+the crowd were the worse for liquor. Indeed, these patriots had
+rendezvoused at a cabaret at the entrance of the village, and swarmed
+from its tables to intercept us. The ladies, they insisted, must alight
+and be examined. Mammy Chris was drawn out of the cart, looking as if
+her face had been rubbed in ashes: Mrs. Leare was nervously excited,
+Hermione went up to her, supported her and drew her bag of diamonds out
+of her hand. I took Claribel in my arms.
+
+"Vos passeports," they demanded.
+
+"Here are our American passports," said Hermione: "we are Americans."
+
+"Yes, Americans, republicans!" cried Mrs. Leare: "we fraternize with all
+republicans in France."
+
+"Aristos," said a man between his teeth, glancing at her dress and at
+that of Hermione.
+
+"What does he say?" cried Mrs. Leare, who did not catch the word.
+
+"Hush, mother!" said Hermione.
+
+"But what did he say?" she shrieked. "Tell me at once: do not keep it
+from me."
+
+Hermione replied (unwilling to use the word "aristocrat") by an American
+idiom: "He said we belonged to the Upper Ten."
+
+"But we don't! Oh, Hermie, your father belongs to a good family in
+Maryland, but _my_ grandfather made shoes. I was quite poor when he
+married me. I was only sixteen."
+
+"What you say?" said a railroad-hand who knew a little English. "You say
+you are not some aristos?"
+
+"No, sir," said I: "these ladies claim to be Americans and republicans."
+
+"Vive la République!" cried the man.
+
+"Vive la République!" quickly echoed Hermione.
+
+"C'est bien! c'est bien!" cried another, raising his lantern to her
+blanched and beautiful face.
+
+"You will let us all pass, monsieur?" she said persuasively: "you will
+even be our escort a little way. We will pay handsomely for your
+protection."
+
+Before he could answer her two or three fellows, more drunk than the
+rest, burst out with a proposition: "She says they are not aristos, but
+republicans. Let her prove it. She cannot, if she be a true republican,
+refuse to kiss her fellow-patriots."
+
+I started and was about to knock the rascal down with the bag of
+diamonds.
+
+But Hermione laid a restraining hand upon my arm. "Gentlemen," she said
+in clear tones and perfect French, "it is quite true that we are
+Americans and republicans. We wish you well, and if it be for the good
+of France to be free under a republican form of government, no one can
+wish her prosperity more than ourselves. But in our free country,
+messieurs, a woman is held free to give her kiss to whom she will, and
+according to our custom she gives it only to her betrothed or to her
+husband." Here stooping she picked up a little boy who had worked
+himself into the forefront of the crowd, and before I knew what she was
+about to do she had lifted him upon the cart beside her. She looked a
+moment steadily at the men around her, holding the boy's hand in both
+her own, then turning toward him and pressing her lips upon his face,
+she said, "Messieurs, I kiss your representative: I cannot embrace a
+multitude;" and placed a piece of money in the gamin's hand.
+
+For a moment there was some doubt what view the crowd might take of
+this, but her beauty, her fearlessness, and, above all, the awe inspired
+by her womanliness, prevailed. They shouted "Vive la République!"
+
+"With all my heart," replied Hermione. "Now shout for me, gentlemen:
+Vive la République des États Unis!"
+
+They were completely won. A French crowd is never dangerous or
+unmanageable till it has tasted blood, and besides it has--or at least
+in those days it used to have--_sentiments_, to which it was possible
+with a little tact to appeal successfully.
+
+The opposition to our progress came to an end. Mrs. Leare and old Mammy
+were helped back into the cart, and a man offered them some wine. They
+brought some also to Hermione. I pressed her to drink it, which she did
+to their good health, and giving back the glass placed in it a napoleon.
+"Do me the favor, messieurs," she said, "to drink your next toast to our
+American republic."
+
+Cheers rose for her. There was no longer any talk of detaining us: the
+old horse was urged forward. Hermione took my arm. We marched on,
+escorted by the rabble. At the end of the village-street they all gave
+us an unsteady cheer and turned back to their wine-tables. Hermione
+proceeded in silence a little farther. Then I felt her slipping from my
+arm, and was just in time to catch her.
+
+Without compunction I requested Mammy Chris to get out of the cart and
+put her young lady in her place, pillowing her head as carefully as I
+could on my own coat, and proceeding in my shirtsleeves.
+
+We were then not half a mile from the Banlieu, which we passed without
+adventure, much to my surprise, its inhabitants having taken advantage
+of the confusion to pour into Paris and infest its richer quarters.
+
+The ladies were obliged to get out at the barrier and to send back the
+cart to its proprietor. Again I had the happiness of supporting Hermione
+while I carried little Claribel, and Mrs. Leare and Mammy walked on
+ahead.
+
+"I feel humiliated," I said, "that the whole burden of those dreadful
+moments should have fallen upon you."
+
+"And to avoid that feeling you were ready to knock down a drunken blouse
+in English style?" she said, smiling. "No, Mr. Farquhar, nothing but the
+power that a woman finds in her own womanhood could have brought us
+through safely. Those men had all had mothers, and each man had some
+sort of womanly ideal. I could not have managed a crowd of _poissardes_,
+but, thank Heaven, there is yet a chord that a woman may strike in the
+hearts of men."
+
+The dawn of Thursday, February 24, 1848, was breaking at the eastward
+when I arrived with Mrs. Leare, Hermione, the nurse and child at their
+own apartment. I went up stairs with them. All was cold and cheerless in
+the rooms. There were no servants. Mrs. Leare sat down; the old nurse
+bemoaned her rheumatism and her aching bones; Hermione, with the
+assistance of the concierge's wife, lighted a fire, made some tea and
+waited on her mother.
+
+For several days afterward she was very ill. She knew nothing of passing
+events--of the king's flight, of the triumphal and victorious
+processions that passed up the Champs Élysées, of the sudden
+impossibility of procuring supplies of change, and of the consequent
+difficulty of paying household bills with _billets de mille francs_
+without gold or silver.
+
+Each day I went several times to make inquiries, and twice I saw Mrs.
+Leare in bed, but Hermione was invisible.
+
+My father, an honorable British officer of the old school, perceived how
+things were with me. "My son," he said one clay, "there are two courses
+open to you. You have nothing but your profession. Your education and
+the premium on your admittance to the office of the great man for whom
+you work have been my provision for you: the little property I have to
+leave must support your sisters. You cannot under such circumstances
+address Miss Leare. You must either go back at once to your work in
+England and forget this episode, or you may go out to America and see
+her father. You can tell him you have nothing on which to support his
+daughter, and ask if he will give you leave to address the young lady.
+No son of mine, situated like yourself, shall offer himself in any other
+way to an heiress whose father is three thousand miles away, and who is
+supposed to have two millions of francs for her dowry."
+
+I saw he was right, but, forlorn as the hope was of any appeal to Mr.
+Leare, I would not relinquish it. I resolved to go out to America and
+see him, and wrote to England to secure letters of introduction to the
+chief engineers in the United States and Canada. Meantime, my father
+proposed that we should go together and call upon Mrs. and Miss Leare.
+
+Hermione received us in the boudoir, looking like a bruised lily: her
+mother came in afterward.
+
+"We are going right straight home," she said, "the moment we can get
+money to get away. I have written to Mr. Leare that he must find some
+means to send me some."
+
+"I am glad to hear you say this, madame," said my father. "My son has
+just made up his mind to go out to America and seek employment on one of
+your railways."
+
+Hermione looked up with a question in her eyes: so did her mother.
+
+"Why, Mr. Farquhar, that will suit us exactly," cried Mrs.
+Leare.--"Hermione, won't it be lovely if Mr. Farquhar takes care of us
+on the voyage?--You will engage your passage--won't you?--in the same
+steamer as we do?--No one was ever so good a squire of dames as your
+son, Captain Farquhar. Hermione and I shall never forget our obligations
+to him."
+
+"No, madame," said my father; and he got up and walked to the fireplace,
+where in his embarrassment he laid his hand upon the ornamented box
+which held the cigarettes of the fast lady.
+
+She rose up too and went hastily toward him, anxious he should not
+surprise her little frailty.
+
+"The truth is, madame," whispered my father, who never could restrain
+his tongue from any kindly indiscretion, "the poor fellow is suffering
+too much from the attractions of Miss Leare. He has nothing but his
+profession, and I tell him he must not dare to address her in her
+father's absence."
+
+"My dear captain, what does that matter? And I believe Hermione would
+have him too," said her mother.
+
+"Disparity of means--" began my father.
+
+"Oh, no matter," interrupted Mrs. Leare: "her father always told her
+just to please herself. Mr. Farquhar is an Englishman and of good
+family. He has his profession to keep him out of mischief, and Hermie
+will more than pay her own expenses. Indeed, I dare not go home without
+a gentleman to look after us on the passage: my nerves have been too
+shattered, and I never again shall trust a courier. Do let your son go
+back with us," she implored persuasively; and added, as she saw that he
+still hesitated, "Besides, what rich man in America knows how long he
+may be rich? 'Spend your money and enjoy yourself' has always been my
+motto."
+
+Thus urged, what could my father do but suppose that Mrs. Leare knew Mr.
+Leare's views better than he did? He no longer held out on the point of
+honor.
+
+In twenty-four hours Hermione and I were engaged to be married.
+
+During the voyage to New York I learned to understand her father's
+character, and when he met us on the wharf I was no longer afraid of
+him.
+
+Hermione's choice in marriage seemed to be wholly left to herself. Mr.
+Leare told me, when I had that formidable talk with him dreaded by all
+aspirants to the hand of a man's daughter, that Hermione had too much
+good sense, self-respect and womanliness to give herself away to a man
+unworthy of her. "That she can love you, sir," he said, "is sufficient
+recommendation."
+
+That it might be sufficient in my case I hoped with all my soul, but
+felt, as Hermione had expressed it early in our acquaintance, that
+society in America must be founded upon very different opinions than our
+own in regard to the relations of men and women.
+
+E.W. LATIMER.
+
+
+
+
+THE AUTHORS OF "FROUFROU."
+
+
+No doubt it will surprise some theatre-goers who are not special
+students of the stage to be told that the authors of _Froufrou_ are the
+authors also of the _Grande Duchesse de Gérolstein_ and of _La Belle
+Hélène_, of _Carmen_ and of _Le Petit Duc_. There are a few, I know, who
+think that _Froufrou_ was written by the fertile and ingenious M.
+Victorien Sardou, and who, without thinking, credit M. Jacques Offenbach
+with the composition of the words as well as the music of the _Grande
+Duchesse_; and as for _Carmen_, is it not an _Italian_ opera, and is not
+the book, like the music, the work of some Italian? As a matter of fact,
+all these plays, unlike as they are to each other, and not only these,
+but many more--not a few of them fairly well known to the American
+play-goer--are due to the collaboration of M. Henri Meilhac and M.
+Ludovic Halévy.
+
+Born in 1832, M. Henri Meilhac, like M. Émile Zola, dealt in books
+before he began to make them. He soon gave up trade for journalism, and
+contributed with pen and pencil to the comic _Journal pour Rire_. He
+began as a dramatist in 1855 with a two-act play at the Palais Royal
+Theatre: like the first pieces of Scribe and of M. Sardou, and of so
+many more who have afterward abundantly succeeded on the stage, this
+play of M. Meilhac's was a failure; and so also was his next, likewise
+in two acts. But in 1856 the _Sarabande du Cardinal_, a delightful
+little comedy in one act, met with favor at the Gymnase. It was followed
+by two or three other comediettas equally clever. In 1859, M. Meilhac
+made his first attempt at a comedy in five acts, but the _Petit fils de
+Mascarille_ had not the good fortune of his ancestor. In 1860, for the
+first time, he was assisted by M. Ludovic Halévy, and in the twenty
+years since then their names have been linked together on the
+title-pages of two score or more plays of all kinds--drama, comedy,
+farce, opera, operetta and ballet. M. Meilhac's new partner was the
+nephew of the Halévy who is best known out of France as the composer of
+the _Jewess_, and he was the son of M. Léon Halévy, poet, philosopher
+and playwright. Two years younger than M. Henri Meilhac, M. Ludovic
+Halévy held a place in the French civil service until 1858, when he
+resigned to devote his whole time, instead of his spare time, to the
+theatre. As the son of a dramatist and the nephew of a popular composer,
+he had easy access to the stage. He began as the librettist-in-ordinary
+to M. Offenbach, for whom he wrote _Ba-ta-clan_ in 1855, and later the
+_Chanson de Fortunio_, the _Pont des Soupirs_ and _Orphée aux Enfers_.
+The first very successful play which MM. Meilhac and Halévy wrote
+together was a book for M. Offenbach; and it was possibly the good
+fortune of this operetta which finally affirmed the partnership. Before
+the triumph of the _Belle Hélène_ in 1864 the collaboration had been
+tentative, as it were: after that it was as though the articles had been
+definitely ratified--not that either of the parties has not now and then
+indulged in outside speculations, trying a play alone or with an
+outsider, but this was without prejudice to the permanent partnership.
+
+This kind of literary union, the long-continued conjunction of two
+kindred spirits, is better understood amongst us than the indiscriminate
+collaboration which marks the dramatic career of M. Eugène Labiche, for
+instance. Both kinds were usual enough on the English stage in the days
+of Elizabeth, but we can recall the ever-memorable example of Beaumont
+and Fletcher, while we forget the chance associations of Marston,
+Dekker, Chapman and Ben Jonson. And in contemporary literature we have
+before us the French tales of MM. Erckmann-Chatrian and the English
+novels of Messrs. Besant and Rice. The fact that such a union endures is
+proof that it is advantageous. A long-lasting collaboration like this of
+MM. Meilhac and Halévy must needs be the result of a strong sympathy and
+a sharp contrast of character, as well as of the possession by one of
+literary qualities which supplement those of the other.
+
+One of the first things noticed by an American student of French
+dramatic literature is that the chief Parisian critics generally refer
+to the joint work of these two writers as the plays of M. Meilhac,
+leaving M. Halévy altogether in the shade. At first this seems a curious
+injustice, but the reason is not far to seek. It is not that M. Halévy
+is some two years the junior of M. Meilhac: it lies in the quality of
+their respective abilities. M. Meilhac has the more masculine style, and
+so the literary progeny of the couple bear rather his name than his
+associate's. M. Meilhac has the strength of marked individuality, he has
+a style of his own, one can tell his touch; while M. Halévy is merely a
+clever French dramatist of the more conventional pattern. This we detect
+by considering the plays which each has put forth alone and unaided by
+the other. In reading one of M. Meilhac's works we should feel no doubt
+as to the author, while M. Halévy's clever pictures of Parisian society,
+wanting in personal distinctiveness, would impress us simply as a
+product of the "Modern French School."
+
+Before finally joining with M. Halévy, M. Meilhac wrote two comedies in
+five acts of high aim and skilful execution, and two other five-act
+pieces have been written by MM. Meilhac and Halévy together. The _Vertu
+de Célimène_ and the _Petit fils de Mascarille_ are by the elder
+partner--_Fanny Lear_ and _Froufrou_ are the work of the firm. Yet in
+these last two it is difficult to see any trace of M. Halévy's
+handiwork. Allowing for the growth of M. Meilhac's intellect during the
+eight or ten years which intervened between the work alone and the work
+with his associate, and allowing for the improvement in the mechanism of
+play-making, I see no reason why M. Meilhac might not have written
+_Fanny Lear_ and _Froufrou_ substantially as they are had he never met
+M. Halévy. But it is inconceivable that M. Halévy alone could have
+attained so high an elevation or have gained so full a comic force.
+Perhaps, however, M. Halévy deserves credit for the better technical
+construction of the later plays: merely in their mechanism the first
+three acts of _Froufrou_ are marvellously skilful. And perhaps, also,
+his is a certain softening humor, which is the cause that the two later
+plays, written by both partners, are not so hard in their brilliance as
+the two earlier comedies, the work of M. Meilhac alone.
+
+It may seem something like a discussion of infinitesimals, but I think
+M. Halévy's co-operation has given M. Meilhac's plays a fuller ethical
+richness. To the younger writer is due a simple but direct irony, as
+well as a lightsome and laughing desire to point a moral when occasion
+serves. Certainly, I shall not hold up a play written to please the
+public of the Palais Royal, or even of the Gymnase, as a model of all
+the virtues. Nor need it be, on the other hand, an embodiment of all the
+cardinal sins. The frequenters of the Palais Royal Theatre are not
+babes; young people of either sex are not taken there; only the
+emancipated gain admittance; and to the seasoned sinners who haunt
+theatres of this type these plays by MM. Meilhac and Halévy are
+harmless. Indeed, I do not recall any play of theirs which could hurt
+any one capable of understanding it. Most of their plays are not to be
+recommended to ignorant innocence or to fragile virtue. They are not
+meant for young men and maidens. They are not wholly free from the taint
+which is to be detected in nearly all French fiction. The mark of the
+beast is set on not a little of the work done by the strongest men in
+France. M. Meilhac is too clean and too clever ever to delve in
+indecency from mere wantonness: he has no liking for vice, but his
+virtue sits easily on him, and though he is sound on the main question,
+he looks upon the vagaries of others with a gentle eye. M. Halévy, it
+seems to me, is made of somewhat sterner stuff. He raises a warning
+voice now and then--in _Fanny Lear_, for instance, the moral is pointed
+explicitly--and even where there is no moral tagged to the fable, he who
+has eyes to see and ears to hear can find "a terrible example" in almost
+any of these plays, even the lightest. For the congregation to which it
+was delivered there is a sermon in _Toto chez Tata_, perhaps the piece
+in which, above all others, the Muse seems Gallic and _égrillarde_. That
+is a touch of real truth, and so of a true morality, where Tata, the
+fashionable courtesan, leaning over her stairs as Toto the school-boy
+bears off her elderly lover, and laughing at him, cries out, "Toi, mon
+petit homme, je te repincerai dans quatre ou cinq ans!" And a cold and
+cutting stroke it is a little earlier in the same little comedy where
+Toto, left alone in Tata's parlor, negligently turns over her basket of
+visiting-cards and sees "names which he knew because he had learnt them
+by heart in his history of France." Still, in spite of this truth and
+morality, I do not advise the reading of _Toto chez Tata_ in young
+ladies' seminaries. Young ladies in Paris do not go to hear Madame
+Chaumont, for whom _Toto_ was written, nor is the Variétés, where it was
+played, a place where a girl can take her mother.
+
+It was at the Variétés in December, 1864, that the _Belle Hélène_ was
+produced: this was the first of half a score of plays written by MM.
+Meilhac and Halévy for which M. Jacques Offenbach composed the music.
+Chief among these are _Barbe-bleue_, the _Grande Duchesse de
+Gérolstein_, the _Brigands_ and _Périchole_. When we recall the fact
+that these five operas are the most widely known, the most popular and
+by far the best of M. Offenbach's works, there is no need to dwell on
+his indebtedness to MM. Meilhac and Halévy, or to point out how
+important a thing the quality of the opera-book is to the composer of
+the score. These earlier librettos were admirably made: they are models
+of what a comic opera-book should be. I cannot well imagine a better bit
+of work of its kind than the _Belle Hélène_ or the _Grande Duchesse_.
+Tried by the triple test of plot, characters and dialogue, they are
+nowhere wanting. Since MM. Meilhac and Halévy have ceased writing for M.
+Offenbach they have done two books for M. Charles Lecoq--the _Petit Duc_
+and the _Grande Demoiselle_. These are rather light comic operas than
+true _opéras-bouffes_, but if there is an elevation in the style of the
+music, there is an emphatic falling off in the quality of the words.
+From the _Grande Duchesse_ to the _Petit Duc_ is a great descent: the
+former was a genuine play, complete and self-contained--the latter is a
+careless trifle, a mere outline sketch for the composer to fill up. The
+story--akin in subject to Mr. Tom Taylor's fine historical drama
+_Clancarty_--is pretty, but there is no trace of the true poetry which
+made the farewell letter of Périchole so touching, or of the true comic
+force which projected Général Bourn. _Carmen_, which, like _Périchole_,
+owes the suggestion of its plot and characters to Prosper Mérimée, is
+little more than the task-work of the two well-trained play-makers: it
+was sufficient for its purpose, no more and no less.
+
+Of all the opera-books of MM. Meilhac and Halévy, that one is easily
+first and foremost which has for its heroine the Helen of Troy whom
+Marlowe's Faustus declared
+
+            Fairer than the evening air,
+  Clad in the beauty of a thousand stars.
+
+In the _Belle Hélène_ we see the higher wit of M. Meilhac. M. Halévy had
+been at the same college with him, and they had pored together over the
+same legends of old time, but working without M. Meilhac on _Orphée aux
+Enfers_, M. Halévy showed his inferiority, for _Orphée_ is the
+old-fashioned anachronistic skit on antiquity--funny if you will, but
+with a fun often labored, not to say forced--the fun of physical
+incongruity and exaggeration. But in the _Belle Hélène_ the fun, easy
+and flowing, is of a very high quality, and it has root in mental, not
+physical, incongruity. Here indeed is the humorous touchstone of a whole
+system of government and of theology. And, allowing for the variations
+made with comic intent, it is altogether Greek in spirit--so Greek, in
+fact, that I doubt whether any one who has not given his days and nights
+to the study of Homer and of the tragedians, and who has not thus taken
+in by the pores the subtle essence of Hellenic life and literature, can
+truly appreciate this French farce. Planché's _Golden Fleece_ is in the
+same vein, but the ore is not as rich. Frere's _Loves of the Triangles_
+and some of his _Anti-Jacobin_ writing are perhaps as good in quality,
+but the subjects are inferior and temporary. Scarron's vulgar burlesques
+and the cheap parodies of many contemporary English play-makers are not
+to be mentioned in the same breath with this scholarly fooling. There is
+something in the French genius akin to the Greek, and here was a Gallic
+wit who could turn a Hellenic love-tale inside out, and wring the
+uttermost drop of fun from it without recourse to the devices of the
+booth at the fair, the false nose and the simulation of needless
+ugliness. The French play, comic as it was, did not suggest hysteria or
+epilepsy, and it was not so lacking in grace that we could not recall
+the original story without a shudder. There is no shattering of an
+ideal, and one cannot reproach the authors of the _Belle Hélène_ with
+what Theophrastus Such calls "debasing the moral currency, lowering the
+value of every inspiring fact and tradition."
+
+Surpassed only by the _Belle Hélène_ is the _Grande Duchesse de
+Gérolstein_. It is nearly fifteen years since all the world went to
+Paris to see an Exposition Universelle and to gaze at the "sabre de mon
+père," and since a Russian emperor, going to hear the operetta, said to
+have been suggested by the freak of a Russian empress, sat incognito in
+one stage-box of the little Variétés Theatre, and glancing up saw a
+Russian grand duke in the other. It is nearly fifteen years since the
+tiny army of Her Grand-ducal Highness took New York by storm, and since
+American audience after audience hummed its love for the military and
+walked from the French Theatre along Fourteenth street to Delmonico's to
+supper, sabring the waiters there with the venerated weapon of her sire.
+The French Theatre is no more, and Delmonico's is no longer at that
+Fourteenth-street corner, and Her Highness Mademoiselle Tostée is dead,
+and M. Offenbach's sprightly tunes have had the fate of all over-popular
+airs, and are forgotten now. _Où sont les neiges d'antan?_
+
+It has been said that the authors regretted having written the _Grande
+Duchesse_, because the irony of history soon made a joke on Teutonic
+powers and principalities seem like unpatriotic satire. Certainly, they
+had no reason to be ashamed of the literary quality of their work: in
+its class it yields only to its predecessor. There is no single figure
+as fine as Calchas--Général Boum is a coarser outline--but how humorous
+and how firm is the drawing of Prince Paul and Baron Grog! And Her
+Highness herself may be thought a cleverer sketch of youthful femininity
+than even the Hellenic Helen. It is hard to judge the play now. Custom
+has worn its freshness and made it too familiar: we know it too well to
+criticise it clearly. Besides, the actors have now overlaid the action
+with over-much "business." But in spite of these difficulties the merits
+of the piece are sufficiently obvious: its constructive skill can be
+remarked; the first act, for example, is one of the best bits of
+exposition on the modern French stage.
+
+Besides these plays for music, and besides the more important five-act
+comedies to be considered later, MM. Meilhac and Halévy are the authors
+of thirty or forty comic dramas--as they are called on the English
+stage--or farce-comedies in one, two, three, four, and even five acts,
+ranging in aim from the gentle satire of sentimentality in _La Veuve_ to
+the outspoken farce of the _Réveillon_. Among the best of the longer of
+these comic plays are _Tricoche et Cacolet_ and _La Boule_. Both were
+written for the Palais Royal, and they are models of the new dramatic
+species which came into existence at that theatre about twenty years
+ago, as M. Francisquc Sarcey recently reminded us in his interesting
+article on the Palais Royal in _The Nineteenth Century_. This new style
+of comic play may be termed realistic farce--realistic, because it
+starts from every-day life and the most matter-of-fact conditions; and
+farce, because it uses its exact facts only to further its fantasy and
+extravagance. Consider _La Boule_. Its first act is a model of accurate
+observation; it is a transcript from life; it is an inside view of a
+commonplace French household which incompatibility of temper has made
+unsupportable. And then take the following acts, and see how on this
+foundation of fact, and screened by an outward semblance of realism,
+there is erected the most laughable superstructure of fantastic farce. I
+remember hearing one of the two great comedians of the Théâtre Français,
+M. Coquelin, praise a comic actor of the Variétés whom we had lately
+seen in a rather cheap and flimsy farce, because he combined "la vérité
+la plus absolue avec la fantasie la plus pure." And this is the merit of
+_La Boule_: its most humorous inventions have their roots in the truth.
+
+Better even than _La Boule_ is _Tricoche et Cacolet_, which is the name
+of a firm of private detectives whose exploits and devices surpass those
+imagined by Poe in America, by Wilkie Collins in England, and by
+Gaboriau in France. The manifold disguises and impersonations of the two
+partners when seeking to outwit each other are as well-motived and as
+fertile in comic effect as any of the attempts of Crispin or of some
+other of Regnard's interchangeable valets. Is not even the _Légataire
+Universel_, Regnard's masterpiece, overrated? To me it is neither higher
+comedy nor more provocative of laughter than either _La Boule_ or
+_Tricoche et Cacolet_; and the modern plays, as I have said, are based
+on a study of life as it is, while the figures of the older comedies are
+frankly conventional. Nowhere in Regnard is there a situation equal in
+comic power to that in the final act of the _Réveillon_--a situation
+Molière would have been glad to treat.
+
+Especially to be commended in _Tricoche et Cacolet_ is the satire of the
+hysterical sentimentality and of the forced emotions born of luxury and
+idleness. The parody of the amorous intrigue which is the staple of so
+many French plays is as wholesome as it is exhilarating. Absurdity is a
+deadly shower-bath to sentimentalism. The method of Meilhac and Halévy
+in sketching this couple is not unlike that employed by Mr. W.S. Gilbert
+in _H.M.S. Pinafore_ and _The Pirates of Penzance_. Especially to be
+noted is the same perfectly serious pushing of the dramatic commonplaces
+to an absurd conclusion. There is the same kind of humor too, and the
+same girding at the stock tricks of stage-craft--in _H.M.S. Pinafore_ at
+the swapping of children in the cradle, and in _Tricoche et Cacolet_ at
+the "portrait de ma mère" which has drawn so many tears in modern
+melodrama. But MM. Meilhac and Halévy, having made one success, did not
+further attempt the same kind of pleasantry--wiser in this than Mr.
+Gilbert, who seems to find it hard to write anything else.
+
+As in the _Château à Toto_ MM. Meilhac and Halévy had made a modern
+perversion of _Dame Blanche_, so in _La Cigale_ did they dress up afresh
+the story of the _Fille du R'egiment_. As the poet asks--
+
+  Ah, World of ours, are you so gray,
+    And weary, World, of spinning,
+  That you repeat the tales to-day
+    You told at the beginning?
+  For lo! the same old myths that made
+    The early stage-successes
+  Still hold the boards, and still are played
+    With new effects and dresses.
+
+I have cited _La Cigale_, not because it is a very good play--for it is
+not--but because it shows the present carelessness of French
+dramatists in regard to dramatic construction. _La Cigale_ is a very
+clever bit of work, but it has the slightest of plots, and this made out
+of old cloth; and the situations, in so far as there are any, follow
+each other as best they may. It is not really a play: it is a mere
+sketch touched up with Parisianisms, "local hits" and the wit of the
+moment. This substitution of an off-hand sketch for a full-sized picture
+can better be borne in a little one-act play than in a more ambitious
+work in three or four acts.
+
+And of one-act plays Meilhac and Halévy have written a score or
+more--delightful little _genre_ pictures, like the _Été de
+Saint-Martin_, simple pastels, like _Toto chez Tata_, and vigorous
+caricatures, like the _Photographe_ or the _Brésilien_. The Frenchman
+invented the ruffle, says Emerson: the Englishman added the shirt. These
+little dramatic trifles are French ruffles. In the beginning of his
+theatrical career M. Meilhac did little comedies like the _Sarabande_
+and the _Autographe_, in the Scribe formula--dramatized anecdotes, but
+fresher in wit and livelier in fancy than Scribe's. This early work was
+far more regular than we find in some of his latest, bright as these
+are: the _Petit Hôtel_, for instance, and _Lolotte_ are etchings, as it
+were, instantaneous photographs of certain aspects of life in the city
+by the Seine or stray paragraphs of the latest news from Paris.
+
+It is perhaps not too much to say that Meilhac and Halévy are seen at
+their best in these one-act plays. They hit better with a single-barrel
+than with a revolver. In their five-act plays, whether serious like
+_Fanny Lear_ or comic like _La Vie Parisienne_, the interest is
+scattered, and we have a series of episodes rather than a single story.
+Just as the egg of the jelly-fish is girt by circles which tighten
+slowly until the ovoid form is cut into disks of independent life, so if
+the four intermissions of some of Meilhac and Halévy's full-sized plays
+were but a little longer and wider and deeper they would divide the
+piece into five separate plays, any one of which could fairly hope for
+success by itself. I have heard that the _Roi Candaule_ was originally
+an act of _La Boule_, and the _Photographe_ seems as though it had
+dropped from _La Vie Parisienne_ by mistake. In M. Meilhac's earlier
+five-act plays, the _Vertu de Celimène_ and the _Petit fils de
+Mascarille_, there is great power of conception, a real grip on
+character, but the main action is clogged with tardy incidents, and so
+the momentum is lost. In these comedies the influence of the new school
+of Alexandre Dumas _fils_ is plainly visible. And the inclination toward
+the strong, not to say violent, emotions which Dumas and Angier had
+imported into comedy is still more evident in _Fanny Lear_, the first
+five-act comedy which Meilhac and Halévy wrote together, and which was
+brought out in 1868. The final situation is one of truth and immense
+effectiveness, and there is great vigor in the creation of character.
+The decrepit old rake, the Marquis de Noriolis, feeble in his folly and
+wandering in helplessness, but irresistible when aroused, is a striking
+figure; and still more striking is the portrait of his wife, now the
+Marquise de Noriolis, but once Fanny Lear the adventuress--a woman who
+has youth, beauty, wealth, everything before her, if it were not for the
+shame which is behind her: gay and witty, and even good-humored, she is
+inflexible when she is determined; hers is a velvet manner and an iron
+will. The name of Fanny Lear may sound familiar to some readers because
+it was given to an American adventuress in Russia by a grand-ducal
+admirer.
+
+After _Fanny Lear_ came _Froufrou_, the lineal successor of _The
+Stranger_ as the current masterpiece of the lachrymatory drama. Nothing
+so tear-compelling as the final act of _Froufrou_ had been seen on the
+stage for half a century or more. The death of Froufrou was a watery
+sight, and for any chance to weep we are many of us grateful. And yet it
+was a German, born in the land of Charlotte and Werther,--it was Heine
+who remarked on the oddity of praising the "dramatic poet who possesses
+the art of drawing tears--a talent which he has in common with the
+meanest onion." It is noteworthy that it was by way of Germany that
+English tragedy exerted its singular influence on French comedy.
+Attracted by the homely power of pieces like _The Gamester_ and _Jane
+Shore_, Diderot in France and Lessing in Germany attempted the _tragédie
+bourgeoise_, but the right of the "tradesmen's tragedies"--as Goldsmith
+called them--to exist at all was questioned until Kotzebue's pathetic
+power and theatrical skill captured nearly every stage in Europe. In
+France the bastard offspring of English tragedy and German drama gave
+birth to an equally illegitimate _comédie larmoyante_. And so it happens
+that while comedy in English literature, resulting from the clash of
+character, is always on the brink of farce, comedy in French literature
+may be tinged with passion until it almost turns to tragedy. In France
+the word "comedy" is elastic and covers a multitude of sins: it includes
+the laughing _Boule_ and the tearful _Froufrou_: in fact, the French
+Melpomene is a sort of _Jeanne qui pleure et Jeanne qui rit_.
+
+So it happens that _Froufrou_ is a comedy. And indeed the first three
+acts are comedy of a very high order, full of wit and rich in character.
+I mentioned _The Stranger_ a few lines back, and the contrast of the
+two plays shows how much lighter and more delicate French art is. The
+humor to be found in _The Stranger_ is, to say the least, Teutonic; and
+German humor is like the simple Italian wines: it will not stand export.
+And in _The Stranger_ there is really no character, no insight into
+human nature. _Misanthropy and Repentance_, as Kotzebue called his play
+(_The Stranger_ was Sheridan's title for the English translation he
+revised for his own theatre), are loud-sounding words when we capitalize
+them, but they do not deceive us now: we see that the play itself is
+mostly stalking sententiousness, mawkishly overladen with gush. But in
+_Froufrou_ there is wit of the latest Parisian kind, and there are
+characters--people whom we might meet and whom we may remember. Brigard,
+for one, the reprobate old gentleman, living even in his old age in that
+Bohemia which has Paris for its capital, and dyeing his few locks
+because he feels himself unworthy to wear gray hair,--Brigard is a
+portrait from life. The Baron de Cambri is less individual, and I
+confess I cannot quite stomach a gentleman who is willing to discuss the
+problem of his wife's virtue with a chance adorer. But the cold Baronne
+herself is no commonplace person. And Louise, the elder daughter of
+Froufrou, the one who had chosen the better part and had kept it by much
+self-sacrifice,--she is a true woman. Best, better even than Brigard, is
+Gilberte, nicknamed "Froufrou" from the rustling of her silks as she
+skips and scampers airily around. Froufrou, when all is said, is a real
+creation, a revelation of Parisian femininity, a living thing, breathing
+the breath of life and tripping along lightly on her own little feet.
+Marrying a reserved yet deeply-devoted husband because her sister bid
+her; taking into her home that sister, who had sacrificed her own love
+for the husband; seeing this sister straighten the household which she
+in her heedless seeking for idle amusement had not governed, then
+beginning to feel herself in danger and aware of a growing jealousy,
+senseless though it be, of the sister who has so innocently supplanted
+her by her hearth, and even with her child; making one effort to regain
+her place, and failing, as was inevitable,--poor Froufrou takes the
+fatal plunge which will for ever and at once separate her from what was
+hers before. What a fine scene is that at the end of the third act, in
+which Froufrou has worked herself almost to a frenzy, and, hopeless in
+her jealousy, gives up all to her sister and rushes from the house to
+the lover she scarcely cares for! And how admirably does all that has
+gone before lead up to it! These first three acts are a wonder of
+constructive art. Of the rest of the play it is hard to speak so highly.
+The change is rather sudden from the study of character in the first
+part to the demand in the last that if you have tears you must prepare
+to shed them now. The brightness is quenched in gloom and despair. Of a
+verity, frivolity may be fatal, and death may follow a liking for
+private theatricals and the other empty amusements of fashion; but is it
+worth while to break a butterfly on the wheel and to put a humming-bird
+to the question? To say what fate shall be meted out to the woman taken
+in adultery is always a hard task for the dramatist. Here the erring and
+erratic heroine comes home to be forgiven and to die, and so after the
+fresh and unforced painting of modern Parisian life we have a finish
+full of conventional pathos. Well, death redeems all, and, as Pascal
+says, "the last act is always tragedy, whatever fine comedy there may
+have been in the rest of life. We must all die alone."
+
+J. BRANDER MATTHEWS.
+
+
+
+
+THE KING'S GIFTS.
+
+
+  Cyrus the king in royal mood
+  Portioned his gifts as seemed him good:
+  To Artabasus, proud to hold
+  The priceless boon, a cup of gold--
+  A rare-wrought thing: its jewelled brim
+  Haloed a nectar sweet to him.
+  No flavor fine it seemed to miss;
+  But when the king stooped down, a kiss
+  To leave upon Chrysantas' lips,
+  The jewels paled in dull eclipse
+  To Artabasus: hard and cold
+  And empty grew the cup of gold.
+  "Better, O Sire, than mine," cried he,
+  "I deem Chrysantas' gift to be."
+  Yet the wise king his courtiers knew,
+  And unto each had given his due.
+
+  To all who watch and all who wait
+  The king will come, or soon or late.
+  Choose well: thy secret wish is known,
+  And thou shalt surely have thine own--
+  A golden cup thy poor wealth's sign,
+  Or on thy lips Love's seal divine.
+
+    EMILY A. BRADDOCK.
+
+
+
+
+BAUBIE WISHART.
+
+
+"I have taken you at your word, you see, Miss Mackenzie. You told me not
+to give alms in the street, and to bring the begging children to you. So
+here is one now."
+
+Thus introduced, the begging child was pushed forward into the room by
+the speaker, a lady who was holding her by one shoulder.
+
+She was a stunted, slim creature, that might have been any age from nine
+to fourteen, barefooted and bareheaded, and wearing a Rob Roy tartan
+frock. She entered in a sidelong way that was at once timid and
+confidently independent, and stared all round her with a pair of large
+brown eyes. She did not seem to be in the least frightened, and when
+released by her guardian stood at ease comfortably on one foot, tucking
+the other away out of sight among the not too voluminous folds of her
+frock.
+
+It was close on twelve o'clock of a March day in the poor sewing-women's
+workroom in Drummond street. The average number of women of the usual
+sort were collected together--a depressed and silent gathering. It
+seemed as if the bitter east wind had dulled and chilled them into a
+grayer monotony of look than usual, so that they might be in harmony
+with the general aspect which things without had assumed at its grim
+bidding. A score or so of wan faces looked up for a minute, but the
+child, after all, had nothing in her appearance that was calculated to
+repay attention, and the lady was known to them all. So "white seam"
+reasserted its old authority without much delay.
+
+Miss Mackenzie laid down the scissors which she had been using on a bit
+of coarse cotton, and advanced in reply to the address of the newcomer.
+"How do you do? and where did you pick up this creature?" she asked,
+looking curiously at the importation.
+
+"Near George IV. Bridge, on this side of it, and I just took hold of her
+and brought her off to you at once. I don't believe"--this was said
+_sotto voce_--"that she has a particle of clothing on her but that
+frock."
+
+"Very likely.--What is your name, my child?"
+
+"Baubie Wishart, mem." She spoke in an apologetic tone, glancing down at
+her feet, the one off duty being lowered for the purpose of inspection,
+which over, she hoisted the foot again immediately into the recesses of
+the Rob Roy tartan.
+
+"Have you a father and mother?"
+
+"Yes, mem."
+
+"What does your father do?"
+
+Baubie Wishart glanced down again in thought for an instant, then raised
+her eyes for the first time directly to her questioner's face: "He used
+to be a Christy man, but he canna be that any longer, sae he goes wi'
+boords."
+
+"Why cannot he be a Christy man any longer?"
+
+Down came the foot once more, and this time took up its position
+permanently beside the other: "Because mother drinks awfu', an' pawned
+the banjo for drink." This family history was related in the most
+matter-of-fact, natural way.
+
+"And does your father drink too?" asked Miss Mackenzie after a short
+pause.
+
+Baubie Wishart's eyes wandered all round the room, and with one toe she
+swept up a little mass of dust before she answered in a voice every tone
+of which spoke unwilling truthfulness, "Just whiles--Saturday nichts."
+
+"Is _he_ kind to you?"
+
+"Ay," looking up quickly, "excep' just whiles when he's fou--Saturday
+nichts, ye ken--and then he beats me; but he's rale kind when he's
+sober."
+
+"Were you ever at school?"
+
+"No, mem," with a shake of the head that seemed to convey that she had
+something else, and probably better, to do.
+
+"Did you ever hear of God?" asked the lady who had brought her.
+
+"Ay, mem," answered Baubie quite readily: "it's a kind of a bad word I
+hear in the streets."
+
+"How old are you?" asked both ladies simultaneously.
+
+"Thirteen past," replied Baubie, with a promptness that made her
+listeners smile, suggesting as it did the thought that the question had
+been put to her before, and that Baubie knew well the import of her
+answer.
+
+She grew more communicative now. She could not read, but, all the same,
+she knew two songs which she sang in the streets--"Before the Battle"
+and "After the Battle;" and, carried away by the thought of her own
+powers, she actually began to give proof of her assertion by reciting
+one of them there and then. This, however, was stopped at once. "Can
+knit too," she added then.
+
+"Who taught you to knit?"
+
+"Don' know. Wis at a Sunday-schuil too."
+
+"Oh, you were? And what did you learn there?"
+
+Baubie Wishart looked puzzled, consulted her toes in vain, and then
+finally gave it up.
+
+"I should like to do something for her," observed her first friend: "it
+is time this street-singing came to an end."
+
+"She is intelligent, clearly," said Miss Mackenzie, looking curiously at
+the child, whose appearance and bearing rather puzzled her. There was
+not a particle of the professional street-singer about Baubie Wishart,
+the child of that species being generally clean-washed, or at least
+soapy, of face, with lank, smooth-combed and greasy hair; and usually,
+too, with a smug, sanctimonious air of meriting a better fate. Baubie
+Wishart presented none of these characteristics: her face was simply
+filthy; her hair was a red-brown, loosened tangle that reminded one
+painfully of oakum in its first stage. And she looked as if she deserved
+a whipping, and defied it too. She was just a female arab--an arab
+_plus_ an accomplishment--bright, quick and inconsequent as a sparrow,
+and reeking of the streets and gutters, which had been her nursery.
+
+"Yes," continued the good lady, "I must look after her."
+
+"Poor little atom! I suppose you will find out where the parents live,
+and send the school-board officer to them. That is the usual thing, is
+it not? I must go, Miss Mackenzie. Good-bye for to-day. And do tell me
+what you settle for her."
+
+Miss Mackenzie promised, and her friend took her departure.
+
+"Go and sit by the fire, Baubie Wishart, for a little, and then I shall
+be ready to talk to you."
+
+Nothing loath apparently, Baubie established herself at the end of the
+fender, and from that coign of vantage watched the on-goings about her
+with the stoicism of a red Indian. She showed no symptom of wonder at
+anything, and listened to the disquisitions of Miss Mackenzie and the
+matron as to the proper adjustment of parts--"bias," "straights,"
+"gathers," "fells," "gussets" and "seams," a whole new language as it
+unrolled its complexities before her--with complacent indifference.
+
+At last, all the web of cotton being cut up, the time came to go. Miss
+Mackenzie buttoned up her sealskin coat, and pulling on a pair of warm
+gloves beckoned Baubie, who rose with alacrity: "Where do your father
+and mother live?"
+
+"Kennedy's Lodgings, in the Gressmarket, mem."
+
+"I know the place," observed Miss Mackenzie, to whom, indeed, most of
+these haunts were familiar. "Take me there now, Baubie."
+
+They set out together. Baubie trotted in front, turning her head,
+dog-fashion, at every corner to see if she were followed. They reached
+the Grassmarket at last, and close to the corner of the West Bow found
+an entry with the whitewashed inscription above it, "Kennedy's
+Lodgings." Baubie glanced round to see if her friend was near, then
+vanished upward from her sight. Miss Mackenzie kilted her dress and
+began the ascent of the stairs, the steps of which, hollowed out as they
+were by the tread of centuries of human feet, afforded a not too safe
+footing.
+
+Arrived at the third floor, she found Baubie waiting for her,
+breathless and panting.
+
+"It's here," she said--"the big kitchen, mem."
+
+A long, narrow passage lay before them, off which doors opened on all
+sides. Precipitating herself at one of these doors, Baubie Wishart, who
+could barely reach the latch, pushed it open, giving egress to a
+confusion of noises, which seemed to float above a smell of cooking, in
+which smell herrings and onions contended for the mastery.
+
+It was a very large room, low-ceilinged, but well enough lighted by a
+couple of windows, which looked into a close behind. The walls had been
+whitewashed once upon a time, but the whitewash was almost lost to view
+under the decorations with which it was overlaid. These consisted of
+pictures cut out of the illustrated weekly papers or milliners' books.
+All sorts of subjects were represented: fashion-plates hung side by side
+with popular preachers and statesmen, race-horses and Roman Catholic
+saints; red-and white-draped Madonnas elbowed the "full-dress" heroines
+of the penny weeklies. It was a curious gallery, and a good many of the
+works of art had the merit of being antique. Generations of flies had
+emblazoned their deeds of prowess on the papers: streaks of
+candle-grease bore witness to the inquiring turn of mind, attracted by
+the letter-press, or the artistic proclivities of Kennedy's lodgers. It
+was about two, the dinner-hour probably, which accounted for the
+presence of so many people in the room. Most, but not all, seemed to be
+of the wandering class. They were variously employed. Some were sitting
+on the truckle-beds that ran round the walls; one or two were knitting
+or sewing; a cripple was mending baskets in one of the windows; and
+about the fire a group were collected superintending the operations
+which produced, though not unaided, the odors with which the room was
+reeking.
+
+Miss Mackenzie stood for a few minutes, unnoticed apparently, looking
+about her at the motley crowd. Baubie on entering the room had raised
+herself for a second on tiptoe to look into a distant corner, and then,
+remarking to herself, half audibly, "His boords is gane," subsided, and
+contented herself with watching Miss Mackenzie's movements.
+
+There seemed to be no one to do the honors. The inmates all looked at
+each other for a moment hesitatingly, then resumed their various
+occupations. A young woman, a sickly, livid-faced creature, rose from
+her place behind the door, and, advancing with a halting step, said to
+Miss Mackenzie, "Mistress Kennedy's no' in, an' Wishart's oot wi's
+boords."
+
+"I wanted to see him about this child, who was found begging in the
+streets to-day."
+
+Miss Mackenzie looked curiously at the woman, wondering if she could
+belong in any way to the Wishart family. She was a miserable object,
+seemingly in the last stage of consumption.
+
+"Eh, mem," she answered hurriedly, and drawing nearer, "ye're a guid
+leddy, I ken, an' tak' t' lassie away oot o' this. The mither's an awfu'
+wuman: tak' her away wi' ye, or she'll sune be as bad. She'll be like
+mysel' and the rest o' them here."
+
+"I will, I will," Miss Mackenzie said, shocked and startled, recoiling
+before the spirit-reeking breath of this warning spectre. "I will, I
+will," she repeated hastily. There was no use remaining any longer. She
+went out, beckoning to Baubie, who was busy rummaging about a bed at the
+top of the room.
+
+Baubie had bethought her that it was time to take her father his dinner.
+So she slipped over to that corner of the big kitchen which was allotted
+to the Wishart family and possessed herself of a piece of a loaf which
+was hidden away there. As she passed by the fire she profited by the
+momentary abstraction of the people who were cooking to snap up and make
+her own a brace of unconsidered trifles in the shape of onions which
+were lying near them. These, with the piece of bread, she concealed on
+her person, and then returned to Miss Mackenzie, who was now in the
+passage.
+
+"Baubie," said that lady, "I will send some one here about you. Now,
+don't let me hear of your singing in the streets or begging again. You
+will get into trouble if you do."
+
+She was descending the stairs as she spoke, and she turned round when
+she had reached the entry: "You know the police will take you, Baubie."
+
+"Yes, mem," answered Baubie, duly impressed.
+
+"Well, now, I am going home. Stay: are you hungry?"
+
+Without waiting for her answer, Miss Mackenzie entered a tiny shop close
+by, purchased a mutton-pie and handed it to Baubie Wishart, who received
+it with wondering reverence. Miss Mackenzie took her way home westward
+up the Grassmarket. She turned round before leaving it by way of King's
+Stables, and caught sight of Bauble's frock by the entry of Kennedy's
+Lodgings--a tiny morsel of color against the shadow of the huge gray
+houses. She thought of the big kitchen and its occupants, and the face
+and words of the poor girl, and promised herself that she would send the
+school-board officer to Kennedy's Lodgings that very night.
+
+Baubie waited till her friend was well out of sight: then she hid her
+mutton-pie in the same place with the onions and the piece of bread, and
+started up the Grassmarket in her turn. She stopped at the first shop
+she passed and bought a pennyworth of cheese. Then she made her way to
+the Lothian road, and looked up and down it anxiously in search of the
+walking advertisement-man. He was not there, so she directed her course
+toward Princes street, and after promenading it as far east as the
+Mound, she turned up into George street, and caught sight of her father
+walking along slowly by the curbstone. It was not long before she
+overtook him.
+
+"Od, lassie, I wis thinkin' lang," he began wearily as soon as he
+realized her apparition. Baubie did not wait for him to finish: with a
+peremptory nod she signified her will, and he turned round and followed
+her a little way down Hanover street. Then Baubie selected a flight of
+steps leading to a basement store, and throwing him a look of command
+flitted down and seated herself at the bottom. It was sheltered from
+the cold wind and not too much overlooked. Wishart shifted the boards
+from about his shoulders, and, following her, laid them against the wall
+at the side of the basement-steps, and sat down heavily beside her. He
+was a sickly-looking man, sandy-haired, with a depressed and shifty
+expression of face--not vicious, but weak and vacillating. Baubie seemed
+to have the upper hand altogether: every gesture showed it. She opened
+the paper that was wrapped about her fragment of rank yellow cheese,
+laid it down on the step between them, and then produced, in their order
+of precedence, the pie, the onions and the bread.
+
+"Wha gied ye that?" asked Wishart, gazing at the mutton-pie.
+
+"A leddy," replied Baubie, concisely.
+
+"An' they?" pointing to the onions.
+
+A nod was all the answer, for Baubie, who was hungry, was busy breaking
+the piece of loaf. Wishart with great care divided the pie without
+spilling much more than half its gravy, and began on his half of it and
+the biggest onion simultaneously. Baubie ate up her share of pie,
+declined cheese, and attacked her onion and a great piece of crust. The
+crust was very tough, and after the mutton-pie rather dry and tasteless,
+and she laid it down presently in her lap, and after a few minutes'
+passive silence began: "That," nodding at the cheese, or what was left
+of it rather, "wis all I got--ae penny. The leddy took me up till a
+hoose, an' anither are that wis there came doon hame and gaed in ben,
+an' wis speirin' for ye, an' says she'll gie me till the polis for
+singin' an' askin' money in t' streets, an' wants you to gie me till her
+to pit in schuil."
+
+She stopped and fixed her eyes on him, watching the effect of her words.
+Wishart laid down his bread and cheese and stared back at her. It seemed
+to take some time for his brain to realize all the meaning of her
+pregnant speech.
+
+"Ay," he said after a while, and with an effort, "I maun tak' ye to
+Glasgae, to yer aunt. Ye'll be pit in schuil if yer caught."
+
+"I'll no bide," observed Baubie, finishing off her onion with a
+grimace. The raw onion was indeed strong and hot, even for Bauble's not
+too epicurean palate, but it had been got for nothing--a circumstance
+from which it derived a flavor which many people more dainty than Bauble
+Wishart find to be extremely appetizing.
+
+"Bide!" echoed her father: "they'll mak' ye bide. Gin I had only the
+banjo agen!" sighed the whilom Christy man, getting up and preparing to
+adjust the boards once more.
+
+The last crumb of the loaf was done, and Bauble, refreshed, got up too.
+"Whenll ye be hame?" she questioned abruptly when they had reached the
+top of the steps.
+
+"Seven. Gaeway hame wi' ye, lassie, noo. Ye didna see _her_?" he
+questioned as he walked off.
+
+"Na," replied Bauble, standing still and looking about her as if to
+choose which way she should take.
+
+He sighed deeply, and moved off slowly on his way back to his post, with
+the listless, hopeless air that seems to belong to the members of his
+calling.
+
+Bauble obeyed her parent's commands in so far as that she did go home,
+but as she took Punch and Judy in her course up the Mound, and diverged
+as far as a football match in the Meadows, it was nearly seven before
+Kennedy's Lodgings saw her again.
+
+The following morning, shortly after breakfast, Miss Mackenzie's butler
+informed her that there was a child who wanted to speak with her in the
+hall. On going down she found Bauble Wishart on the mat.
+
+"Where is your father? and why did he not come with you?" asked Miss
+Mackenzie, puzzled.
+
+"He thoucht shame to come an' speak wi' a fine leddy like you." This
+excuse, plausible enough, was uttered in a low voice and with downcast
+eyes, but hardly was it pronounced when she burst out rapidly and
+breathlessly into what was clearly the main object of her visit: "But
+please, mem, he says he'll gie me to you if ye'll gie him the three
+shillin's to tak' the banjo oot o' the pawn."
+
+This candid proposal took Miss Mackenzie's breath away. To become the
+owner of Baubie Wishart, even at so low a price, seemed to her rather a
+heathenish proceeding, with a flavor of illegality about it to boot.
+There was a vacancy at the home for little girls which might be made
+available for the little wretch without the necessity of any preliminary
+of this kind; and it did not occur to her that it was a matter of any
+moment whether Mr. Wishart continued to exercise the rôle of
+"sandwich-man" or returned to his normal profession of banjo-player.
+Baubie was to be got hold of in any case. With the muttered adjuration
+of the wretched girl in Kennedy's Lodgings echoing in her ears, Miss
+Mackenzie determined that she should be left no longer than could be
+helped in that company.
+
+How earnest and matter of fact she was in delivering her extraordinary
+errand! thought Miss Mackenzie to herself, meeting the eager gaze of
+Baubie Wishart's eyes, looking out from beneath her tangle of hair like
+those of a Skye terrier.
+
+"I will speak to your father myself, Baubie--tell him so--to-morrow,
+perhaps: tell him I mean to settle about you myself. Now go."
+
+The least possible flicker of disappointment passed over Baubie's face.
+The tangled head drooped for an instant, then she bobbed by way of adieu
+and vanished.
+
+That day and the next passed before Miss Mackenzie found it possible to
+pay her long-promised visit to Mr. Wishart, and when, about eleven in
+the forenoon, she once more entered the big kitchen in Kennedy's
+Lodgings, she was greeted with the startling intelligence that the whole
+Wishart family were in prison.
+
+The room was as full as before. Six women were sitting in the middle of
+the floor teasing out an old hair mattress. There was the same odor of
+cooking, early as it was, and the same medley of noises, but the people
+were different. The basket-making cripple was gone, and in his place by
+the window sat a big Irish beggar-woman, who was keeping up a
+conversation with some one (a compatriot evidently) in a window of the
+close behind.
+
+The mistress of the house came forward. She was a decent-looking little
+woman, but had rather a hard face, expressive of care and anxiety. On
+recognizing her visitor she curtsied: "The Wisharts, mem? Yes, they're
+a' in jail."
+
+"All in jail?" echoed Miss Mackenzie. "Will you come outside and speak
+to me? There are so many people--"
+
+"Eh yes, mem: I'm sure ye fin' the room closs. Eh yes, mem, the Wisharts
+are a' in the lock-up."
+
+They were standing outside in the passage, and Mrs. Kennedy held the
+door closed by the latch, which she kept firmly grasped in her hand. It
+struck Miss Mackenzie as being an odd way to secure privacy for a
+privileged communication, to fasten the door of their room upon those
+inside. It was expressive, however.
+
+"Ye see, mem," began the landlady, "Wishart's no a very bad man--jist
+weak in the heid like--but's wife is jist something awfu', an' I could
+not let her bide in a decent lodging-house. We hae to dra' the line
+somewhere, and I dra' it low enough, but she wis far below that. Eh,
+she's jist terrible! Wishart has a sister in Glasgae verra weel to do,
+an' I h'ard him say he'd gie the lassie to her if it wer na for the
+wife. The day the school-board gentleman wis here she came back: she'd
+been away, ye ken, and she said she'd become a t'otaller, an' so I sed
+she micht stay; but, ye see, when nicht came on she an' Wishart gaed out
+thegither, an' jist to celebrate their bein' frien's again she an' him
+gaed intil a public, an' she got uproarious drunk, an' the polis took
+her up. Wishart wis no sae bad, sae they let him come hame; but, ye see,
+he had tasted the drink, an' wanted mair, an' he hadna ony money. Ye
+see, he'd promised the gentleman who came here that he widna send Baubie
+oot to sing again. But he _did_ send her oot then to sing for money for
+him, an' the polis had been put to watch her, an' saw her beg, an' took
+her up to the office, an' came back here for Wishart. An' so before the
+day was dune they were a' lockit up thegither."
+
+Such was the story related to Miss Mackenzie. What was to be done with
+Baubie now? It was hardly fair that she should be sent to a reformatory
+among criminal children. She had committed no crime, and there was that
+empty bed at the home for little girls. She determined to attend the
+sheriff-court on Monday morning and ask to be given the custody of
+Baubie.
+
+When Monday morning came, ten o'clock saw Miss Mackenzie established in
+a seat immediately below the sheriff's high bench. The Wisharts were
+among the first batch tried, and made their appearance from a side-door.
+Mrs. Wishart came first, stepping along with a resolute, brazen bearing
+that contrasted with her husband's timid, shuffling gait. She was a
+gypsy-looking woman, with wandering, defiant black eyes, and her red
+face had the sign-manual of vice stamped upon it. After her came Baubie,
+a red-tartan-covered mite, shrinking back and keeping as close to her
+father as she could. Baubie had favored her mother as to complexion:
+that was plain. The top of her rough head and her wild brown eyes were
+just visible over the panel as she stared round her, taking in with
+composure and astuteness everything that was going on. She was the most
+self-possessed of her party, for under Mrs. Wishart's active brazenness
+there could easily be seen fear and a certain measure of remorse hiding
+themselves; and Wishart seemed to be but one remove from imbecility.
+
+The charges were read with a running commentary of bad language from
+Mrs. Wishart as her offences were detailed; Wishart blinked in a
+helpless, pathetic way; Baubie, who seemed to consider herself as
+associated with him alone in the charge, assumed an air of indifference
+and sucked her thumb, meantime watching Miss Mackenzie furtively. She
+felt puzzled to account for her presence there, but it never entered her
+head to connect that fact with herself in any way.
+
+"Guilty or not guilty?" asked the sheriff-clerk.
+
+"There's a kin' lady in coort," stammered Wishart, "an' she kens a'
+aboot it."
+
+"Guilty or not guilty?" reiterated the clerk: "this is not the time to
+speak." "She kens it a', an' she wis to tak' the lassie."
+
+"Guilty or not guilty? You must plead, and you can say what you like
+afterward." Wishart stopped, not without an appealing look at the kind
+lady, and pleaded guilty meekly. A policeman with a scratched face and
+one hand plastered up testified to the extravagances Mrs. Wishart had
+committed on the strength of her conversion to teetotal principles.
+
+Baubic heard it all impassively, her face only betraying anything like
+keen interest while the police-officer was detailing his injuries. Three
+months' imprisonment was the sentence on Margaret Mactear or Wishart.
+Then Wishart's sentence was pronounced--sixty days.
+
+He and Baubie drew nearer to each other, Wishart with a despairing,
+helpless look. Baubie's eyes looked like those of a hare taken in a gin.
+Not one word had been said about her. She was not to go with her father.
+What was to become of her? She was not long left in doubt as to her
+fate.
+
+"I will take the child, sheriff," said Miss Mackenzie eagerly and
+anxiously. "I came here purposely to offer her a home in the refuge."
+
+"Policeman, hand over the child to this lady at once," said the
+sheriff.--
+
+"Nothing could be better, Miss Mackenzie. It is very good of you to
+volunteer to take charge of her."
+
+Mrs. Wishart disappeared with a parting volley of blasphemy; her
+husband, casting, as he went, a wistful look at Miss Mackenzie, shambled
+fecklessly after the partner of his joys and sorrows; and the child
+remained alone behind. The policeman took her by an arm and drew her
+forward to make room for a fresh consignment of wickedness from the
+cells at the side. Baubie breathed a short sigh as the door closed upon
+her parents, shook back her hair, and looked up at Miss Mackenzie, as if
+to announce her readiness and good will. Not one vestige of her internal
+mental attitude could be gathered from her sun-and wind-beaten little
+countenance. There was no rebelliousness, neither was there guilt. One
+would almost have thought she had been told beforehand what was to
+happen, so cool and collected was she.
+
+"Now, Baubie, I am going to take you home. Come, child."
+
+Pleased with her success, Miss Mackenzie, so speaking, took the little
+waif's hand and led her out of the police-court into the High street.
+She hardly dared to conjecture that it was Baubie Wishart's first visit
+to that place, but as she stood on the entrance-steps and shook out her
+skirts with a sense of relief, she breathed a sincere hope that it might
+be the child's last.
+
+A cab was waiting. Baubie, to her intense delight and no less
+astonishment, was requested to occupy the front seat. Miss Mackenzie
+gave the driver his order and got in, facing the red tartan bundle.
+
+"Were you ever in a cab before?" asked Miss Mackenzie.
+
+"Na, niver," replied Baubie in a rapt tone and without looking at her
+questioner, so intent was she on staring out of the windows, between
+both of which she divided her attention impartially.
+
+They were driving down the Mound, and the outlook, usually so
+far-reaching from that vantage-ground, was bounded by a thick sea-fog
+that the east wind was carrying up from the Forth and dispensing with
+lavish hands on all sides. The buildings had a grim, black look, as if a
+premature old age had come upon them, and the black pinnacles of the
+Monument stood out sharply defined in clear-cut, harsh distinctness
+against the floating gray background. There were not many people
+stirring in the streets. It was a depressing atmosphere, and Miss
+Mackenzie observed before long that Baubie either seemed to have become
+influenced by it or that the novelty of the cab-ride had worn off
+completely. They crossed the Water of Leith, worn to a mere brown thread
+owing to the long drought, by Stockbridge street bridge, and a few yards
+from it found themselves before a gray stone house separated from the
+street by a grass-plot surrounded by a stone wall: inside the wall grew
+chestnut and poplar trees, which in summer must have shaded the place
+agreeably, but which this day, in the cold gray mist, seemed almost
+funereal in their gloomy blackness. The gate was opened from within the
+wall as soon as Miss Mackenzie rang, and she and Baubie walked up the
+little flagged path together. As the gate clanged to behind them Baubie
+looked back involuntarily and sighed.
+
+"Don't fear, lassie," said her guide: "they will be very kind to you
+here. And it will be just a good home for you."
+
+It may be questioned whether this promise of a good home awoke any
+pleasing associations or carried with it any definite meaning to Baubie
+Wishart's mind. She glanced up as if to show that she understood, but
+her eyes turned then and rested on the square front of the little
+old-fashioned gray house with its six staring windows and its front
+circumscribed by the wall and the black poplars and naked chestnuts, and
+she choked down another sigh.
+
+"Now, Mrs. Duncan," Miss Mackenzie was saying to a comfortably-dressed
+elderly woman, "here's your new girl, Baubie Wishart."
+
+"Eh, ye've been successful then, Miss Mackenzie?"
+
+"Oh dear, yes: the sheriff made no objection. And now, Mrs. Duncan, I
+hope she will be a good girl and give you no trouble.--Come here,
+Baubie, and promise me to do everything you are told and obey Mrs.
+Duncan in everything."
+
+"Yes, mem," answered Bauble reverently, almost solemnly.
+
+There seemed to be no necessity for further exhortation. Baubie's
+demeanor promised everything that was hoped for or wanted, and,
+perfectly contented, Miss Mackenzie turned her attention to the minor
+details of wardrobe, etc.: "That frock is good enough if it were washed.
+She must get shoes and stockings; and then underwear, too, of some sort
+will be wanted."
+
+"That will it," responded the matron; "but I had better send her at
+once to get a bath."
+
+A big girl was summoned from a back room and desired to get ready a tub.
+It was the ceremony customary at the reception of a neophyte--customary,
+and in general very necessary too.
+
+Baubie's countenance fell lower still on hearing this, and she blinked
+both eyes deprecatingly. Nevertheless, when the big girl--whom they
+called Kate--returned, bringing with her a warm whiff of steam and soap,
+she trotted after her obediently and silently.
+
+After a while the door opened, and Kate's yellow head appeared. "Speak
+with ye, mem?" she said. "I hae her washen noo, but what for claes?"
+
+"Eh yes.--Miss Mackenzie, we can't put her back into those dirty
+clothes."
+
+"Oh no.--I'll come and look at her clothes, Kate." As she spoke Miss
+Mackenzie rose and followed the matron and Kate into a sort of kitchen
+or laundry.
+
+In the middle of the floor was a tub containing Miss Wishart mid-deep in
+soapsuds. Her thick hair was all soaking, and clung fast to her head:
+dripping locks hung clown over her eyes, which looked out through the
+tangle patient and suffering. She glanced up quickly as Miss Mackenzie
+came in, and then resigned herself passively into Kate's hands, who with
+a piece of flannel had resumed the scrubbing process.
+
+Miss Mackenzie was thinking to herself that it was possibly Baubie
+Wishart's first experience of the kind, when she observed the child
+wince as if she were hurt.
+
+"It's yon' as hurts her," said Kate, calling the matron's attention to
+something on the child's shoulders. They both stooped and saw a long
+blue-and-red mark--a bruise all across her back. Nor was this the only
+evidence of ill-treatment: other bruises, and even scars, were to be
+seen on the lean little body.
+
+"Puir thing!" said the matron in a low tone, sympathizingly.
+
+"Baubie, who gave you that bruise?" asked Miss Mackenzie.
+
+No answer from Baubie, who seemed to be absorbed in watching the drops
+running off the end of her little red nose, which played the part of a
+gargoyle to the rest of her face.
+
+Miss Mackenzie repeated the question, sternly almost: "Bauble Wishart, I
+insist upon knowing who gave you that bruise."
+
+"A didna gie't to mysel', mem." was the answer from the figure in the
+soapsuds. There was a half sob in the voice as of terror, and her manner
+had all the appearance of ingenuousness.
+
+The matron and Miss Mackenzie looked at each other significantly, and
+agreed tacitly that there was no use in pushing the question.
+
+"Od!" said Kate, who had paused in the act of taking a warm towel from
+the fireplace to listen, "a'body kens ye didna gie it till yoursel',
+lassie."
+
+"Where are her clothes?" said the matron. "Oh, here. Yon frock's good
+enough if it was washed; but, losh me! just look at these for clothes!"
+She was exhibiting some indescribable rags as she spoke.
+
+"Kate," said Miss Mackenzie, "dress her in the lassie Grant's clothes:
+they are the most likely to fit her. Don't lose time: I want to see her
+again before I go."
+
+Kate fished up her charge, all smoking, from the soapsuds and rubbed her
+down before the fire. Then the tangled wet hair was parted evenly and
+smoothed into dark locks on either side of her face. Raiment clean, but
+the coarsest of the coarse, was found for her. A brown wincey dress
+surmounted all. Shoes and stockings came last of all, probably in the
+order of importance assigned to them by Kate.
+
+From the arm-chair of the matron's sitting-room Miss Mackenzie surveyed
+her charge with satisfaction. Baubie looked subdued, contented, perhaps
+grateful, and was decidedly uncomfortable. Every vestige of the
+picturesque was gone, obliterated clean by soap and water, and Kate's
+hair-comb, a broken-toothed weapon that had come off second best in its
+periodic conflicts with her own barley-mow, had disposed for ever of the
+wild, curly tangle of hair. Her eyes had red rims to them, caused by
+superfluous soap and water, and in its present barked condition, when
+all the dirt was gone, Baubie's face had rather an interesting, wistful
+expression. She seemed not to stand very steadily in her boots, which
+were much too big for her.
+
+Miss Mackenzie surveyed her with great satisfaction. The brown wincey
+and the coarse apron seemed to her the neophyte's robe, betokening
+Baubie's conversion from arab nomadism to respectability and from a
+vagabond trade to decorous industry.
+
+"Now, Baubie, you can knit: I mean to give you needles and worsted to
+knit yourself stockings. Won't that be nice? I am sure you never knitted
+stockings for yourself before."
+
+"Yes, mem," replied Baubie, shuffling her feet.
+
+"Now, what bed is she to get, Mrs. Duncan? Let us go up stairs and see
+the dormitory."
+
+"I thought I would put her in the room with Kate: I changed the small
+bed in there. If you will just step up stairs, Miss Mackenzie?"
+
+The party reached the dormitory by a narrow wooden staircase, the
+whiteness of which testified to the scrubbing powers of Kate's red arms
+and those of her compeers. All the windows were open, and the east wind
+came in at its will, nippingly cold if airy. They passed through a
+large, low-ceilinged room into a smaller one, in which were only four
+beds: a small iron stretcher beside the window was pointed out as
+Baubie's. Miss Mackenzie turned down the red-knitted coverlet and looked
+at the blankets. They were perfectly clean, like everything else, and,
+like everything else too, very coarse and very well worn.
+
+"This will do very nicely.--Baubie, this is to be your bed."
+
+Baubie, fresh from the lock-up and Kennedy's Lodgings, might have been
+expected to show some trace of her sense of comparison, but not a
+vestige of expression crossed her face: she looked up in civil
+acknowledgment of having heard: that was all.
+
+"I shall look in again in the course of a week," announced Miss
+Mackenzie.--"Good-bye, Baubie: do everything Mrs. Duncan tells you."
+
+With this valedictory Miss Mackenzie left the matron, and Kate attended
+her down stairs; and Baubie was at last alone.
+
+She remained standing stock-still when they left her by the
+bedside--when the door, shut by Kate, who went out last, hid them from
+her view. She listened in a stupid kind of way to the feet tramping on
+the bare boards of the outer dormitory and down the stairs: then all was
+still, and Baubie Wishart, clean, clothed and separated from her father
+for the first time in her life, was left alone to consider how she liked
+"school." She felt cold and strange and lonely, and for about three
+minutes' space she abandoned herself without reserve to the sensation.
+Then the heavy shoes troubled her, and in a fit of anger and impatience
+she suddenly began to unlace one. Some far-off sound startled her, and
+with a furtive, timorous look at the door she fastened it up again. No
+one came, but instead of returning to the boot she sprang to the window,
+and, mounting the narrow sill, prepared to survey the domain that lay
+below it. There was not much to see. The window looked out on the back
+green, which was very much like the front, save that there was no
+flagged walk. A few stunted poplars ran round the walls: the grass was
+trodden nearly all off, and from wall to wall were stretched cords from
+which fluttered a motley collection of linen hung out to dry. There was
+no looking out of it. Baubie craned her adventurous small neck in all
+directions. One side of the back green was overlooked by a
+tenement-house; the other was guarded by the poplars and a low stone
+wall; at the bottom was a dilapidated outhouse. The sky overhead was all
+dull gray: a formless gray sea-mist hurried across it, driven by the
+east wind, which found time as well to fill, as it passed, all the
+fluttering garments on the line and swell them into ridiculous
+travesties of the bodies they belonged to, tossing them the while with
+high mockery into all manner of weird contortions.
+
+Baubie looked at them curiously, and wondered to herself how much they
+would all pawn for--considerably more than three shillings no doubt.
+She established that fact to her own satisfaction ere long, although she
+was no great arithmetician, and she sighed as she built and demolished
+an air-castle in her own mind. Though there was but little attraction
+for her in the room, she was about to leave the window when her eye fell
+on a large black cat crouched on the wall, employed in surveillance of
+the linen or stalking sparrows or in deadly ambush for a hated rival.
+Meeting Baubie's glance, he sat up and stared at her suspiciously with a
+pair of round yellow, unwinking orbs.
+
+"Ki! ki! ki!" breathed Baubie discreetly. She felt lonely, and the cat
+looked a comfortable big creature, and belonged to the house doubtless,
+for he stared at her with an interested, questioning look. Presently he
+moved. She repeated her invitation, whereon the cat slowly rose to his
+feet, humped his back and yawned, then deliberately turned quite round,
+facing the other way, and resumed his watchful attitude, his tail tucked
+in and his ears folded back close, as if to give the cold wind as little
+purchase as possible. Baubie felt snubbed and lonely, and drawing back
+from the window she sat down on the edge of her bed to wait events.
+
+Accustomed as she was to excitement, the experiences of the last few
+days were of a nature to affect even stronger nerves than hers, and the
+unwonted bodily sensations caused by the bath and change of garments
+seemed to intensify her consciousness of novelty and restraint. There
+was another not very pleasant sensation too, of which she herself had
+not taken account, although it was present and made itself felt keenly
+enough. It was her strange sense of desolation and grief at the parting
+from her father. Baubie herself would have been greatly puzzled had any
+person designated her feelings by these names. There were many things in
+that philosophy of the gutter in which Baubie Wishart was steeped to the
+lips undreamt of by her. What she knew she knew thoroughly, but there
+was much with which most children, even of her age and class in life,
+are, it is to be hoped, familiar, of which Baubie Wishart was utterly
+ignorant. Her circumstances were different from theirs--fortunately for
+them; and amongst the poor, as with their betters, various conditions
+breed various dispositions. Baubie was an outer barbarian and savage in
+comparison with some children, although they perhaps went barefooted
+also; but, like a savage too, she would have grown fat where they would
+have starved. And this she knew well.
+
+Kate's yellow head, appearing at the door to summon her to dinner, put
+an end to her gloomy reverie. And with this, her first meal, began
+Baubie's acquaintance with the household of which she was to form an
+integral portion from that hour.
+
+They gave her no housework to do. Mrs. Duncan, whom a very cursory
+examination satisfied as to the benighted ignorance of this latest
+addition to her flock, determined that Baubie should learn to read,
+write and sew as expeditiously as might be. In order that she might
+benefit by example, she was made to sit by the lassie Grant, the child
+whose clothes had been lent to her, and her education began forthwith.
+
+It was tame work to Baubie, who did not love sitting still: "white seam"
+was a vexation of spirit, and her knitting, in which she had beforehand
+believed herself an adept, was found fault with. The lassie Grant, as
+was pointed out to her, could knit more evenly and possessed a superior
+method of "turning the heel."
+
+Baubie Wishart listened with outward calmness and seeming acquiescence
+to the comparison instituted between herself and her neighbor. Inwardly,
+however, she raged. What about knitting? Anybody could knit. She would
+like to see the lassie Grant earn two shillings of a Saturday night
+singing in the High street or the Lawnmarket. Baubie forgot in her flush
+of triumphant recollection that there had always been somebody to take
+the two shillings from her, and beat her and accuse her of malversation
+and embezzlement into the bargain. Artist-like, she remembered her
+triumphs only: she could earn two shillings by her braced of songs, and
+for a minute, as she revelled in this proud consciousness, her face lost
+its demure, watchful expression, and the old independent, confident
+bearing reappeared. Baubie forgot also in her present well-nourished
+condition the never-failing sensation of hunger that had gone hand in
+hand with these departed glories. But even if she had remembered every
+circumstance of her former life, and the privations and sufferings, she
+would still have pined for its freedom.
+
+The consequence of her being well fed was simply that her mind was freed
+from what is, after all, the besetting occupation of creatures like her,
+and was therefore at liberty to bestow its undivided attention upon the
+restraints and irksomeness of this new order of things. Her gypsy blood
+began to stir in her: the charm of her old vagabond habits asserted
+itself under the wincey frock and clean apron. To be commended for
+knitting and sewing was no distinction worth talking about. What was it
+compared with standing where the full glare of the blazing windows of
+some public-house fell upon the Rob Roy tartan, with an admiring
+audience gathered round and bawbees and commendations flying thick? She
+never thought then, any more than now, of the cold wind or the day-long
+hunger. It was no wonder that under the influence of these cherished
+recollections "white seam" did not progress and the knitting never
+attained to the finished evenness of the lassie Grant's performance.
+
+None the less, although she made no honest effort to equal this model
+proposed for her example, did Baubie feel jealous and aggrieved. Her
+nature recognized other possibilities of expression and other fields of
+excellence beyond those afforded by the above-mentioned useful arts, and
+she brooded over her arbitrary and forcedly inferior position with all
+the intensity of a naturally masterful and passionate nature. It was all
+the more unbearable because she had no real cause of complaint: had she
+been oppressed or ill-treated in the slightest degree, or had anybody
+else been unduly favored, there would have been a pretext for an
+outbreak or a shadow of a reason for her discontent. But it was not so.
+The matron dispensed even-handed justice and motherly kindness
+impartially all round. And if the lassie Grant's excellences were
+somewhat obtrusively contrasted with Baubie's shortcomings, it was
+because, the two children being of the same age, Mrs. Duncan hoped to
+rouse thereby a spark of emulation in Baubie. Neither was there any
+pharisaical self-exaltation on the part of the rival. She was a
+sandy-haired little girl, an orphan who had been three years in the
+refuge, and who in her own mind rather deprecated as unfair any
+comparison drawn between herself and the newly-caught Baubie.
+
+Day followed day quietly, and Baubie had been just a week in the refuge,
+when Miss Mackenzie, faithful to her promise, called to inquire how her
+_protégée_ was getting on.
+
+The matron gave her rather a good character of Baubie. "She's just no
+trouble--a quiet-like child. She knows just nothing, but I've set her
+beside the lassie Grant, and I don't doubt but she'll do well yet; but
+she is some dull," she added.
+
+"Are you happy, Baubie?" asked Miss Mackenzie. "Will you try and learn
+everything like 'Lisbeth Grant? See how well she sews, and she is no
+older than you."
+
+"Ay, mem," responded Baubie, meekly and without looking up. She was
+still wearing 'Lisbeth Grant's frock and apron, and the garments gave
+her that odd look of their real owner which clothes so often have the
+power of conveying. Baubie's slim figure had caught the flat-backed,
+square-shoulder form of her little neighbor, and her face, between the
+smooth-laid bands of her hair, seemed to have assumed the same
+gravely-respectable air. The disingenuous roving eye was there all the
+time, could they but have noted it, and gave the lie to her compressed
+lips and studied pose.
+
+That same day the Rob Roy tartan frock made its appearance from the
+wash, brighter as to hue, but somewhat smaller and shrunken in size, as
+was the nature of its material for one reason, and for another because
+it had parted, in common with its owner when subjected to the same
+process, with a great deal of extraneous matter. Baubie saw her familiar
+garb again with joy, and put it on with keen satisfaction.
+
+That same night, when the girls were going to bed--whether the
+inspiration still lingered, in spite of soapsuds, about the red frock,
+and was by it imparted to its owner, or whether it was merely the
+prompting of that demon of self-assertion that had been tormenting her
+of late--Baubie Wishart volunteered a song, and, heedless of
+consequences, struck up one of the two which formed her stock in trade.
+
+The unfamiliar sounds had not long disturbed the quiet of the house when
+the matron and Kate, open-eyed with wonder, hastened up to know what was
+the meaning of this departure from the regular order of things. Baubie
+heard their approach, and only sang the louder. She had a good and by no
+means unmusical voice, which the rest had rather improved; and by the
+time the authorities arrived on the scene there was an audience gathered
+round the daring Baubie, who, with shoes and stockings off and the Rob
+Roy tartan half unfastened, was standing by her bed, singing at the
+pitch of her voice. The words could be heard down the stairs:
+
+Hark! I hear the bugles sounding: 'tis the signal for the fight.
+Now, may God protect us, mother, as He ever does the right.
+
+"Baubie Wishart," cried the astonished mistress, "what do you mean?"
+
+The singer was just at the close of a verse:
+
+Hear the battle-cry of Freedom! how it swells upon the air!
+Yes, we'll rally round the standard or we'll perish nobly there.
+
+She finished it off deliberately, and turned her bright eyes and flushed
+face toward the speaker.
+
+"Who gave you leave, Baubie Wishart," went on the angry matron, "to make
+yon noise? You ought to think shame of such conduct, singing your
+good-for-nothing street-songs like a tinkler. One would think ye would
+feel glad never to hear of such things again. Let me have no more of
+this, do ye hear? I just wonder what Miss Mackenzie would say to
+ye!--Kate, stop here till they are all bedded and turn off yon gas."
+
+Long before the gas was extinguished Baubie had retired into darkness
+beneath the bed-clothes, rage and mortification swelling her small
+heart. Good-for-nothing street-songs! Tinkler! Mrs. Duncan's scornful
+epithets rang in her ears and cut her to the quick. She lay awake,
+trembling with anger and indignation, until long after Kate had followed
+the younger fry to rest, and their regular breathing, which her ears
+listened for till they caught it from every bed, warned her that the
+weary occupants were safely asleep: then she sat up in bed. The
+moonlight was streaming into the room through the uncurtained window,
+and lit up her tumbled head and hot face. After a cautious pause she
+stepped out on the floor and went round the foot of her bed to the
+window. She knelt down on the floor, as if she were in search of
+something, and began feeling with her hand on the lower part of the
+shutter. Then, close to the floor, and in a place where they were likely
+to escape detection, she marked clearly and distinctly eight deep, short
+scratches in an even line on the yellow-painted woodwork. She ran her
+fingers over them until she could feel each scratch distinctly. Eight!
+She counted them thrice to make sure, then jumped back into bed, and in
+a few minutes was as fast asleep as her neighbors.
+
+The days wore into weeks, and the weeks had soon made a month, and time,
+as it went, left Baubie more demure, quieter and more diligent--diligent
+apparently at least, for the knitting, though it advanced, showed no
+sign of corresponding improvement, and the rest of her work was simply
+scamped. March had given way to April, and the late Edinburgh spring at
+last began to give signs of its approach. The chestnuts showed brown
+glistening tips to their branch-ends, and their black trunks became
+covered with an emerald-colored mildew; the rod-like branches of the
+poplars turned a pale whitish-green and began to knot and swell; the
+Water of Leith overflowed, and ran bubbling and mud-colored under the
+bridge; and the grass by its banks, and even that in the front green of
+the refuge, showed here and there a red-eyed daisy. The days grew longer
+and longer, and of a mild evening the thrush's note was to be heard
+above the brawling of the stream from the thickets of Dean Terrace
+Gardens.
+
+Baubie Wishart waited passively. Every day saw her more docile and
+demure, and every day saw a new scratch added to her tally on the
+window-shutter behind her bed.
+
+May came, and the days climbed with longer strides to their goal, now
+close; on reaching which they return slowly and unwillingly, but just as
+surely; and to her joy, about, the third week in May, Baubie Wishart
+counted one warm, clear night fifty-nine scratches on the shutter.
+Fifty-nine! She knew the number well without counting them.
+
+Whether she slept or watched that night is not known, but the next
+morning at four saw Baubie make a hasty and rather more simple toilette
+than usual, insomuch as she forgot to wash herself, brush her hair or
+put on her shoes and stockings. Barefooted and bareheaded, much as she
+had come, she went. She stole noiselessly as a shadow through the outer
+dormitory, passing the rows of sleepers with bated breath, and not
+without a parting glance of triumph at the bed where her rival,
+Elizabeth Grant, was curled up. Down the wooden stair, her bare feet
+waking no echoes, glided Baubie, and into the school-room, which looked
+out on the front green. She opened the window easily, hoisted herself on
+the sill, crept through and let herself drop on the grass below. To
+scramble up the trunk of one of the chestnuts and swing herself over the
+wall was quickly done, and then she was once more on the flagged path of
+the street, and the world lay before her.
+
+As she stood for one moment, breathless with her haste and excitement,
+she was startled by the sudden apparition of the house cat, who was on
+his way home as surreptitiously as she was on hers abroad. He had one
+bloody ear and a scratched nose, and stared at her as he passed: then,
+probably in the hope of finding an open door after her, he jumped over
+the wall hurriedly. Baubie was seized with a sudden panic lest the cat
+should waken some one in the house, and she took to her heels and ran
+until she reached the bridge. The morning sun was just beginning to
+touch the tall tops of the houses, and the little valley through which
+the Water of Leith ran lay still in a kind of clear grayish light, in
+which the pale tender hues of the young leaves and the flowering trees
+were all the more vividly beautiful. The stream was low, and it hurried
+along over its stony bed, as if it too were running away, and in as
+great a hurry to be free of all restraints as truant Baubie Wishart,
+whose red frock was now climbing the hilly gray street beyond.
+
+She could hear, as she strained herself to listen for pursuing voices,
+the rustle and murmur of the water with an odd distinctness as it rose
+upon the still air of the summer morning.
+
+Not a creature was to be seen as she made her way eastward, shaping her
+course for Princes street, and peering, with a gruesome fear of the
+school-board officer, round every corner. That early bird, however, was
+not so keenly on the alert as she gave him the credit of being, and she
+reached her goal unchallenged after coasting along in parallel lines
+with it for some time.
+
+The long beautiful line of Princes street was untenanted as the Rob Roy
+tartan tacked cautiously round the corner of St. David street and took a
+hasty look up and down before venturing forth.
+
+The far-reaching pale red beams of the morning sun had just touched and
+kindled as with a flame the summit of the Rock, and the windows of the
+Castle caught and flashed back the greeting in a dozen ruddy
+reflections. The gardens below lay partly veiled in a clear transparent
+mist, faintly blue, that hovered above the trees and crept up the banks,
+and over which the grand outlines of the Rock towered as it lifted its
+head majestically into the gold halo that lay beyond.
+
+Not a sound or stir, even the sparrows were barely awake, as Baubie
+darted along. Fixing her eye on that portion of the High School which is
+visible from Princes street, she pushed along at a pace that was almost
+a run, and a brief space saw her draw up and fall exhausted on the steps
+that lead up to the Calton Hill.
+
+Right before her was the jail-gate.
+
+The child's feet, unused now for some time to such hardships, were hot
+and bruised, for she had not stopped to pick her footing in her hasty
+course, and she was so out of breath and heated that it seemed to her as
+if she would never get cool or her heart cease fluttering as if it would
+choke her. She shrank discreetly against the stone wall at her side, and
+there for three long hours she remained crouched, watching and waiting
+for the hour to chime when the grim black gate opposite would open.
+
+The last tinge of crimson and purple had faded before the golden glories
+of the day as the sun climbed higher and higher in the serene blue sky.
+The red cliffs of Salisbury Crags glared with a hot lustre above the
+green slopes of the hill, and in the white dust of the high-road a
+million tiny stars seemed to sparkle and twinkle most invitingly to
+Baubie's eyes. The birds had long been awake and busy in the bushes
+above her head, and from where she sat she could see, in the distant
+glitter of Princes street, all the stir of the newly-raised day.
+
+It was a long vigil, and her fear and impatience made it seem doubly
+longer. At last the clock began to chime eight, and before it was half
+done the wicket in the great door opened with a noisy clang after a
+preliminary rattle.
+
+First came a boy, who cast an anxious look round him, then set off at a
+run; next a young woman, for whom another was waiting just out of sight
+down the road; last of all (there were only three released), Baubie,
+whose heart was beginning to beat fast again with anxiety, saw the
+familiar, well-known figure shamble forth and look up and down the road
+in a helpless, undecided way. The next moment the wicket had clapped to
+again. Wishart glanced back at it, sighed once or twice, and blinked his
+eyes as though the sunlight were too strong for them.
+
+Baubie, scarce breathing, watched him as a cat watches just before she
+springs.
+
+After a second of hesitation he began to move cityward, obeying some
+sheep-like instinct which impelled him to follow those who had gone on
+before. Baubie saw this, and, just waiting to let him get well under way
+and settle into his gait, she gathered herself up and sprang across the
+road upon him with the suddenness and rapidity of a flash.
+
+He fairly staggered with surprise. There she was, exactly as he had left
+her, dusty, barefooted and bareheaded. The wind had tossed up her hair,
+which indeed was only too obedient to its will, and it clustered all the
+more wildly about her face because of having been cropped to the
+regulation length of the refuge.
+
+"Lassie, is't you?" he ejaculated, lost in astonishment. Then, realizing
+the fact, he gave expression to his feeling by grinning in a convulsive
+kind of way and clapping her once or twice on the shoulder next him.
+"Od! I niver! Didna the leddy--"
+
+Baubie cut him short. "Sed I widna bide," she observed curtly and
+significantly.
+
+Gestures and looks convey, among people like the Wisharts, far more
+meaning than words, and Baubie's father perfectly understood from the
+manner and tone of her pregnant remark that she had run away from
+school, and had severed the connection between herself and the "kind
+leddy," and that in consequence the situation was highly risky for both.
+They remained standing still for a moment, looking at each other. The
+boy and the woman were already out of sight, and the white, dusty
+high-road seemed all their own domain.
+
+Wishart shuffled with his feet once more, and looked in the direction
+of Princes street, and then at Baubie inquiringly. It was for her, as
+usual, to decide. Baubie had been his Providence for as long as he had
+memory for--no great length of time. He was conjecturing in his own mind
+vaguely whether his Providence had, by any chance, got the desiderated
+three shillings necessary for the redemption of the banjo hidden away in
+the Rob Roy tartan. He would not have been surprised had it been so, and
+he would have asked no questions.
+
+Seeing that her eyes followed the direction of his with a forbidding
+frown, he said tentatively, "Ye didn'--didna--"
+
+"What?" snapped Baubie crossly: she divined his meaning exactly. "Come
+awa' wi' ye!" she ordered, facing right round countryward.
+
+"We'll gae awa' til Glasgae, Baubie, eh? I'm thinkin' to yer auntie's.
+_She_"--with a gesture of his head backward at the prison--"will no' be
+oot this month; sae she'll niver need to ken, eh?"
+
+Baubie nodded. He only spoke her own thoughts, and he knew it.
+
+The first turn to the right past the High School brought them out on the
+road before Holyrood, which lay grim and black under the sun-bathed
+steeps of Arthur's Seat. On by the Grange and all round the
+south-eastern portion of the city this odd couple took their way. It was
+a long round, but safety made it necessary. At last, between
+Corstorphine's wooded slopes and the steeper rise of the Pentlands, they
+struck into the Glasgow road. In the same order as before they pursued
+their journey, Baubie leading as of old, now and again vouchsafing a
+word over her shoulder to her obedient follower, until the dim haze of
+the horizon received into itself the two quaint figures, and Baubie
+Wishart and the Rob Roy tartan faded together out of sight.
+
+_The Author of "Flitters, Tatters and the Counsellor_."
+
+
+
+
+GAS-BURNING, AND ITS CONSEQUENCES.
+
+
+"It is remarkable what attention has been attracted all over the country
+by the recent experiments with Edison's inventions," observed my friend
+the traveller as our host turned a fuller flow of gas in the chandelier.
+"Even in the little villages out West, of only one bank and _not_ one
+good hotel, the topics which last spring generally excited most interest
+in all circles were Edison's electric light and Bell's telephone."
+
+"Very likely," replied our host, an elderly gentleman of fortune. "If we
+had such impure gas as is found in many of the villages and small cities
+not so very far West, I'd never light a burner in my library again. As
+it is, I do so very rarely. The products of gas combustion act on the
+bindings until firm calf drops in pieces, and even law-sheep loses its
+coherency, as the argument of the opposing counsel does when your own
+lawyer begins to talk."
+
+"The effect on the upholstery and metallic ornaments is as bad as upon
+the books," added our hostess. "This room will have to be refurnished in
+the spring--all on account of the changes in color both of the paper and
+the silk and cotton fabrics; and the bronze dressing on those statuettes
+is softening, so that there are lines and spots of rust all over them."
+
+"Perhaps, my dear, they would have suffered equally from the atmosphere
+without gas," replied the old gentleman, looking at his wife over his
+glasses.
+
+"Our friend here has a hundred thousand more in gas stock than he had a
+year ago, and I suspect that he is still a bear in the market," said his
+neighbor a chemist, who had just dropped in.
+
+"If I lose I shall lay it to your advice."
+
+"You did well to buy--if you sell at once," said the traveller, who was
+interested in the electric light to some unknown extent: "gas stock will
+finally have to go down."
+
+"When the sun shines in the night, not before," asserted a young
+accountant from the gas-works who had been holding a private talk with
+the daughter of the house at the other corner of the room.
+
+"Gas companies can manufacture at less cost than formerly," said the
+chemist.
+
+"But yet gas has gone up again lately. You may thank the electric-light
+boom for the temporary respite you have had from poor gas at high
+prices."
+
+"Yes; some of the companies put gas down lower than they could
+manufacture it, in order to hold their customers at a time when people
+almost believed that Edison's light would prove a success."
+
+"But it _was_ a success. It proved an excellent light, displayed a neat
+lamp, and gave no ill effects upon either the atmosphere or the eyes;
+and the perfect carbons showed a surprising endurance. The only
+difficulty is that the invention is not yet perfected so as to go
+immediately into use."
+
+"But the lower part of the glasses becomes dark with deposited carbon,"
+returned the chemist. "If carbons could be made to last long enough to
+render the lamps cheap, this smoking of the globes would set a limit at
+which the lamps would cease to be presentable; and the cleaning, and the
+exhausting of air again, are difficult and expensive."
+
+"That remains to be proved. But coal is sure to grow dearer."
+
+"That isn't likely within a century. Besides, by the fault of the
+consumer gas-light costs now one-third more than it should for the same
+light. The best English authorities state this to be the case in Great
+Britain, and I have no question that such is the fact here."
+
+"How would you remedy the evil of waste?"
+
+"By the use of economical burners and of governors to regulate the flow
+of gas."
+
+"That is very easily said. What is the name of your economical burner?"
+
+"I am not an advocate of any special burner, but of all that are
+constructed on right principles."
+
+"There are many kinds of burners. Do you not have some classification
+for them?" inquired the young lady, who was fresh from Wellesley.
+
+"The usual forms of the burner," replied the chemist "--or, more
+properly, the forms of the tip--are the fishtail, the batwing and the
+argand. In the first the gas issues through two holes which come
+together at the top, so that the two jets of gas impinge and form a flat
+flame; in the batwing the gas issues in a thin sheet through a slit in a
+hollow knob; while in the argand the gas enters a short cylinder or
+broad ring, escaping thence through numerous holes at the upper edge.
+There are many varieties of each of these, differing in the construction
+of the part below the tip. The argand has long been the favorite burner
+for the table and desk. Its advantages are a strong, steady light, but,
+as you know, it is apt to smoke at every slight increase in the pressure
+of the gas, though there are recent improved forms in which this fault
+is in a measure corrected. A properly-made argand burner will give a
+light equal to three whole candles (spermaceti, of the standard size and
+quality) for every foot of gas burned. Of the argand burners, Guise's
+shadowless argand has been considered the best, but of late years Sugg's
+Letheby burner has carried off the palm. Wood's burner has been a
+favorite, as, being a fishtail, it could be used with a short chimney,
+which gives the flame steadiness. By the arms on the chimney-frame the
+flame is broadened at the bottom, with a smaller dark space at the base
+than in any other flat-flame burner. It is so constructed that the
+quantity of gas passing is regulated by turning a tap in the lower part
+of the burner, which changes the size of the orifice in the tube. Ten
+years ago this burner, with a regulator at the meter, was generally
+thought to be the most economical contrivance possible. It is now little
+used. Yet either the batwing or the fishtail tip can be used in any
+common burner except the argand. The old brass and iron tips are mostly
+superseded by those of "lava," being liable to an early change of the
+orifice from incrustation and rust. In the flat-flame burners there are
+differences in the internal arrangement. Perhaps our young
+gas-manufacturer here can tell us what is now the most approved burner."
+
+The young man confessed that he had specimens of the best kinds of
+flat-flame burners in his pocket. He quickly brought from his overcoat
+in the hall a small paper parcel from which he produced several bright
+little brass tubes, explaining that he carried them because somebody was
+always inquiring about the best kind of burner. "These save talk," said
+he.
+
+With a small wrench he removed one of the old burners, and the several
+kinds were successively tested in its place. Some gave a better light,
+but it was objected that they might consume more gas. Whereupon the
+chemist tore a strip from his well-worn handkerchief, and, having damped
+it, wound the ribbon several times around the top of the old burner
+(which had been replaced), leaving the orifice uncovered. The new burner
+was screwed down over this, making a gas-tight connection. "There," said
+he, "we have a gauge. The new burner will receive the same amount of gas
+that the old one consumed--no more, no less--but the current is slightly
+checked."
+
+The burner gave the same amount of light as before, so far as the eye
+could perceive.
+
+"In the combustion of gas for heating purposes," continued the chemist,
+"seek the burner with free, rapid delivery through small holes. For
+light you want something different. Suppose you send a current of gas up
+into this sewing-thimble: it can find an exit only by turning backward.
+Then suppose it escapes from the thimble only to enter a larger cavity
+above it, whence it must issue through a burner-tip with an orifice of
+the usual size. The current, you perceive, is twice completely broken.
+It will be seen that only the expansive force of the gas, together with
+its buoyancy, acts upon the jets, instead of a direct current. Now, it
+will always be found that the burner which best carries out the
+principles just illustrated--other points being equal--will give more
+light with a less quantity of gas than any other. This also exhibits
+the chief principle of most of the governors or regulators.
+
+"You will observe that this checking of the current is attained in
+various ways in different burners," continued the chemist as he
+unscrewed and dissected the samples before him. "In some it is done by a
+perforated metal disk in the orifice; in others, by a bit of wool, which
+checks slightly a slow current, and by the pressure of a strong one
+becomes compacted and forms a more effective obstacle. In most cases,
+however, it soon becomes solid with condensed matters from the gas.
+Another form of check is a small cap having perpendicular slits at the
+sides. The cylinder of the cap, being smaller than the orifice of the
+burner, screws down into it; the openings being shortened or lengthened
+according as the cylinder is screwed up or down. One objection to this
+is the trouble required in regulating. Here is another burner, in which
+the orifice ends in a cap whose sides, near the bottom, are pierced with
+four pin-holes directed downward. This reverses the direction of the
+current of gas, which then escapes through the pin-holes downward into a
+chamber, then turns upward along its sides to the tip, on entering which
+it again turns. Each burner is able to consume economically a flow of
+gas peculiar to itself, which can be ascertained by a minute's
+experiment, and then regulated by the tap in the pipe. But this requires
+much care, and is apt to be neglected. A very small tap in the burner
+(as in the Wood and Ellis burners), which can be adjusted so as to
+require no further attention, seems the best method of effecting this
+graduation."
+
+The chemist now pulled a manuscript from his pocket and read from it as
+follows: "The quantity of light decreases with disproportionate rapidity
+by reduced consumption; for, as experiments have shown, when consuming
+only two feet per hour, eighty-five per cent. of the gas is lost; with
+two and a half feet the loss is sixty per cent.; and with three and a
+half feet it is thirty-four per cent. of that derived from the gas when
+burning the full quantity for which the burner is constructed. In some
+experiments made upon this matter under the direction of referees
+appointed by the London Board of Trade the loss at the other extreme is
+given. They report: 'Instead of the gas giving increased light as the
+rate of consumption is increased, it will be seen that _in every case_
+there is a point beyond which the _light decreases_ relatively to the
+proportion of gas consumed. In every case, too, this point lies far
+below the maximum of gas-consumption, observing the turning-points in
+the case of the different burners.' Again, every burner has a certain
+amount of gas which it will consume to the greatest advantage as to both
+light and economy; which in a completely-regulated burner is quickly
+found, and the delivery fixed by the small tap. When the gas is issuing
+from the burner at so low a pressure that the flame is just on the point
+of smoking, the maximum effect for the quantity of gas consumed in that
+particular burner is attained, because in that case the quantity and
+intensity of the light are most advantageously balanced. For the same
+reason, the burner best suited for light is one in which the
+jet-openings are proportionately large, so as to prevent as much as
+possible too great contact with the air in the lower part of the flame.
+In case the air-currents disturb the light, it is necessary to turn on a
+stronger flow, which secures steadiness, but sets economy at naught."
+
+"It would be a good thing," said the young fellow, interrupting him, "if
+some person would invent a burner that should heat the gas before its
+discharge. We could then get a perfect combustion of the carbon, and so
+greater brilliancy and economy."
+
+"That is a very common error. Mr. Leslie's burner was designed on that
+very theory: the result was contrary to expectation."
+
+"What was the form of the burner?" inquired our host.
+
+"Leslie's burner is a form of the argand. The gas, instead of issuing
+from holes pierced in a solid ring, is conducted to the flame in
+separate small tubes upward of an inch long. Twenty-eight of these tubes
+are inserted in a ring two inches in diameter, and converge to one inch
+at the ends, where the gas escapes. These tubes become hot very quickly
+when the gas is lighted, and it issues at a high temperature. Here is
+the result of a test made by Mr. Clegg, and given on page 344 of his
+valuable work on coal gas:
+
+        COMMON ARGAND, FIFTEEN HOLES.
+  Consumption per hour in cubic feet:
+        6 feet, light = 17.4 standard candles.
+        5 feet, light = 13.64 standard candles
+
+  LESLIE'S BURNER, TWENTY-EIGHT HOLES.
+        6 feet, light = 14.73 standard candles.
+        5 feet, light = 11.28 standard candles.
+
+"In experimenting with common burners, argand and others, it is found
+that, if the aperture in the tip is too small for the orifice in the
+body of the burner, the escaping gas is too highly heated and is
+consumed too quickly. So with Leslie's burner in an increased degree.
+Theories brought to the test of experiment are often disappointing."
+
+The chemist now proceeded to illustrate his harangue with the argand
+upon the table, which he lighted and turned on full, without replacing
+the chimney. The dull-red flame streamed up to a height of eight inches
+or more, waving and smoking slightly. He now turned down the gas and
+replaced the chimney, then set the tap at the same angle as before.
+"Here," said he, "we have a flame barely four inches high--of brilliant
+white--which gives more light than the taller flame did. The cause of
+the shortening of the flame is the more rapid combustion of the gas,
+owing to the increased draught or air-supply in the chimney. From the
+greater intensity of this flame a much larger quantity of light is
+produced than by the longer flame. If too tall a chimney is used, the
+flame is shortened still more and its brilliancy increased, but not to a
+degree sufficient to compensate for the diminished surface. The light,
+you are doubtless aware, comes from the incandescence of the carbon,
+heated by the union of the hydrogen of the gas with a portion of the
+oxygen of the air."
+
+The chemist now read from his manuscript again: "Carburetted hydrogen of
+a passably good quality requires two volumes of pure oxygen for its
+complete combustion and conversion into carbonic acid and water.
+Atmospheric air contains, in its pure state, about twenty per cent. of
+oxygen; therefore, one cubic foot of gas requires for its perfect
+combustion ten cubic feet of air. If less be admitted to the flame, a
+quantity of free carbon will escape, and be deposited in the form of
+black smoke. If an excess of air be admitted, we shall find that the
+quantity of nitrogen accompanying this excess has a tendency to
+extinguish the flame, while it takes no part in the elective affinity
+constantly going on between the other elements--namely, hydrogen, oxygen
+and the vapor of carbon.
+
+"Again," said he, turning down the gas, "if the flame be reduced to a
+consumption of two feet per hour, its light will be equal to that of one
+candle only; but on raising the chimney, thus, about half an inch from
+the gallery or support the light is greatly increased, or by simply
+placing a disk on top of the chimney the light is increased ninefold;
+both of which effects seem to result from a diminished current of air,
+while at the same time there is an ample supply. Lastly, with the
+ordinary glass moon-globe so generally used in dwellings with the
+fishtail burner little difference can be perceived between the light
+given from the flame by four feet and that from six feet of gas per
+hour, in consequence of the strong current of air passing up through the
+globe; but if the top of the glass be enclosed by a talc cover having an
+orifice in the centre about an inch in diameter, then the conditions of
+the burner are completely changed. The light is greatly increased,
+because the highest economical advantage is then approached."[2]
+
+"Smoke from the aperture and lamp-black on the cover must result from
+such an arrangement," objected the old gentleman.
+
+"There need be very little of either," responded the chemist. "From some
+burners there is little light without smoke. A smoky flame may arise
+from too much carbon, but the gas companies in this part of the country
+are not apt to make their product too rich; and such a condition is not
+likely to occur except with vapor-gas when warm weather quickly succeeds
+to a cold spell in the winter season. The consumer's immediate remedy in
+any case is to use a smaller tip with the fishtail and batwing burners,
+and a taller chimney with the argand; which devices will give a quicker
+movement to the gas in one case and to the air in the other. The
+smoking, however, may be caused by carbonic acid, which checks
+combustion. There is always more or less of this in gas, arising from a
+partial combustion in the retorts when charging them with coal or while
+withdrawing the exhausted charge. But it is only by excessively slow and
+careless work that this can happen to a serious extent. Only an expert
+can tell when this condition exists, though if the symptoms do not yield
+to manipulations of the chimney and tap, it may be suspected. There is
+no effective remedy for this adulteration which can be applied by the
+consumer except a vigorous complaint against the company which supplies
+the stuff.
+
+"There remains one burner or lamp to be mentioned, contrived with
+special reference to health," he continued--"the ventilating standard
+lamp of Doctor Faraday, used in the House of Lords. In this there is an
+outer glass by which the vitiated air passes away through the pipe
+communicating with the external air. The lamp is interesting, but there
+is a question whether there is any practical advantage in its use.
+Rutter's ventilating lamp is of different form, having a globe instead
+of an outer cylinder, the gas and air coming in from above. Some of the
+best dwellings now being erected in the vicinity of New York are
+provided with tin pipes leading from the burners to the open air. In
+some the pipe receives the foul air from an open metallic or mineral
+shade over the burner; others have a larger pipe enclosing the gas-pipe
+for ventilation, the tops of the two pipes (including the burner) being
+enclosed by a globe pierced with holes for fresh air. There is said to
+result a good ventilation, with economy of gas, an increased steadiness
+of the flame and power of light. A better arrangement is a third pipe
+enclosing the gas-pipe and enclosed in the ventilating-pipe, opening to
+the air, instead of the holes in the globe, which in this case should be
+air-tight. This plan is said to have reached its perfection when the
+three pipes are filled with wire gauze to some extent. This, being
+heated by the escape of hot gases in the ventilating-pipe, sends both
+the air and the gas to the flame already highly heated. The result is
+said to be admirable as regards ventilation, steadiness and power of the
+light and economy of gas.
+
+"With these lamps the pressure of the gas-current is of great
+importance; and I now turn to that subject. It is a general complaint in
+buildings whose rooms are high that the flow of gas on the lower floor
+is deficient, while on the upper floors there is a greater supply than
+is necessary. This inconvenience arises from the upper stories being
+subjected to less atmospheric pressure than the lower, every rise of ten
+feet making a difference in the pressure of about one-tenth of an inch
+of water; and, consequently, a column of gas acquires that amount of
+pressure additional. The following table, recording an experiment of Mr.
+Richards, will show the result in respect to light:
+
+  Gas issuing from the burner at a pressure of--
+  1/10  inch of water gave the light of 12 candles,
+  5/10   "    "   "    "    "    "    "  6    "
+  10/10  "    "   "    "    "    "    "  2    "
+  40/10  "    "   "    "    no appreciable light.
+
+Suppose a building of six floors is supplied from the gas-mains at a
+pressure of six-tenths, and that the difference of altitude between the
+highest and lowest light is equal to fifty feet: the gas in the highest
+or sixth floor will issue from the burners at a pressure of
+eleven-tenths; the fifth floor, at ten-tenths; and so on. In order to
+secure an entirely equable flow and economical light a regulator is
+necessary on each floor above the first. The gas companies are
+frequently obliged to supply mills at a much greater pressure than is
+stated above as necessary, in order that the ground floors may have
+sufficient light."
+
+"How about incorrect meters?" asked the traveller.
+
+"Little need be said of them, as they fall within the domain of the
+companies and the public inspector of gas. Under favorable conditions
+gas-meters will remain in order for ten years or more; and when they
+become defective they as often favor the consumer, probably, as they do
+the gas company. Their defects do not often occasion inconvenience; and
+when they once get out of order they run so wild that their condition is
+soon detected, when the errors in previous bills should be corrected by
+estimate of other seasons."
+
+"You haven't mentioned the apparatus (carburetters) for increasing the
+richness of the gas, which can be applied by the consumer upon his own
+premises," said the old gentleman.
+
+"There is little need. The burners should be adjusted to the quality of
+gas furnished. If there were any real gain in this method of enrichment,
+the gas companies are the parties who could make the most of it: indeed,
+many of them do to such an extent as can be made profitable. But
+whenever the temperature of the atmosphere falls, the matter added to
+the gas is deposited in the pipes, sometimes choking them entirely at
+the angles. No: arrange your burners and regulators to suit the gas that
+is furnished, demand of the company that it fulfil the law and the
+contract in regard to the quality of the gas, and give all gas-improving
+machines the go-by.[3]
+
+"Light having, perhaps, been sufficiently considered for the present
+needs, we have now to note the effects of the combustion of gas upon the
+atmosphere, and through this upon the furnishing of rooms and the health
+of the persons living therein," said the chemist, again taking up his
+manuscript. "The usual products from the combustion of common
+illuminating gas are carbonic acid, sulphuric acid, ammonia and
+water-vapor. Every burner consuming five cubic feet of gas per hour
+spoils as much air as two full-grown men: it is therefore evident that
+the air of a room thus lighted would soon become vitiated if an ample
+supply of fresh air were not frequently admitted.
+
+"Remember," said he, looking up from the paper, "that nearly the same
+effects proceed from the combustion of candles and lamps of every kind
+when a sufficient number of these are burned to give an equal amount of
+light. Carbonic acid is easily got rid of, for the rooms where gas is
+burned usually have sufficient ventilation near the floor by means of a
+register, or even the slight apertures under the doors--together with
+their frequent opening--to carry off the small quantity emitted by one
+or two burners. But there are other gases which must have vent at the
+upper part of the room, while fresh air should be admitted to supply the
+place of that which is chemically changed."
+
+Returning to his manuscript, he continued: "The burners which give the
+least light, burning instead with a low, blue flame, form the most
+carbonic acid and free the most nitrogen. Such are all the burners for
+heat rather than light. But the formation of sulphuric acid gas may be
+the same in each. In the yellow flame the carbon particles escape to
+darken the light colors of the room, not being heated sufficiently to
+combine with the oxygen. This product of the combustion of gas (free
+carbon) might be regarded as rather wholesome than otherwise (as its
+nature is that of an absorbent) were it not the worst kind of dust to
+breathe--in fact, clogging the lungs to suffocation. In vapor gas--made
+at low heat--the carbon is in a large degree only mechanically mixed
+with the hydrogen, and is liable, especially in cold weather, to be
+deposited in the pipes. This leaves only a very poor, thin gas, mainly
+hydrogen, which burns with a pale blue flame, as seen in cold spells in
+winter. High heats and short charges in the retorts of the manufactory
+give a purer gas and a larger production. Gas made at high heat will
+reach the consumer in any weather very nearly as rich as when it leaves
+the gas-holder; for, thus made, the hydrogen and carbon are chemically
+combined, instead of the hydrogen merely bearing a quantity of
+carbon-vapor mechanically mixed and liable to deposit with every
+reduction of temperature. To relieve the atmosphere of the gases and
+vapors proceeding from combustion is, of course, the purpose of
+ventilation. The sulphuric acid gas and ammonia will be largely in
+combination with the water-vapor, which also proceeds from combustion,
+so that all will be got rid of together. The vaporization of libraries
+to counteract the excessive dryness (or drying, rather) which causes
+leather bindings to shrink and to break at the joints, would be of
+doubtful utility, since it might only serve to carry into the porous
+leather still more of the gases just mentioned. The action of both
+sulphuric acid and ammonia is, undoubtedly, to destroy the fibre of
+leather, so that it crumbles to meal or falls apart in flakes.
+
+"In a very interesting paper read by Professor William R. Nichols of the
+Massachusetts Institute of Technology before the American Association of
+Science at its Saratoga meeting in 1879, the results of many analyses of
+leather bindings were given, showing the presence of the above-named
+substances in old bindings in many times greater quantity than in new.
+Still, their presence did not prove them to be the cause of the decay;
+and Professor Nichols proposes to ascertain the fact by experiments
+requiring some years for demonstration.
+
+"In the hope of deciding the question with reasonable certainty at once,
+I have made careful examinations of the books in the three largest
+libraries of Boston and Cambridge, each differing from the others in age
+and atmosphere. The bindings of the volumes examined bore their own
+record in dates and ownership, by which the conditions of their
+atmosphere in respect to gas and (approximately) to heat were made
+known for periods varying from current time to over two hundred years.
+In the Public Library the combined influences of gas, heat and effluvium
+have wrought upon the leather until many covers were ready to drop to
+pieces at a touch. The binding showed no more shrinkage than in the
+other libraries, but in proportion to the time the books had been upon
+the shelves the decay of the leather was about the same as in the
+Athenæum. I am informed that many of the most decayed have from time to
+time been rebound, so that a full comparison cannot be made between this
+and the others. In the Athenæum less gas has been used, and there is
+very little effluvium, but the mealy texture of the leather is general
+among the older tenants of the shelves. Numbers of volumes in the
+galleries were losing their backs, which were more or less broken off at
+the joints from the shrinkage and brittleness of the leather. The plan
+has been proposed of introducing the vapor of water to counteract the
+effects of dryness upon the bindings. In this library the atmosphere has
+the usual humidity of that out of doors, being warmed by bringing the
+outer air in over pipes conveying hot water, while the other libraries
+have the higher heat of steam-pipes. If, therefore, its atmosphere
+differs from that of the other libraries in respect to moisture, the
+variation is in the direction of greater humidity, without any
+corresponding effect on the preservation of bindings. In fact, proper
+ventilation and low shelves seem to be the true remedies for these
+evils, or, rather, the best means of amelioration, since there is no
+complete antidote to the decay common to all material things. The last
+condition involves the disuse of galleries and of rooms upon more than
+one flat, unless the atmosphere in the upper portions of the lower rooms
+be shut off from the higher, as it should be. Another precaution which
+might be taken with advantage is to use the higher shelves for cloth
+bindings.
+
+"In the Harvard College Library no gas has ever been used, nor any other
+artificial illuminator to much extent. Neither had any large number of
+the volumes been exposed to the products of gas-combustion, except for
+a brief time before they were placed here. The bindings in this library
+showed very little crumbling, but many covers were breaking at the
+joints from the shrinking which arises from excessive dryness. In common
+with many other substances, leather yields moisture to the air much more
+readily than it receives it from that medium. Cloth bindings showed no
+decay at all here--very little in any of the libraries, except in the
+loss of color. It should be stated that the volumes which I examined at
+Harvard College were generally older than those inspected in the other
+libraries. There are parchment bindings in each of the libraries
+hundreds of years old, apparently just as perfect in texture as when
+first placed upon the shelves of the original owner. The parchment was
+often worn through at the angles, but there was no breakage from
+shrinking, the material having been shrunken as much as possible when
+prepared from the skin. At Harvard College I examined an embossed calf
+binding stretched on wooden sides which was above a hundred years old.
+It was in almost perfect preservation, and not much shrunken. This
+volume, being very large, was on a shelf next the ground floor--a
+position which it had probably held ever since the erection of the
+building.
+
+"Professor Nichols does not mention morocco in his tables of analyses.
+Indeed, morocco was so little used for bookbindings until within about
+thirty years that it affords a less ample field for investigation than
+any other of the leathers now in common use. My attention was therefore
+directed specially to this material, of which I found some specimens
+having a record of nearly fifty years. My observation was, that in all
+the libraries these were less affected by decay, in proportion to their
+age, than other leathers. In Harvard College Library the best Turkey
+morocco, with forty years of exposure, showed no injury except from
+chafing. The outer integument was often worn away, exposing the texture
+of the skin, which was still of strong fibre. In the Athenæum, on the
+contrary, many of the moroccos showed the same decay as the calf,
+russia and sheep. There was, however, a wide difference in the condition
+of moroccos of the same age--some showing as much decay as the calf,
+while others had scarcely any of the disintegration common to the older
+calf bindings. The same might, indeed, be said of all leathers, those
+tanned by the quick modern methods, with much more acid than is used in
+old processes, in which time is a large factor, showing always a more
+rapid deterioration. But, the methods being the same, morocco, the
+oiliest of the common leathers and the one having the firmest cuticle,
+endures the best.
+
+"The order of endurance of leather (as observed by librarians) against
+atmospheric effects is as follows, descending from the first to the last
+in order: Parchment, light-colored morocco, sheep, russia, calf. Cloth
+wears out quickly by use, but appears--the linen especially--to be
+affected by the atmosphere only in loss of color. These observations all
+refer to the ordinary humidity of the air in frequented rooms.
+
+"This, then, is the result of my inquiries: I found the shrinking and
+breaking resulting from heat much the same in all the libraries, but
+most in that where the heating is from the outer air brought in over
+hot-water pipes, the two other libraries examined being warmed by
+steam-pipes having a higher temperature. I found the mealy structure--or
+instead thereof flakiness--to prevail most in the Athenæum, next in the
+Public Library: in the latter, however, many volumes have been rebound,
+thus raising the average of condition. In the Harvard College Library no
+gas--in fact, little if any artificial light--is used, and here, too,
+the mealy structure and disintegration are mostly absent. I conclude,
+therefore, from these limited observations, that heat is responsible for
+a large part of the damage to leather bindings, its effects being
+evidently supplemented and hastened by gas-combustion.
+
+"The ventilating lamps before described, though rather cumbrous to eyes
+accustomed to the small and simple apparatus commonly used, might prove
+valuable in rooms containing fabrics liable; to be injured by the gases
+from open burners."
+
+As the chemist concluded his reading the traveller remarked to the
+somewhat weary listeners, "You now see the vast amount of study and care
+required to use gas with economy and safety. I could not have argued the
+cause of a new, clean, gasless and vaporless light like electricity any
+better myself."
+
+"It will be found," responded the chemist, "that there are more troubles
+and dangers connected with the electric light--besides the larger
+expense--than are thought of now."
+
+"That is so!" ejaculated the young fellow.
+
+"At any rate," said the old gentleman, "gas stock won't go lower for
+twenty years than it has been this winter."
+
+"You are all wedded to your idols," was the final protest of the
+traveller.
+
+"I wish I was," murmured the young fellow, with a side-glance at his
+fair neighbor, who immediately removed to another part of the room.
+
+GEORGE J. VARNEY.
+
+
+
+
+THE "_???? ??G?????_ IN SHAKESPEARE.
+
+
+When we examine the vocabulary of Shakespeare, what first strikes us is
+its copiousness. His characters are countless, and each one speaks his
+own dialect. His little fishes never talk like whales, nor do his whales
+talk like little fishes. Those curious in such matters have detected in
+his works quotations from seven foreign tongues, and those from Latin
+alone amount to one hundred and thirty-two.
+
+Our first impression, that the Shakespearian variety of words is
+multitudinous, is confirmed by statistics. Mrs. Cowden Clarke has
+counted those words one by one, and ascertained their sum to be not less
+than fifteen thousand. The total vocabulary of Milton's poetical remains
+is no more than eight thousand, and that of Homer, including the _Hymns_
+as well as both _Iliad_ and _Odyssey_, is about nine thousand. In the
+English Bible the different words are reckoned by Mr. G.P. Marsh in his
+lectures on the English language at rather fewer than six thousand.
+Those in the Greek Testament I have learned by actual count to be not
+far from five thousand five hundred.
+
+Some German writers on Greek grammar maintain that they could teach
+Plato and Demosthenes useful lessons concerning Greek moods and tenses,
+even as the ancient Athenians, according to the fable of Phædrus,
+contended that they understood squealing better than a pig. However this
+may be, any one of us to-day, thanks to the Concordance of Mrs. Clarke
+and the Lexicon of Alexander Schmidt, may know much in regard to
+Shakespeare's use of language which Shakespeare himself cannot have
+known. One particular as to which he must have been ignorant, while we
+may have knowledge, is concerning his employment of terms denominated
+_apa? ?e??µe?a_.
+
+The phrase _apa? ?e??µe?a_--literally, _once spoken_--may be traced
+back, I think, to the Alexandrian grammarians, centuries before our era,
+who invented it to describe those words which they observed to occur
+once, and _only once_, in any author or literature. It is so convenient
+an expression for statistical commentators on the Bible, and on the
+classics as well, that they will not willingly let it die.
+
+The list of _apa? ?e??µe?a_--that is, words used once and _only
+once_--in Shakespeare is surprisingly long. It embraces a greater
+multitude than any man can easily number. Nevertheless, I have counted
+those beginning with two letters. The result is that the apa? ?e??µe?a
+with initial _a_ are 364, and those with initial _m_ are 310. There is
+no reason, that I know of, to suppose the census with these initials to
+be proportionally larger than that with other letters. If it is not,
+then the words occurring only once in all Shakespeare cannot be less
+than five thousand, and they are probably a still greater legion.
+
+The number I have culled from one hundred and forty-six pages of Schmidt
+is 674. At this rate the total on the fourteen hundred and nine pages of
+the entire Lexicon would foot up 6504. It is possible, then, that
+Shakespeare discarded, after once trying them, more different words than
+fill and enrich the whole English Bible. The old grammarians tell us
+that a certain part of speech was called _supine_, because it was very
+seldom needed, and therefore almost always lying _on its back_--i.e.
+in Latin, _supinus_. The supines of Shakespeare outnumber the employés
+of most authors.
+
+The array of Shakespearian _apa? ?e??µe?a_ appears still vaster if we
+compare it with expressions of the same nature in the Scriptures and in
+Homer. In the English Bible words with the initials _a_ and _m_ used
+once only are 132 to 674 with the same initials in Shakespeare. The
+scriptural _once-onlys_ would be more than twice as many as we find them
+were they as frequent in proportion to their total vocabulary as his
+are.
+
+The Homeric _apa? ?e??µe?a_ with initial _m_ are 78, but were they as
+numerous in proportion to Homer's whole world of words as Shakespeare's
+are, they would run up to 186; that is, to more than twice as many as
+their actual number.
+
+In the Greek New Testament I have enumerated 63 _apa? ?e??µe?a_
+beginning with the letter _m_--a larger number than you would expect,
+for it is as large as that in both English Testaments beginning with
+that same letter, which is also exactly 63. It indicates a wider range
+of expression in the authors of the Greek original than in their English
+translators.
+
+The 310 Shakespearian words with initial _m_ used _once only_ I have
+also compared with the whole verbal inventory of our language so far as
+it begins with that letter. They make up one-fifth almost of that
+entire stock, which musters in Webster only 1641 words. You will at once
+inquire, "What is the _nature_ of these rejected Shakespearian vocables,
+which he seems to have viewed as milk that would bear no more than one
+skimming?"
+
+The percentage of _classical_ words among them is great--greater indeed
+than in the body of Shakespeare's writings. According to the analysis of
+Weisse, in an average hundred of Shakespearian words one-third are
+classical and two-thirds Saxon. But then all the classical elements have
+inherent meaning, while half of the Saxon have none. We may hence infer
+that of the significant words in Shakespeare one-half are of classical
+derivation. Now, of the apa? ?e??µe?a with initial _a_, I call 262 words
+out of 364 classical, and with initial _m_, 152 out of 310; that is, 414
+out of 674, or about four-sevenths of the whole Shakespearian host
+beginning with those two letters. In doubtful cases I have considered
+those words only as classical the first etymology of which in Webster is
+from a classical or Romance root. In the biblical words used once only
+the classical portion is enormous--namely, not less than sixty-nine per
+cent.--while the classical percentage in Shakespearian words of the same
+class is no more than sixty-one.
+
+Among the 674 _a_ and _m_ Shakespearian words occurring once only the
+proportion of words now _obsolete_ is unexpectedly small. Of 310 such
+words with initial _m_, only one-sixth, or 51 at the utmost, are now
+disused, either in sense or even in form. Of this half-hundred a few are
+used in Shakespeare, but not at present, as verbs; thus, to _maculate_,
+to _miracle_, to _mud_, to _mist_, to _mischief_, to _moral_--also
+_merchandized_ and _musicked_. Another class now wellnigh unknown are
+_misproud, misdread, mappery, mansionry, marybuds, masterdom,
+mistership, mistressship._
+
+Then there are slight variants from our modern orthography or meanings,
+as _mained_ for maimed, _markman_ for marksman, _make_ for mate,
+_makeless_ for mateless, _mirable, mervaillous, mess_ for mass,
+_manakin, minikin, meyny_ for many, _momentarry_ for momentary,
+_moraler, mountainer, misgraffing, misanthropos, mott_ for motto, to
+_mutine, mi'nutely_ for every minute.
+
+None seem wholly dead words except the following eighteen: To _mammock_,
+tear; _mell_, meddle; _mose_, mourn; _micher_, truant; _mome_, fool;
+_mallecho_, mischief; _maund_, basket; _marcantant_, merchant; _mun_,
+sound of wind; _mure_, wall; _meacock_, henpecked; _mop_, grin;
+_militarist_, soldier; _murrion_, affected with murrain; _mammering_,
+hesitating; _mountant_, raised up; _mered_, only; _man-entered_, grown
+up.
+
+About one-tenth of the remaining _apa? ?e??µe?a_ with initial _m_ are
+descriptive compounds. Among them are the following adjectives:
+_Maiden-tongued, maiden-widowed, man-entered_ (before noted as
+obsolete), _many-headed, marble-breasted, marble-constant,
+marble-hearted, marrow-eating, mean-apparelled, merchant-marring,
+mercy-lacking, mirth-moving, moving-delicate, mock-water, more-having,
+mortal-breathing, mortal-living, mortal-staring, motley-minded,
+mouse-eaten, moss-grown, mouth-filling, mouth-made, muddy-mettled,
+momentary-swift, maid-pale_. From this list, which is nearly complete,
+it is evident that such compounds as may be multiplied at will form but
+a small fraction of the words that are used _once only_ by Shakespeare.
+
+The words used _once only_ by Shakespeare are often so beautiful and
+poetical that we wonder how they could fail to be his favorites again
+and again. They are jewels that might hang twenty years before our eyes,
+yet never lose their lustre. Why were they never shown but once? They
+remind me of the exquisite crystal bowl from which I saw a Jewess and
+her bridegroom drink in Prague, and which was then dashed in pieces on
+the floor of the synagogue, or of the Chigi porcelain painted by
+Raphael, which as soon as it had been once removed from the Farnesina
+table was thrown into the Tiber. To what purpose was this waste? Why
+should they be used up with once using? Specimens of this sort, which
+all poets but Shakespeare would have paraded as pets many a time, are
+multifarious. Among a hundred others never used but once, we have
+_magical, mirthful, mightful, mirth-moving, moonbeams, moss-grown,
+mundane, motto, matin, mural, multipotent, mourningly, majestically,
+marbled, martyred, mellifluous, mountainous, meander, magnificence,
+magnanimity, mockable, merriness, masterdom, masterpiece, monarchize,
+menaces, marrowless_.
+
+Again, a majority of Shakespearian _apa? ?e??µe?a_ being familiar to us
+as household words, it seems impossible that he who had tried them once
+should have need of them no more. Instances--all with initial _m_--are
+as follows: _mechanics, machine, maxim, mission, mode, monastic, marsh,
+magnify, malcontent, majority, manly, malleable, malignancy, maritime,
+manna, manslaughter, masterly, market-day-folks, maid-price, mealy,
+meekly, mercifully, merchant-like, memorial, mercenary, mention,
+memorandums, mercurial, metropolis, miserably, mindful, meridian, medal,
+metaphysics, ministration, mimic, misapply, misgovernment, misquote,
+misconstruction, monstrously, monster-like, monstrosity, mutable,
+moneyed, monopoly, mortise, mortised, muniments_, to _moderate_, and
+_mother-wit_ These words, and five thousand more equally excellent,
+which have remained part of the language of the English-speaking world
+for three centuries since Shakespeare, and will no doubt continue to
+belong to it for ever, we are apt to declare he should have worn in
+their newest gloss, not cast aside so soon. Why was he as shy of
+repeating any one of them even once as Hudibras was of showing his
+wit?--
+
+      Who bore it about,
+  As if afraid to wear it out
+  Except on holidays or so,
+  As men their best apparel do.
+
+This question, why a full third of Shakespeare's verbal riches was never
+brought to light more than once, is probably one which nobody can at
+present answer even to his own satisfaction. Yet the phenomenon is so
+remarkable that every one will try after his own fashion to account for
+it. My own attempt at a provisional explanation I will present in the
+latter part of this paper.
+
+Let us first, however, notice another question concerning the _apa?
+?e??µe?a_--namely, that which respects their _origin_. Where did they
+come from? how far did Shakespeare make them? and how far were they
+ready to his hand? No approach to answering this inquiry can be made for
+some years. Yet as to this matter let us rejoice that the unique
+dictionary of the British Philological Society is now near publication.
+This work, slowly elaborated by thousands of co-workers in many devious
+walks of study on both sides of the Atlantic, aims to exhibit the first
+appearance in a book of every English word. In regard to the great bulk
+of Shakespeare's diction it will enable us ten years hence to determine
+how much of it was known to literature before him, and how much of it he
+himself gathered or gleaned in highways and byways, or caused to ramify
+and effloresce from Saxon or classical roots and trunks, thus "endowing
+his purposes with words to make them known." Meantime, we are left to
+conjectures. As of his own coinage I should set down such vocables as
+_motley-minded, mirth-moving, mockable, marbled, martyred, merriness,
+marrowless, mightful, multipotent, masterdom, monarchize_, etc. etc.
+
+But, however much of his linguistic treasury Shakespeare shall be proved
+to have inherited ready-made--whatever scraps he may have stolen at the
+feast of languages--it is clear that he was an imperial creator of
+language, and lived while his mother-tongue was still plastic. Having a
+mint of phrases in his own brain, well might he speak with the contempt
+he does of those "fools who for a tricksy word defy the matter;" that
+is, slight or disregard it. He never needed to do that. Words were
+"correspondent to his command, and, Ariel-like, did his spiriting
+gently."
+
+In a thousand cases, however, Shakespeare cannot have rejected words
+through fear lest he should repeat them. It has taken three centuries
+for the world to ferret out his _apa? ?e??µe?a_: can we believe that he
+knew them all himself? Unless he were the Providence which numbers all
+hairs of the head, he had not got the start of the majestic world so far
+as that, however myriad-minded we may consider him. An instinct which
+would have rendered him aware of each and every individual of five
+thousand that he had employed once only would be as inconceivable as
+that of Falstaff, which made him discern the heir-apparent in Prince Hal
+when disguised as a highwayman. In short, Shakespeare could not be
+conscious of all the words he had once used, more than Brigham Young
+could recognize all the wives he had once wedded.
+
+In the absence of other theories concerning the reasons for
+Shakespeare's _apa? ?e??µe?a_ being so abundant, I throw out a
+suggestion of my own till a better one shall supplant it.
+
+Shakespeare's forte lay in characterization, and that endlessly
+diversified. But when he sketched each several character it seems that
+he was never content till he had either found or fabricated the aptest
+words possible for representing its form and pressure most true to life.
+No two characters being identical in any particular more than two faces
+are, no two descriptions, as drawn by his genius, could repeat many of
+the selfsame characterizing words. Each of his vocables thus became like
+each of the seven thousand constituents of a locomotive, which fits the
+one niche it was ordained to fill, but everywhere else is out of place,
+and even _dislocated_. The more numerous his ethical differentiations,
+the more his language was differentiated.
+
+His personages were as multifarious as have been portrayed by the whole
+band of Italian painters; but, as a wizard in words, he resembled the
+magician in mosaic, who can delineate in stone every feature of those
+portraits because he can discriminate and imitate shades of color more
+numberless than even Shakespeare's words.
+
+It is hard to believe that the Shakespearian characters were born, like
+Athene from the brain of Zeus, in panoplied perfection. They grew. The
+play of _Troilus_ was a dozen years in growth. According to the best
+commentators, "Shakespeare, after having sketched out a play on the
+fashion of his youthful taste and skill, returned in after years to
+enlarge it, remodel it, and enrich it with the matured fruits of years
+of observation and reflection. _Love's Labor Lost_ first appeared in
+print with the annunciation that it was 'newly corrected and augmented,'
+and _Cymbeline_ was an entire _rifacimento_ of an early dramatic
+attempt, showing not only matured fulness of thought, but laboring
+intensity of compressed expression." So speaks Verplanck, and his
+utterance is endorsed by Richard Grant White.
+
+Such being the facts, it is clear that Shakespeare treated his dramas as
+Guido did the _Cleopatra_, which he would not let leave his studio till
+ten years after the non-artistic world deemed that portrait fully
+finished. Meantime, the painter in moments of inspiration was pencilling
+his canvas with curious touches, each approximating nearer his ideal. So
+the poet sought to find out acceptable words, or what he terms "an army
+of good words." He poured his new wine into new bottles, and never was
+at rest till he had arrayed his ideas in that fitness of phrase which
+comes only by fits.
+
+Had he survived fifty years longer, I suppose he would to the last have
+been perfecting his phrases, as we read in Dionysius of Halicarnassus
+that Plato up to the age of eighty-one was "combing and curling, and
+weaving and unweaving, his writings after a variety of fashions."
+Possibly, the great dramatist would at last have corrected one of his
+couplets as a modern commentator has done for him, so that it would
+stand,
+
+  Find _leaves_ on trees, _stones_ in the running brooks,
+  Sermons in _books_, and _all_ in everything.
+
+To speak seriously with a writer in the _Encyclopædia Britannica:_ "His
+manner in diction was progressive, and this progress has been deemed so
+clearly traceable in his plays that it can enable us to determine their
+chronological sequence." The result is, that while other authors satiate
+and soon tire us, Shakespeare's speech for ever "breathes an
+indescribable freshness."
+
+                Age cannot wither
+  Nor custom stale his infinite variety.
+
+In the last line I have quoted there is a apa? ?e??µe?a but it is a word
+which I think you would hardly guess. It is the last word--_variety_.
+
+On every average page of Shakespeare you are greeted and gladdened by at
+least five words that you never saw before in his writings, and that you
+never will see again, speaking once and then for ever holding their
+peace--each not only rare, but a nonsuch--five gems just shown, then
+snatched away. Each page is studded with five stars, each as unique as
+the century-flower, and, like the night-blooming cereus, "the perfume
+and suppliance of a minute"--_ipsa varietate variora_. The mind of
+Shakespeare was bodied forth as Montezuma was apparelled, whose costume,
+however gorgeous, was never twice the same. Hence the Shakespearian
+style is fresh as morning dew and changeful as evening clouds, so that
+we remain for ever doubtful in relation to his manner and his matter,
+which of them owes the greater debt to the other. The Shakespearian
+plots are analogous to the grouping of Raphael, the characters to the
+drawing of Michael Angelo, but the word-painting superadds the coloring
+of Titian. Accordingly, in studying Shakespeare's diction I should long
+ago have said, if I could, what I read in Arthur Helps, where he treats
+of a perfect style--that "there is a sense of felicity about it,
+declaring it to be the product of a happy moment, so that you feel it
+will not happen again to that man who writes the sentence, nor to any
+other of the sons of men, to say the like thing so choicely, tersely,
+mellifluously and completely."
+
+In the central court of the Neapolitan Museum I saw grape-clusters,
+mouldings, volutes, fingers and antique fragments of all sorts wrought
+in rarest marble, lying scattered on the pavement, exposed to sun and
+rain, cast down the wrong side up, and as it were thrown away, as when
+the stones of the Jewish sanctuary were poured out in every street.
+Nothing reveals the sculptural opulence of Italy like this apparent
+wastefulness. It seems to proclaim that Italy can afford to make
+nothing of what would elsewhere be judged worthy of shrines. We say to
+ourselves, "If such be the things she throws away, what must be her
+jewels?" A similar feeling rises in me while exploring Shakespeare's
+prodigality in apa? ?e??µe?a. His exchequer appears more exhaustless
+than the Bank of England.
+
+James D. Butler.
+
+
+
+
+AN EPISODE OF SPANISH CHIVALRY.
+
+
+Don Quijote's readers are aware of the enormous popularity of the
+romances of chivalry, but they are apt to imagine that these represent a
+purely ideal state of things. This is undoubtedly the case as far as
+knight-errantry is concerned, but certain distinctive habits and customs
+of chivalry prevailed in Spain and elsewhere long after the feudal
+system and the earlier and original form of chivalry had passed away.
+One of the most curious instances of this survival of chivalry occurred
+in Spain in the first half of the fifteenth century, and after
+commanding the admiration of Europe furnished Don Quijote with an
+admirable argument for the existence of Amadis of Gaul and his long line
+of successors. The worthy knight had been temporarily released from his
+confinement in the Enchanted Cage, and had begun his celebrated reply to
+the canon's statement that there had never been such persons as Amadis
+and the other knights-errant, nor the absurd adventures with which the
+romances of chivalry abound. Don Quijote's answer is a marvellous
+mixture of sense and nonsense: the creations of the romancer's brain are
+placed side by side with the Cid, Juan de Merlo and Gutierre Ouijada,
+whose names were household words in Spain: "Let them deny also that Don
+Fernando de Guerara went to seek adventures in Germany, where he did
+combat with Messer George, knight of the household of the duke of
+Austria. Let them say that the jousts of Sucro de Quiñones, him of the
+Pass, were a jest."
+
+It is to these jousts, as one of the most characteristic episodes of the
+reign of John II. and of the times, that we wish to call attention.[4]
+
+On the evening of Friday, the 1st of January, 1434, while the king and
+his court were at Medina del Campo and engaged in the rejoicings
+customary on the first day of the New Year, Suero de Quiñones and nine
+knights clad in white entered the saloon, and, coming before the throne,
+kissed the hands and feet of the king, and presented him through their
+herald with a petition of which the following is the substance:
+
+"It is just and reasonable for those who are in confinement or deprived
+of their freedom to desire liberty; and since I, your vassal and
+subject, have long been in durance to a certain lady--in witness whereof
+I bear this chain about my neck every Thursday--now, therefore, mighty
+sovereign, I have agreed upon my ransom, which is three hundred lances
+broken by myself and these knights, as shall more clearly hereafter
+appear--three with every knight or gentleman (counting as broken the
+lance which draws blood) who shall come to a certain place this year; to
+wit, fifteen days before and fifteen days after the festival of the
+apostle St. James, unless my ransom shall be completed before the day
+last mentioned. The place shall be on the highway to Santiago, and I
+hereby testify to all strange knights and gentlemen that they will
+there be provided with armor, horses and weapons. And be it known to
+every honorable lady who may pass the aforesaid way that if she do not
+provide a knight or gentleman to do combat for her, she shall lose her
+right-hand glove. All the above saving two things--that neither Your
+Majesty nor the constable Don Alvaro de Luna is to enter the lists."
+
+After the reading of this petition the king took counsel with his court
+and granted it, for which Quiñones humbly thanked him, and then he and
+his companions retired to disarm themselves, returning shortly after in
+dresses more befitting a festal occasion.
+
+After the dancing the regulations for the jousts, consisting of
+twenty-two chapters, were publicly read. In addition to the declarations
+in the petition, it is provided that in case two or more knights should
+come to ransom the glove of any lady, the first knight only will be
+received, and no one can ransom more than one glove. In the seventh
+chapter Quiñones offers a diamond to the first knight who appears to do
+combat for one of three ladies to be named by him, among whom shall not
+be the one whose captive he is. No knight coming to the Pass of Honor
+shall select the defender with whom to joust, nor shall he know the name
+of his adversary until the combat is finished; but any one after
+breaking three lances may challenge by name any one of the defenders,
+who, if time permits, will break another lance with him. If any knight
+desires to joust without some portion of his armor named by Quiñones,
+his request shall be granted if reason and time permit. No knight will
+be admitted to the lists until he declare his name and country. If any
+one is injured, "as is wont to happen in jousts," he shall be treated as
+though he were Quiñones himself, and no one in the future shall ever be
+held responsible for any advantage or victory he may have gained over
+any of the defenders of the Pass. No one going as a pilgrim to Santiago
+by the direct road shall be hindered by Quiñones unless he approach the
+aforesaid bridge of Orbigo (which was somewhat distant from the
+highway). In case, however, any knight, having left the main road,
+shall come to the Pass, he shall not be permitted to depart until he has
+entered the lists or left in pledge a piece of his armor or right spur,
+with the promise never to wear that piece or spur until he shall have
+been in some deed of arms as dangerous as the Pass of Honor. Quiñones
+further pledges himself to pay all expenses incurred by those who shall
+come to the Pass.
+
+Any knight who, after having broken one or two lances, shall refuse to
+continue, shall lose his armor or right spur as though he had declined
+to enter the lists. No defender shall be obliged to joust a second time
+with any one who had been disabled for a day in any previous encounter.
+
+The twenty-first chapter provides for the appointment of two knights,
+"_caballeros anliguos è probados en annas è dignas de fè_," and two
+heralds, all of whom shall swear solemnly to do justice to all who come
+to the Pass, and who shall decide all questions which may arise.
+
+The last chapter provides "that if the lady whose I [Quiñones] am shall
+pass that way, she shall not lose her glove, and no one but myself shall
+do combat for her, for no one in the world could do it so truly as I."
+
+When the preceding provisions had been read, Quiñones gave to the
+king-at-arms a letter signed and sealed, which invited to the Pass all
+knights so disposed, granting safe conduct to those of other kingdoms,
+and declaring the cause of said trial of arms. Copies of the above
+letter were also given to other heralds, who were provided with
+everything necessary for long journeys, and in the six months that
+intervened before the day fixed for the jousts the matter had been
+proclaimed throughout all Christendom. Meanwhile, Quiñones provided
+horses and arms and everything necessary for "such an important
+enterprise."
+
+In the kingdom of Leon, about ten miles east of Astorga and on the
+highway from that city to the capital, is the bridge of Orbigo. Suero de
+Quiñones did not select Orbigo with reference to convenience of access
+from the Castiles, but because it must be passed by pilgrims to
+Santiago; and that year (1434) was especially sacred to the saint, whose
+festival, on the 25th of July, has always been celebrated with great
+pomp. The Spaniards having been forbidden to go to Jerusalem as
+crusaders, and being too much occupied at home with the Moors to make
+such a long pilgrimage, wisely substituted Santiago, where the remains
+of St. James, the patron of Spain, is supposed to rest. His body is said
+to have floated in a stone coffin from Joppa to Padron (thirteen miles
+below Santiago) in seven days, and for nearly eight centuries lay
+forgotten in a cave, but was at length miraculously brought to light by
+mysterious flames hovering over its resting-place, and in 829 was
+removed to Santiago. In 846 the saint made his appearance at the
+celebrated battle of Clavijo, where he slew sixty thousand Moors, and
+was rewarded by a grant of a bushel of grain from every acre in Spain.
+His shrine was a favorite resort for pilgrims from all Christendom until
+after the Reformation, and the saint retained his bushel of grain (the
+annual value of which had reached the large sum of one million dollars)
+until 1835.
+
+It was near the highway, in a pleasant grove, that Quiñones erected the
+lists, a hundred and forty-six paces long and surrounded by a palisade
+of the height of a lance, with various stands for the judges and
+spectators. At the opposite ends of the lists were entrances--one for
+the defenders of the Pass--and there were hung the arms and banners of
+Quiñones, as well as at the other entrance, which was reserved for the
+knights who should come to make trial of their arms. In order that no
+one might mistake the way, a marble king-at-arms was erected near the
+bridge, with the right arm extended and the inscription, "To the Pass."
+
+The final arrangements were not concluded until the 10th of July, the
+first day of the jousts. Twenty-two tents had been erected for the
+accommodation of those engaged in the enterprise as well as for mere
+spectators, and Quiñones had provided all necessary servants and
+artisans, among whom are mentioned kings-at-arms, heralds, trumpeters
+and other musicians, notaries, armorers, blacksmiths, surgeons,
+physicians, carpenters, lance-makers, tailors, embroiderers, etc. In the
+midst of the tents was erected a wooden dining--hall, hung with rich
+French cloth and provided with two tables--one for Quiñones and the
+knights who came to the Pass, and the other for those who honored the
+jousts with their presence. A curious fact not to be omitted is that the
+king sent one of his private secretaries to prepare daily accounts of
+what happened at the Pass, which were transmitted by relays to Segovia
+(where he was engaged in hunting), so that he should receive them within
+twenty-four hours.
+
+On Saturday, the 10th of July, 1434, all the arrangements having been
+completed, the heralds proceeded to the entrance of the lists and
+announced to Quiñones that three knights were at the bridge of Orbigo
+who had come to make trial of their arms--one a German, Messer Arnoldo
+de la Floresta Bermeja of the marquisate of Brandenburg, "about
+twenty-seven years old, blond and well-dressed;" the others two brothers
+from Valencia, by name Juan and Per Fabla. Quiñones was greatly
+delighted at their coming, and sent the heralds to invite them to take
+up their quarters with him, which they did, and were received with honor
+at the entrance of the lists in the presence of the judges. It being
+Saturday, the jousting was deferred until the following Monday, and the
+spurs of the three knights were hung up in the judges' stand as a sort
+of pledge, to be restored to their owners when they were ready to enter
+the lists.
+
+The next morning the trumpets sounded, and Quiñones and his nine
+companions heard mass in the church of St. John at Orbigo, and took
+possession of the lists in the following fashion: First came the
+musicians with drums and Moorish fifes, preceded by the judge, Pero
+Barba. Then followed two large and beautiful horses drawing a cart
+filled with lances of various sizes pointed with Milan steel. The cart
+was covered with blue and green trappings embroidered with bay trees and
+flowers, and on every tree was the figure of a parrot. The driver of
+this singular conveyance was a dwarf. Next came Quiñones on a powerful
+horse with blue trappings, on which were worked his device and a chain,
+with the motto _Il faut deliberer_[5] He was dressed in a quilted jacket
+of olive velvet brocade embroidered in green, with a cloak of blue
+velvet, breeches of scarlet cloth and a tall cap of the same color. He
+wore wheel-spurs of the Italian fashion richly gilt, and carried a drawn
+sword, also gilt. On his right arm, near the shoulder, was richly
+embroidered his device in gold two fingers broad, and around it in blue
+letters,
+
+  Si a vous ne plait de avoyr me sure,
+          Certes ie clis,
+          Que ie suis,
+        Sans venture.[6]
+
+With Quiñones were his nine companions in scarlet velvet and blue cloaks
+bearing Quiñones' device and chain, and the trappings of their horses
+blue, with the same device and motto. Near Quiñones were many knights on
+foot, some of whom led his horse to do him honor. Three pages
+magnificently attired and mounted closed the procession, which entered
+the lists, and after passing around it twice halted before the judges'
+stand, and Quiñones exhorted the judges to decide impartially all that
+should happen, giving equal justice to all, and especially to defend the
+strangers in case they should be attacked on account of having wounded
+any of the defenders of the Pass.
+
+The next day, Monday, at dawn the drums beat the reveille, and the
+judges, with the heralds, notaries and kings-at-arms, took their places
+in their stands. The nine defenders meanwhile heard mass in a large tent
+which served as a private chapel for Quiñones, and where mass was said
+thrice daily at his expense by some Dominicans. After the defenders were
+armed they sent for the judges to inspect their weapons and armor. The
+German knight, Arnoldo, had a disabled hand, but he declared he would
+rather die than refrain from jousting. His arms and horse were approved,
+although the latter was superior to that of Quiñones. The judges had
+provided a body of armed soldiers whose duty it was to see that all had
+fair play in the field, and had a pile of lances of various sizes placed
+where each knight could select one to suit him.
+
+Quiñones and the German now entered the lists, accompanied by their
+friends and with "much music." The judges commanded that no one should
+dare to speak aloud or give advice or make any sign to any one in the
+lists, no matter what happened, under penalty of having the tongue cut
+out for speaking and a hand cut off for making signs; and they also
+forbade any knight to enter the lists with more than two servants, one
+mounted and the other on foot. The spur taken from the German the
+previous Saturday was now restored to him, and the trumpets sounded a
+charge, while the heralds and kings-at-arms cried _Legeres allér!
+legeres allér! é fair son deber_.
+
+The two knights charged instantly, lance in rest, and Quiñones
+encountered his antagonist in the guard of his lance, and his weapon
+glanced off and touched him in the armor of his right hand and tore it
+off, and his lance broke in the middle. The German encountered him in
+the armor of the left arm, tore it off and carried a piece of the border
+without breaking his lance. In the second course Quiñones encountered
+the German in the top of his plastron, without piercing it, and the
+lance came out under his arm-pit, whereupon all thought he was wounded,
+for on receiving the shock he exclaimed _Olas!_ and his right vantbrace
+was torn off, but the lance was not broken. The German encountered
+Quiñones in the front of his helmet, breaking his lance two palms from
+the iron. In the third course Quiñones encountered the German in the
+guard of his left gauntlet, and passed through it, and the head of the
+lance stuck in the rim without breaking, and the German failed to
+encounter. In the fourth course Quiñones encountered the German in the
+armor of his left arm without breaking his lance, and the German failed
+to encounter. In the next course both failed to encounter, but in the
+sixth Quiñones encountered the German in the joint of his left
+vantbrace, and the iron passed half through without breaking, while the
+shaft broke in the middle, and the German failed to encounter. After
+this last course they went to the judges' stand, where their jousting
+was pronounced finished, since they had broken three lances between
+them. Quiñones invited the German to supper, and both were accompanied
+to their quarters by music, and Quiñones disarmed himself in public.
+
+The two Valencian knights did not delay to challenge Quiñones, since he
+had remained uninjured; and, as they had the right to demand horses and
+arms, they chose those which Quiñones had used in the last joust. The
+chronicler adds: "It seems to me that they did not ask it so much for
+their honor as for the safety of their skins." The judges decided that
+Quiñones was not bound to give his own armor, as there were other suits
+as good: nevertheless, he complied, and sent in addition four horses to
+choose from. He was also anxious to joust with them, but Lope de
+Estuñiga refused to yield his place, and cited the chapter of the
+regulations which provided that no one should single out his adversary.
+Quiñones offered him a very fine horse and a gold chain worth three
+hundred doubloons, but Estuñiga answered that he would not yield his
+turn although he were offered a city.
+
+At vespers Estuñiga and Juan Fabla were armed and the judges examined
+their arms, and although Fabla had the better horse, they let it pass.
+At the sound of the trumpet Estuñiga entered the lists magnificently
+attired, and attended by two pages in armor bearing a drawn sword and a
+lance. Juan Fabla followed immediately, and at the given signal they
+attacked each other lance in rest. Fabla encountered Estuñiga in the
+left arm, tearing off his armor, but neither of them broke his lance. In
+the four following courses they failed to encounter. In the sixth Fabla
+encountered his adversary in the breastplate, breaking his lance in the
+middle, and the head remained sticking in the armor. They encountered in
+the seventh course, and Estuñiga's servant, who was in the lists, cried
+out, "At him! at him!" The judges commanded his tongue to be cut out,
+but at the intercession of those present the sentence was commuted to
+thirty blows and imprisonment. They failed to encounter in the eighth
+course, but in the ninth Estuñiga broke his lance on Fabla's left arm:
+the latter failed to encounter, and received a great reverse. After this
+they ran nine courses without encountering, but in the nineteenth
+Estuñiga met Fabla in the plastron, and his lance slipped off on to his
+helmet, but did not break, although it pierced the plastron and the iron
+remained sticking in it. By this time it had grown so dark that the
+judges could not distinguish the good from the bad encounters, and for
+this reason they decided that the combat was finished the same as though
+three lances had been broken. Estuñiga invited Fabla to sup with
+Quiñones, "and at table there were many knights, and after supper they
+danced."
+
+That same day there arrived at the Pass nine knights from Aragon, who
+swore that they were gentlemen without reproach. Their spurs were taken
+from them, according to the established custom, and hung up in the
+judges' stand until they should enter the lists.
+
+The succeeding combats were but repetitions, with trifling variations,
+of those just described. From dawn, when the trumpet sounded for battle,
+until the evening grew so dark that the judges could not distinguish the
+combatants, the defenders maintained the Pass against all comers with
+bravery and honor.
+
+The third day there passed near Orbigo two ladies, and the judges sent
+the king-at-arms and the herald to ascertain whether they were of noble
+birth and provided with knights to represent them in the lists and win
+them a passage through Orbigo, and also to request them to give up their
+right-hand gloves. The ladies answered that they were noble and were on
+a pilgrimage to Santiago; their names were Leonora and Guiomar de la
+Vega; the former was married and accompanied by her husband; the latter
+was a widow. The king-at-arms then requested their gloves to be kept as
+a pledge until some knight should ransom them. Frances Davio, an
+Aragonese knight, immediately offered to do combat for the ladies. The
+husband of Doña Leonora said that he had not heard of this adventure,
+and was unprepared to attempt it then, but if the ladies were allowed to
+retain their gloves, as soon as he had accomplished his pilgrimage he
+would return and enter the lists for them. The gloves, however, were
+retained and hung in the judges' stand. The matter caused some
+discussion, and finally the judges decided that the gloves should not be
+kept, for fear it should seem that the defenders of the Pass were
+interfering with pilgrims, and also on account of Juan de la Vega's
+chivalrous response. So the gloves were sent on to Astorga to be
+delivered to their owners, and Juan de la Vega was absolved from all
+obligation to ransom them, "and there was strife among many knights as
+to who should do battle for the sisters."
+
+On the 16th of July, Frances Davio jousted with Lope de Estuñiga, and
+when the trial of arms was ended with great honor to both, Davio swore
+aloud, so that many knights heard him, "that never in the future would
+he have a love-affair with a nun, for up to that time he had loved one,
+and it was for her sake that he had come to the Pass; and any one who
+had known it could have challenged him as an evil-doer, and he could not
+have defended himself." Whereat Delena, the notary and compiler of the
+original record of the Pass, exclaims, "To which I say that if he had
+had any Christian nobleness, or even the natural shame which leads every
+one to conceal his faults, he would not have made public such a
+sacrilegious scandal, so dishonorable to the religious order and so
+injurious to Christ."
+
+The same day the king-at-arms and herald announced to Quiñones that a
+gentleman named Vasco de Barrionuevo, servant of Ruy Diaz de Mendoza,
+mayor-domo of the king, had come to make trial of his arms, but as he
+was not a knight he prayed Quiñones to confer that honor on him.
+Quiñones consented, and commanded him to wait at the entrance of the
+lists, whither he and the nine defenders went on foot accompanied by a
+great crowd. Quiñones asked Vasco if he desired to become a knight, and
+on his answering in the affirmative he drew his gilt sword and said,
+"Sir, do you promise to keep and guard all the things appertaining to
+the noble order of chivalry, and to die rather than fail in any one of
+them?" He swore that he would do so, and Quiñones, striking him on the
+helmet with his naked sword, said, "God make thee a good knight and aid
+thee to live and act as every good knight should do!" After this
+ceremony the new knight entered the lists with Pedro de los Rios, and
+they ran seven courses and broke three lances.
+
+On the festival of St. James (July 25th) Quiñones entered the lists
+without three of the principal pieces of his armor--namely, the visor of
+his helmet, the left vantbrace and breastplate--and said, "Knights and
+judges of this Passo Honroso, inasmuch as I announced through Monreal,
+the king's herald, that on St. James's Day there would be in this place
+three knights, each without a piece of his armor, and each ready to run
+two courses with every knight who should present himself that day, know,
+therefore, that I, Suero de Quiñones, alone am those three knights, and
+am prepared to accomplish what I proclaimed." The judges after a short
+deliberation answered that they had no authority to permit him to risk
+his life in manifest opposition to the regulations which he had sworn to
+obey, and declared him under arrest, and forbade all jousting that day,
+as it was Sunday and the festival of St. James. Quiñones felt greatly
+grieved at their decision, and told them that "in the service of his
+lady he had gone into battle against the Moors in the kingdom of Granada
+with his right arm bared, and God had preserved him, and would do so
+now." The judges, however, were inflexible and refused to hear him.
+
+The last day of July, late in the afternoon, there arrived at the Pass
+a gentleman named Pedro de Torrecilla, a retainer or squire of Alfonso
+de Deza, but no one was willing to joust with him, on the ground that he
+was not an hidalgo. The generous Lope de Estuñiga, hearing this, offered
+to dub him a knight, but Torrecilla thanked him and said he could not
+afford to sustain in becoming manner the honor of chivalry, but he would
+make good the fact that he was an hidalgo. Lope de Estuñiga was so much
+pleased by this discreet answer that he believed him truly of gentle
+blood, and to do him honor entered the lists with him. It was, however,
+so late that they had only time to run three courses, and then the
+judges pronounced their joust finished. Torrecilla esteemed so highly
+the fact that so renowned a knight as Lope de Estuñiga should have
+condescended to enter the lists with him that he swore it was the
+greatest honor he had ever received in his life, and he offered him his
+services. Estuñiga thanked him, and affirmed that he felt as much
+honored by having jousted with him as though he had been an emperor.[7]
+
+A few days after the above events an incident occurred which shows how
+contagious the example of Quiñones and his followers was, and to what
+amusing imitations it led. A Lombard trumpeter made his appearance at
+the Pass, and said that he had been to Santiago on a pilgrimage, and
+while there had heard that there was at the Passo Honroso a trumpeter of
+the king of Castile named Dalmao, very celebrated in his line, and he
+had gone thirty leagues out of his way in order to have a trial of skill
+with him; and he offered to stake a good trumpet against one of
+Dalmao's. The latter took the Lombard's trumpet and blew so loud and
+skilfully that the Italian, in spite of all his efforts, was obliged to
+confess himself conquered, and gave up his trumpet. |
+
+So far, the encounters, if not entirely bloodless, had not been
+attended by any fatal accident. The defenders had all been wounded, more
+or less severely: once Quiñones concealed the fact until the end of the
+joust in which his antagonist had been badly hurt, and it was only when
+the knights were disarmed that it was discovered that Quiñones was
+bleeding profusely. On another occasion his helmet was pierced by his
+adversary's lance, the fragment of which he strove in vain to withdraw.
+All believed him mortally wounded, but he cried, "It is nothing! it is
+nothing! Quiñones! Quiñones!" and continued as though nothing had
+occurred. After three encounters the judges descended from their stands
+and made him remove his helmet to see whether he was wounded. When it
+was found that he was not, "every one thought that God had miraculously
+delivered him." Quiñones was also wounded in his encounter with Juan de
+Merlo, and again concealed the fact until the end of the combat, when he
+asked the judges to excuse him from jousting further that day, as his
+right hand, which he had previously sprained, was again dislocated, and
+caused him terrible suffering; and well it might, for the flesh was
+lacerated and the whole arm seemed paralyzed.
+
+The wounds received the 28th of July were, unfortunately, sufficiently
+healed by the 6th of August to enable him to enter the lists with the
+unhappy Esberte de Claramonte, an Aragonese. "Would to God," exclaims
+the chronicler, "he had never come here!" In the ninth encounter
+Quiñones' lance entered his antagonist's left eye and penetrated the
+brain. The luckless knight broke his lance in the ground, was lifted
+from his saddle by the force of the blow, and fell dead without uttering
+a word; "and his face seemed like the face of one who had been dead two
+hours." The Aragonese and Catalans present bewailed his death loudly,
+and Quiñones was grieved in his soul at such a great misfortune. Every
+possible honor was shown the dead knight, and the welfare of his soul
+was not forgotten. Master Anton, Quiñones' confessor, and the other
+priests were sent for to administer the sacraments, and Quiñones begged
+them to chant the _Responsorium_[8] over the body, as was customary in
+the Church, and do in all respects as though he himself were the dead
+man. The priest replied that the Church did not consider as sons those
+who died in such exercises, for they could not be performed without
+mortal sin, neither did she intercede for their souls; in proof whereof
+he referred to the canonical law, cap. _de Torneamentis_.[9] However, at
+the earnest request of Quiñones, Messer Anton went with a letter to the
+bishop of Astorga to ask leave to bury Claramonte in holy ground,
+Quiñones promising if it were granted to take the dead knight to Leon
+and bury him in his own family chapel. Meanwhile, they bore the body to
+the hermitage of Santa Catalina, near the bridge of Orbigo, and there it
+remained until night, when Messer Anton returned without the desired
+license; so they buried Claramonte in unconsecrated ground near the
+hermitage, with all possible honor and amid the tears of the assembled
+knights. This mournful event does not seem, however, to have made a very
+deep impression, for that same afternoon the jousting was continued.
+
+The remaining days were marked by no unusual occurrence: several were
+seriously but not fatally wounded, and one by one the defenders of the
+Pass were disabled; so that when the 9th of August, the last day of the
+jousts, arrived, Sancho de Ravenal was the only one of the ten defenders
+who was able to enter the lists. He maintained the Pass that day against
+two knights, and then the jousts were declared ended. When the decision
+was known there was great rejoicing and blowing of trumpets, and the
+lists were illuminated with torches. The judges returned the spurs which
+still hung in the stand to the owners who through lack of time had not
+been able to joust. Quiñones and eight of his companions (Lope de Aller
+was confined to his bed by his wounds) entered the lists in the same
+manner and order as on the first day, and halting before the judges
+Quiñones addressed them as follows: "It is known to Your Honors how I
+presented myself here thirty days ago with these companions, and the
+cause of my so doing was to terminate the captivity in which until this
+moment I was to a very virtuous lady, in token of which I have worn this
+iron collar continually every Thursday. The condition of my ransom was,
+as you know, three hundred lances broken or guarding this Pass thirty
+days, awaiting knights and gentlemen who should free me from said
+captivity; and whereas I believe, honorable sirs, that I have fulfilled
+everything according to the terms set down at the beginning, I therefore
+beg you will command me to remove this iron collar in testimony of my
+liberty."
+
+The judges answered briefly as follows: "Virtuous gentleman and knight,
+after hearing your declaration, which seems just and true, we hereby
+declare your enterprise completed and your ransom paid; and be it known
+to all present that of the three hundred lances mentioned in the
+agreement but few remain yet to be broken, and these would not have
+remained unbroken had it not been for lack of adversaries. We therefore
+command the king-at-arms and the herald to remove the collar from your
+neck and declare you from this time henceforth free from your enterprise
+and ransom." | The king-at-arms and the herald then descended from the
+stand, and in the presence of the notaries with due solemnity took the
+collar from Quiñones' neck in fulfilment of the judges' command.
+
+During the thirty days' jousting sixty-eight knights had entered the
+lists: of these, one, Messer Arnoldo de la Floresta Bermeja (Arnold von
+Rothwald?), was a German; one an Italian, Messer Luis de Aversa; one
+Breton,[10] three Valencians, one Portuguese, thirteen Aragonese, four
+Catalans, and the remaining forty-four were from the Castiles and other
+parts of Spain. The number of courses run was seven hundred and
+twenty-seven, and one hundred and sixty-six lances were broken. Quiñones
+was afterward killed by Gutierre Quijada, one of the knights who took
+part in the Passo Honroso, and with whom he seems to have had some kind
+of a feud. Quiñones' sword may still be seen at Madrid in the Royal
+Armory, No. 1917.
+
+T.F. CRANE.
+
+
+
+
+AUTOMATISM.
+
+CONCLUDING PAPER.
+
+
+A few months ago, walking along Fifteenth street, I came up behind a
+friend and said, "Good-morning." No answer. "Good-morning, sir," a
+little louder.--"Oh, excuse me: I did not hear you the first time."--"
+How then did you know that I had spoken twice?" My friend was
+nonplussed, but what had happened was this: on my first speaking the
+impulse of the voice had fallen upon his ear and started a nerve-wave
+which had struggled up as far as the lower apparatus at the base of the
+brain, and, passing through this, had probably even reached the higher
+nerve-centres in the surface of the cerebrum, near to which
+consciousness resides, but not in sufficient force to arouse
+consciousness. When, however, the attention was excited by my second
+address, it perceived the first faint impulse which had been registered
+upon the protoplasm of the nerve-centres, although unfelt. Probably most
+of my readers have had a similar experience. A word spoken, but not
+consciously heard, has a moment afterward been detected by an effort as
+distinctly conscious as that made by the man who is attempting to
+decipher some old faint manuscript. This incident and its explanation
+will serve to illustrate the relation which seems to exist between
+consciousness and sensation, and also between consciousness and the
+general mental actions.
+
+It will perhaps render our thinking more accurate if we attempt to get a
+clear idea just here as to what consciousness is and what it is not.
+Various definitions of the term have been given, but the simplest and
+truest seems to be that it is a knowledge of the present existence of
+self, and perhaps also of surrounding objects, although it is
+conceivable that a conscious person might be shut off from all contact
+with the external world by abolition of the senses. Consciousness is
+certainly not what the philosopher and the theologian call the Ego, or
+the personality of the individual. A blow on the head puts an end for
+the time being to consciousness, but not to the man's personality.
+Neither is consciousness the same as the sense of personal identity,
+although it is closely connected with it. The conviction of a man that
+he is the same person through the manifold changes which occur in him as
+the successive years go on is evidently based on consciousness and
+memory. This is well illustrated by some very curious cases in which the
+sense or knowledge of personal identity has been completely lost. Not
+long ago an instance of such complete loss was recorded by Doctor
+Hewater (_Hospital Gazette_, November, 1879). The gentleman who was the
+subject of this loss found himself standing upon the dépôt-platform in
+Belaire City, Ohio, utterly ignorant of who he was or where he came from
+or where he was going to. He had a little money in his pocket, and in
+his hand a small port-manteau which contained a pair of scissors and a
+change of linen. He was well dressed, and on stating at the nearest
+hotel his strange condition and asking for a bed, was received as a
+guest. In the evening he went out and attended a temperance lecture.
+Excited by the eloquence of the speaker, he was seized with an
+uncontrollable impulse, rushed from the room and began to smash with a
+club the windows of a neighboring tavern. The roughs ran out of the
+saloon and beat him very badly, breaking his arm: this brought him to
+the police-station, and thence to the hospital. For months every effort
+was made to identify him, but at the date of reporting without avail. He
+was known in the hospital as "Ralph," that name having been found on his
+underclothing. His knowledge upon all subjects unconnected with his
+identity is correct: his mental powers are good, and he has shown
+himself expert at figures and with a pen. For a long time it was thought
+that he was feigning, but every one about him was finally convinced that
+he is what he says he is--namely, a man without knowledge of his
+personal identity. This curious case, which is by no means unparalleled
+in the annals of psychological medicine, shows how distinct memory is
+from consciousness. Memory of the past was in Ralph entirely abolished
+so far as concerned his own personality, but consciousness was perfect,
+and the results of previous mental training remained, as is shown by his
+use of figures. It was as though there was a dislocation between
+consciousness and the memory of self.
+
+The distinctness of consciousness from memory is also shown by dreams.
+Events which have passed are often recalled during the unconsciousness
+of sleep. The curious although common carrying of the memory of a dream
+over from the unconsciousness of sleep to the consciousness of waking
+movements further illustrates the complete distinction between the two
+cerebral functions.
+
+If memory, then, be not part of consciousness, what is its nature? There
+is a law governing nervous actions both in health and disease which is
+known as that of habitual action. The curious reflex movements made by
+the frog when acid is put upon its foot, as detailed in my last paper,
+were explained by this law. The spinal cord, after having frequently
+performed a certain act under the stimulus of conscious sensation,
+becomes so accustomed to perform that act that it does it when the
+oft-felt peripheral impulse comes again to it, although the cerebral
+functions and consciousness are suspended. A nerve-centre, even of the
+lowest kind, once moulded by repeated acts, retains their
+impression--i.e. remembers them. Learning to walk is, as was shown in
+the last paper, training the memory of the lower nerve-centres at the
+base of the brain until at last they direct the movements of walking
+without aid from consciousness. The musician studies a piece of music.
+At first the notes are struck in obedience to a conscious act of the
+will founded upon a conscious recognition of the printed type. By and by
+the piece is so well known that it is played even when the attention is
+directed to some other subject; that is, the act of playing has been
+repeated until the lower nerve-centres, which preside over the movements
+of the fingers during the playing, have been so impressed that when once
+the impulses are started they flow on uninterruptedly until the whole
+set has been gone through and the piece of music is finished. This is
+the result of memory of the lower nerve-centres. At first, the child
+reads only by a distinct conscious effort of memory, recalling painfully
+each word. After a time the words become so impressed upon the lower
+nerve-centres that we may read on when our attention is directed to some
+other thing. Thus, often we read aloud and are unconscious of what we
+have read, precisely as the compositor habitually sets up pages of
+manuscript without the faintest idea of what it is all about. This law
+of habitual action applies not only to the lower nerve-centres in their
+healthy condition, but with equal force in disease. It is notorious that
+one of the great difficulties in the cure of epilepsy is the habit which
+is acquired by the nerve-centres of having at intervals attacks of
+convulsive discharge of nerve-force. Some years since I saw in
+consultation a case which well illustrates this point. A boy was struck
+in the head with a brick, and dropped unconscious. On coming to be was
+seized with an epileptic convulsion. These convulsions continually
+recurred for many months before I saw him. He never went two hours
+without them, and had usually from thirty to forty a day--some, it is
+true, very slight, but others very severe. Medicines had no influence
+over him, and with the idea that there might be a point of irritation in
+the wound itself causing the epilepsy, the scar was taken out. The
+result was that the seizures were the same day reduced very much in
+frequency, and in a short time became amenable to treatment, so that
+finally complete recovery occurred. He had, however, probably fifty
+convulsions in all after the removal of the scar before this result was
+achieved. Undoubtedly, in this case the point of irritation was removed
+by the operation. The cause of the convulsions having been taken away,
+they should have stopped at once. But here the law of habitual action
+asserted itself, and it was necessary to overcome the remembrance of the
+disease by the nerve-centres. It is plain that the higher nerve-centre
+remembers the idea or fact because it is impressed by ideas and facts,
+precisely as the lower spinal nerve-centres in the frog remember
+irritations and movements which have impressed them. The faculty of
+memory resides in all nerve-centres: the nature of that which is
+remembered depends upon the function of the individual centre. A
+nerve-cell which thinks remembers thought--a nerve-cell which causes
+motion remembers motion.
+
+The so-called cases of double consciousness are perfectly simple in
+their explanation when the true nature of memory is borne in mind. In
+these cases the subject seems to lead a double life. The attacks usually
+come on suddenly. In the first attack all memory of the past is lost.
+The person is as an untaught child, and is forced to begin re-education.
+In some of these cases this second education has gone on for weeks, and
+advanced perhaps beyond the stage of reading, when suddenly the patient
+passes back to his original condition, losing now all memory of events
+which had occurred and all the knowledge acquired in what may be called
+his second state, but regaining all that he had originally possessed.
+Weeks or months afterward the second state reoccurs, the individual now
+forgetting all memory of the first or natural condition. It is usually
+found that events happening and knowledge acquired during the first
+attack of what we have called the second state are remembered in
+subsequent returns, so that the second education can be taken up at the
+point at which it was lost, and progress be made. This alternation of
+conditions has in some instances gone on for years, the patient living,
+as it were, two lives at broken intervals. This condition, usually
+called double consciousness, is not double consciousness at all, but, if
+the term may be allowed, double memory. It is evidently allied in its
+nature to the loss of the sense of personal identity. Certain phenomena
+of remembrance seen frequently in exhausting diseases, and especially in
+old age, show the permanence of impressions made upon the higher
+nerve-centres, and are also very similar in their nature to this
+so-called double consciousness. Not long since a very aged lady of
+Philadelphia, who was at the point of death, began to talk in an unknown
+tongue, soon losing entirely her power of expressing herself in English.
+No one could for a time make out the language she was speaking, but it
+was finally found to be Portuguese; and in tracing the history of the
+octogenarian it was discovered that until four or five years of age she
+had been brought up in Rio Janeiro, where Portuguese is spoken. There is
+little difference between the nature of such a case and that of the
+so-called double consciousness, both involving the forgetting of that
+which has been known for years.
+
+There is a curious mental condition sometimes produced by large doses of
+hasheesh which might be termed double consciousness more correctly than
+the state to which the name is usually applied. I once took an enormous
+dose of this substance. After suffering from a series of symptoms which
+it is not necessary here to detail, I was seized with a horrible
+undefined fear, as of impending death, and began at the same time to
+have marked periods when all connection seemed to be severed between the
+external world and myself. During these periods I was unconscious in so
+far that I was oblivious of all external objects, but on coming out of
+one it was not a blank, dreamless void upon which I looked back, a mere
+empty space, but rather a period of active but aimless life, full, not
+of connected thought, but of disjointed images. The mind, freed from the
+ordinary laws of association, passed, as it were, with lightning-like
+rapidity from one idea to another. The duration of these attacks was but
+a few seconds, but to me they seemed endless. Although I was perfectly
+conscious during the intermissions between the paroxysms, all power of
+measuring time was lost: seconds appeared to be hours--minutes grew to
+days--hours stretched out to infinity. I would look at my watch, and
+then after an hour or two, as I thought, would look again and find that
+scarcely a minute had elapsed. The minute-hand appeared motionless, as
+though graven in the face itself: the laggard second-hand moved so
+slowly that it seemed a hopeless task to watch it during its whole
+infinite round of a minute, and I always gave up in despair before the
+sixty seconds had elapsed. When my mind was most lucid there was a
+distinct duplex action in regard to the duration of time. I would think
+to myself, "It has been so long since a certain event!"--an hour, for
+example, since the doctor was summoned--but Reason would say, "No, it
+has been only a few minutes: your thoughts and feelings are caused by
+the hasheesh." Nevertheless, I was not able to shake off, even for a
+moment, this sense of the almost indefinite prolongation of time.
+Gradually the periods of unconsciousness became longer and more
+frequent, and the oppressive feeling of impending death more intense. It
+was like a horrible nightmare: each successive paroxysm was felt to be
+the longest I had suffered. As I came out of it a voice seemed
+constantly saying, "You are getting worse; your paroxysms are growing
+longer and deeper; they will overmaster you; you will die." A sense of
+personal antagonism between my will-power and myself, as affected by the
+drug, grew very strong. I felt as though my only chance was to struggle
+against these paroxysms--that I must constantly arouse myself by an
+effort of will; and that effort was made with infinite toil and pain. It
+seemed to me as if some evil spirit had the control of the whole of me
+except the will, and was in determined conflict with that, the last
+citadel of my being. Once or twice during a paroxysm I felt myself
+mounting upward, expanding, dilating, dissolving into the wide confines
+of space, overwhelmed by a horrible, unutterable despair. Then by a
+tremendous effort I seemed to break loose and to start up with the
+shuddering thought, "Next time you will not be able to throw this off;
+and what then?" The sense of double consciousness which I had to some
+extent is often, under the action of hasheesh, much more distinct. I
+have known patients to whom it seemed that they themselves sitting upon
+the chair were in continual conversation with a second self standing in
+front of them. The explanation of this curious condition is a difficult
+one. It is possible that the two sides of the brain, which are
+accustomed in health to work as one organ, are disjoined by the poison,
+so that one half of the brain thinks and acts in opposition to the other
+half.
+
+From what has already been said it is plain that memory is entirely
+distinct from consciousness, and that it is in a certain sense
+automatic, or at least an attribute of all nerve-centres. If this be so,
+it would seem probable, _a priori_, that other intellectual acts are
+also distinct from consciousness. For present purposes the activities of
+the cerebrum may be divided into the emotional and the more
+strictly-speaking intellectual acts. A little thought will, I think,
+convince any of my readers that emotions are as purely automatic as the
+movements of the frog's hind leg. The Irishman who said that he was
+really a brave man, although he had a cowardly pair of legs which always
+ran away with him, was far from speaking absurdly. It is plain that
+passion is something entirely beyond the conscious will, because it is
+continually excited from without, and because we are unable to produce
+it by a mere effort of the will without some external cause. The common
+phrase, "He is working himself up into a passion," indicates a
+perception of the fact that consciousness sometimes employs memories,
+thoughts, associations, etc. to arouse the lower nerve-centres that are
+connected with the emotion of anger. It is so also with various other
+emotions. The soldier who habitually faces death in the foremost rank of
+the battle, and yet shrinks in mortal fear or antipathy from a mouse, is
+not an unknown spectacle. It is clear that his fear of the little animal
+is based not upon reason, but upon an uncontrollable sensitiveness in
+his nervous system acquired by inheritance or otherwise. It does not
+follow from this that conscious will is not able to affect emotion. As
+already pointed out, it can arouse emotion by using the proper means,
+and it undoubtedly can, to a greater or less extent, directly subdue
+emotion. The law of inhibition, as it is called by the physiologist,
+dominates the whole nervous system. Almost every nerve-centre has above
+it a higher centre whose function it is directly to repress or subdue
+the activity of the lower centre. A familiar instance of this is seen in
+the action of the heart: there are certain nerve-centres which when
+excited lessen the rate of the heart's beat, and are even able to stop
+it altogether. The relation of the will-power to the emotions is
+directly inhibitory. The will is able to repress the activity of those
+centres which preside over anger. In the man with red hair these centres
+may be very active and the will-power weak; hence the inhibitory
+influence of the will is slight and the man gets angry easily. In the
+phlegmatic temperament the anger-centres are slow to action, the
+will-power strong, and the man is thrown off his balance with
+difficulty. It is well known that power grows with exercise, and when we
+habitually use the will in controlling the emotional centres its power
+continually increases. The man learning self-control is simply drilling
+the lower emotional centres into obedience to the repressive action of
+the higher will. Without further demonstration, it is clear that emotion
+is distinct from conscious will, and is automatic in the sense in which
+the term has been used in this article.
+
+Imagination also is plainly distinct from consciousness. It acts during
+sleep. Often, indeed, it runs riot during the slumbers of the night, but
+at times it works with an automatic regularity exceeding its powers
+during the waking moments. It is also true that judgment is exercised in
+sleep, and that reason sometimes exerts its best efforts in that state.
+But not only do the intellectual nets go on without consciousness during
+sleep, but also while we are awake. Some years since I was engaged in
+working upon a book requiring a good deal of thought. Very frequently I
+would be unable to solve certain problems, but leaving them would find a
+day or two afterward, on taking pen in hand, that the solution traced
+itself without effort on the paper clearly and logically. During the
+sleeping hours, or during the waking hours of a busy professional life,
+the brain had, without my consciousness, been solving the difficulties.
+This experience is by no means a peculiar one. Many scientific workers
+have borne testimony to a similar habit of the cerebrum. The late Sir W.
+Rowan Hamilton, the discoverer of the mathematical method known as that
+of the quaternions, states that his mind suddenly solved that problem
+after long work when he was thinking of something else. He says in one
+place: "Tomorrow will be the fifteenth birthday of the quaternions. They
+started into life or light full grown on the 16th of October, 1843, as I
+was walking with Lady Hamilton to Dublin and came up to Brougham Bridge;
+that is to say, I then and there felt the galvanic circle of thought
+closed, and the sparks which fell from it were the fundamental equations
+between _I, F_ and _K_ exactly as I have used them ever since. I felt
+the problem to have been at that moment solved--an intellectual want
+relieved which had haunted me for at least fifteen years before." Mr.
+Appolo, a distinguished scientific inventor, stated in the Proceedings
+of the Royal Society that it was his habit to get the bearings and facts
+of a case during the day and go to bed, and wake the next morning with
+the problem solved. If the problem was a difficult one he always passed
+a restless night. Examples might be multiplied. Sir Benjamin Brodie,
+speaking of his own mental action, states that when he was unable to
+proceed further in some investigation he was accustomed to let the
+matter drop. Then "after an interval of time, without any addition to my
+stock of knowledge, I have found the obscurity and confusion in which
+the subject was originally enveloped to have cleared away. The facts
+have seemed all to settle themselves in their right places, and their
+mutual relations to have become apparent, although I have not been
+sensible of having made any distinct effort for that purpose."
+
+Not only is there such a thing, then, as unconscious thought, but it is
+probable that the best thinking is rarely, if ever, done under the
+influence of consciousness. The poet creates his work when the
+inspiration is on him and he is forgetful of himself and the world.
+Consciousness may aid in pruning and polishing, but in creating it often
+interferes with, rather than helps, the cerebral action. I think any one
+of my readers who has done any literary or scientific writing will agree
+that his or her best work is performed when self and surrounding objects
+have disappeared from thought and consciousness scarcely exists more
+than it does in a dream. Sometimes the individual is conscious of the
+flow of an undercurrent of mental action, although this does not rise to
+the level of distinct recognition. Oliver Wendell Holmes speaks of a
+business-man of Boston who, whilst considering a very important
+question, was conscious of an action going on in his brain so unusual
+and painful as to excite his apprehension that he was threatened with
+palsy; but after some hours his perplexity was all at once cleared up by
+the natural solution of the problem which was troubling him, worked out,
+as he believed, in the obscure and restless interval. "Jumping to a
+conclusion," a process to which the female sex is said to be especially
+prone, is often due to unconscious cerebration, the reasoning being so
+rapid that the consciousness cannot follow the successive steps. It is
+related that Lord Mansfield once gave the advice to a younger friend
+newly appointed to a colonial judgeship, "Never give reasons for your
+decisions. Your judgments will very probably be right, but your reasons
+will almost certainly be wrong." The brain of the young judge evidently
+worked unconsciously with accuracy, but was unable to trace the steps
+along which it really travelled.
+
+We are not left to the unaided study of our mental processes for proof
+that the human brain is a mechanism. In the laboratory of Professor
+Goltz in Strasburg I saw a terrier from which he had removed, by
+repeated experiments, all the surface of the brain, thereby reducing the
+animal to a simple automaton. Looked at while lying in his stall, he
+seemed at first in no wise different from other dogs: he took food when
+offered to him, was fat, sleek and very quiet. When I approached him he
+took no notice of me, but when the assistant caught him by the tail he
+instantly became the embodiment of fury. He had not sufficient
+perceptive power to recognize the point of assault, so that his keeper,
+standing behind him, was not in danger. With flashing eyes and hair all
+erect the dog howled and barked furiously, incessantly snapping and
+biting, first on this side and then on that, tearing with his fore legs
+and in every way manifesting rage. When his tail was dropped by the
+attendant and his head touched, the storm at once subsided, the fury was
+turned into calm, and the animal, a few seconds before so rageful, was
+purring like a cat and stretching out its head for caresses. This
+curious process could be repeated indefinitely. Take hold of his tail,
+and instantly the storm broke out afresh: pat his head, and all was
+tenderness. It was possible to play at will with the passions of the
+animal by the slightest touches.
+
+During the Franco-German contest a French soldier was struck in the head
+with a bullet and left on the field for dead, but subsequently showed
+sufficient life to cause him to be carried to the hospital, where he
+finally recovered his general health, but remained in a mental state
+very similar to that of Professor Goltz's dog. As he walked about the
+rooms and corridors of the soldiers' home in Paris he appeared to the
+stranger like an ordinary man, unless it were in his apathetic manner.
+When his comrades were called to the dinner-table he followed, sat down
+with them, and, the food being placed upon his plate and a knife and
+fork in his hands, would commence to eat. That this was not done in
+obedience to thought or knowledge was shown by the fact that his dinner
+could be at once interrupted by awakening a new train of feeling by a
+new external impulse. Put a crooked stick resembling a gun into his
+hand, and at once the man was seized with a rage comparable to that
+produced in the Strasburg dog by taking hold of his tail. The fury of
+conflict was on him: with a loud yell he would recommence the skirmish
+in which he had been wounded, and, crying to his comrades, would make a
+rush at the supposed assailant. Take the stick out of his hand, and at
+once his apathy would settle upon him; give him a knife and fork, and,
+whether at the table or elsewhere, he would make the motions of eating;
+hand him a spade, and he would begin to dig. It is plain that the
+impulse produced by seeing his comrades move to the dining-room started
+the chain of automatic movements which resulted in his seating himself
+at the table. The weapon called into new life the well-known acts of the
+battle-field. The spade brought back the day when, innocent of blood, he
+cultivated the vineyards of sunny France.
+
+In both the dog and the man just spoken of the control of the will over
+the emotions and mental acts was evidently lost, and the mental
+functions were performed only in obedience to impulses from
+without--i.e. were automatic. The human brain is a complex and very
+delicate mechanism, so uniform in its actions, so marvellous in its
+creation, that it is able to measure the rapidity of its own processes.
+There are scarcely two brains which work exactly with the same rapidity
+and ease. One man thinks faster than another man for reasons as purely
+physical as those which give to one man a faster gait than that of
+another. Those who move quickly are apt to think quickly, the whole
+nervous system performing its processes with rapidity. This is not,
+however, always the case, as it is possible for the brain to be
+differently constructed, so far as concerns its rapidity of action, from
+the spinal cord of the same individual. Our power of measuring time
+without instruments is probably based upon the cerebral system of each
+individual being accustomed to move at a uniform rate. Experience has
+taught the brain that it thinks so many thoughts or does so much work in
+such a length of time, and it judges that so much time has elapsed when
+it has done so much work. The extraordinary sense of prolongation of
+time which occurs in the intoxication produced by hasheesh is probably
+due to the fact that under the influence of the drug the brain works
+very much faster than it habitually does. Having produced a multitude of
+images or thoughts in a moment, the organ judges that a corresponding
+amount of time has elapsed. Persons are occasionally seen who have the
+power of waking at any desired time: going to bed at ten o'clock, they
+will rouse themselves at four, five or six in the morning, as they have
+made up their minds to do the previous night. The explanation of this
+curious faculty seems to be that in these persons the brain-functions go
+on with so much regularity during sleep that the brain is enabled to
+judge, though unconsciously, when the time fixed upon has arrived, and
+by an unconscious effort to recall consciousness.
+
+Of course the subject of automatism might have been discussed at far
+greater length than is allowable in the limits of two magazine articles,
+but sufficient has probably been said to show the strong current of
+modern physiological psychology toward proving that all ordinary mental
+actions, except the exercise of the conscious will, are purely physical,
+produced by an instrument which works in a method not different from
+that in which the glands of the mouth secrete saliva and the tubules of
+the stomach gastric juice. Some of my readers may say this is pure
+materialism, or at least leads to materialism. No inquirer who pauses to
+think how his investigation is going to affect his religious belief is
+worthy to be called scientific. The scientist, rightly so called, is a
+searcher after truth, whatever may be the results of the discovery of
+the truth. Modern science, however, has not proved the truth of
+materialism. It has shown that the human organism is a wonderful
+machine, but when we come to the further question as to whether this
+machine is inhabited by an immortal principle which rules it and directs
+it, or whether it simply runs itself, science has not, and probably
+cannot, give a definite answer. It has reached its limit of inquiry, and
+is unable to cross the chasm that lies beyond. There are men who
+believe that there is nothing in the body save the body itself, and that
+when that dies all perishes: there are others, like the writer, who
+believe that they feel in their mental processes a something which they
+call "will," which governs and directs the actions of the machine, and
+which, although very largely influenced by external surroundings, is
+capable of rising above the impulses from without, leading them to
+believe in the existence of more than flesh--of soul and God. The
+materialist, so far as natural science is concerned, stands upon logical
+ground, but no less logical is the foundation of him who believes in
+human free-will and immortality. The decision as to the correctness of
+the beliefs of the materialist or of the theist must be reached by other
+data than those of natural science.
+
+H.C. WOOD, M.D.
+
+
+
+
+OUR MONTHLY GOSSIP.
+
+CIVIL-SERVICE REFORM AND DEMOCRATIC IDEAS.
+
+
+A movement which appeals not to the emotions, but to the
+intellect--whose advocates aim at enlightening-the public mind and
+convincing it of the truth of some new or disregarded principle, and the
+necessity of enforcing it--needs above all things open and active
+opposition, both as a stimulant to its supporters and as a means of
+arousing general attention. It has been very unfortunate for our
+Civil-Service Reformers that they have never been able to provoke
+discussion. They have had the field of argument all to themselves. Their
+repeated challenges have been received only with silent respect,
+scornful indifference, or expressions of encouragement still more
+depressing. Those whose hostility they were prepared to encounter have
+been the readiest to acknowledge the truth of their propositions--
+considered as pure abstractions--and have even invited
+them to apply their system--in conjunction with that which it seeks to
+supplant. Meanwhile, the popular interest has been kept busily absorbed
+by issues of a different nature; and the Reformers, snubbed in quarters
+where they had confidently counted on aid, and hustled from the arena in
+which they had fondly imagined they were to play a prominent part and
+exert a decisive influence, are now, it is announced, about to devote
+their energies to the quiet propagation of their views by means of
+tracts and other publications, abstaining from any appearance in the
+domain of actual politics either as a distinct party or as an organized
+body of independent voters appealing to the hopes and fears of existing
+parties, and ready to co-operate with one or the other according to the
+inducements offered for their support.
+
+We heartily wish them success in this new enterprise, and it is as a
+contribution to their efforts that we publish in this number of the
+Magazine an article which, so far as our observation extends, is the
+first direct argumentative attack upon their doctrines and open defence
+of the system they have assailed. We shall not undertake to anticipate
+their reply, but I shall content ourselves with pointing out, on the
+principle of _fas est ab hoste doceri,_ what they may learn from this
+attack, and especially what hints may be derived from it in regard to
+the proper objective point of their proposed operations. Hitherto, if we
+mistake not, they have been led to suppose that the only obstacles in
+their way are the interested antagonism of the "politicians" and the
+ignorant apathy of the great mass of the people, and it is because they
+have found themselves powerless to make head against the tactics of the
+former class that they intend to confine themselves henceforth to the
+work of awaking and enlightening the latter. There is always danger,
+however, when we are expounding our pet theories to a group of silent
+listeners, of ignoring their state of mind in regard to the
+subject-matter and mistaking the impression produced by our eloquence.
+George Borrow tells us that when preaching in Rommany to a congregation
+of Gypsies he felt highly flattered by the patient attention of his
+hearers, till he happened to notice that they all had their eyes fixed
+in a diabolical squint. Something of the same kind would, we fear, be
+the effect on a large number of persons of well-meant expositions of the
+English civil-service reform and its admirable results. Nor will any
+appeals to the moral sense excite an indignation at the workings of our
+present system sufficiently deep and general to demand its overthrow.
+Civil-service reform had a far easier task in England than it has here,
+and forces at its back which are here actively or inertly opposed to it.
+There the system of patronage was intimately connected with
+oligarchical rule; official positions were not so much monopolized by a
+victorious party as by a privileged class; the government of the day had
+little interest in maintaining the system, the bulk of the nation had a
+direct interest in upsetting it, and its downfall was a natural result
+of the growth of popular power and the decline of aristocracy. Our
+system, however similar in its character and effects, had no such
+origin; it does not belong to some peculiar institution which we are
+seeking to get rid of: on the contrary, it has its roots in certain
+conceptions of the nature of government and popular freedom--of the
+relations between a people and those who administer its affairs--which
+are all but universally current among us.
+
+It is this last point which is clearly and forcibly presented in the
+article of our contributor, and which it will behoove the Reformers not
+to overlook. Nothing is more characteristic of the American mind, in
+reference to political ideas, than its strong conservatism. This fact,
+which has often puzzled foreign observers accustomed to connect
+democracy with innovating tendencies and violent fluctuations, is yet
+easily explained. Though ours is a new country, its system of government
+is really older than that of almost any other civilized country. In the
+century during which it has existed intact and without any material
+modification the institutions of most other nations have undergone a
+complete change, in some cases of form and structure, in others of
+theory and essence. Even England, which boasts of the stability of its
+government and its immunity from the storms that have overturned so many
+thrones and disorganized so many states, has experienced a fundamental,
+though gradual and peaceable, revolution. There, as elsewhere, the
+centre of power has changed, the chain of tradition has been broken, and
+new conceptions of the functions of government and its relations to the
+governed have taken the place of the old ones. But in America nothing of
+this kind has occurred: the "old order" has not passed away, nor have
+its foundations undergone the least change; the municipal and colonial
+institutions under which we first exercised the right of
+self-government, and the Constitution which gave us our national
+baptism, are still the fountain of all our political ideas; and our
+party struggles are not waged about new principles or animated by new
+watch words, but are fenced and guided by the maxims transmitted by the
+founders of the republic. This is our strength and our safeguard against
+wild experiments, but it is also an impediment to every suggestion of
+improvement. It binds us to the letter of tradition, leads us to
+confound the accidental with the essential, and gives to certain notions
+and certain words a potency which must be described as an anachronism.
+We still use the language of the Revolutionary epoch, recognize no
+perils but those against which our ancestors had to guard, and put faith
+in the efficacy of methods that have no longer an object, and of phrases
+that have lost their original significance. Because George III.
+distributed offices at his pleasure as rewards, and bound the holders to
+party services in conformity with his will, the sovereign people is to
+do the same. "Rotation in office" having been the means in the
+eighteenth century of dispelling political stagnation and checking
+jobbery and corruption, it is still the only process for correcting
+abuses and getting the public service properly performed. The prime duty
+of all good citizens is to emulate the incessant political activity of
+their patriotic forefathers, and it is owing solely to a too general
+neglect of this duty that ballot-stuffing and machine-running, and all
+the other evils unknown in early days and in primitive communities, have
+come into existence and gained sway throughout the land. These and
+similar views, according to our observation, characterize what we may
+without disrespect, and without confining the remark to the rural
+districts, term the provincial mind, and wherever they exist the ideas
+of the Civil-Service Reformers are not only not understood or treated as
+visionary, but are regarded with aversion and distrust as foreign,
+monstrous and inconsistent with popular freedom and republican
+government.
+
+
+AN UNFINISHED PAGE OF HISTORY.
+
+I can easily understand why educated Americans cross the Atlantic every
+year in shoals in search of the picturesque; and I can understand, too,
+all that they say of the relief which ivied ruins and cathedrals and
+galleries, or any other reminders of past ages, give to their eyes,
+oppressed so long by our interminable rows of store-box houses, our
+pasteboard villas, the magnificence of our railway accommodations for
+Ladies and Gents, and all the general gaseous glitter which betrays how
+young and how rich we are. But I cannot understand why it is that their
+eyes, thus trained, should fail to see the exceptional picturesqueness
+of human life in this country. The live man is surely always more
+dramatic and suggestive than a house or a costume, provided we have eyes
+to interpret him; and this people, as no other, are made up of the
+moving, active deposits and results of world-old civilizations and
+experiments in living.
+
+Outwardly, if you choose, the country is like one of the pretentious
+houses of its rich citizens--new, smug, complacently commonplace--but
+within, like the house again, it is filled with rare bits gathered out
+of every age and country and jumbled together in utter confusion. If you
+ride down Seventh street in a horse-car, you are in a psychological
+curio-shop. On one side, very likely, is a Russian Jew just from the
+Steppes; on the other, a negro with centuries of heathendom and slavery
+hinting themselves in lip and eye; the driver is a Fenian, with the
+blood of the Phoenicians in his veins; in front of you is a gentleman
+with the unmistakable Huguenot nose, and chin; while an almond-eyed
+pagan, disguised behind moustache and eye-glasses, courteously takes
+your fare and drops it for you in the Slawson box. Nowhere do all the
+elements of Tragedy and Comedy play so strange a part as on the
+dead-level of this American stage. It is because it is so dead a level
+that we fail to see the part they play--because "furious Goth and fiery
+Hun" meet, not on the battle-field, but in the horse-car, dropping their
+cents together in a Slawson box.
+
+For example, as to the tragedy.
+
+I met at dinner not long ago a lady who was introduced to me under a
+French name, but whose clear olive complexion, erect carriage and
+singular repose of manner would indicate her rather to be a Spaniard.
+She wore a red rose in the coils of her jetty hair, and another fastened
+the black lace of her corsage. Her eyes, which were slow, dark and
+brilliant, always rested on you an instant before she spoke with that
+fearless candor which is not found in the eyes of a member of any race
+that has ever been enslaved. I was told that her rank was high among her
+own people, and in her movements and voice there were that quiet
+simplicity and total lack of self-consciousness which always belong
+either to a man or woman of the highest breeding, or to one whose
+purpose in life is so noble as to lift him above all considerations of
+self. Although a foreigner, she spoke English with more purity than most
+of the Americans at the table, but with a marked and frequent recurrence
+of forcible but half-forgotten old idioms; which was due, as! learned
+afterward, to her having had no book of English literature to study for
+several years but Shakespeare. I observed that she spoke but seldom, and
+to but one person at a time; but when she did, her casual talk was the
+brimming over of a mind of great original force as yet full and unspent.
+She was, besides, a keen observer who had studied much, but seen more.
+
+This lady, in a word, was one who would deserve recognition by the best
+men and women in any country; and she received it here, as many of the
+readers of _Lippincott_, who will recognize my description, will
+remember. She was caressed and feted by literary and social celebrities
+in Washington and New York; Boston made much of her; Longfellow and
+Holmes made verses in her honor; prying reporters gave accounts of her
+singular charm and beauty to the public in the daily papers.
+
+She was accompanied by two of the men of her family. They did not speak
+English, but they were men of strong practical sense and business
+capacity, with the odd combination in their character of that
+exaggerated perception of honorable dealing which we are accustomed to
+call chivalric. They had, too, a grave dignity and composure of bearing
+which would have befitted Spanish hidalgos, and beside which our pert,
+sociable American manner and slangy talk were sadly belittled. These men
+(for I had a reason in making particular inquiries concerning them) were
+in private life loyal friends, good citizens, affectionate husbands and
+fathers--in a word, Christian men, honest from the marrow to the
+outside.
+
+Now to the strange part of my story, revolting enough to our republican
+ears. This lady and her people, in the country to which they belong, are
+held in a subjection to which that of the Russian serf was comparative
+freedom. They are held legally as the slaves not of individuals, but of
+the government, which has absolute power over their persons, lives and
+property. Its manner of exercising that power is, however, peculiar.
+They are compelled to live within certain enclosures. Each enclosure is
+ruled by a man of the dominant race, usually of the lower class, who, as
+a rule, gains the place by bribing the officer of government who has
+charge of these people. The authority of this man within the limits of
+the enclosure is literally as autocratic as that of the Russian czar. He
+distributes the rations intended by the government for the support of
+these people, or such part of them as he thinks fit, retaining whatever
+amount he chooses for himself. There is nothing to restrain him in these
+robberies. In consequence, the funds set aside by the government for the
+support of its wretched dependants are stolen so constantly by the
+officers at the capital and the petty tyrants of the separate enclosures
+that the miserable creatures almost yearly starve and freeze to death
+from want. Their resource would be, of course, as they are in a
+civilized country, to work at trades, to farm, etc. But this is not
+permitted to them. Another petty officer is appointed in each enclosure
+to barter goods for the game or peltry which they bring in or crops that
+they manage to raise. He fixes his own price for both his goods and
+theirs, and cheats them by wholesale at his leisure. There is no appeal:
+they are absolutely forbidden to trade with any other person. The men of
+my friend's family--educated men and shrewd in business as any merchant
+of Philadelphia--when at home were liable to imprisonment and a fine of
+five hundred dollars if they bought from or sold to any other person
+than this one man. They are, too, taught no trade or profession. Each
+enclosure has its appointed blacksmith, carpenter, etc. of the dominant
+class, who, naturally, will not share their profits by teaching their
+trade to the others.
+
+Within the enclosures my friend and her people, no matter how
+enlightened or refined they may be, are herded, and under the same
+rules, as so many animals. They cannot leave the enclosure without
+passes, such as were granted to our slaves before the war when they
+wished to go outside of the plantation. This woman, when seated at
+President Hayes's table, the equal in mind and breeding of any of her
+companions, was, by the laws of her country, a runaway, legally liable
+to be haled by the police back to her enclosure, and shot if she
+resisted. She and her people are absolutely unprotected by any law. It
+is indeed the only case, so far as I know, in any Christian country, in
+which a single class are so set aside, unprotected by any law. When our
+slaves were killed or tortured by inhuman masters, there was at least
+some show of justice for them. The white murderer went through some form
+of trial and punishment. The slave, though a chattel, was still a human
+being. But these people are not recognized by the law as human beings.
+They cannot buy nor sell; they cannot hold property: if with their own
+hands they build a house and gather about them the comforts of
+civilization and the wife and children to which the poorest negro, the
+most barbarous savage, has a right, any man of the dominant class can,
+without violating any law, take possession of the house, ravage the
+wife and thrust the children out to starve. The wrong-doer is subject to
+no penalty. The victim has no right of appeal to the courts. Hence such
+outrages are naturally of daily occurrence. Not only are they
+perpetrated on individuals, but frequently there is a raid made upon the
+whole of the inmates of one enclosure--whenever, in fact, the people in
+the neighborhood fancy they would like to take possession of their land.
+The kinsmen of my friend, with their clan numbering some seven hundred
+souls--a peaceable, industrious Christian community, living on land
+which had belonged to their ancestors for centuries--were swept off of
+it a few years ago at the whim of two of their rulers: their houses and
+poor little belongings were all left behind, and they were driven a
+thousand miles into a sterile, malarious region where nearly half of
+their number died. The story of their sufferings, their homesickness and
+their despair on the outward journey, and of how still later some thirty
+of them returned on foot, carrying the bones of those who had died to
+lay them in their old homes, is one of the most dramatic pages in
+history. De Quincey's "Flight of a Tartar Clan" does not equal it in
+pathos or as a story of heroism and endurance. At the end of their
+homeward journey, when almost within sight of their homes, the heroic
+little band were seized by order of the ruler of their enclosure and
+committed to prison. The tribe are still in the malarious swamps to
+which they were exiled. Strangers hold their farms and the houses which
+they built with their own hands.
+
+The anomalous condition of a people legally ranking as animals, and not
+human beings, would naturally produce unpleasant consequences when they
+are criminally the aggressors. When they steal or kill they cannot be
+tried, sent to jail or hung as if they were human in the eye of the law.
+The ruler of each enclosure is granted arbitrary power in such cases to
+punish at his discretion. He is judge, jury, and often executioner. He
+has a control over the lives of these people more absolute than that of
+any Christian monarch over his subjects. If he thinks proper to shoot
+the offender, he can call upon the regular army of the country to
+sustain him. If the individual offender escapes, the whole of the
+inmates of the enclosure are held responsible, and men, women and
+children are slaughtered by wholesale and without mercy.
+
+My readers understand my little fable by this time. It is no fable, but
+a disgraceful truth.
+
+The government under which a people--many of whom are educated,
+enlightened Christian gentlemen--are denied the legal rights of human
+beings and all protection of law is not the absolute despotism of Siara
+or Russia, but the United States, the republic which proclaims itself
+the refuge for the oppressed of all nations--the one spot on earth where
+every man is entitled alike to life, liberty and the pursuit of
+happiness. The only people in the world to whom it denies these rights
+are not its quondam slaves, not pagans, not runaway convicts, not the
+offscourings of any nation however degraded, but the original owners of
+the country.
+
+The legal disability under which the Indian is held is as much of an
+outrage on human rights, and as bald a contradiction of the doctrines on
+which our republic is based, as negro slavery was.
+
+R.H.D.
+
+
+
+
+A LITTLE IRELAND IN AMERICA.
+
+
+The humorous side of life was never more vividly brought before me than
+while living a few years ago in the vicinity of an Irish settlement in
+one of the suburbs of New York. What we call "characters" were to be
+found in every cottage--the commonplace was the exception. Indeed, I do
+not remember that it existed at all in "The Lane," as this locality was
+called.
+
+Perhaps among the inhabitants of The Lane none more deserved distinction
+than Mary Magovern. The grandmother of a numerous family, she united all
+the masculine and feminine virtues. About the stiff, spotless and
+colossal frill of her cap curled wreaths of smoke from her stout
+dhudeen as she sat before the door blacking the small boots of her
+grandchildren, stopping from time to time to remove the pipe from her
+mouth, that she might deliver in her full bass voice a peremptory order
+to the large yellow dog that lay at her feet. It was usually on the
+occasion of a carriage passing, when the dog would growl and rise. Very
+quickly out came the pipe, and immediately followed the words, "Danger,
+lay by thim intintions;" and the pipe was used as an indicator for the
+next movement--namely, to patiently lie down again upon the ground.
+
+Mary Magovern kept a drinking-shop behind the living-rooms of her
+cottage, and the immense prestige she had in The Lane must have had some
+foundation in the power which this thriving business gave her, many of
+her neighbors being under the obligation of debt to her.
+
+Mike Quinlan would have been her most frequent visitor had it not been
+for the ever-open eye of Mrs. Quinlan, which caused her husband to seek
+his delights by stealth at a village a mile away. Mike was an elderly
+and handsome man, but his wits had ebbed out as the contents of the
+wine-cup flowed in, and the beauty that had won so remarkable a person
+as Mrs. Quinlan in its first glow was somewhat marred. He was the owner
+of a small cart and a mule, and those who had stones or earth to move
+usually remembered to employ poor Mike. But it was on foot, as a more
+inconspicuous method of eluding the watchfulness of Mrs. Quinlan, that
+Mike slipped away to the neighboring village of an afternoon, and it was
+on foot that I one night saw Mrs. Quinlan going over the same road with
+an invincible determination in her countenance and a small birch rod in
+her hand. Mrs. Quinlan was somewhat younger than her lord and master:
+she had a clear, bright-blue eye, a roseate color in her little slender
+face, and gray hair tidily smoothed back beneath the dainty ruffles of
+her cap, about which a black ribbon was tied. She wore short petticoats
+and low shoes, and as she walked briskly along she smoothed her apron
+with the disengaged hand, as if, the balance of the family
+respectability having so wholly fallen upon her own shoulders, she would
+not disturb it by permitting a disorderly wrinkle. Half an hour later
+she passed again over the road, her face turned homeward and wearing an
+even greater austerity, the birch rod grasped firmly in her hand, and
+her worser half preceding her with a foolish smile upon his lips, half
+of concession, half of pride in the power to which he stooped.
+
+Another of Mrs. Magovern's occasional visitors was Old Haley, who had
+regular employment upon our own place. Like Mike Quinlan, he rejoiced in
+a wife who was an ornament to her sex--a most respectable, handsome and
+intelligent woman, though education had done little to sharpen her wits
+or widen her experience. She could tell a one from a five dollar bill,
+as her husband would proudly inform you, and she could cook a dinner, do
+up a skirt or a frilled cap, keep a house or tend a sick friend, as well
+as any woman in the land. "Maggie's a janeous!" her husband would remark
+with a look of intense admiration.
+
+One evening Mrs. Haley made her appearance at our house, asking for an
+audience of my mother. The object was to inform her--these sympathetic
+people like to be advised in all their affairs--that being in need of
+various household supplies she proposed on the following day to go to
+the city and purchase them at the Washington Market.
+
+"I suppose you have been to the city before, Mrs. Haley?" remarked my
+mother.
+
+"I have not, ma'am," said Mrs. Haley.
+
+"Had you not better take some friend with you who has been there before,
+lest you should get lost?"
+
+"Faith, I had, ma'am: I had a right to have moor sinse an' think o'
+that."
+
+So Mrs. Haley departed, returning again in company with Mary Magovern:
+"Here's Mary Magovern, ma'am: she's goin' along wid me."
+
+"Ah, that's very well.--You know the city, Mary? you've been there?"
+
+"I have not, ma'am."
+
+"Why, what, then, is the use of your going with Mrs. Haley?"
+
+"We'll make a shtrict inquiry, ma'am."
+
+The next morning they started, and at four o'clock Old Haley came in
+much anxiety of mind to seek comfort of my mother: "Maggie's not come,
+ma'am. Faith, I'm throubled, for the city is a quare place."
+
+When it grew late Haley returned again and again, in ever-increasing
+anxiety, to be reassured. At last, when the family were retiring to bed,
+came Mrs. Haley and Mrs. Magovern to report their arrival. In spite of
+the lateness of the hour my mother received them, and in spite of their
+wearied and worn faces administered a gentle rebuke for the anxiety that
+Mrs. Haley had caused her spouse.
+
+"Well, indade it's no wonder he was throubled," said Mrs. Haley, "an'
+it's a wonder we got here at all. We got nothing at the Washington
+Market, for we couldn't find it at all: I think they tuk it away to
+Washington. It was in the mornin' airly that we got to the city, ma'am,
+an' there was a koind of a carr, an' a gintleman up on the top of it,
+an' anuther gintleman at the dure of it, wid the dure in his hand, an'
+he sez, sez he, 'Git in, ladies,' sez he.--'We're goin' to the
+Washington Market, sur,' sez I.--That's where I'll take yez, ladies,'
+sez he. 'Pay yer fares, ladies.' An' we got in, ma'am, an' wint up to
+the top of the city, an' paid tin cints, the both of us. An' there was a
+great many ladies an' gintlemen got in an' done the same, ma'am, an'
+some got out one place an' some another. An' whin we got up to the top
+of the city, 'Mrs. Magovern,' sez I,' this isn't the Washington Market,'
+sez I.--' It is not, Mrs. Haley,' sez she.--'We'll git out, Mrs.
+Magovern,' sez I.--'We will, Mrs. Haley,' sez she. An' thin, ma'am,
+there was a small bit of a howl in the carr, and it was through the howl
+the ladies an' gintlemen would cry out to the gintleman on the top o'
+the carr, and he'd put his face down forninst it an' spake wid thim; an'
+I cried up through the howl to him, an' sez I, 'Me an' Mrs. Magovern
+will git out, sur,' sez I, 'for this isn't the Washington Market at
+all.'--'It is not, ma'am,' sez he, 'but that's where I'll take yez,' sez
+he. 'Sit down, ladies,' sez he, 'and pay me the money,' sez he. 'I had a
+great many paple to lave,' sez he. An' indade he had, ma'am. An' we paid
+the money agin, an' we wint down to the bottom o' the city. 'This is not
+the Washington Market, Mrs. Magovern,' sez I.--'It is not, Mrs. Haley,'
+sez she.--'We'll git out, Mrs. Magovern,' sez I.--'We will, Mrs. Haley,'
+sez she. Thin came the gintleman that first had the dure in his hand.
+'What's the matther, ladies?' sez he.--'This isn't the Washington
+Market, sur,' sez I.--'It is not, ma'am,' sez he, 'but the city is a
+great place,' sez he, 'an' it's not aisy to go everywhere at wonst,' sez
+he; 'an' if yez will have patience,' sez he, 'ye'll git there,' sez he.
+'Git in, ladies,' sez he, 'an' pay yer fares.' Wid all the houses
+there's in the city, an' all the sthrates there's in it, faith, it was
+no good at all to thry to foind our way alone; but thim wur false
+paple--they niver took us to the Washington Market at all; an' it was
+all the day we wint up to the top o' the city and down to the bottom o'
+the city, and spinding our money at it. An' sez I, 'Mrs. Magovern, it
+would be better for us if we wint home,' sez I.--'It would, Mrs. Haley,'
+sez she; an' we come down to the boat, an' it was two hours agin befoor
+the boat would go, an' thin we come home; an' it's toired we are, an'
+it's an' awful place, the city is."
+
+Haley's statements could seldom be relied on, but his untruth fulness
+was never a matter of self-interest, but rather of amiability. He
+desired to tell you whatever you desired to know, and to tell it as you
+would like to hear it, even if facts were so perverse as to be contrary.
+
+One day I wanted to do an errand in the village, and called for the
+horse and carriage. Haley brought them to the door. As I took the reins
+I remembered that it was noon and the horse's dinner-time: "Did the
+horse have his dinner, Haley?"
+
+"I just gave it to him, ma'am; and an ilegint dinner he had."
+
+"Why did you feed him just when I was about to drive him?"
+
+"Oh, well, it's not much he got."
+
+"He should have had nothing."
+
+"Faith, me lady, I ownly showed it to him."
+
+There were no more respectable people in The Lane than John Godfrey and
+his family. His pretty little wife with an anxious face tenderly watched
+over an ever-increasing family of daughters, till on one most
+providential occasion the expected girl turned out to be a boy, and I
+went with my sisters to congratulate the happy mother. "What will you
+name the little fellow, Mrs. Godfrey?" I asked, sympathetically.
+
+The poor woman looked up with a smile, saying weakly, "John Pathrick,
+miss--John afther the father, an' Pathrick afther the saint."
+
+The following year the same unexpected luck brought another boy, and
+again we young girls, being much at leisure, carried our
+congratulations: "What will be the name of this little boy, Mrs.
+Godfrey?"
+
+"Pathrick John, miss--Pathrick afther the saint, an' John afther the
+father."
+
+A confused sense of having heard that sentence before came over me.
+"Why, Mrs. Godfrey," I said, "was not that the name of your last child?"
+
+"To be shure, miss. Why would I be trating one betther than the other?"
+
+A member of this same family, upon receiving a blow with a stone in the
+eye, left her somewhat overcrowded paternal home for the quieter
+protection of her widowed aunt, Mrs. King, and one day my sister and
+myself knocked at Mrs. King's door to inquire about the state of the
+injured organ.
+
+"Troth, miss, it's very bad," said Mrs. King.
+
+"What do you do for it, Mrs. King?"
+
+"Do?" said Mrs. King, suddenly applying the corner of her apron to her
+overflowing eyes--"Do?" she continued in a broken voice. "I've been
+crying these three days."
+
+"But what do you do to make it better?"
+
+Mrs. King took heart, folded her arms, and thus applied herself to the
+setting forth of her humane exertions: "In comes Mistress Magovern,
+an', 'Mrs. King,' sez she, 'put rar bafesteak to the choild's oye;' an'
+that minit, ma'am, the rar bafesteak wint to it. Thin comes Mrs. Haley.
+'Is it rar bafesteak ye'd be putting to it, Mrs. King?' sez she. 'Biling
+clothes, Mrs. King,' sez she. That minit, ma'am, the rar bafesteak come
+afif an' the biling clothes wint to it. In comes Mrs. Quinlan. 'Will ye
+be destryin' the choild's oye intirely, Mrs. King?' sez she. 'Cowld ice,
+Mrs. King.' An' that minit, ma'am, the biling clothes come aff an' the
+cowld ice wint to it. Oh, I do be doin' iverything anybody do tell me."
+
+It was a memorable sight to see the Gunning twins wandering down The
+Lane hand in hand when their maternal relative had gone out washing for
+the day and taken the door-key with her. "Thim lads is big enough to
+take care of thimsilves," she would remark, though "the lads" were not
+yet capable of coherent speech. No doubt they wandered into some
+neighbor's at meal-time and received a willingly-given potato or a drink
+of milk. They seemed happy enough, and their funny, ugly little faces
+were defaced by no tears. They grew in time old enough to explain their
+position to inquiring passers-by and to pick up and eat an amazing
+quantity of green apples. A lady passing one day stopped and
+remonstrated with one of them. "Barney," she said, "it will make you ill
+if you eat those green apples."--"I do be always atin' of them, ma'am,"
+replied Barney, stolidly.
+
+Perhaps it may have been the green apples, but from whatever cause
+Barney fell ill, and all that the doctor prescribed made him no better.
+"It's no matther, stir," said Mrs. Gunning one morning: "yer needn't
+come ag'in. I'll just go an' ask Mrs. ------" (my mother).
+
+The next morning the doctor, meeting my mother, laughingly remarked
+that it was very plain that they couldn't practise in the same
+district: he had just met Mrs. Gunning, who informed him that "what
+Mrs. ------ gave her the night befoor done the choild a power of good."
+
+The day preceding our departure from the place my sister and I passed
+through The Lane, and received the most amiable farewells, accompanied
+with blessings, and even tears. The figure I best remember is that of
+Mrs. Regan, who, bursting out from her doorway, stood in our path, and,
+dissolving in tears, sobbed out, "Faith, I'm sorry yez be goin'. I don't
+know what I'll do at all widout yez;" and, seizing my sister's hand,
+gave her this unique recommendation: "Ye were always passing by
+mannerly--niver sassy nor impidint, nor nothing."
+
+The Lane has changed to-day. A Chinese grocer has, I hear, set up a shop
+in its midst. Some of its most noted characters have passed away, and
+the younger generation have taken on habits more American than those of
+their predecessors.
+
+M.R.O.
+
+
+
+
+A CHILD'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY.
+
+
+A quaint and charming volume, which has fallen in our way, is _Little
+Charlie's Life_, "the autobiography of a child between six and seven
+years of age, written with his own hand and without any assistance
+whatever." It was at the urgent request of the gentleman who acted as
+editor, Rev. W.R. Clark--thus rescuing an inimitable little work from
+comparative oblivion--that the parents of the youthful author
+reluctantly consented to the publication of this curious delineation of
+child-life. From the date of his birth (1833), Charlie must have written
+his work some forty years ago. How long he was engaged in its
+composition is not stated, but from the internal evidence yielded by the
+spelling and the handwriting (for the work is lithographed in exact
+imitation of the manuscript) we should infer that it occupied two or
+three years, the handwriting of the first seven chapters being in
+imitation of ordinary printing, while the remaining chapters appear in
+an ordinary schoolboy's hand. We may add that it is copiously
+illustrated by himself, and that the illustrations are worth their
+weight in gold, supplementing as they do, in a superfluously exact and
+curiously quaint manner, this most unique work.
+
+He starts with this account of himself: "My name is Charles John Young,
+and I was born in Amfort, a pretty village in Hampshire, 1833 in July,
+that pleasant time when the birds sing merrily and flowers bloom
+sweetly. My father and mother are the kindest in the world, and I love
+them dearly and both alike. I shall give a description of them by and
+by. In the mean time I shall just say that my papa is a clergyman."
+
+The earlier chapters describe the various migrations of the family from
+one parish to another, and from them we have no difficulty in
+recognizing in "papa" the Rev. Julian Young, who possessed no small
+share of the talents that distinguished _his_ father, the celebrated
+tragedian, Charles Young, and which seem to have been transmitted to our
+author, who, we understand, has honorably served his country in Her
+Majesty's army. From his earliest years Charlie seems to have been
+strongly influenced by religious feelings. His creed was a bright and
+trustful one, a realization of God's presence and of the need of
+speaking to Him as to one who could always hear and help. When he was
+about three years old, we are told in the editor's interesting preface,
+he was often heard offering up little petitions for the supply of his
+child-like wants. Once, when, his nurse left him to fetch some more
+milk, his father overheard him saying, "O God, please let there be
+enough milk in the jug for me to have some more, for Jesus Christ's
+sake. Amen." Many quaint little religious reflections and scriptural
+allusions are interspersed throughout the book. In one place he declares
+that "without papa and mamma the garden would be to me what the
+wilderness was to John the Baptist;" while again he offers up a pathetic
+prayer for a baby-brother; and throughout we are struck by the fact that
+his religion was pre-eminently one of love. Charlie's educational
+advantages were of the noblest and best, home-training largely
+predominating. In the ninth chapter he refers in a simple matter-of-fact
+way to his early studies: "Mamma devotes her time in teaching me and in
+reading instructive books with me. Papa tells me about the productions
+of the earth, rivers, mountains, valleys, mines, and, most wonderful of
+all, the formation of the human body." Further on we read: "Nothing of
+any great importance occurred now for some time. My life was spent
+quietly in the country, as the child of a Wiltshire clergyman ought,
+mamma devoting her time in teaching me, and my daily play going on the
+same, till at last papa and mamma took me to the splendid capital of
+England." However much this brilliant transition may have dazzled him,
+he still prefers his quiet country home, arguing thus: "As to living
+there [in London], I should not like it. The reason why--because its
+noisy riots in the streets suit not my mood like the tranquil streams
+and the waving trees I love in England's country.... 'Tis true--oh, how
+true!--in the poetic words of Mr. Shakespeare, 'Man made the town, God
+made the country.'"
+
+Despite the stilted style and absurdly pompous descriptions, with an
+occasional terrible breakdown, Charlie's love of Nature, and especially
+of the animal creation, seems to have been most genuine. He speaks of
+"the wide ocean which when angry roars and clashes over the beach, but
+when calm crabs are seen crawling on the shore and the sun shines bright
+over the waves," and of "the billows rolling over each other and foaming
+over the rough stones," with an apparently real enthusiasm. The softer
+emotions of his nature were engrossed in this way, as we infer from the
+negative evidence afforded by his autobiography that he reached his
+seventh year without any experience of the tender passion.
+
+His physiological ideas in the speculations regarding the origin of a
+baby-brother are naïvely expressed: "One day I was told that a baby was
+born [this was when he was three years and a half old], and upon going
+into mamma's bedroom I saw a red baby lying in an arm-chair wrapped in
+swaddling-clothes. It puzzled me very much to think how he came into the
+world: it was mysterious, very, and I cannot make it out now. My first
+thought was, that he must have had airy wings, and after he had come
+they had disappeared. My second thought was that he was so very little
+as to be able to come through the keyhole, and increased rapidly in
+size, just as it says in the Bible that a grain of mustard-seed springs
+to be so large a tree that the fowls of the air can roost upon it."
+
+In his sixth year Charlie evinced poetic tendencies. We have in one of
+his poems a description of his grandpapa, "a venerable old gentleman
+with dark eyes, gray hair, noble features, and altogether very generous
+aspect." Here is "a song appropriate to him:"
+
+  Oh, venerable is our old ancestor--
+        Cloud on his brow,
+        Lightning in his eyes,
+  His gray hair streaming in the wind.
+        To children ever kind,
+        To merit never blind,--
+  Oh, such is our old ancestor,
+  With hair that streameth wild.
+
+At the head of this poem is a picture of the old ancestor, consisting of
+a hat, a head, a walking-stick, one arm and two legs, one of
+which--whether the right or left is doubtful, as their origin is
+concealed by the aforesaid arm--is much longer than the other, and
+walking in a contrary direction. The most wonderful feature of this
+sketch is the "hair streaming in the wind," the distance from the poll
+to the end of the flowing locks being longer than the longest leg.
+
+We cannot conclude without an extract describing a "dreadful accident"
+which happened to our youthful author; "perhaps," as he solemnly says,
+"for a punishment of my sins, or to show me that Death stands ready at
+the door to snatch my life away:" "One night papa had been conjuring a
+penny, and I thought _I_ should like to conjure; so I took a round brass
+thing with a verse out of the Bible upon it that I brought into bed with
+me. I thought it went down papa's throat, so _I_ put it down _my_ throat,
+and I was pretty near choked. I called my nurse, who was in the next
+room. She fetched up papa, and then my nurse brought the basin. Papa
+beat my back, and I was sick. _Lo! there was the counter!_ Papa said,
+'Good God!' and my nurse fainted, but soon recovered. Don't you think
+papa was very clever when he beat my back? Papa then had a long talk
+afterward with me about it--a very serious one."
+
+The above pathetic story is accurately illustrated, but we especially
+regret that we cannot transfer to these pages some of the marvellous
+delineations of the animals in the Clifton Zoological Garden.
+
+M.S.D.
+
+
+
+
+WANTED--A REAL GAINSBOROUGH.
+
+
+I am an unmarried man of twenty-four. After that confession it is hardly
+necessary to add that I am in the habit of thinking a great deal about a
+person not yet embodied into actual existence--i.e. my future wife. I
+have not yet met her--she is a purely ideal being--but at the same time
+I so often have a vivid conception of her looks, her air, her walk, her
+tones even, that she seems to be present. My misery is that I cannot
+find her in real life.
+
+No one need fancy that I am an imaginative man: quite the contrary is
+the fact. I am a lawyer, and have an office in Bond street. Every
+morning at eight o'clock I take the Sixth Avenue horse-cars and ride
+down to Fourteenth street. I have a fancy for walking the rest of the
+way, and toward evening I saunter back homeward along Broadway and Union
+Square.
+
+Prosaic as these journeys may seem, they are nevertheless the
+inspiration of my hopes, the feeders of my visions. It is at such times
+that I enjoy my glimpses of the lady I long to meet. I jostle gentle
+creatures at every step: feminine shapes and feminine tones are on every
+side presented to eyes and ears. I trust nobody will be prejudiced
+against me when I confess that I see the fair one of my dreams in the
+shop-windows. Once having seen her, I become immeasurably happy, and go
+on dreaming about her until we meet again. It may seem a curious
+admission, but this beautiful although impalpable being is suggested by
+the charming dresses, hats and bonnets displayed on the milliners'
+blocks. None of our artists can paint portraits now-a-days: Art seems to
+have withdrawn her gifts from them and endowed the dressmakers and
+milliners instead.
+
+It was at first difficult for me to decide on the personality of my
+beloved. My earliest fancy was for a blond: at least the dress was of
+pale blue silk with a profusion of lace trimmings. Her hat was of straw
+faced with azure velvet, and the crown surrounded by a long plume, also
+of ciel blue. I knew by heart the features of this fair young creature,
+invisible although she was to others. They seemed to belong more to a
+flower than to a face: her eyes were large and blue, full of appealing
+love; her hair was of course golden; her smile was angelic; and her
+whole expression was one of sweetness and goodness. She was my first
+dream: little although she belonged to actual life, she used to trip
+about by my side and sit with me in my room at home. Suddenly, however,
+I became enamored of a different creature, and my dream changed. I began
+to think of my lovely blond regretfully as of a beautiful creature too
+good for earth who died young. It is the habit of the shopkeepers to
+change the figures in their windows, and one morning I fell in love with
+quite a different creature. She wore when I first saw her a long dress
+of black silk and velvet sparkling with jet; over her shoulders was
+thrown carelessly a mantle of cream-colored cloth; on her head was a
+plush hat--what they call a Gainsborough--trimmed with a long graceful
+plume, also of cream-color. Although only her back was toward me, I knew
+by instinct exactly what her face was. She was dark of course, with a
+low broad forehead, about which clustered little short curls; her eyes
+were superb, at once laughing and melancholy; her features suggested
+rather pride than softness; but her smile was enchanting, open, sunny,
+like a burst of light from behind a cloud. Nothing could be more real
+than this vision. At first the discovery of this magnificently-endowed
+woman rendered me happy: I used to walk past the shop half a dozen
+times a day to look at her. Her costumes varied, but they always
+suggested the same dark but brilliant lineaments, the same graceful
+movements, the same peculiarly lovely tones. She often looked back at me
+over her shoulder, but had an air of evading me. All at once, with
+surprise and delight, I remembered that she might be found in actual
+existence, in real flesh and blood. I deserted the image for a week in
+the hope of finding the reality. I paced Fifth Avenue; I went to the
+dry-goods stores; I attended the theatres. Often I seemed to see her
+before me--the picturesque hat, the long plume, the rich mantle and
+dress. At such moments while I pressed forward my heart beat. When the
+cheek turned toward me and the eyes lighted up with surprise at my
+disappointed stare, it was easy enough to see that I had made a mistake.
+There was the hat, the cloak, the bewitching little frippiness of lace
+and net and ribbon about the bust. She had, however, copied the
+masterpiece without investing herself with its soul: her face was vague
+and characterless, her whole personality void of that eloquent
+womanliness which had so wrought upon me. This experience was so many
+times repeated that I was frightfully tormented by it. The familiar
+dress seemed to reveal with appalling truthfulness the lack of those
+qualities of heart and soul which I demanded. Those lovely, picturesque
+outlines suggest not only rounded cheeks colored with girlish bloom, but
+something more; and the graceful draping is not a meaningless husk.
+
+I have gone back to my shop-window image. She never disappoints me. She
+is as beautiful, as magnificently endowed, as full of fascinating life
+and spirit, as ever. I sometimes think, unless I find her actual
+prototype, of buying that Gainsborough hat, that cloth mantle and velvet
+dress, and hanging them up in my room.
+
+
+
+
+LITERATURE OF THE DAY.
+
+
+     History of the English People. By John Richard Green. New York:
+     Harper & Brothers.
+
+Most readers interested in English history have long felt the need of
+such a work as this, in which the results of recent research among
+original sources and of the critical examination of earlier labors are
+gathered up and summarized in a narrative at once clear and concise,
+free from disquisition, minuteness of detail and elaborate descriptions,
+without being meagre or superficial, devoid of suggestiveness or of
+animation. In calling his work a _History of the English People_, Mr.
+Green has not undertaken to deviate from the beaten track, devoting his
+attention to social development and leaving political affairs in the
+background. What he has evidently had in view is the fact that English
+history is in a special sense that of the rise and growth of free
+institutions, exhibiting at every stage the mutual influence or combined
+action of different classes, permeated even when the Crown or the
+aristocracy was most powerful by a popular spirit, and contrasting in
+this respect with that of France and Spain, in which during many
+centuries the mass of the people lost instead of gaining ground,
+representative bodies analogous to the English Parliament were deprived
+of their rights or swept out of existence, and liberty was sacrificed to
+national consolidation and unity. Whence this difference came need
+hardly be pointed out. The Angles, Saxons and Jutes were neither freer
+nor more enterprising than the Franks and other Teutonic families; but
+the fortune which carried them to Britain saved them from inheriting any
+onerous share of the great legacy of the Roman Empire--with the task of
+absorbing and transmitting its language and civilization--secured them
+against the risk of being either merged in a more numerous race or
+submerged by a new influx, and thus preserved an identity and continuity
+which link their latest achievements with their earliest exploits, and
+stamp their whole career with the same character.
+
+With such a subject, Mr. Green has had no difficulty in so marking its
+divisions as to concentrate attention on successive epochs without
+dropping the thread that runs through the whole. The earlier portions of
+his work are naturally the most instructive and the fullest of interest.
+The last volume, indeed, which covers the ground from the Revolution to
+the battle of Waterloo, besides including the index to the whole work,
+gives far too rapid a survey of momentous and familiar events to afford
+profit or satisfaction. One feels that, while the style retains its
+fluency, the tone has lost its warmth, and that much of the writing must
+have been perfunctory: the reading, at all events, cannot but be so. But
+scarcely any one, however well acquainted with the ground, can follow
+without pleasure and an enlargement of view Mr. Green's account of
+"Early England," "England under Foreign Kings," "The Charter" and "The
+Parliament" (from 1307 to 1461), which form the subjects of the first
+four books; while the next four, occupying the second and third volumes,
+and entitled "The Monarchy," "The Reformation," "Puritan England" and
+"The Revolution," are marked by a grasp of thought, a fine sense of
+proportion, a thorough knowledge and well-balanced judgment of men and
+events, and not unfrequently a dramatic force, which sustain the
+interest throughout, and which make them a valuable addition, and
+sometimes a necessary corrective, to the fuller and more brilliant
+narratives in which the same periods and subjects have been separately
+treated.
+
+Mr. Green does not appear to have gone deeply into the study of original
+sources, but it is only in his incidental treatment of continental
+history that his deficiencies in this respect become palpable. Here he
+is often inaccurate, and even when his facts are correct his mode of
+stating them shows that he is not master of the whole field, and has
+little appreciation of mingled motives and attendant circumstances. Such
+a sentence as this: "The restoration of the towns on the Somme to
+Burgundy, the cession of Normandy to the king's brother, Francis, the
+hostility of Brittany, not only detached the whole western coast from
+the hold of Lewis, but forced its possessors to look for aid to the
+English king who lay in their rear," could not have been written with
+any clear ideas of either the political or the geographical relations
+of the places mentioned. What is meant by the "western coast"? Not,
+certainly, the towns on the Somme, which lie in the north-east, nor
+Normandy, which has indeed a western coast of its own, but cannot be
+said to form part of the western coast of France. Nor does Brittany
+include "the _whole_ western coast," or even the larger portion of it,
+while it could not have been "detached from the hold of Lewis," inasmuch
+as he had never held it. As little will that remark apply to the other
+provinces on the western coast, as these were still in his possession.
+Who are meant, therefore, by the "possessors" of this misty coast, and
+why the English king is said to have lain "in their rear," can only be
+conjectured. It is a small blunder that the French king's brother is
+called "Francis" instead of Charles, since we must not suspect Mr. Green
+of confounding him with the duke of Brittany, who bore the former name.
+But the whole passage, in connection with what follows it, indicates
+that the author has mixed up the state of affairs at two very close, but
+very distinct, conjunctures. Many similar instances of defective
+knowledge might be cited, nor are they confined to this early period.
+The remark, in regard to Charles of Austria (the emperor Charles V.),
+that "the madness of his mother left him _next heir_ of Castille" is
+nonsense: he was her heir in any case, while through her madness he
+became nominally joint, and virtually sole, ruler of the kingdom. His
+son Philip had not been "twice a widower" when he married Mary of
+England, and the assertion that "he owed his victory at Gravelines
+mainly to the opportune arrival of ten English ships of war" is
+patriotic, but foolish. That "Catholicism alone united the burgher of
+the Netherlands to the noble of Castille, or Milanese and Neapolitan to
+the Aztec of Mexico and Peru," would be an incomprehensible statement
+even if Peru had been inhabited by the Aztecs. Such errors, however,
+cannot seriously impair the value of Mr. Green's work. Its merits, as
+regards both matter and form, are solid and varied. The scale on which
+it was planned adapts it admirably to the gap which it was intended to
+fill, and, except in the latter portions, its comparative brevity of
+treatment excludes neither important facts nor modifying views. No
+shorter work could give the reader any adequate knowledge or conceptions
+in regard to English history, and no longer work is needed to make him
+fully acquainted with its essential features.
+
+     White Wings: A Yachting Romance. By William Black. New York: Harper
+     & Brothers.--Roy and Viola. By Mrs. Forrester. Philadelphia: J.B.
+     Lippincott & Co.--The Wellfields. By Jessie Fothergill.
+     (Leisure-Hour Series.) New York: Holt & Co.--Troublesome Daughters.
+     By L.B. Walford. (Leisure--Hour Series.) New York: Holt &
+     Co.--Brigitta. By Berthold Auerbach. (Leisure--Hour Series.) New
+     York: Holt & Co.
+
+There is a time appointed to read novels--a time which belongs, like
+that of other good things, to youth, when the real and the ideal merge
+into each other, and even the most practical beliefs turn upon the
+notion that the world was created for ourselves, and that the general
+system of things is bound to furnish circumstances and incidents which
+shall flatter our unsatisfied desires. It seems a pity that it should
+not fall to the lot of the critic to write down his impression of new
+books at this epoch, when he is most fitted to enjoy them. When romance
+and other delights have blankly vanished--"gone glimmering through the
+dreams of things that were"--he is scarcely fitted to trust the worth of
+his own impressions. Reading from mere idle curiosity or with critical
+intentions, and reading with delight, with eager absorption in the story
+and an eager desire to know how it turns out, are two different matters.
+The loss of this capacity for enjoyment of the every-day novel is not a
+subject for self-gratulation, coming as it does from our own absence of
+imagination and from narrowing instead of increasing powers. That period
+of our existence when we could read anything which offered should be
+looked back upon with a feeling of purely admiring regret, and in our
+efforts to master the novel of to-day we should endeavor to bring back
+the glory and the sweetness of the early dream.
+
+It is not so very long ago that Mr. William Black's novels began to
+charm us. He did not take Fame at a single leap, but wooed her
+patiently, and suffered many a repulse. His first book, _Ion; or,
+Marriage_, was probably the very worst novel ever written by a man who
+was finally to make a great success. _The Daughter of Heth_ achieved
+this result, and _The Strange Adventures of a Phaeton, A Princess of
+Thule_ and _Macleod of Dar_ deepened, one by one, the witchery the
+first threw over us. The author's power was especially shown in
+investing his maidens with glamour and piquancy: Coquette and Sheila led
+their captives away from the suffocating dusts and the burning heats of
+life. Then his backgrounds were so well chosen--those mysterious reaches
+of the far northern seas, the slow twilights over the heaving ocean, the
+swift dawns, the storms and the lightnings, and the glad blue skies.
+Even the music of the bagpipes inspired lamentations only less sweet
+than notes of joy. Mr. Black still has lovely girls; his yachts still
+pitch and roll and scud over the tossed and misty Hebridean seas; there
+are the same magical splendors of air and sky and water and shores; the
+wail of the pibroch is heard as of yore--
+
+    Dunvegan! oh, Dunvegan!
+
+Why, then, is it that his last book fails to do more than arouse dim
+memories of some previous enjoyment? Why are his violets without
+perfume? Why is his music vacant of the old melodies?
+
+In _Roy and Viola_, on the contrary, Mrs. Forrester is seen at her best,
+and has given us a book of lively interest. The situation in some
+respects suggests that of _Daniel Deronda:_ D'Arcy is a sort of
+Grandcourt cheapened and made popular, acting out his instincts of
+tyranny and brutality with more ostentation and less good taste. What is
+subtly indicated by George Eliot is given with profuse effect by the
+present writer. Viola, if not a Gwendolen, is yet an unloving wife. Sir
+Douglas Roy plays a somewhat difficult rôle--that of friend to the
+husband and undeclared lover to the wife--without losing our respect. He
+is in many ways a successful hero, and acts his part without either
+insipidity or priggishness. A genial optimist like Mrs. Forrester, as
+her old readers may well believe, sacrifices to a hopelessly unhappy
+marriage no lot which interests us. Disagreeable husbands die at an
+auspicious moment, and everybody is finally made happy in his or her own
+way, which includes the possession of plenty of money. The conversations
+are piquant, and the interest of the story is well kept up.
+
+_The Wellfields_ is a falling off from _Probation_, which in its turn
+was a distinct falling-off from Miss Fothergill's initial story, _The
+First Violin_. The characters are dim, intangible, remote, possessing no
+reality even at the outset, and as they progress becoming even more
+estranged from our belief and sympathy. Jerome is too feeble to arouse
+even our resentment, which we mildly expend on Sara instead for
+displaying grief for so poor a creature. When an author publishes one
+successful book, it should be a matter of serious thought whether it is
+not worth while to make such a triumph the crowning event of his or her
+destiny, lest Fate should have in reserve the tedious trials which await
+those who are compelled to hear that their sun has set.
+
+Mrs. Walford's last book has, in a measure, retrieved a certain
+reputation for interest which her _Cousins_ had lost. In _Troublesome
+Daughters_, however, one looks in vain for the fulfilment of the promise
+of _Mr. Smith_ and her delightful _Van: A Summer Romance_.
+
+In _Brigitta_ we find enough of Auerbach's charm to like the story,
+simple as it is. It recalls his greater books only by the fidelity of
+the tone and the clearness of the pictures. Xander is well drawn, and
+the tragedy of his life, portrayed as it is by those few strong touches
+which reveal the real artist, is profoundly impressive.
+
+------
+
+_New Books Received._
+
+Geo. P. Rowell & Co.'s American Newspaper Directory, containing Accurate
+Lists of all the Newspapers and Periodicals published in the United
+States, Territories and the Dominion of Canada, together with a
+description of the towns and cities in which they are published. New
+York: George P. Rowell & Co.
+
+The Skin in Health and Disease. By L. Duncan Bulkley, M.D. (American
+Health Primers.) Philadelphia: Presley Blakiston.
+
+The Confessions of a Frivolous Girl. Edited by Robert Grant. Vignette
+Illustrations. Boston: A. Williams & Co.
+
+The Life and Public Services of James A. Garfield. By Major J.M. Bundy.
+New York: A.D. Barnes & Co.
+
+The Mystery of Allanwold. By Mrs. Elizabeth Van Loon. Philadelphia: T.
+B. Peterson & Brothers.
+
+Political and Legal Remedies for War. By Sheldon Amos, M.A. New York:
+Harper & Brothers.
+
+Mary Anerley: A Yorkshire Tale. By R.D. Blackmore. New York: Harper &
+Brothers.
+
+A Selection of Spiritual Songs, with Music for the Sunday-school. New
+York: Scribner & Co.
+
+[Footnote 1: I use here the official nomenclature of Pennsylvania: by
+whatever title the local officials are known in the various States, the
+general fact is of course the same in all.]
+
+[Footnote 2: In some tests given in Richards' _Treatise on Coal Gas_ (p.
+293) the following results were shown: Obstruction of light by--
+
+  A      clear               glass  globe, about 12  per cent.
+  An    engraved              "     "      "     24     "
+  Obscured  all     over      "     "      "     40     "
+  Opal       "       "        "     "      "     60     "
+  Painted    "       "        "     "      "     64     "               ]
+
+[Footnote 3: There is a recent method of adding carbon to the gas which
+is not liable to the objection of clogging the pipes. By a small
+apparatus a stick of naphthaline is attached to the burner so as to be
+slowly vaporized. It is not yet in the hands of dealers in
+gas-fixtures.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Our narrative is drawn from the _Libra del Passo Honroso,
+defendido por el excelente caballero Suero de Quiñones, copilado de un
+libro antiguo de mano por Fr. Juan de Pineda, Religiose de la orden de
+San Francisco. Segunda edicion_. Madrid, 1783, in the _Crónicas
+españolas_, vol. v.]
+
+[Footnote 5: In modern French, _Il faut délivrer_--"It is necessary to
+release," referring to the chain worn by Quiñones.]
+
+[Footnote 6: "If it does not please you to show moderation, I say, in
+truth, that I am unfortunate."]
+
+[Footnote 7: Prosper Mérimée, in a note to his _History of Peter the
+Cruel_ (London, 1849, vol. i., p. 35), says, referring to the above
+episode, "I do not think that at that period an example of similar
+condescension could be found anywhere except in Spain. A century later
+the _chevalier sans peur et sans reproche_, the valiant Bayard, refused
+to mount a breach in company with lansquenets."]
+
+[Footnote 8: Beginning, "Libera me, Domine, de morte æterna," etc.]
+
+[Footnote 9: The Church as early as 1131 (Council of Rheims) endeavored
+to prevent these dangerous amusements by denying burial in consecrated
+ground with funeral rites to those who were killed in tournaments.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Puymaigre explains this almost total absence of Frenchmen
+by the fact that in 1434 the wars between Charles VII and the English
+were being waged. The English pilgrims to Santiago (the large number of
+whom we have previously mentioned) were probably non-combatants.]
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Lippincott's Magazine of Popular
+Literature and Science, Vol. XXVI., December, 1880., by Various
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LIPPINCOTT'S MAGAZINE ***
+
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