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diff --git a/20095.txt b/20095.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6a39cd7 --- /dev/null +++ b/20095.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2656 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Journeys to Bagdad, by Charles S. Brooks, +Illustrated by Allen Lewis + + +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: Journeys to Bagdad + + +Author: Charles S. Brooks + + + +Release Date: December 12, 2006 [eBook #20095] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JOURNEYS TO BAGDAD*** + + +E-text prepared by Barbara Tozier, Bill Tozier, and the Project Gutenberg +Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net/) + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustrations. + See 20095-h.htm or 20095-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/0/0/9/20095/20095-h/20095-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/0/0/9/20095/20095-h.zip) + + +Transcriber's note: + + Words or phrases in italics are enclosed by underscores. + + An underscore is also used in the chapter "Through the + Scuttle with the Tinman" in the equation + a=(Dx/2T)f(a, b c T_3) + to indicate that the "3" is a subscript. + + + + + +JOURNEYS TO BAGDAD + +by + +CHARLES S. BROOKS + +Illustrated with Original Wood-Cuts by Allen Lewis + + + + + + + +[Illustration] + + +Yale University Press +New Haven Connecticut +M D CCCC XV +Copyright, 1915, by +Yale University Press +First printed November, 1915, 1000 copies + + + PUBLISHERS' NOTE + + The Yale University Press makes grateful acknowledgment to the + Editors of the _Yale Review_ and of the _New Republic_ for + permission to include in the present work essays of which they were + the original publishers. + + + + +CONTENTS + + +CHAPTER + + I. Journeys to Bagdad + II. The Worst Edition of Shakespeare + III. The Decline of Night-Caps + IV. Maps and Rabbit-Holes + V. Tunes for Spring + VI. Respectfully Submitted--To a Mournful Air + VII. The Chilly Presence of Hard-headed Persons + VIII. Hoopskirts and Other Lively Matter + IX. On Traveling + X. Through the Scuttle with the Tinman + + + + +JOURNEYS TO BAGDAD + + + + +[Illustration] + +JOURNEYS TO BAGDAD + + +Are you of that elect who, at certain seasons of the year--perhaps in +March when there is timid promise of the spring or in the days of October +when there are winds across the earth and gorgeous panic of fallen +leaves--are you of that elect who, on such occasion or any occasion else, +feel stirrings in you to be quit of whatever prosy work is yours, to throw +down your book or ledger, or your measuring tape--if such device marks +your service--and to go forth into the world? + +I do count myself of this elect. And I will name such stimuli as most set +these stirrings in me. And first of all there is a smell compounded out of +hemp and tar that works pleasantly to my undoing. Now it happens that +there is in this city, down by the river where it flows black with city +stain as though the toes of commerce had been washed therein, a certain +ship chandlery. It is filthy coming on the place, for there is reek from +the river and staleness from the shops--ancient whiffs no wise enfeebled +by their longevity, Nestors of their race with span of seventy lusty +summers. But these smells do not prevail within the chandlery. At first +you see nothing but rope. Besides clothesline and other such familiar and +domestic twistings, there are great cordages scarce kinsmen to them, which +will later put to sea and will whistle with shrill enjoyment at their +release. There are such hooks, swivels, blocks and tackles, such confusion +of ships' devices as would be enough for the building of a sea tale. It +may be fancied that here is Treasure Island itself, shuffled and laid +apart in bits like a puzzle-picture. (For genius, maybe, is but a +nimbleness of collocation of such hitherto unconsidered trifles.) Then you +will go aloft where sails are made, with sailormen squatting about, +bronzed fellows, rheumatic, all with pipes. And through all this shop is +the smell of hemp and tar. + +In finer matters I have no nose. It is ridiculous, really, that this very +messenger and forerunner of myself, this trumpeter of my coming, this +bi-nasal fellow in the crow's-nest, should be so deficient. If smells were +bears, how often I would be bit! My nose may serve by way of ornament or +for the sniffing of the heavier odors, yet will fail in the nice detection +of the fainter waftings and olfactory ticklings. Yet how will it dilate on +the Odyssean smell of hemp and tar! And I have no explanation of this, for +I am no sailor. Indeed, at sea I am misery itself whenever perchance "the +ship goes _wop_ (with a wiggle between)." Such wistful glances have I cast +upon the wide freedom of the decks when I leave them on the perilous +adventure of dinner! So this relish of hemp and tar must be a legacy from +a far-off time--a dim atavism, to put it as hard as possible--for I seem +to remember being told that my ancestors were once engaged in buccaneering +or other valiant livelihood. + +But here is a peculiar thing. The chandlery gives me no desire to run away +to sea. Rather, the smell of the place urges me indeterminately, +diffusedly, to truantry. It offers me no particular chart. It but cuts my +moorings for whatever winds are blowing. If there be blood of a pirate in +me, it is a shame what faded juice it is. It would flow pink on the +sticking. In mean contrast to skulls, bowie-knives and other red villainy, +my thoughts will be set toward the mild truantry of trudging for an +afternoon in the country. Or it is likely that I'll carry stones for the +castle that I have been this long time building. Were the trick of prosody +in me, I would hew a poem on the spot. Such is my anemia. And yet there is +a touch of valiancy, too, as from the days when my sainted ancestors +sailed with their glass beads from Bristol harbor; the desire of visiting +the sunset, of sailing down on the far side of the last horizon where the +world itself falls off and there is sky with swirl of stars beyond. + +[Illustration] + +In the spring of each year everyone should go to Bagdad--not particularly +to Bagdad, for I shall not dictate in matter of detail--but to any such +town that may happen to be so remote that you are not sure when you look +it up whether it is on page 47 which is Asia, or on page 53 which is +Persia. But Bagdad will serve: For surely, Reader, you have not forgotten +that it was in Bagdad in the surprising reign of Haroun-al-Raschid that +Sinbad the Sailor lived! Nor can it have escaped you that scarce a mule's +back distance--such was the method of computation in those golden +days--lived that prince of medieval plain-clothes men, Ali Baba! + +Historically, Bagdad lies in that tract of earth where purple darkens into +night. Geographically, it lies obliquely downward, and is, I compute, +considerably off the southeast corner of my basement. It is such distant +proximity, doubtless, that renders my basement--and particularly its +woodpile, which lies obscurely beyond the laundry--such a shadowy, grim +and altogether mysterious place. If there be any part of the house, +including certain dark corners of the attic, that is fearfully +Mesopotamian after nightfall, it is that woodpile. Even when I sit above, +secure with lights, if by chance I hear tappings from below--such noises +are common on a windy night--I know that it is the African Magician +pounding for the genie, the sound echoing through the hollow earth. It is +matter of doubt whether the iron bars so usual on basement windows serve +chiefly to keep burglars out, or whether their greater service is not +their defense of western Christianity against the invasion from the East +which, except for these bars, would enter here as by a postern. At a +hazard, my suspicion would fall on the iron doors that open inwards in the +base of chimneys. We have been fondly credulous that there is nothing but +ash inside and mere siftings from the fire above; and when, on an +occasion, we reach in with a trowel for a scoop of this wood-ash for our +roses, we laugh at ourselves for our scare of being nabbed. But some day +if by way of experiment you will thrust your head within--it's a small +hole and you will be besmirched beyond anything but a Saturday's +reckoning--you will see that the pit goes off in darkness--_downward_. It +was but the other evening as we were seated about the fire that there came +upward from the basement a gibbering squeak. Then the woodpile fell over, +for so we judged the clatter. Is it fantastic to think that some dark and +muffled Persian, after his dingy tunneling from the banks of the Tigris, +had climbed the pile of wood for a breath of night at the window and, his +foot slipping, the pile fell over? Plainly, we heard him scuttling back to +the ash-pit. + +Be these things as they may, when you have arrived in Bagdad--and it is +best that you travel over land and sea--if you be serious in your zest, +you will not be satisfied, but will journey a thousand miles more at the +very least, in whatever direction is steepest. And you will turn the +flanks of seven mountains, with seven villainous peaks thereon. For the +very number of them will put a spell on you. And you will cross running +water, that you leave no scent for the world behind. Such journey would be +the soul of truantry and you should set out upon the road every spring +when the wind comes warm. + +Now the medieval pilgrimage in its day, as you very well know, was a most +popular institution. And the reasons are as plentiful as blackberries. But +in the first place and foremost, it came always in the spring. It was like +a tonic, iron for the blood. There were many men who were not a bit pious, +who, on the first warm day when customers were scarce, yawned themselves +into a prodigious holiness. Who, indeed, would resign himself to changing +moneys or selling doves upon the Temple steps when such appeal was in the +air? What cobbler even, bent upon his leather, whose soul would not mount +upon such a summons? Who was it preached the first crusade? There was no +marvel in the business. Did he come down our street now that April's here, +he would win recruits from every house. I myself would care little whether +he were Christian or Mohammedan if only the shrine lay over-seas and deep +within the twistings of the mountains. + +[Illustration] + +If, however, your truantry is domestic, and the scope of the seven seas +with glimpse of Bagdad is too broad for your desire, then your yearning +may direct itself to the spaces just outside your own town. If such myopic +truantry is in you, there is much to be said for going afoot. In these +days when motors are as plentiful as mortgages this may appear but +discontented destitution, the cry of sour grapes. And yet much of the +adventuring of life has been gained afoot. But walking now has fallen on +evil days. It needs but an enlistment of words to show its decadence. +Tramp is such a word. Time was when it signified a straight back and +muscular calves and an appetite, and at nightfall, maybe, pleasant gossip +at the hearth on the affairs of distant villages. There was rhythm in the +sound. But now it means a loafer, a shuffler, a wilted rascal. It is +patched, dingy, out-at-elbows. Take the word vagabond! It ought to be of +innocent repute, for it is built solely from stuff that means to wander, +and wandering since the days of Moses has been practiced by the most +respectable persons. Yet Noah Webster, a most disinterested old gentleman, +makes it clear that a vagabond is a vicious scamp who deserves no better +than the lockup. Doubtless Webster, if at home, would loose his dog did +such a one appear. A wayfarer, also, in former times was but a goer of +ways, a man afoot, whether on pilgrimage or itinerant with his wares and +cart and bell. Does the word not recall the poetry of the older road, the +jogging horse, the bush of the tavern, the crowd about the peddler's pack, +the musician piping to the open window, or the shrine in the hollow? Or +maybe it summons to you a decked and painted Cambyses bellowing his wrath +to an inn-yard. + +[Illustration] + +One would think that the inventor of these scandals was a crutched and +limping fellow, who being himself stunted and dwarfed below the waist was +trying to sneer into disuse all walking the world over, or one who was +paunched by fat living beyond carrying power, larding the lean earth, +fearing lest he sweat himself to death, some Falstaff who unbuttons him +after supper and sleeps on benches after noon. Rather these words should +connote the strong, the self-reliant, the youthful. He is a tramp, we +should say, who relies most on his own legs and resources, who least +cushions himself daintily against jar in his neighbor's tonneau, whose eye +shines out seldomest from the curb for a lift. The wayfarer must go forth +in the open air. He must seek hilltop and wind. He must gather the dust of +counties. His prospects must be of broad fields and the smoking chimneys +of supper. + +But the goer afoot must not be conceived as primarily an engine of muscle. +He is the best walker who keeps most widely awake in his five senses. Some +men might as well walk through a railway tunnel. They are so concerned +with the getting there that a black night hangs over them. They plunge +forward with their heads down as though they came of an antique race of +road builders. Should there be mileposts they are busied with them only, +and they will draw dials from their pokes to time themselves. I fell into +this iniquity on a walk in Wales from Bala to Dolgelley. Although I set +out leisurely enough, with an eye for the lake and hills, before many +hours had elapsed I had acquired the milepost habit and walked as if for a +wager. I covered the last twenty miles in less than five hours, and when +the brown stone village came in sight and I had thumped down the last hill +and over the peaked bridge, I was a dilapidated and foot-sore vagrant and +nothing more. To this day Wales for me is the land where one's feet have +the ugly habit of foregathering in the end of the shoes. + +Worse still than the athletic walker is he who takes Dame Care out for a +stroll. He forever runs his machinery, plans his business ventures and +introduces his warehouse to the countryside. + +Nor must walking be conceived as merely a means of resting. One should set +out refreshed and for this reason morning is the best time. Yours must be +an exultant mood. "Full many a glorious morning have I seen flatter the +mountain-tops with sovereign eye." Your brain is off at a speed that was +impossible in your lack-luster days. You have a flow of thoughts instead +of the miserable trickle that ordinarily serves your business purposes and +keeps you from under the trolley cars. + +But all truantry is not in the open air. I know a man who while it is yet +winter will get out his rods and fit them together as he sits before the +fire. Then he will swing his arm forward from the elbow. The table has +become his covert and the rug beyond is his pool. And sometimes even when +the rod is not in his hand he will make the motion forward from the elbow +and will drop his thumb. It will show that he has jumped the seasons and +that he stands to his knees in an August stream. + +It was but yesterday on my return from work that I witnessed a sight that +moved me pleasantly to thoughts of truantry. Now, in all points a grocer's +wagon is staid and respectable. Indeed, in its adherence to the business +of the hour we might use it as a pattern. For six days in the week it +concerns itself solely with its errands of mercy--such "whoas" and running +up the kitchen steps with baskets of potatoes--such poundings on the +door--such golden wealth of melons as it dispenses. Though there may be a +kind of gayety in this, yet I'll hazard that in the whole range of +quadricycle life no vehicle is more free from any taint of riotous +conduct. Mark how it keeps its Sabbath in the shed! Yet here was this +sturdy Puritan tied by a rope to a motor-car and fairly bounding down the +street. It was a worse breach than when Noah was drunk within his tent. +Was it an instance of falling into bad company? It was Nym, you remember, +who set Master Slender on to drinking. "And I be drunk again," quoth he, +"I'll be drunk with those that have the fear of God, and not with drunken +knaves." Or rather did not every separate squeak of the grocer's wagon cry +out a truant disposition? After years of repression here was its chance at +last. And with what a joyous rollic, with what a lively clatter, with what +a hilarious reeling, as though in gay defiance of the law of gravity, was +it using its liberty! Had it been a hearse in a runaway, the comedy would +not have been better. If I had been younger I would have pelted after and +climbed in over the tailboard to share the reckless pitch of its +enfranchisement. + +Then there is a truantry that I mention with hesitation, for it comes +close to the heart of my desire, and in such matter particularly I would +not wish to appear a fool to my fellows. The child has this truantry when +he plays at Indian, for he fashions the universe to his desires. But some +men too can lift themselves, though theirs is an intellectual bootstrap, +into a life that moves above these denser airs. Theirs is an intensity +that goes deeper than daydreaming, although it admits distant kinship. +Through what twilight and shadows do such men climb until night and +star-dust are about them! Theirs is the dizzy exaltation of him who mounts +above the world. Alas, in me is no such unfathomable mystery. I but trick +myself. Yet I have my moments. These stones that I carry on the mountain, +what of them? On what windy ridge do I build my castle? It is shrill and +bleak, they say, on the topmost peaks of the Delectable Mountains, so +lower down I have reared its walls. There is no storm in these upland +valleys and the sun sits pleasantly on their southern slopes. But even if +there be unfolded no broad prospect from the devil to the sunrise, there +are pleasant cottages in sight and the smoke of many suppers curling up. + +If you happened to have been a freshman at Yale some eighteen years ago +and were at all addicted to canoeing on Lake Whitney, and if, moreover, on +coming off the lake there burned in you a thirst for ginger-beer--as is +common in the gullet of a freshman--doubtless you have gone from the +boathouse to a certain little white building across the road to gratify +your hot desires. When you opened the door, your contemptible person--I +speak with the vocabulary of a sophomore--is proclaimed to all within by +the jangling of a bell. After due interval wherein you busy yourself in an +inspection of the cakes and buns that beam upon you from a show-case--your +nose meanwhile being pressed close against the glass for any slight +blemish that might deflect your decision (for a currant in the dough often +raises an unsavory suspicion and you'll squint to make the matter +sure)--there will appear through a back door a little old man to minister +unto you. You will give no great time to the naming of your drink--for the +fires are hot in you--but will take your bottle to a table. The braver +spirits among you will scorn glasses as effeminate and will gulp the +liquor straight from the bottle with what wickedest bravado you can +muster. + +Now it is likely that you have done this with a swagger and have called +your servitor "old top" or other playful name. Mark your mistake! You were +in the presence, if you but knew it, of a real author, not a tyro fumbling +for self-expression, but a man with thirty serials to his credit. Shall I +name the periodical? It was the _Golden Hours_, I think. Ginger-beer and +jangling bells were but a fringe upon his darker purpose. His desk was +somewhere in the back of the house, and there he would rise to all the +fury of a South-Sea wreck--for his genius lay in the broader effects. Even +while we simpletons jested feebly and practiced drinking with the open +throat--which we esteemed would be of service when we had progressed to +the heavier art of drinking real beer--even as we munched upon his ginger +cakes, he had left us and was exterminating an army corps in the back +room. He was a little man, pale and stooped, but with a genius for +truantry--a pilgrim of the Bagdad road. + +But we move on too high a plane. Most of us are admitted into truantry by +the accidents, merely, of our senses. By way of instance, the sniff of a +rotten apple will set a man off as on seven-league boots to the valleys of +his childhood. The dry rustling of November leaves re-lights the fires of +youth. It was only this afternoon that so slight a circumstance as a ray +of light flashing in my eye provided me an agreeable and unexpected +truantry. It sent me climbing the mountains of the North and in no less +company than that of Brunhilda and a troop of Valkyrs. + +It is likely enough that none of you have heard of Long Street. As far as +I am aware it is not known to general fame. It is typically a back street +of the business of a city, that is, the ventages of its buildings are +darkened most often by packing cases and bales. Behind these ventages are +metal shoots. To one uninitiated in the ways of commerce it would appear +that these openings were patterned for the multiform enactment of an Amy +Robsart tragedy, with such devilish deceit are the shoots laid up against +the openings. First the teamster teeters and cajoles the box to the edge +of the dray, then, with a sudden push, he throws it off down the shoot, +from which it disappears with a booming sound. As I recall it was by some +such treachery that Amy Robsart met her death. Be that as it may, all day +long great drays go by with Earls of Leicester on their lofty seats, +prevailing on their horses with stout, Elizabethan language. If there +comes a tangle in the traffic it is then especially that you will hear a +largeness of speech as of spacious and heroic days. + +During the meaner hours of daylight it is my privilege to occupy a desk +and chair at a window that overlooks this street. Of the details of my +activity I shall make no mention, such level being far below the flight of +these enfranchised hours of night wherein I write. But in the pauses of +this activity I see below me wagon loads of nails go by and wagon loads of +hammers hard after, to get a crack at them. Then there will be a truck of +saws, as though the planking of the world yearned toward amputation. Or +maybe, at a guess, ten thousand rat-traps will move on down the street. +It's sure they take us for Hamelin Town, and are eager to lay their +ambushment. There is something rather stirring in such prodigious +marshaling, but I hear you ask what this has to do with truantry. + +It was near quitting time yesterday that a dray was discharging cases down +a shoot. These cases were secured with metal reinforcement, and this metal +being rubbed bright happened to catch a ray of the sun at such an angle +that it was reflected in my eye. This flash, which was like lightning in +its intensity, together with the roar of the falling case, transported +me--it's monstrous what jumps we take when the fit is on us--to the slopes +of dim mountains in the night, to the heights above Valhalla with the +flash of Valkyrs descending. And the booming of the case upon the +slide--God pity me--was the music. It was thus that I was sent aloft upon +the mountains of the North, into the glare of lightning, with the cry of +Valkyrs above the storm.... + +But presently there was a voice from the street. "It's the last case +to-night, Sam, you lunk-head. It's quitting time." + +The light fades on Long Street. The drays have gone home. The Earls of +Leicester drowse in their own kitchens, or spread whole slices of bread on +their broad, aristocratic palms. Somewhere in the dimmest recesses of +those cluttered buildings ten thousand rat-traps await expectant the +oncoming of the rats. And in your own basement--the shadows having +prospered in the twilight--it is sure (by the beard of the prophet, it is +sure) that the ash-pit door is again ajar and that a pair of eyes gleam +upon you from the darkness. If, on the instant, you will crouch behind the +laundry tubs and will hold your breath--as though a doctor's thermometer +were in your mouth, you with a cold in the head--it's likely that you will +see a Persian climb from the pit, shake the ashes off him, and make for +the vantage of the woodpile, where--the window being barred--he will sigh +his soul for the freedom of the night. + +[Illustration] + + + + +THE WORST EDITION OF SHAKESPEARE + + + + +[Illustration] + +THE WORST EDITION OF SHAKESPEARE + + +Reader, if by fortunate chance you have a son of tender years--the age is +best from the sixth to the eleventh summer--or in lieu of a son, a nephew, +only a few years in pants--mere shoots of nether garments not yet +descending to the knees--doubtless, if such fortunate chance be yours, you +went on one or more occasions last summer to a circus. + +If the true holiday spirit be in you--and you be of other sort, I'll not +chronicle you--you will have come early to the scene for a just +examination of what mysteries and excitements are set forth in the +side-shows. Now if you be a man of humane reasoning, you will stand +lightly on your legs, alert to be pulled this way or that as the nepotic +wish shall direct, whether it be to the fat woman's booth or to the +platform where the thin man sits with legs entwined behind his neck, in +delightful promise of what joy awaits you when you have dropped your +nickel in the box and gone inside. To draw your steps, it is the showman's +privilege to make what blare he please upon the sidewalk; to puff his +cheeks with robustious announcement. + +If by further fortunate chance, you are addicted, let us say, in the +quieter hours of winter, to writing of any kind--and for your joy, I pray +that this be so, whether this writing be in massive volumes, or obscure +and unpublished beyond its demerit--if such has been your addiction, you +have found, doubtless, that your case lies much like the fat woman's; that +it is the show you give before the door that must determine what numbers +go within--that, to be plain with you, much thought must be given to the +taking of your title. It must be a most alluring trumpeting, above the din +of rival shows. + +So I have named this article with thought of how I might stir your learned +curiosity. I have set scholars' words upon my platform, thereby to make +you think how prodigiously I have stuffed the matter in. And all this +while, my article has to do only with a certain set of Shakespeare in nine +calfskin volumes, edited by a man named John Bell, now long since dead, +which set happens to have stood for several years upon my shelves; also, +how it was disclosed to me that he was the worst of all editors, together +with the reasons thereto and his final acquittal from the charge. + +John Bell has stood, for the most part, in unfingered tranquillity, for I +read from a handier, single volume. Only at cleaning times has he been +touched, and then but in the common misery with all my books. Against this +cleaning, which I take to be only a quirk of the female brain, I have +often urged that the great, round earth itself has been subjected to only +one flood, and that even that was a failure, for, despite Noah's +shrewdness at the gangway, villains still persist on it. How then shall my +books profitably endure a deluge both autumn and spring? + +Thereafter, when the tempest has spent itself and the waters have returned +from off my shelves, I'll venture in the room. There will be something +different in the sniff of the place, and it will be marvelously picked up. +Yet I can mend these faults. But it does fret me how books will be +standing on their heads. Were certain volumes only singled out to stand +upon their heads, Shaw for one, and others of our moderns, I would suspect +the housemaid of expressing in this fashion a sly and just criticism of +their inverted beliefs. I accused her on one occasion of this subtlety, +but was met by such a vacant stare that I acquitted her at once. However, +as she leaves my solidest authors also on their heads, men beyond the +peradventure of such antics, I must consider it but a part of her +carelessness, for which I have warned her twice. Were it not for her +cunning with griddlecakes, to which I am much affected, I would have +dismissed her before this. + +And now this Bell, which has ridden out so many of my floods, is +proclaimed to me a villain. We had got beyond the April freshets and there +was in consequence a soapy smell about. It is clear in my mind that a +street organ had started up a gay tune and that there were sounds of +gathering feet. I was reading at the time, in the green rocker by the +lamp, a life of John Murray, by one whose name I have forgotten, when my +eyes came on the sentence that has shaken me. Bell, it said, Bell of my +own bookshelf, of all the editors of Shakespeare was the worst. + +In my agitation I removed my glasses, breathed upon the lenses, and +polished them. Here was one of my familiars accused of something that was +doubtless heinous, although in what particulars I was at a loss to know. +It came on me suddenly. It was like a whispered scandal, sinister in its +lack of detail. All that I had known of Bell was that its publication had +dated from the eighteenth century. Yet its very age had seemed a patent of +respectability. If a thing does not rot and smell in a hundred and forty +years, it would seem to be safe from corruption: it were true peacock. But +here at last from Bell was an unsavory whiff. My flood had abated only a +fortnight since, and here was a stowaway escaped. Bell was proclaimed a +villain. Again had a flood proved itself a failure. + +[Illustration] + +Now, I feel no shame in having an outsider like Murray display to me these +hidden evils; for I owe no inquisitorial duty to my books. There are +people who will not admit a volume to their shelves until they have thrown +it open and laid its contents bare. This is the unmannerly conduct of the +customs wharf. Indeed, it is such scrutiny, doubtless, that induces some +authors to pack their ideas obscurely, thereby to smuggle them. However, +there being now a scandal on my shelves, I must spy into it. + +John Murray, wherein I had read the charge, had been such a friendly, +tea-and-gossip book, not the kind to hiss a scandal at you. It was bound +in blue cloth and was a heavy book, so that I held it on a cushion. (And +this device I recommend to others.) It was the kind of book that stays +open at your place, if you leave it for a moment to poke the fire. Some +books will flop a hundred pages, to make you thumb them back and forth, +though whether this be the binder's fault or a deviltry set therein by +their authors I am at a loss to say. But Shaw would be of this kind, +flopping and spry to mix you up. And in general, Shaw's humor is like that +of a shell-man at a country fair--a thimble-rigger. No matter where you +guess that he has placed the bean, you will be always wrong. Even though +you swear that you have seen him slip it under, it's but his cunning to +lead you off. But Murray was not that kind. It would stand at its post, +unhitched, like a family horse. + +Here was quandary. I looked at Bell, but God forgive me, it was not with +the old trustfulness. He was on the top shelf but one, just in line with +the eyes, with gilt front winking in the firelight. I had set him thus +conspicuous with intention, because of his calfskin binding, quite old and +worn. A decayed Gibbon, I had thought, proclaims a grandfather. A set of +British Essayists, if disordered, takes you back of the black walnut. To +what length, then, of cultured ancestry must not this Bell give evidence? +(I had bought Bell, secondhand, on Farringdon Road, London, from a cart, +cheap, because a volume was missing.) + +And now it seemed he was in some sort a villain. Although shocked, I felt +a secret joy. For somewhat too broadly had Bell smirked his sanctity on +me. When piety has been flaunting over you, you will steal a slim occasion +to proclaim a flaw. There is much human nature goes to the stoning of a +saint. In my ignorance I had set the rogue in the company of the decorous +Lorna Doone and the gentle ladies of Mrs. Gaskell. It is not that I admire +that chaste assembly. But it were monstrous, even so, that I should +neighbor them with this Bell, who, as it appeared, was no better than a +wolf in calf's clothing. It was Little Red Riding Hood, you will recall, +who mistook a wolf for her grandmother. And with what grief do we look on +her unhappy end! + +My hand was now raised to drag Bell out by the heels, when I reflected +that what I had heard might be unfounded gossip, mere tattle, and that +before I turned against an old acquaintance, it were well to set an +inquiry afoot. First, however, I put him alongside Herbert Spencer. If it +were Bell's desire to play the grandmother to him, he would find him tough +meat. + +Bell, John--I looked him up, first in volume Aus to Bis of the +encyclopedia, without finding him, and then successfully in the National +Biography--Bell, John, was a London bookseller. He was born in 1745, +published his edition of Shakespeare in 1774, and after this assault, with +the blood upon him, lived fifty years. This was reassuring. It was then +but a bit of wild oats, no hanging matter. I now went at the question +deeply. Yet I left him awhile with the indigestible Herbert. + +It was in 1774 that Bell squirted his dirty ink. In _The Gentleman's +Magazine_ for that year appear mutterings from America, since called the +Boston Tea Party. I set this down to bring the time more warmly to your +mind, for a date alone is but a blurred signpost unless you be a scholar. +And it is advisedly that I quote from this particular periodical, because +its old files can best put the past back upon its legs and set it going. +There is a kind of history-book that sorts the bones and ties them all +about with strings, that sets the past up and bids it walk. Yet it will +not wag a finger. Its knees will clap together, its chest fall in. Such +books are like the scribblings on a tombstone; the ghost below gives not +the slightest squeal of life. But slap it shut and read what was written +hastily at the time on the pages of _The Gentleman's Magazine_, and it +will be as though Gabriel had blown a practice toot among the headstones. +It is then that you will get the gibbering of returning life. + +So it was in 1774 that Bell put out his version of Shakespeare. Bell was +not a man of the schools. Caring not a cracked tinkle for learning, it was +not to the folios, nor to any authority that he turned for the texts of +his plays. Instead, he went to Drury Lane and Covent Garden and took their +acting copies. These volumes, then, that catch my firelight hold the very +plays that the crowds of 1774 looked upon. Herein is the Romeo, word for +word, that Lydia Languish sniffled over. Herein is Shylock, not yet with +pathos on him, but a buffoon still, to draw the gallery laugh. + +A few nights later, having by grace of God escaped a dinner out, and being +of a consequence in a kindly mood, the scandal, too, having somewhat +abated in my memory, I took down a brown volume and ran my fingers over +its sides and along its yellow edges. Then I made myself comfortable and +opened it up. + +There is nothing to-day more degenerate than our title-pages. It is in a +mean spirit that we pinch and starve them. I commend the older kind +wherein, generously ensampled, is the promise of the rich diet that shall +follow. At the circus, I have said, I'll go within that booth that has +most allurement on its canvas front, and where the hawker has the biggest +voice. If a fellow will but swallow a snake upon the platform at the door, +my money is already in my palm. Thus of a book I demand an earnest on the +title-page. + +Bell's title-page is of the right kind. In the profusion and variety of +its letters it is like a printer's sample book, with tall letters and +short letters, dogmatic letters for heaping facts on you and script +letters reclining on their elbows, convalescent in the text. There are +slim letters and again the very progeny of Falstaff. And what flourishes +on the page! It is like a pond after the antics of a skater. + +There follows the subscribers' list. It is a Mr. Tickle's set that has +come to me, for his name is on the fly-leaf. But for me and this set of +Bell, Mr. Tickle would seem to have sunk into obscurity. I proclaim him +here, and if there be anywhere at this day younger Tickles, even down to +the merest titillation, may they see these lines and thus take a greeting +from the past. + +Then follows an essay on oratory. It made me grin from end to end. Yet, as +on the repeating of a comic story, it is hard to get the sting and rollic +on the tongue. And much quotation on a page makes it like a foundling +hospital--sentences unparented, ideas abandoned of their proper text. +"Where grief is to be expressed," says Bell, "the right hand laid slowly +on the left breast, the head and chest bending forward, is a just +expression of it.... Ardent affection is gained by closing both hands +warmly, at half arm's length, the fingers intermingling, and bringing them +to the breast with spirit.... Folding arms, with a drooping of the head, +describe contemplation." I have put it to you and you can judge it. + +Let us consider Bell's marginalia of the plays! Every age has importuned +itself with words. _Reason_ was such a word, and _fraternity_, and +_liberty_. _Efficiency_, maybe, is the latest, though it is sure that when +you want anything done properly, you have to fight for it. It is below the +dignity of my page to put a plumber on it, yet I have endured occasions! +This word _efficiency_, then, comes from our needs and not from our +accomplishment. It is at best a marching song, not a shout of victory. It +is when the house is dirty that the cry goes up for brooms. + +So Bell in the notes upon the margins of his pages echoes a world that is +talking about _delicacy_, about _sentiment_, about _equality_. (For a +breeze blows up from France.) It was these words that the eighteenth +century most babbled when it grew old. It had horror for what was low and +vulgar. It wore laces on its doublet front, and though it seldom washed, +it perfumed itself. And all this is in Bell, for his notes are a running +comment of a shallow, puritanistic prig, who had sharp eyes and a gossip's +tongue. This was the time, too, when such words as _blanket_ were not +spoken by young ladies if men were about; for it is a bedroom word and +therefore immoral. Bell objected from the bottom of his silly soul that +Lady Macbeth should soil her mouth with it. "Blanket of the dark," he +says, "is an expression greatly below our author. Curtain is evidently +better." "Was the hope drunk wherein you dressed yourself?" Whereat Bell +again complains that Lady Macbeth is "unnecessarily indelicate." "Though +this tragedy," says Bell, "must be allowed a very noble composition, it is +highly reprehensible for exhibiting the chimeras of witchcraft, and still +more so for advancing in several places the principles of fatalism. We +would not wish to see young, unsettled minds to peruse this piece without +proper companions to prevent absurd prejudices." + +It must appear from this, that, although one gains no knowledge of +Shakespeare, one does gain a considerable knowledge of Bell and of his +time. And this is just as well. For Bell's light on Shakespeare would be +but a sulphur match the more at carnival time. Indeed, Shakespeare +criticism has been such a pageantry of spluttering candle-ends and +sniffing wicks that it is well that one or two tallow dips leave the +rabble and illuminate the adjacent alleys. It is down such an alley that +Bell's smoking light goes wandering off. + +As I read Bell this night, it is as though I listen at the boxes and in +the pit, in that tinkling time of 'seventy-four. The patched Laetitia sits +surrounded by her beaux. It was this afternoon she had the vapors. Next to +her, as dragon over beauty, is a fat dame with "grenadier head-dress." +"The Rivals" has yet to be written. London still hears "The Beggar's +Opera." Lady Macbeth is played in hoopskirts. The Bastille is a tolerably +tight building. Robert Burns is strewn with his first crumbs. It is the +age of omber, of sonnets to Chloe's false ringlets, of odes to red heels +and epics to lap dogs, of tinseled struttings in gilded drawing-rooms. It +was town-and-alley, this age; and though the fields lay daily in their new +creation with sun and shadow on them, together with the minstrelsy of the +winds across them and the still pipings of leaf and water, London, the +while, kept herself in her smudgy convent, her ear tuned only to the +jolting music of her streets, the rough syncope of wheel and voice. Since +then what countless winds have blown across the world, and cloud-wrack! +And this older century is now but a clamor of the memory. What mystery it +is! What were the happenings in that pin-prick of universe called London? +Of all the millions of ant hills this side Orion, what about this one? +London was so certain it was the center of circumambient space. +Tintinnabulate, little Bell! + +So you see that the head and front of Bell's villainy was that he was a +little man with an abnormal capacity for gossip. If gossip, then, be a +gallows matter, let Bell unbutton him for the end. On the contrary, if +gossip be but a trifle, here were a case for clement judgment. + +In the first place, there is no vice of necessity in gossip. This must be +clearly understood. It is proximity in time and place that makes it +intolerable. A gossip next door may be a nuisance. A gossip in history may +be delightful. No doubt if I had lived in Auchinleck in the days when +Boswell lived at home, I would have thought him a nasty little "skike." +But let him get to London and far off in the revolving years, and I admit +him virtuous. + +A gossip seldom dies. The oldest person in every community is a gossip and +there are others still blooming and tender, who we know will live to be +leathery and hard. That the life-insurance actuaries do not recognize this +truth is a shame to their perception. Ancestral lesions should bulk for +them no bigger than any slightest taint of keyhole lassitude. For it is by +thinking of ourselves that we die. It leads to rheums and indigestions and +off we go. And even an ignoble altruism would save us. I know one old lady +who has been preserved to us these thirty years by no other nostrum than a +knot-hole appearing in her garden fence. + +[Illustration] + +It is a matter of doubt whether at the fashionable cures it is the water +that has chief potency; or whether, so many being met together each +morning at the pump, it is not the exchange of these bits of news that +leads to convalescence. It is marvelous how a dull eye lights up if the +bit be spicy. There was a famous cure, I'm told, though I answer not for +the truth of this, closed up for no other reason than that a deeper +scandal being hissed about (a lady's maid affair), all the inmates became +distracted from their own complaints, and so, being made new, departed. To +this day the building stands with broken doors and windows as testament to +the blight such a sudden miracle put on the springs. + +This shows, therefore, that gossipry must be judged by its effects. If it +allay the stone or give a pleasant evening it should have reward instead +of punishment. And here had Bell diverted me agreeably for an hour. It is +true he had given me no "chill and arid knowledge" of Shakespeare, but I +had had ample substitute and the clock had struck ten before its time. It +were justice, then, that I cast back the lie on Murray and give Bell full +acquittal. + +No sooner was this decision made than I lifted him tenderly from the shelf +where I had sequestered him. Volume seven was on its head, but I set it +upright. Then I stroked its sides and blew upon its top, as is my custom. +At the last I put him on his former shelf in the company of the chaste +Lorna Doone and the gentle ladies of Mrs. Gaskell. + +He sits there now, this night, on the top shelf but one, just in line with +the eyes, with gilt front winking in the firelight. A decayed Gibbon, I +had thought, proclaims a grandfather. To what length, then, of cultured +ancestry must not this Bell give evidence? + +[Illustration] + + + + +THE DECLINE OF NIGHT-CAPS + + + + +[Illustration] + +THE DECLINE OF NIGHT-CAPS + + +It sounds like the tinkle of triviality to descend from the stern business +of this present time to write of night-caps: And yet while the discordant +battles are puffing their cheeks upon the rumbling bass pipes, it is +relief if there be intermingled a small, shrill treble--any slightest +squeak outside the general woe. + +There was a time when the chief issue of fowl was feather-beds. Some few +tallest and straightest feathers, maybe, were used on women's hats, and a +few of better nib than common were set aside for poets' use--goose +feathers in particular being fashioned properly for the softer flutings, +whether of Love or Spring--but in the main the manifest destiny of a +feather was a feather-bed. + +In those days it was not enough that you plunged to the chin in this hot +swarm of feathers, for discretion, in an attempt to ward off from you all +snuffling rheums, coughings, hackings and other fleshly ills, required you +before kicking off the final slippers to shut the windows against what +were believed to be the dank humors of the night. Nor was this enough. You +slept, of course, in a four-post bed; and the curtains had to be pulled +together beyond the peradventure of a cranny. Then as a last prophylaxis +you put on a night-cap. Mr. Pickwick's was tied under the chin like a +sunbonnet and the cords dangled against his chest, but this was a matter +of taste. It was behind such triple rampart that you slept, and were +adjudged safe from the foul contagion of the dark. Consequently your bed +was not exactly like a little boat. Rather it was like a Pullman sleeper, +which, as you will remember, was invented early in the nineteenth century +and stands as a monument to its wisdom. + +I have marveled at the ease with which Othello strangled Desdemona. +Further thought gives it explanation. The poor girl was half suffocated +before he laid hands on her. I find also a solution of Macbeth's enigmatic +speech, "Wicked dreams abuse the curtain'd sleep." Any dream that could +get at you through the circumvallation of glass, brocade, cotton and +feathers could be no better than a quadruplicated house-breaker, +compounded out of desperate villainies. + +Reader, have you ever purchased a pair of pajamas in London? This is +homely stuff I write, yet there's pathos in it. That jaunty air betokens +the beginning of your search before question and reiteration have dulled +your spirits. Later, there will be less sparkle in your eye. What! Do not +the English wear pajamas? Does not the sex that is bifurcated by day keep +by night to its manly bifurcation? Is not each separate leg swathed in +complete divorcement from its fellow? Or, womanish, do they rest in the +common dormitory of a shirt _de nuit_? The Englishman _does_ wear pajamas, +but the word with him takes on an Icelandic meaning. They are built to the +prescription of an Esquimo. They are woolly, fuzzy and the width of a +finger thick. If I were a night-watchman, "doom'd for a certain term to +walk the night," I should insist on English pajamas to keep me awake. If +Saint Sebastian, who, I take it, wore sackcloth for the glory of his soul, +could have lighted on the pair of pajamas that I bought on Oxford Circus, +his halo would have burned the brighter. + +Just how the feathery and billowy nights of our great-grandparents were +changed into the present is too deep for explanation. Perhaps Annie left a +door or window open--such neglect fitting with her other heedlessness--and +notwithstanding this means of entry, it was found in the morning that no +sprite or ooph had got in to pinch the noses of the sleepers. At least, +there was no evidence of such a visitation, unless the snoring that +abounded all the night did proceed from the pinching of the nose (the +nasal orifice being so clamped betwixt the forefinger and the thumb of +these devilish sprites that the breath was denied its proper channel). +Unless snoring was so caused, it is clear that no ooph had clambered +through the window. + +Or perhaps some brave man--a brother to him who first ate an oyster--put +up the window out of bravado to snap thereby his fingers at the forms of +darkness, and being found whole and without blemish or mark of witch upon +his throat and without catarrhal snuffling in his nose, of a consequence +the harsh opinion against the night softened. + +Or maybe some younger woman threw up her window to listen to the slim +tenor of moonlight passion with such strumming business as +accompanied--tinkling of cithern or mandolin--and so with chin in hand, +she sighed her soul abroad, to the result that the closing was forgotten. +It is like enough that her dreams were all the sweeter for the breeze that +blew across her bed--loaded with the rhythmic memory of the words she had +heard within the night. + +It was vanity killed the night-cap. What aldermanic man would risk the +chance of seeing himself in the mirror? What judge, peruked by day, could +so contain his learned locks? What male with waxed moustachios, or with +limpest beard, or chin new-reaped would put his ears in such a compress? +You will recall how Mr. Pickwick snatched his off when he found the lady +in the curl papers in his room. His round face showed red with shame +against the dusky bed-curtains, like the sun peering through the fog. + +As for bed-curtains, they served the intrigue of at least five generations +of novelists from Fielding onward. There was not a rogue's tale of the +eighteenth century complete without them. The wrong persons were always +being pinned up inside them. The cause of such confusion started in the +tap, too much negus or an over-drop of pineapple rum with a lemon in it or +a potent drink whose name I have forgotten that was always ordered "and +make it luke, my dear." Then, after such evening, a turn to the left +instead of right, a wrong counting of doors along the passage, the +jiggling of bed-curtains, screams and consternation. It is one of the +seven original plots. Except for clothes-closets, screens and +bed-curtains, Sterne must have gone out of the novel business, Sheridan +have lost fecundity and Dryden starved in a garret. But the moths got into +their red brocade at last and a pretty meal they made. + +A sleeping porch is the symbol of the friendly truce between man and the +material universe. The world itself and the void spaces of its wanderings, +together with the elements of our celestial neighborhood, have been viewed +by man with dark suspicion, with rather a squint-eyed prejudice. Let's +take a single case! Winds for a long time have borne bad +reputations--except such anemic collateral as are called zephyrs--but +winds, properly speaking, which are big and strong enough to have rough +chins and beards coming, have been looked upon as roustabouts. What was +mere humor in their behavior has been set down to mischief. If a wind in +playfulness does but shake a casement, or if in frolic it scatters the +ashes across the hearth, or if in liveliness it swishes you as you turn a +corner and drives you aslant across the street, is it right that you set +your tongue to gossip and judge it a son of Belial? + +There are persons also--but such sleep indoors--in whose ears the +wind whistles only gloomy tunes. Or if it rise to shrill piping, it +rouses only a fear of chimneys. Thus in both high pitch and low there +is fear in the hearing of it. Into their faces will come a kind of +God-help-the-poor-sailors-in-the-channel look, as in a melodrama when the +paper snowstorm is at its worst and the wind machine is straining at its +straps. One would think that they were afraid the old earth itself might +be buffeted off its course and fall afoul of neighboring planets. + +But behold the man whose custom is to sleep upon a porch! At what +slightest hint--the night being yet young, with scarce three yawns gone +round--does he shut his book and screen the fire! With what speed he bolts +the door and puts out the downstairs lights, lest callers catch him in the +business! How briskly does he mount the stairs with fingers already on the +buttons! Then with what scattering of garments he makes him ready, as +though his explosive speed had blown him all to pieces and lodged him +about the room! + +Then behold him--such general amputation not having proved +fatal--advancing to the door muffled like a monk! There is a slippered +flight. He dives beneath the covers. (I draw you a winter picture.) You +will see no more of him now than the tip of his nose, rising like a little +AEtna from the waves. + +But does _he_ fear the wind as it fumbles around the porch and plays like +a kitten with the awning cords? Bless you, he has become a playmate of the +children of the night--the swaying branches, the stars, the swirl of +leaves--all the romping children of the night. And if there was any fear +at all within the darkness, it has gone to sulk behind the mountains. + +[Illustration] + +But the wind sings a sleepy song and the game's too short. Then the wind +goes round and round the house looking for the leaves--for the wind is a +bit of a nursemaid--and wherever it finds them it tucks them in, under +fences and up against cellar windows where they will be safe until +morning. Then it goes off on other business, for there are other streets +in town and a great many leaves to be attended to. + +But the fellow with the periscopic nose above the covers lies on his back +beneath the stars, and contemplation journeys to him from the wide spaces +of the night. + + + + +MAPS AND RABBIT-HOLES + + + + +[Illustration] + +MAPS AND RABBIT-HOLES + + +In what pleasurable mystery would we live were it not for maps! If I +chance on the name of a town I have visited, I locate it on a map. I may +not actually get down the atlas and put my finger on the name, but at +least I picture to myself its lines and contour and judge its miles in +inches. And thereby for a thing of ink and cardboard I have banished from +the world its immensity and mystery. But if there were no maps--what then? +By other devices I would have to locate it. I would say that it came at +the end of some particular day's journey; that it lies in the twilight at +the conclusion of twenty miles of dusty road; that it lies one hour +nightward of a blow-out. I would make it neighbor to an appetite gratified +and a thirst assuaged, a cool bath, a lazy evening with starlight and +country sounds. Is not this better than a dot on a printed page? + +[Illustration] + +That is the town, I would say, where we had the mutton chops and where we +heard the bullfrogs on the bridge. Or that town may be circumstanced in +cherry pie, a comical face at the next table, a friendly dog with +hair-trigger tail, or some immortal glass of beer on a bench outside a +road-inn. These things make that town as a flame in the darkness, a flame +on a hillside to overtop my course. Many years can go grinding by without +obliterating the pleasant sight of its flare. Or maybe the town is so +intermingled with dismal memories that no good comes of too particularly +locating it. Then Tony Lumpkin's advice on finding Mr. Hardcastle's house +is enough. "It's a damn'd long, dark, boggy, dirty, dangerous way." And +let it go at that. + +Maps are toadies to the thoroughfares. They shower their attentions on the +wide pavements, holding them up to observation, marking them in red, and +babbling and prattling obsequiously about them, meanwhile snubbing with +disregard all the lanes and bypaths. They are cockney and are interested +in showing only the highroads between cities, and in consequence neglect +all tributary loops and windings. In a word, they are against the jog-trot +countryside and conspire with the signposts against all loitering and +irregularity. + +As for me, I do not like a straight thoroughfare. To travel such a road is +like passing a holiday with a man who is going about his business. Idle as +you are, vacant of purpose, alert for distraction, _he_ must keep his eyes +straight ahead and he must attend to the business in hand. I like a road +that is at heart a vagabond, which loiters in the shade and turns its head +on occasion to look around the corner of a hill, which will seek out +obscure villages even though it requires a zigzag course up a hillside, +which follows a river for the very love of its company and humors its +windings, which trots alongside and listens to its ripple and then +crosses, sans bridge, like a schoolboy, with its toes in the water. I love +a road which goes with the easy, rolling gait of a sailor ashore. It has +no thought of time and it accepts all the vagaries of your laziness. I +love a road which weaves itself into eddies of eager traffic before the +door of an inn, and stops a minute at the drinking trough because it has +heard the thirst in your horse's whinny; and afterwards it bends its head +on the hillside for a last look at the kindly spot. Ah, but the vagabond +cannot remain long on the hills. Its best are its lower levels. So down it +dips. The descent is easy for roads and cart wheels and vagabonds and much +else; until in the evening it hears again the murmur of waters, and its +journey has ended. + +[Illustration] + +There is of course some fun in a map that is all wrong. Those, for +example, of the early navigators are worth anybody's time. There is +possibility in one that shows Japan where Long Island ought to be. That +map is human. It makes a correct and proper map no better than a +molly-coddle. There can be fine excitement in learning on the best of +fourteenth century authority that there is no America and that India lies +outside the Pillars of Hercules. The uncharted seas, the _incognova terra_ +where lions are (_ubi leones erunt_, as the maps say), these must always +stir us. In my copy of Gulliver are maps of his discoveries. Lilliput lies +off the coast of Sumatra and must now be within sight of the passengers +bound from London to Melbourne if only they had eyes to see it. +Brobdingnag, would you believe it, is a hump on the west coast of America +and cannot be far from San Francisco. That gives one a start. Swift, +writing in 1725 with a world to choose from, selects the Californian coast +as the most remote and unknown for the scene of his fantastical adventure. +It thrusts 1725 into a gray antiquity. And yet there are many buildings in +England still standing that antedate 1725 by many years, some by +centuries. Queen Elizabeth had been dead more than a hundred years. +Canterbury was almost as old and probably in worse repair than it is now, +when Frisco was still Brobdingnag. Can it be that the giant red trees and +the tall bragging of the coast date from its heroic past? + +Story-writers have nearly always been the foes of maps, finding in them a +kind of cramping of their mental legs. And in consequence they have struck +upon certain devices for getting off the map and away from its precise and +restricting bigotry. Davy fell asleep. It was Davy, you remember, who grew +drowsy one winter afternoon before the fire and sailed away with the +goblin in his grandfather's clock. Robinson Crusoe was driven off his +bearings by stress of weather at sea. This is a popular device for eluding +the known world. Whenever in your novel you come on a sentence like +this--On the third night it came on to blow and that night and the three +succeeding days and nights we ran close-reefed before the +tempest--whenever you come on a sentence like that, you may know that the +author feels pinched and cramped by civilization, and is going to regale +you with some adventures of his uncharted imagination which are likely to +be worth your attention. + +Then there was Sentimental Tommy! Do you remember how he came to find the +Enchanted Street? It happened that there was a parade, "an endless row of +policemen walking in single file, all with the right leg in the air at the +same time, then the left leg. Seeing at once that they were after him, +Tommy ran, ran, ran until in turning a corner he found himself wedged +between two legs. He was of just sufficient size to fill the aperture, but +after a momentary lock he squeezed through, and they proved to be the gate +into an enchanted land." In that lies the whole philosophy of going +without a map. There is magic in the world then. There are surprises. You +do not know what is ahead. And you cannot tell what is about to happen. +You move in a proper twilight of events. After that Tommy went looking for +policemen's legs. Doubtless there were some details of the wizardry that +he overlooked, as never again could he come out on the Enchanted Street in +quite the same fashion. Alice had a different method. She fell down a +rabbit-hole and thereby freed herself from some very irksome lessons and +besides met several interesting people, including a Duchess. Alice may be +considered the very John Cabot of the rabbit-hole. Before her time it was +known only to rabbits, wood-chucks, and dogs on holidays, whose noses are +muddy with poking. But since her time all this is changed. Now it is known +as the portal of adventure. It is the escape from the plane of life into +its third dimension. + +Children have the true understanding of maps. They never yield slavishly +to them. If they want a pirates' den they put it where it is handiest, +behind the couch in the sitting-room, just beyond the glimmer of +firelight. If they want an Indian village, where is there a better place +than in the black space under the stairs, where it can be reached without +great fatigue after supper? Farthest Thule may be behind the asparagus +bed. The North Pole itself may be decorated by Annie on Monday afternoon +with the week's wash. From whatever house you hear a child's laugh, if it +be a real child and therefore a great poet, you may know that from the +garret window, even as you pass, Sinbad, adrift on the Indian Ocean, may +be looking for a sail, and that the forty thieves huddle, daggers drawn, +in the coal hole. Then it is a fine thing for a child to run away to +sea--well, really not to sea, but down the street, past gates and gates +and gates, until it comes to the edge of the known and sees a collie or +some such terrible thing. I myself have fine recollection of running away +from a farmhouse. Maybe I did not get more than a hundred paces, but I +looked on some broad heavens, saw a new mystery in the night's shadows, +and just before I became afraid I had a taste of a new life. + +To me it is strange that so few people go down rabbit-holes. We cannot be +expected to find the same delight in squeezing our fat selves behind the +couch of evenings, nor can we hope to find that the Chinese Mountains +actually lie beyond our garden fence. We cannot exactly run away either; +after one is twenty, that takes on an ugly and vagrant look, commendable +as it may be on the early marches. Prince Hal is always a more amiable +spectacle than John Falstaff, much as we love the knight. But there are +men, however few, who although they are beyond forty, retain in themselves +a fine zest for adventure. A man who, I am proud to say, is a friend of +mine and who is a devil for work by which he is making himself known in +the world, goes of evenings into the most delightful truantry with his +music. And it isn't only music, it is flowers and pictures and books. Of +course he has an unusual brain and few men can hope to equal him. He is +like Disraeli in that respect, who, it is said, could turn in a flash from +the problem of financing the Suez Canal to the contemplation of the +daffodils nodding along the fence. But do the rest of us try? There are +few men of business, no matter with what singleness of purpose they have +been installing their machinery and counting their nickels, but will admit +that this is but a small part of life. They dream of rabbit-holes, but +they will never go down one. I had dinner recently with a man who by his +honesty and perseverance has built up and maintained a large and +successful business. An orchestra was playing, and when it finished the +man told me that if he could write music like that we had heard he would +devote himself to it. Well, if he has enough desire in him for that +speech, he owes it to himself that he sound his own depths for the +discoveries he may make. It is doubtful if this quest would really lead +him to write music, God forbid; it might however induce him to develop a +latent appreciation until it became in him both a refreshment and a +stimulus. + +There are many places uncharted that are worth a visit. Treasure Island is +somewhere on the seas, the still-vex'd Bermoothes feel the wind of some +southern ocean, the coast of Bohemia lies on the furthermost shore of +fairyland--all of these wonderful, like white towers in the mind. But +nearer home, as near as the pirates' den that we built as children, within +sight of our firelight, should come the dreams and thoughts that set us +free from sordidness, that teach our minds versatility and sympathy, that +create for us hobbies and avocations of worth, that rest and refresh us. +If we must be ocean liners all day, plodding between known and monotonous +ports, at least we may be tramp ships at night, cargoed with strange +stuffs and trafficking for lonely and unvisited seas. + +[Illustration] + + + + +TUNES FOR SPRING + + + + +[Illustration] + +TUNES FOR SPRING + + Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo! + Spring, the sweet Spring! + + +If by any chance you have seen a man in a coat with sagging pockets, and a +cloth hat of the latest fashion but two--a hat which I may say is precious +to him (old friends, old wine, old hats)--emerging from his house just +short of noon, do not lay his belated appearance to any disorder in his +conduct! Certain neighbors at their windows as he passed, raised their +eyes in a manner, if I mistake not, of suspicion that a man should be so +far trespassing on the day, for nine o'clock should be the penny-picker's +latest departure for the vineyard. Thereafter the street belongs to the +women, except for such sprouting and unripe manhood as brings the +groceries, and the hardened villainy that fetches ice and with deep voice +breaks the treble of the neighborhood. But beyond these there are no men +in sight save the pantalooned exception who mows the grass, and with the +whirr of his clicking knives sounds the prelude of the summer. I'll say by +way of no more than a parenthetical flick of notice that his eastern +front, conspicuous from the rear as he bends forward over his machine, +shows a patched and jointed mullionry that is not unlike the tracery of +some cathedral's rounded apse. But I go too far in imagery. Plain speech +is best. I'll waive the gothic touch. + +But observe this sluggard who issues from his door! He knows he is +suspected--that the finger is uplifted and the chin is wagging. And so he +takes on a smarter stride with a pretense of briskness, to proclaim +thereby the virtue of having risen early despite his belated appearance, +and what mighty business he has despatched within the morning. + +But you will get no clue as to whether he has been closeted with the law, +or whether it is domestic faction--plumbers or others of their ilk (if +indeed plumbers really have any ilk and do not, as I suspect, stand +unbrothered like the humped Richard in the play). Or maybe some swirl of +fancy blew upon him as he was spooning up his breakfast, which he must set +down in an essay before the matter cool. Or an epic may have thumped +within him. Let us hope that his thoughts this cool spring morning have +not been heated to such bloody purpose that he has killed a score of men +upon his page, and that it is with the black gore of the ink-pot on him +that he has called for his boots to face the world. You remember the +fellow who kills him "some six or seven dozens of Scots at a breakfast, +washes his hands, and says to his wife, 'Fie upon this quiet life! I want +work.'" + +Such ferocity should not sully this fair May morning, when there are +sounds only of carpet-beating, the tinkle of the man who is out to grind +your knives and the recurrent melody of the connoisseur of rags and +bottles who stands in his cart as he drives his lean and pointed horse. At +the cry of this perfumed Brummel--if you be not gone in years too far--as +often as he prepares to shout the purpose of his quest, you'll put a +question to him, "Hey, there, what do you feed your wife on?" And then his +answer will come pat to your expectation, "Pa-a-a-per Ra-a-a-gs, +Pa-a-a-per Ra-a-a-gs!" If the persistence of youth be in you and the +belief that a jest becomes better with repetition--like beans nine days +cold within the pot--you will shout your question until he turns the +corner and his answer is lost in the noises of the street. "Adieu! Adieu! +thy plaintive anthem fades--" + +To this day I think of a rag-picker's wife as dining sparingly out of a +bag--not with her head inside like a horse, but thrusting her scrawny arm +elbow deep to stir the pottage, and sprinkling salt and pepper on for +nicer flavor. Following such preparation she will fork it out like +macaroni, with her head thrown back to present the wider orifice. If her +husband's route lies along the richer streets she will have by way of +tidbit for dessert a piece of chewy velvet, sugared and buttered to a +tenderness. + +But what is this jingling racket that comes upon the street? Bless us, +it's a hurdy-gurdy. The hurdy-gurdy, I need hardly tell you, belongs to +the organ family. This family is one of the very oldest and claims +descent, I believe, from the god Pan. However, it accepted Christianity +early and has sent many a son within the church to pipe divinity. But the +hurdy-gurdy--a younger son, wild, and a bit of a pagan like its +progenitor--took to the streets. In its life there it has acquired, among +much rascality, certain charming vices that are beyond the capacity of its +brother in the loft, however much we may admire the deep rumble of his +Sabbath utterance. + +The world has denied that chanticleer proclaims the day. But as far as I +know no one has had the insolence to deny the street-organ as the proper +herald of the spring. Without it the seasons would halt. Though science +lay me by the heels, I'll assert that the crocus, which is a pioneer on +the windy borderland of March, would not show its head except on the +sounding of the hurdy-gurdy. I'll not deny that flowers pop up their heads +afield without such call, that the jack-in-the-pulpit speaks its maiden +sermon on some other beckoning of nature. But in the city it is the +hurdy-gurdy that gives notice of the turning of the seasons. On its sudden +blare I've seen the green stalk of the daffodil jiggle. If the tune be of +sufficient rattle and prolonged to the giving of the third nickel, before +the end is reached there will be seen a touch of yellow. + +Whether this follows from the same cause as attracts the children to +flatten their noses on the windows and calls them to the curb that they +put their ears close upon the racket that no sweetest sound be lost, is a +deep question and not to be lightly answered. In the sound there is +promise of the days to come when circuses will be loosed upon the land and +elephants will go padding by--with eyes looking around for peanuts. Why +this biggest of all beasts, this creature that looms above you like a +crustaceous dinosaur--to use long words without squinting too closely on +their meaning--why this behemoth with the swishing trunk, should eat +peanuts, contemptible peanuts, lies so deep in nature that the mind turns +dizzy. It is small stuff to feed valor on--a penny's worth of food in such +a mighty hulk. Whatever the lion eats may turn to lion, but the elephant +strains the proverb. He might swallow you instead, breeches, hat and +suspenders--if you be of the older school of dress before the belt came +in--and not so much as cough upon the buttons. And there will be red and +yellow wagons, boarded up seductively, as though they could show you, if +they would, snakes and hyenas. May be it is best, you think--such things +lying in the seeds of time--to lay aside a dime from the budget of the +week, for one can never be sure against the carelessness of parents, and +their jaded appetites. + +[Illustration] + +But the hurdy-gurdy is the call to sterner business also. I know an old +lady who, at the first tinkle from the street, will take off her glasses +with a finality as though she were never to use them again for the light +pleasure of reading, but intended to fill the remainder of her days with +deeper purpose. There is a piece of two-legged villainy in her employ by +the name of William, and even before the changing of the tune, she will +have him rolling up the rugs for the spring cleaning. There is a sour +rhythm in the fellow and he will beat a pretty syncopation on them if the +hurdy-gurdy will but stick to marching time. It is said that he once broke +the fabric of a Kermanshah in his zeal at some crescendo of the _Robert E. +Lee_. But he was lost upon the valse and struck languidly and out of time. + +But maybe, Reader, in your youth you have heated a penny above a lamp, and +with treacherous smile you have come before an open window. And when the +son of Italy has grinned and beckoned for your bounty--the penny being +just short of a molten state--you have thrown it to him. He stoops, he +feels.... You have learned by this how much more blessed it is to give +than to receive. Or, to dig deep in the riot of your youth, you have +leased a hurdy-gurdy for a dollar and with other devils of your kind gone +forth to seek your fortune. It's in noisier fashion than when Goldsmith +played the flute through France for board and bed. If you turned the +handle slowly and fast by jerks you attained a rare tempo that drew +attention from even the most stolid windows. But as music it was as +naught. + +Down the street--it being now noon and the day Monday--Mrs. Y's washing +will be out to dry. Observe her gaunt replica, _cap-a-pie_, as immodest as +an advertisement! In her proper person she is prodigal if she unmask her +beauty to the moon. And in company with this, is the woolen semblance of +her plump husband. Neither of them is shap'd for sportive tricks: But look +upon them when the music starts! Hand in hand upon the line, as is proper +for married folk, heel and toe together, one, two, and a one, two, three. +It is the hurdy-gurdy that calls to life such revelry. The polka has come +to its own again. + +Yet despite this evidence that the hurdy-gurdy sets the world to +dancing--like the fiddle in the Turkish tale where even the headsman +forgot his business--despite such evidence there are persons who affect to +despise its melody. These claim such perceptivity of the outer ear and +such fineness of the channels that the tune is but a clack when it gets +inside. God pity such! I'll not write a word of them. + +A spring day is at its best about noon. I thrust this in the teeth of +those who prefer the dawn or the coming on of night. At noon there are +more yellow wheels upon the street. The hammering on sheds is at its +loudest as the time for lunch comes near. More grocers' carts are rattling +on their business. There is a better chance that a load of green +wheelbarrows may go by, or a wagon of red rhubarb. Then, too, the air is +so warm that even decrepitude fumbles on the porch and down the steps, +with a cane to poke the weeds. + +If you have luck, you may see a "cullud pusson" pushing a whitewash cart +with altruistic intent toward all dusky surfaces except his own. Or maybe +he has nice appreciation of what color contrasts he himself presents when +the work is midway. If he wear the faded memory of a silk hat, it's the +better picture. + +But also the schools are out and the joy of life is hissing up a hundred +gullets. Baseball has now a fierceness it lacks at the end of day. There +is wild demand that "Shorty, soak 'er home!" "Butter-fingers!" is a harder +insult. And meanwhile a pop-corn wagon will be whistling a blithe if +monotonous tune in trial if there be pennies in the crowd. Or a waffle may +be purchased if you be a Croesus, ladled exclusively for you and dropped +on the gridiron with a splutter. It is a sweet reward after you have +knocked a three-bagger and stolen home, and is worth a search in all your +eleven pockets for any last penny that may be skulking in the fuzz. + +Or perhaps there is such wealth upon your person that there is still a +restless jingle. In such case you will cross the street to a shop that +ministers to the wants of youth. In the window is displayed a box of +marbles--glassies, commonies, and a larger browny adapted to the purpose +of "pugging," by reason of the violence with which it seems to respond to +the impact of your thumb. Then there are baseballs of graded excellence +and seduction. And tops. Time is needed for the choosing of a top. First +you stand tiptoe with nose just above the glass and make your trial +selection. Pay no attention to the color, for that's the way a girl +chooses! Black is good, without womanish taint. Then you wiggle the peg +for its tightness and demand whether it be screwed in like an honest top. +And finally, before putting your money down, you will squint upon its +roundness. Then slam the door and yell your presence to the street! + +Or do you come on softer errand? In the rear of the shop is a parlor with +a base-burner and virtuous mottoes on the walls--a cosy room with vases. +And here it is they serve cream-puffs.... For safe transfer you balance +the puff in your fingers and take an enveloping bite, emerging with a +prolonged suck for such particles as may not have come safely across, and +bending forward with stomach held in. I'll leave you in this refreshment; +for if the money hold, you will gobble until the ringing of the bell. + +By this time, as you may imagine, the person with the sagging pockets whom +I told you of, has arrived in the center of the city where already he is +practicing such device of penny-picking as he may be master of. + +[Illustration] + + + + +RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED + +TO A MOURNFUL AIR + + + + +RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED + +TO A MOURNFUL AIR + + +_To any one of several editors._ + +Dear Sir: I paid a visit to your city several days since and humored +myself with ambitious thoughts in the contemplation of your editorial +windows. I was tempted to rap at your door and request an audience but +modesty held me off. Once by appointment I passed an hour in your office +pleasantly and profitably and even so tardily do I acknowledge your +courtesy and good-nature. But a beggar must choose his streets carefully +and must not be seen too often in a neighborhood as the same door does not +always offer pie. So this time your brass knocker shows no finger-marks of +mine. + +You did not accept for publication the last paper I sent to you. (You +spread an infinite deal of sorrow in your path.) On its return I re-read +it and now confess to concurrence with your judgment. Something had gone +wrong. It was not as intended. Unlike Cleopatra, age had withered it. Was +I not like a cook whose dinner has been sent back untasted? The best +available ingredients were put into that confection and if it did not +issue from the oven with those savory whiffs that compel appetite, my +stove is at fault. Perhaps some good old literary housewife will tell me, +disconsolate among my pots and pans, how long an idea must be boiled to be +tender and how best to garnish a thought to an editor's taste? And yet, +sir, your manners are excellent. It was Petruchio who cried: + + What's this? Mutton?-- + 'Tis burnt; and so is all the meat. + Where is the rascal cook? + +Manners have improved. In pleasant contrast is your courteous note, +signifying the excellence of my proffered pastry, your delight that you +are allowed to sniff and your regret for lack of appetite and abdominal +capacity. Nevertheless, the food came back and I poked at the broken +pieces mournfully. It is a witch's business presiding at the caldron of +these things and there is no magic pottage above my fire. + +And yet, kind sir, with your permission I shall continue in my ways and +offer to you from time to time such messes as I have, hoping that some day +your taste will deteriorate to my level or that I shall myself learn the +witchcraft and enter your regard. + +Up to this present time only a few of my papers have been asked to stay. +The rest have gone the downward tread of your stair carpet and have passed +into the night. My desk has become a kind of mausoleum of such as have +come home to die, and when I raise its lid a silence falls on me as on one +who visits sacred places. + +There is, however, another side of this. Certain it is that thousands of +us who write seek your recognition and regard. Certain it is that your +favorable judgment moves us to elation, and your silence to our merits +urges us to harder endeavors. But for all this, dear sir, and despite your +continued neglect, we are a tolerably happy crew. It may be that our best +things were never published--best, because we enjoyed them most, because +they recall the happiest hours and the finest moods. They bring most +freshly to our memories the influences of books and friends and the +circumstances under which they were written. It is because we lacked the +skill to tame our sensations to our uses, the patience to do well what we +wished to do fast, that you rightly judged them unavailable. We do not +feel rebellious and we admit that you are right. Only we do not care as +much as we did, for most of us are learning to write for the love of the +writing and without an eye on the medal. With no livelihood depending, +with no compulsion of hours or subject, under the free anonymity of sure +rejection, we have worked. It has been a fine world, these hours of study +and reflection, and when we assert that one essay is our best, we are +right, for it has led us to happiness and pleasant thoughts and to an +interpretation of ourselves and the world that moves about us. In these +best moods of ours, we live and think beyond our normal powers and even +come to a distant kinship with men far greater than ourselves. Knowing +this, prudence only keeps us from snapping our fingers at you and marking +each paper, as we finish it, "rejected," without the formality of a trip +to you, and then happily beginning the next. We are learning to be +amateurs and although our names shall never be shouted from the housetops, +we shall be almost as content. Still will there be the morning hours of +study with sunlight across the floor, the winding country roads of autumn +with smells of corn-stacks and burdened vineyards, the fire-lit hours of +evening. Still shall we write in our gardens of a summer afternoon or +change the winter snowstorm that drives against our windows into the +coinage of our thoughts. + +[Illustration] + +We shall be independent and think and write as we please. And although we +enclose stamps for a mournful recessional, please know, dear sir, that +even as you dictate your polite note of refusal, we are hard at it with +another paper. + +[Illustration] + + + + +THE CHILLY PRESENCE OF HARD-HEADED PERSONS + + + + +THE CHILLY PRESENCE OF HARD-HEADED PERSONS + + +It is rash business scuttling your own ship. Now as I am in a way a +practical person, which is, I take it, a diminutive state of +hard-headedness, any detraction against hard-headedness must appear as +leveled against myself. Gimlet in hand, deep down amidships, it would look +as if I were squatted and set on my own destruction. + +But by hard-headed persons I mean those beyond the ordinary, those so far +gone that a pin-prick through the skull would yield not so much as a drop +of ooze; persons whose brain convolutions did they appear in fright at the +aperture on the insertion of the pin--like a head at a window when there +is a fire on the street--would betray themselves as but a kind of cordage. +Such hard-headedness, you will admit, is of a tougher substance than that +which may beset any of us on an occasion at the price of meat, or on the +recurrent obligations of the too-constant moon. + +I am reasonably free from colds. I do not fret myself into a congestion if +a breath comes at me from an open window; or if a swirl of wind puts its +cold fingers down my neck do I lift my collar. Yet the presence of a +thoroughly hard-headed person provokes a sneeze. There is a chilly vapor +off him--a swampish miasma--that puts me in a snuffling state, beyond +poultice and mustard footbaths. No matter how I huddle to the fire, my +thoughts will congeal and my purpose cramp and stiffen. My conceit too +will be but a shriveled bladder. + +Several years ago I knew a man of extreme hard-headedness. As I recall, I +was afflicted at the time--indeed, the malady co-existed with his +acquaintance--with a sorry catarrh of the nasal passages. I can remember +still the clearings and snufflings that obtruded in my conversation. For +two winters my complaint was beyond the cunning of the doctors. Despite +local applications and such pills as they thought fit to administer, still +did the snuffling continue. Then on a sudden my friend left town. +Consequent to which and to the amazement of the profession, the springs of +my disease dried up. As this happened at the beginning of the warm days of +summer, I am loath to lay my cure entirely to his withdrawal, yet there +was a nice jointry of time. My acquaintance thereafter dropped to an +infrequent, statistical letter, against which I have in time proofed +myself. But the catarrh has ceased except when some faint thought echoes +from the past, at which again, as in the older days, I am forced to blow a +passage in the channel for verbal navigation. + +This man's interest in life was oil. It oozed from the ventages of his +talk. If he looked on the map of this fair world, with its mountains like +caterpillars dozing on the page--for so do maps present themselves to my +fancy--_he_ would see merely the blueprint and huge specification of oil +production and consumption. The dotted cities would suggest no more than +agencies in its distribution, and they would be pegged in many colors--as +is the custom of our business efficiency--by way of base symbolism of +their rank and pretense; the wide oceans themselves would be merely +courses for his tank ships to bustle on and leave a greasy trail. Really, +contrary to my own experience and sudden cure, one might think that such +an oleaginous stream of talk, if directed in atomizer fashion against the +nostrils of the listener, would serve as a healing emulsion for the +complaint I then suffered with. + +Be these things as they may, what I can actually vouch for is that when +this fellow had set himself and opened a volley of facts on me, I was +shamed to silence. There was a spaciousness, a planetary sweep and +glittering breadth that shriveled me. The commodity which I dispensed was +but used around the corner, with a key turned upon it at the shadowy end +of day against its intrusion on the night. But his oil, all day long and +all night too, was swishing in its tanks on the course to Zanzibar. And +all the fretted activity of the earth was tributary to his purpose. How +like an untrimmed smoky night-candle did my ambition burn! If I chanced to +think in thousands it was a strain upon me. My cerebrum must have throbbed +itself to pieces upon the addition of another cypher. But he marshaled his +legions and led them up and down, until it dazed me. I was no better than +some cobbler with a fiddle, crooked and intent to the twanging of his E +string, while the great Napoleon thundered by. + +The secret channels of the earth and the fullness thereof made a joyful +gurgle in his thoughts. And if he ever wandered in the country and ever +saw a primrose on the river's brim--which I consider unlikely, his +attention being engaged at the moment on figuring the cost of oil barrels, +with special consideration for the price of bungs--if this man ever did +see a primrose, would it have been a yellow primrose to him and nothing +more? Bless your dear eyes, it would have been a compound of +by-products--parafine, wax-candles, cup-grease, lamp-black, beeswax and +peppermint drops--not to mention its proper distillation into such rare +odors as might be sold at so much a bottle to jobbers, and a set price at +retail, with best legal talent to avoid the Sherman Act. + +This man has lived--my spleen rises at the thought--in many of the +capitals of Europe. For six months at a time he has walked around one +end of the Louvre on his way home at night without once putting his +head inside. Indeed, it is probable he hasn't noticed the building, +or if he has, thinks it is an arsenal. Now in all humility, and +unbuttoned, as it were, for a spanking by whomsoever shall wish to give +it, I must confess that I myself have no great love for the Louvre, +regarding it somewhat as an endurance test for tired tourists, a kind +of blow-in-the-nozzle-and-watch-the-dial-mount-up contrivance, as at a +country fair. And so I am not sure but that the band playing in the +gardens is a better amusement for a bright afternoon, and that a +nursemaid in uniform with her children--bare-legged tots with fingers +in the sand--that such sight is more worthy of respect than a dead +Duchess painted on the wall. It is but a ritualistic obeisance I have paid +the gods inside. My finer reverence has been for benches in the sun and +the vagabondage of a bus-top. + +If ever my friend gets to heaven it will be but another point for +exportation. How closely he will listen for any squeaking of the Pearly +Gates, with a nostrum ready for their dry complaint! When he is once +through and safe (the other pilgrims still coming up the hill--for heaven, +I'm sure, will be set on some wind-swept ridge, with purple distance in +the valleys--) how he will put his ear against the hinge for nice +diagnosis as to the weight of oil that will give best result! How he will +wink upon the gateman that he write his order large! + +Reader, I have sent you off upon a wrong direction. I have twisted the +wooden finger at the crossroads. The man of oil does not exist. He is a +piece of fiction with which to point a moral. Pig-iron or cotton-cloth +would have served as well; anything, in fact, whereon, by too close +squinting, one may blunt his sight. + +We have all observed a growing tendency in many persons to put, as it +were, electric lights in all the corners and attics of their brains, until +it is too much a rarity to find any one who will admit a twilight in his +whole establishment. This is carrying mental housekeeping too far. I will +confess that I prefer a light at the foot of the back stairs, where the +steps are narrow at the turn, for Annie is precious to us. I will confess, +also, that it is well to have a switch in the kitchen to throw light in +the basement, on the chance that the wood-box may get empty before the +evening has spent itself. There is comfort, too, in not being forced to go +darkling to bed, like Childe Roland to the tower, but to put out the light +from the floor above. But we are carrying this business too far in mental +concerns. Here is properly a place for a rare twilight. It is not well +that a man should always flare himself like a lighted ballroom. + +Much of our best mental stuff--if you exclude the harsher grindings of our +business hours--fades in too coarse a light. 'Tis a brocade that for best +preservation must not be hung always in the sun. There must be regions in +you unguessed at--cornered and shadowed places--recesses to be shown at +peep of finger width, yielding only to the knock of fancy, dim +sequesterings tucked obscurely from the noises of the world, where one +must be taken by the hand and led--dusky closets beyond the common use. It +is in such places--your finger on your lips and your feet a-tiptoe on the +stairs--that you will hide away from baser uses the stowage of moonlight +stuff and such other gaseous and delightful foolery as may lie in your +inheritance. + +[Illustration] + + + + +HOOPSKIRTS & OTHER LIVELY MATTER + + + + +[Illustration] + +HOOPSKIRTS & OTHER LIVELY MATTER + + +Several months ago I had occasion to go through a deserted "mansion." It +was a gaunt building with long windows and it sat in a great yard. Over +the windows were painted scrolls, like eyebrows lifted in astonishment. +Whatever was the cause of this, it has long since departed, for it is +thirty years since the building was tenanted. It would seem as if it fell +asleep--for so the blinds and the drawn curtains attest--before the lines +of this first astonishment were off its face. I am told that the faces of +men dead in battle show in similar fashion the marks of conflict. But +there is a shocked expression on the face of this house as if a scandal +were on the street. It is crying, as it were, "Fie, shame!" upon its +neighbors. + +Inside there are old carpets and curtains which spit dust at you if you +touch them. (Is there not some fabulous animal which does the same, +thereby to escape in the mirk it has itself created?) Most of the +furniture has been removed, but here and there bulky pieces remain, an +antique sideboard, maybe too large to be taken away; like Robinson +Crusoe's boat, too heavy to be launched. In each room is a chandelier for +gas, resplendent as though Louis XV had come again to life, with tinkling +glass pendants and globules interlinked, like enormous Kohinoors. + +Down in the kitchen--which is below stairs as in an old English +comedy--you can see the place where the range stood. And there are smoky +streaks upon the walls that may have come from the coals of ancient +feasts. If you sniff, and put your fancy in it--it is an unsavory +thought--it is likely even that you can get the stale smell from such +hospitable preparation. + +From the first floor to the second is a flaring staircase with a landing +where opulence can get its breath. And then there is a choice of upward +steps, either to the right or left as your wish shall direct. And on each +side is a balustrade unbroken by posts from top to bottom. Now the first +excitement of my own life was on such a rail, which seemed a funicular +made for my special benefit. The seats of all my early breeches, I have +been told, were worn shiny thereon, like a rubbed apple. These descents +were executed slowly at the turn, but gathered wild speed on the +straight-away. There was slight need for Annie to dust the "balusters." + +An old house is strong in its class distinctions. There is a front part +and a back part. To know the front part is to know it in its spacious and +generous moods. But somewhere you will find a door and there will be three +steps behind it, and poof!--you will be prying into the darker life of the +place. In this particular house of which I write, it was as if the back +rooms, the back halls and the innumerable closets had been playing at hide +and seek and had not been told when the game was over, and so still kept +to their hiding places. It is in such obscure closets that a family +skeleton, if it be kept at all, might be kept most safely. There would be +slight hazard of its discovery if the skeleton restrained itself from +clanking, as is the whim of skeletons. + +It was in the back part of this house that I came on a closet, where, +after all these years, women's garments were still hanging. A lighted +match--for I am no burglar with a bull's-eye as you might +suspect--displayed to me an array of petticoats--the flounced kind that +gladdened the eye of woman in those remote days--also certain gauzy +matters which the writers of the eighteenth century called by the name of +smocks. Besides these, there were suspended from hooks those sartorial +deceits, those lying mounds of fashion, that false incrustation on the +surface of nature, known as "bustles." Also, there was a hoopskirt curled +upon the floor, and an open barrel with a stowage of books--a novel or two +of E. P. Roe, the poems of John Saxe, a table copy of Whittier in padded +leather, an album with a flourish on the cover--these at the top of the +heap. + +I choose to trace the connection between the styles of dress and books, +and--where my knowledge serves--to show the effect of political change on +both. For it is written that when Constantinople fell in the fifteenth +century Turkish costumes became the fashion through western Europe--maybe +a flash of eastern color across the shoulders or an oriental buckle for +the shoes. Similarly the Balkan War gave us hints for dress. Many styles +to-day are marks of our kinship with the East. These are mere broken +promptings for your own elaboration. And it seems to sort with this theory +of close relation, that the generation which flared and flounced its +person until nature was no more than a kernel in the midst, which puffed +itself like a muffin with but a finger-point of dough within, should be +the generation that particularly delighted in romantic literature, in +which likewise nature is so prudently wrapped that scarce an ankle can +show itself. It would be a nice inquiry whether the hoopskirt was not +introduced--it was midway in the eighteenth century, I think--at the time +of the first budding of romantic sentiment. The "Man of Feeling" came +after and Anne Radcliffe's novels. Is it not significant also, in these +present days of Russian novels and naked realism, that costume should +advance sympathetically to the edge of modesty? + +[Illustration] + +There is something, however, to be said in favor of romantic books, +despite the horrible examples at the top of this barrel. Perhaps our own +literature shivers in too thin a shift. For once upon a time somewhere +between the age of bustles and ourselves there were writers who ended +their stories "and they were married and lived happily ever after." +Whereas at this present day stories are begun "They were married and +straightway things began to go to the devil." And for my own part I have +read enough of family quarrels. I am tired of the tune upon the triangle +and I am ready for softer flutings. When I visit my neighbors, I want them +to make a decent pretense. It was Charles Lamb who found his married +friends too loving in his presence, but let us not go to extremes! And so, +after I have read a few books of marital complication, I yearn for the +old-fashioned couple in the older books who went hand in hand to old age. +At this minute there is a black book that looks down upon me like a crow. +It is "Crime and Punishment." I read it once when I was ill, and I nearly +died of it. I confess that after a very little acquaintance with such +books I am tempted to sequester them on a top shelf somewhere, beyond +reach of tiptoe, where they may brood upon their banishment and rail +against the world. + +Encyclopedias and the tonnage of learning properly take their places on +the lowest shelves, for their lump and mass make a fitting foundation. I +must say, however, that the habit of the dictionary of secreting itself in +the darkest corner of the lowest shelf contributes to general illiteracy. +I have known families wrangle for ten minutes on the meaning of a word +rather than lift this laggard from its depths. Be that as it may, the +novels and poetry should be on the fifth shelf from the bottom, just off +the end of the nose, so to speak. + +Now, the vinegar cruet is never the largest vessel in the house. So by +strict analogy, sour books--the kind that bite the temper and snarl upon +your better moods--should be in a small minority. Do not mistake me! I +shall find a place, maybe, for a volume or two of Nietzsche, and all of +Ibsen surely. I would admit _uplift_ too, for my taste is catholic. And +there will be other books of a kind that never rouse a chuckle in you. For +these are necessary if for no more than as alarm clocks to awake us from +our dreaming self-content. But in the main I would not have books too +insistent upon the wrongs of the world and the impossibility of remedy. + +I confess to a liking for tales of adventure, for wrecks in the South +Seas, for treasure islands, for pirates with red shirts. Mark you, how a +red shirt lights up a dull page! It is like a scarlet leaf on a gray +November day. Also I have a weakness for the bang of pistols, round oaths +and other desperate rascality. In such stories there is no small mincing. +A villain proclaims himself on his first appearance--unless John Silver be +an exception--and retains his villainy until the rope tightens about his +neck in the last chapter but one; the very last being set aside for the +softer commerce of the hero and heroine. + +You will remember that about twenty years ago a fine crop of such stories +came out of the Balkans. At that time it was a dim, unknown land, a kind +of novelists' Coast of Bohemia, an appropriate setting for distressed +princesses. I'll hazard a guess that there was not a peak in all that +district on which there was not some Black Rudolph's castle, not a road +that did not clack romantically with horses' hoofs on bold adventure. But +the wars have changed all this by bringing too sharp a light upon the dim +scenery of this pageantry, and swash-bucklery is all but dead. + +To confess the truth, it is in such stories that I like horses best. In +real life I really do not like them at all. I am rather afraid of them as +of strange organisms that I can neither start with ease nor stop with +safety. It is not that I never rode or drove a horse. I have achieved +both. But I don't urge him to deviltry. Instead I humor his whims. Some +horses even I might be fond of. Give me a horse that nears the age of +slippered pantaloon and is, moreover, phlegmatic in his tastes, and then, +as the stories say "with tightened girth and feet well home"--but enough! +I must not be led into boasting. + +But in these older stories I love a horse. With what fire do his hoofs +ring out in the flight of elopement! "Pursuit's at the turn. Speed my +brave Dobbin!" And when the Prince has kissed the Princess' hand, you know +that the story is nearly over and that they will live happily ever after. +Of course there is always someone to suggest that Cinderella was never +happy after she left her ashes and pumpkins and went to live in the +palace. But this is idle gossip. Even if there were "occasional +bickerings" between her and the Prince, this is as Lamb says it should be +among "near relations." + +I nearly died of "Crime and Punishment." These Russian novelists have too +distressful a point of view. They remind me too painfully of the poem-- + + It was dreadful dark + In that doleful ark + When the elephants went to bed. + +Doubtless if the lights burn high in you, it is well to read such gloom as +is theirs. Perhaps they depict life. These things may be true and if so, +we ought to know them. At the best, theirs is a real attempt "to cleanse +the foul body of the infected world." But if there be a blast without and +driving rain, must we be always running to the door to get it in our face? +Will not one glance in the evening be enough? Shall we be always exposing +ourselves "to feel what wretches feel"? It is true that we are too content +under the suffering of others, but it is true, also, that too few of us +were born under a laughing star. Gray shadows fall too often on our minds. +A sunny road is the best to travel by. Furthermore--and here is a deep +platitude--there is many a man who sobs upon a doleful book, who to the +end of time will blithely underpay his factory girls. His grief upon the +book is diffuse. It ranges across the mountains of the world, but misses +the nicer point of his own conduct. Is this not sentimentally like the +gray yarn hysteria under the spell of which wealthy women clicked their +needles in public places for the soldiers? Let me not underrate the number +of garments that they made--surely a single machine might produce as many +within a week. But there is danger that their work was only a sentimental +expression of their world-grief. I'll sink to depths of practicality and +claim that a pittance from their allowances would have bought more and +better garments in the market. + +Perhaps we read too many tragical books. In the decalogue the inheritance +of evil is too strongly visited on the children to the third and fourth +generation, and there is scant sanction as to the inheritance of goodness. +It is the sins of the fathers that live in the children. It is the evil +that men do that lives after them, while the good, alas, is oft interred +with their bones. If a doleful book stirs you up to life, for God's sake +read it! If it wraps you all about as in a winding sheet for death, you +had best have none of it. + +[Illustration] + +I had now burned several matches--and my fingers too--in the inspection of +the closet where the women's garments hung. And it came on me as I poked +the books within the barrel and saw what silly books were there, that +perhaps I have overstated my position. It would be a lighter doom, I +thought, to be rived and shriveled by the lightning flash of a modern +book, even "Crime and Punishment," than stultified by such as were within. + +Then, like the lady of the poem + + Having sat me down upon a mound + To think on life, + I concluded that my views were sound + And got me up and turned me round, + And went me home again. + + + + +ON TRAVELING + + + + +[Illustration] + +ON TRAVELING + + +In old literature life was compared to a journey, and wise men rejoiced to +question old men because, like travelers, they knew the sloughs and +roughnesses of the long road. Men arose with the sun, and toddled forth as +children on the day's journey of their lives, and became strong to endure +the heaviness of noonday. They strived forward during the hours of early +afternoon while their sun's ambition was hot, and then as the heat cooled +they reached the crest of the last hill, and their road dipped gently to +the valley where all roads end. And on into the quiet evening, until, at +last, they lie down in that shadowed valley, and await the long night. + +This figure has lost its meaning, for we now travel by rail, and life is +expressed in terms of the railway time-table. As has been said, we leave +and arrive at places, but we no longer travel. Consequently we cannot +understand the hubbub that Marco Polo must have caused among his townsmen +when he swaggered in. He and his crew were bronzed by the sun, were +dressed as Tartars, and could speak their native Italian with difficulty. +To convince the Venetians of their identity, Marco gave a magnificent +entertainment, at which he and his officers received, clad in oriental +dress of red satin. Three times during the banquet they changed their +dress, distributing the discarded garments among their guests. At last, +the rough Tartar clothing worn on their travels was displayed and then +ripped open. Within was a profusion of jewels of the Orient, the gifts of +Kublai Khan of Cathay. The proof was regarded as perfect, and from that +time Marco was acknowledged by his countrymen, and loaded with +distinction. When Drake returned from the Straits of Magellan and, +powdered and beflunkied, told his lies at fashionable London dinners, no +doubt he was believed. And his crew, let loose on the beer-shops, gathered +each his circle of listeners, drank at his admirers' expense, and yarned +far into the night. It was worth one's while to be a traveler in those +times. + +But traveling has fallen to the yellow leaf. The greatest traveler is now +the brakeman. Next is he who sells colored cotton. A poor third pursues +health and flees from restlessness. Wise men have ceased to question +travelers, except to inquire of the arrival of trains and of the comfort +of hotels. + +To-day I am a thousand miles from home. From my window the world stretches +massive, homewards. Even though I stood on the most distant range of +mountains and looked west, still I would look on a world that contained no +suggestion of home; and if I leaped to that horizon and the next, the +result would be the same--so insignificant would be the relative distance +accomplished. And here I am set down with no knowledge of how I came. +There was a continuous jar and the noise of motion. We passed a barn or +two, I believe, and on one hillside animals were frightened from their +grazing as we passed. There were the cluttered streets of several cities +and villages. There was a prodigious number of telegraph poles going in +the opposite direction, hell-bent as fast as we, which poles considerately +went at half speed through towns, for fear of hitting children. The United +States was once an immense country, and extended quite to the sunset. For +convenience we have reduced its size, and made it but a map of its former +self. Any section of this map can be unrolled and inspected in a day's +time. + +In the books for children is the story of the seven-league +boots--wonderful boots, worth a cobbler's fortune. If a prince is escaping +from an ogre, if he is eloping with a princess, if he has an engagement at +the realm's frontier and the wires are down, he straps these boots to his +feet and strides the mountains and spans the valleys. For with the +clicking of the silver buckles he has destroyed the dimensions of space. +Length, breadth and depth are measured for him but in wishes. One wish and +perhaps a snap of the fingers, or an invocation to the devil of +locomotion, and he stands on a mountain-top, the next range of hills blue +in the distance; another wish and another snap and he has leaped the +valley. Wonderful boots, these! Worth a king's ransom. And this prince, +too, as he travels thus dizzily may remember one or two barns, animals +frightened from their grazing, and the cluttered streets nested in the +valley. When he reaches his journey's end he will be just as wise and just +as ignorant as we who now travel by rail in magic, seven-league fashion. +For here I am set down, and all save the last half-mile of my path is lost +in the curve of the mountains. From my window I see the green-covered +mountains, so different from city streets with their horizon of buildings. + +I fancy that, on the memorable morning when Aladdin's Palace was set down +in Africa after its magic night's ride from the Chinese capital, a +housemaid must have gone to the window, thrown back the hangings and +looked out, astounded, on the barren mountains, when she expected to see +only the courtyard of the palace and its swarm of Chinese life. She then +recalled that the building rocked gently in the night, and that she heard +a whirling sound as of wind. These were the only evidences of the +devil-guided flight. Now she looked on a new world, and the familiar +pagodas lay far to the east within the eye of the rising sun. + +There are summer evenings in my recollection when I have traveled the +skies, landing from the sky's blue sea upon the cloud continent, and +traversing its mountain ranges, its inland lakes, harbors and valleys. +Over the wind-swept ridges I have gone, watching the world-change, seeing + + the hungry ocean gain + Advantage on the Kingdom of the shore, + And the firm soil win of the watery main, + Increasing store with loss and loss with store. + +The greatest traveler that I know is a little man, slightly bent, who +walks with a stick in his garden or sits passive in his library. Other +friends have boasted of travels in the Orient, of mornings spent on the +Athenian Acropolis, of visiting the Theatre of Dionysius, and of hallooing +to the empty seats that re-echoed. They warn me of this and that hotel, +and advise me concerning the journey from London. The usual tale of +travelers is that Athens is a ruin. I have heard it rumored, for instance, +that the Parthenon marbles are in London, and that the Parthenon itself +has suffered from the "wreckful siege of battering days"; that the walls +to Piraeus contain hardly one stone left upon another. + +And this sets me to thinking, for my friend denies all this with such an +air of sincerity that I am almost inclined to believe his word against all +the others. The Athens he pictures is not ruinous. The Parthenon stands +before him as it left the hand of Phidias. The walls to Piraeus stand high +as on that morning, now almost forgotten, when Athens awaited the Spartan +attack. For him the Dionysian Theatre does not echo to tourists' shouts, +but gives forth the sounds of many-voiced Greek life. He knows, too, the +people of Athens. He walked one day with Socrates along the banks of the +Ilissus, and afterwards visited him in his prison when about to drink the +hemlock. It is of the grandeur of Athens and her sons that he speaks, not +of her ruins. The best of his travels is that he buys no tickets of Cook, +nor, indeed, of any one, and when he has seen the cities' sights, his wife +enters and says, "Isn't it time for the bookworm to eat?" So he has his +American supper in the next room overlooking Attica, so to speak. + +[Illustration] + + + + +THROUGH THE SCUTTLE WITH THE TINMAN + + + +[Illustration] + +THROUGH THE SCUTTLE WITH THE TINMAN + + +Yesterday I was on the roof with the tinman. He did not resemble the +tinman of the "Wizard of Oz" or the flaming tinman of "Lavengro," for he +wore a derby hat, had a shiny seat, and smoked a ragged cigar. It was a +flue he was fixing, a thing of metal for the gastronomic whiffs journeying +from the kitchen to the upper airs. There was a vent through the roof with +a cone on top to shed the rain. I watched him from the level cover of a +second-story porch as he scrambled up the shingles. I admire men who can +climb high places and stand upright and unmoved at the gutter's edge. But +their bravado forces on me unpleasantly how closely I am tied because of +dizziness to Mother Earth's apron strings. These fellows who perch on +scaffolds and flaunt themselves on steeple tops are frontiersmen. They +stand as the outposts of this flying globe. Often when I observe a workman +descend from his eagle's nest in the open steel frame of a lofty building, +I look into his face for some trace of exaltation, some message from his +wider horizon. You may remember how they gazed into Alcestis' face when +she returned from the House of Hades, that they might find there a token +of her shadowed journey. It is lucky that I am no taller than six feet; if +ten, giddiness would set in and reversion to type on all fours. An +undizzied man is to me as much of a marvel as one who in his heart of +hearts is not afraid of a horse. + +Maybe after all, it is just because I am so cowardly and dizzy that I have +a liking for high places and especially for roofs. Although here my people +have lived for thousands of years on the very rim of things, with the +unimagined miles above them and the glitter of Orion on their windows, so +little have I learned of these verities that I am frightened on my shed +top and the grasses below make me crouch in terror. And yet to my fearful +perceptions there may be pleasures that cannot exist for the accustomed +and jaded senses of the tinman. Could he feel stimulus in Hugo's +description of Paris from the towers of Notre Dame? He is too much the +gargoyle himself for the delights of dizziness. + +Quite a little could be said about the creative power of gooseflesh. If +Shakespeare had been a tinman he could not have felt the giddy height and +grandeur of the Dover Cliffs; Ibsen could not have wrought the climbing of +the steeple into the crisis and calamity of "The Master Builder"; +Teufelsdroeckh could not have uttered his extraordinary night thoughts +above the town of Weissnichtwo; "Prometheus Bound" would have been +impossible. Only one with at least a dram of dizziness could have +conceived an "eagle-baffling mountain, black, wintry, dead, unmeasured." +In the days when we read Jules Verne, was not our chief pleasure found in +his marvelous way of suspending us with swimming senses over some fearful +abyss; wet and slippery crags maybe, and void and blackness before us and +below; and then just to give full measure of fright, a sound of running +water in the depths. Doesn't it raise the hair? Could a tinman have +written it? + +But even so, I would like to feel at home on my own roof and have a +slippered familiarity with my slates and spouts. A chimney-sweep in the +old days doubtless had an ugly occupation, and the fear of a sooty death +must have been recurrent to him. But what a sable triumph was his when he +had cleared his awful tunnel and had emerged into daylight, blooming, as +Lamb would say, in his first tender nigritude! "I seem to remember," he +continues, "that a bad sweep was once left in a stack with his brush to +indicate which way the wind blew." After observing the tinman for a while, +I put on rubber shoes and slunk up to the ridgepole, the very watershed of +my sixty-foot kingdom, my legs slanting into the infinities of the North +and South. It sounds unexciting when written, but there I was, astride my +house, up among the vents and exhausts of my former cloistered life, my +head outspinning the weathercock. My Matterhorn had been climbed, "the +pikes of darkness named and stormed." Next winter when I sit below snug by +the fire and hear the wind funneling down the chimney, will not my peace +be deeper because I have known the heights where the tempest blows, and +the rain goes pattering, and the whirling tin cones go mad? + +Right now, if I dared, I would climb to the roof again, and I would sit +with my feet over the edge and crane forward and do crazy things just +because I could. Then maybe my neighbors would mistake the point of my +philosophy and lock me up; would sympathize with my fancies as did Sir +Toby and Maria with Malvolio. If one is to escape bread and water in the +basement, one's opinions on such slight things as garters and roofs must +be kept dark. Be a freethinker, if you will, on the devil, the deep sea, +and the sunrise, but repress yourself in the trifles. + +I like flat roofs. There is in my town a public library on the top story +of a tall building, and on my way home at night I often stop to read a bit +before its windows. When my eyes leave my book and wander to the view of +the roofs, I fancy that the giant hands of a phrenologist are feeling the +buildings which are the bumps of the city. And listening, I seem to hear +his dictum "Vanity"; for below is the market of fashion. The world has +sunk to ankle height. I sit on the shoulders of the world, above the +tar-and-gravel scum of the city. And at my back are the books--the past, +all that has been, the manners of dress and thought--they too peeping +aslant through these windows. Soon it will be dark and this day also will +be done and burn its ceremonial candles; and the roar from the pavement +will be the roar of yesterday. + +Astronomy would have come much later if it had not been for the flat roofs +of the Orient and its glistening nights. In the cloudy North, where the +roofs were thatched or peaked, the philosophers slept indoors tucked to +the chin. But where the nights were hot, men, banished from sleep, watched +the rising of the stars that they might point the hours. They studied the +recurrence of the star patterns until they knew when to look for their +reappearance. It was under a cloudless, breathless sky that the +constellations were named and their measures and orbits allotted. On the +flat roof of some Babylonian temple of Bel came into life astrology, +"foolish daughter of a wise mother," that was to bind the eyes of the +world for nearly two thousand years, the most enduring and the strongest +of superstitions. It was on these roofs, too, that the planets were first +maligned as wanderers, celestial tramps; and this gossip continued until +recent years when at last it appeared that they are bodies of regular and +irreproachable habits, eccentric in appearance only, doing a cosmic beat +with a time-clock at each end, which they have never failed to punch at +the proper moment. + +Somewhere, if I could but find it, must exist a diary of one of these +ancient astronomers--and from it I quote in anticipation. "Early this +night to my roof," it runs, "the heavens being bare of clouds (_coelo +aperto_). Set myself to measure the elevation of Sagittarius Alpha with my +new astrolabe sent me by my friend and master, Hafiz, from out Arabia. Did +this night compute the equation a=(Dx/2T)f(a, b c T_3). Thus did I prove +the variations of the ellipse and show Hassan Sabah to be the mule he is. +Then rested, pacing my roof even to the rising of the morning star, which +burned red above the Sultan's turret. To bed, satisfied with this night." + +Northern literature has never taken the roof seriously. There have been +many books written from the viewpoint of windows. The study window is +usual. Then there is the college window and the Thrums window. Also there +is a window viewpoint as yet scarcely expressed; that of the boy of +Stevenson's poems with his nose flattened against the glass--convalescence +looking for sailormen with one leg. What is "Un Philosophe sous les Toits" +but a garret and its prospect? But does Souvestre ever go up on the roof? +He contents himself with opening his casement and feeding crumbs to the +birds. Not once does he climb out and scramble around the mansard. On +wintry nights neither his legs nor thoughts join the windy devils that +play tempest overhead. Then again, from Westminster bridges, from country +lanes, from crowded streets, from ships at sea, and mountain tops have +sonnets been thrown to the moon; not once from the roof. + +Is not this neglect of the roof the chief reason why we Northerners fear +the night? When darkness is concerned, the cowardice of our poetry is +notorious. It skulks, so to speak, when beyond the glare of the street +lights. I propound it as a question for scholars. + + 'Tis now the very witching time of night, + When churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out + Contagion to this world. + +Why is the night conceived as the time for the bogey to be abroad?--an + + ... evil thing that walks by night, + In fog or fire, by lake or moorish fen, + Blue meager hag, or stubborn unlaid ghost + That breaks his magic chains at curfew time. + +Why does not this slender, cerulean dame keep normal hours and get sleepy +after dinner with the rest of us--and so to bed? Such a baneful thing is +night, "hideous," reeking with cold shivers and gloom, from which morning +alone gives relief. + + Pack, clouds, away! and welcome, day! + With night we banish sorrow. + +Day is jocund that stands on the misty mountain tops. + +But we cannot expect the night to be friendly and wag its tail when we +slam against it our doors and, until lately, our windows. Naturally it +takes to ghoulishness. It was in the South where the roofs are flat and +men sleep as friends with the night that it was written, "The heavens +declare the glory of God: and the firmament showeth his handiwork." + +I get full of my subject as I write and a kind of rage comes over me as I +think of the wrongs the roof has suffered. It is the only part of the +house that has not kept pace with the times. To say that you have a good +roof is taken as meaning that your roof is tight, that it keeps out the +water, that it excels in those qualities in which it excelled equally +three thousand years ago. What you ought to mean is that you have a roof +that is flat and has things on it that make it livable, where you can +walk, disport yourself, or sleep; a house-top view of your neighbors' +affairs; an airy pleasance with a full sweep of stars; a place to listen +of nights to the drone of the city; a place of observation, and if you are +so inclined, of meditation. + +Everything but the roof has been improved. The basement has been coddled +with electric lights until a coal hole is no longer an abode of mystery. +Even the garret, that used to be but a dusty suburb of the house and +lumber room for early Victorian furniture, has been plastered and strewn +with servants' bedrooms. + +There _was_ a garret once: somewhat misty now after these twenty years. It +was not daubed to respectability with paint, nor was it furnished forth as +bedrooms; but it was rough-timbered, and resounded with drops when the +dark clouds passed above. On bright days a cheerful light lay along the +floor and dust motes danced in its luminous shaft. And always there was +cobwebbed stillness. But on dark days, when the roof pattered and the +branches of trees scratched the shingles and when windows rattled, a +deeper obscurity crept out of the corners. Yet was there little fear in +the place. This was the front garret where the theatre was, with the +practicable curtain. But when the darker mood was on us, there was the +back garret. It was six steps lower and over it the roof crouched as if to +hide its secrets. The very men that built it must have been lowering, +bearded fellows; for they put into it many corners and niches and black +holes. The wood, too, from which it was fashioned must have been gnarled +and knotted and the nails rusty and crooked. One window cast a narrow +light down the middle of this room, but at both sides was immeasurable +night. When you had stooped in from the sunlight and had accustomed your +eyes to the dimness, you found yourself in an uncertain anchorage of old +furniture, abandoned but offering dusty covert for boys with the light of +brigands in their eyes. A pirates' den lay safe behind the chimney, +protected by a bristling thicket of chairs and table legs, to be +approached only on hands and knees after divers rappings. And back there +in the dark were strange boxes--strange boxes, stout and securely nailed. +But the garret has gone. + +Whither have the pirates fled? Maybe some rumor of the great change +reached them in their fastnesses; and then in the light of early dawn, in +single file they climbed the ladder, up through the scuttle. And +straddling the ridgepole with daggers between their teeth, alas, they +became dizzy and toppled down the steep shingles to the gutter, to be +whirled away in the torrent of an April shower. Ah me! Had only the roof +been flat! Then it would have been for them a reservation where they might +have lived on and waited for the sound of children's feet to come again. +Then when those feet had come and the old life had returned, then from +aloft you would hear the old cry of Ship-ahoy, and you would know that at +last your house had again slipped its moorings and was off to Madagascar +or the Straits. + + Where shall we adventure, to-day that we're afloat, + Wary of the weather and steering by a star? + Shall it be to Africa, asteering of the boat, + To Providence, or Babylon, or off to Malabar? + +So a roof must be more than a cover. The roof of a boat, its deck, is +arranged for occupation and is its best part. Consider the omnibus! Even +it has seats on top, the best seats in fine weather. When Martin +Chuzzlewit went up to London it was on the _top_ of the coach he sat. +Pickwick betook himself, gaiters, small-clothes, and all, to the roof. +Even the immaculate Rollo scorned the inside seats. He sat on top, you may +remember, and sucked oranges to ward off malaria, he and that prince of +roisterers, Uncle George. De Quincey is the authority on mail coaches and +for the roof seats he is all fire and enthusiasm. It happened once, to +continue with De Quincey, that a state coach was presented by His Majesty +George the Third of England, as a gift to the Chinese Emperor. This kind +of vehicle being unknown in Peking, "it became necessary to call a cabinet +council on the grand state question, 'Where was the Emperor to sit?' The +hammer cloth happened to be unusually gorgeous; and partly on that +consideration, but partly also because the box offered the most elevated +seat, was nearest the moon, and undeniably went foremost, it was resolved +by acclamation that the box was the Imperial throne, and for the scoundrel +who drove, he could sit where he could find a perch." + +Consider that the summer day has ended and that you are tired with its +rush and heat. Up you must climb to your house-roof. On the rim of the sky +is the blurred light from the steel furnaces at the city's edge and, +paneling this, stands a line of poplars stirring and sounding in the night +wind. + + Alone upon the house-top to the North + I turn and watch the lightnings in the sky. + +Is it fanciful to think that into the mind comes a little of the beauty of +the older world when roofs were flat and men meditated under the stars and +saw visions in the night? + +Once upon a time I crossed the city of Nuremberg after dark; the market +cleared of all traces of its morning sale, the "Schoener Brunnen" at its +edge, the narrow defile leading to the citadel, the climb at the top. And +then I came to an open parade above the town--"except the Schlosskirche +Weathercock no biped stands so high." The night had swept away all details +of buildings. Nuremberg lay below like a dark etching, the centuries +folded and creased in its obscurities. Then from some gaunt tower came a +peal of bells, the hour maybe, and then an answering peal. "Thus stands +the night," they said; "thus stand the stars." I was in the presence of +Time and its black wings were brushing past me. What star was in the +ascendant, I knew not. And yet in me I felt a throb that came by blind, +circuitous ways from some far-off Chaldean temple, seven-storied in the +night. In me was the blood of the star-gazer, my emotions recalling the +rejected beliefs, the signs and wonders of the heavens. The waves of old +thought had but lately receded from the world; and I, but a chink and +hollow on the beach, had caught my drop of the ebbing ocean. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JOURNEYS TO BAGDAD*** + + +******* This file should be named 20095.txt or 20095.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/0/0/9/20095 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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